I sighed, knowing from what mother tells me that time will slip by more swiftly as I get older. I could see that already. I involuntarily looked back to Misty again. I couldn't dissuade her on her fifteenth birthday last year from petitioning to become a squire. Though she was of the same opinion as me, that our baby shouldn't aspire to become a knight, Celeste vowed to me that if Misty was to be a squire, then she would take her on as she did me.
I inclined my head to the other knight with them as they passed by, saluting us, Lady Brenda. Bexington's wife, and mother of my god-babies. Their twins were little hellions who everyone at Templar Hall have adopted as their own. How were they five already? They were just in diapers and then I blinked and they are mischief makers in their first year of school.
They, unfortunately, have their father's intelligence and are always making gadgets and thingamadoodles that got them into trouble. Imagine the look on poor Bex's face when he was informed that he had to go to the classrooms in Wexbury Keep to retrieve his twins after they had stunned the class bully with a makeshift form of his shocking gauntlet.
What wonders they will create when they are grown if their father brought us airships, auto-wagons, and instant communication across the flash lines?
My guards got uneasy when Brenda passed right next to Goliath as we moved past, we exchanged fist bumps and greetings, “Wench,” “Runt.” Then she and Celeste tried to shove each other off their mounts.
I looked at the guards when the patrol had moved on. “Oh lighten up, would you? You all know Lady Brenda.”
They gave me stoic expressions in return.
Grr. I'm not made of spun sugar, and besides, if I were, who would dare mess with me with Celeste at my side? Anyone with any sense knew she was one of the most dangerous people in all the habitable lands.
A couple of minutes later we passed through the stone archway under the portcullis into the courtyard of Templar Hall which sat on top of the rise that overlooked the small ravine with the Hawktail River flowing at its base twenty feet below.
At the ravine, five huge paddle wheels turned steadily at the powerhouses, supplying electricity to Cedar Ridge and the Cheap Quarter and Trough of Wexbury Keep two miles west. Two had been added since the original three, and it seemed the more free power we generated, the more that was needed.
I slipped off of Goliath while he was slowly plodding along the cobblestones, and bounced lightly on my toes as he just plodded up to the waiting stable hands on his own where everyone else dismounted. I stepped back to the wagon pulling into the green space we had put in for visiting Mountain Gypsy dignitaries.
Misty jumped off the tiny porch at the back of the wagon without dropping the fold-down steps, Shan riding piggyback. Ingr landed beside them and took Misty's hand in the most natural motion that I doubt either realized they did or just how cute it was. The young lovers... well I hoped they weren't lovers yet, they were only sixteen, always put a smile on everyone's faces.
I said as I grabbed Misty's other hand pulling them along in a human chain, “Come along girls. We need to get the road dust off of us and maybe get in some sparring in the Keep before we see what your grandma Emily is scheming.”
It was hard to keep straight which of the girl's five grandmothers we spoke of, six for Misty including her living biological one, so we started adding their names to keep things straight.
Emily, the matron of the Library of the Techromancy Scrolls, lovingly referred to as the Queen of the Scrolls, like Rain, looked no more than a year or two older than me, when in reality she was closer to sixty. The more magic that flows through someone's veins, the longer their lives. Where it was uncommon for a nonmagic user to live to see sixty years, it was quite a common occurrence for those touched with the spark.
The retired Mother Udele of the Lupei is rumored to be over one hundred thirty, but the ancient woman coyly says that even she doesn't know the truth of it as time doesn't matter once you reach a certain age.
We hadn't even known that Emily was a magic-user... and not of our lands... until she revealed it in defense of Sparo during the Avalon War. That revelation rocked the foundation of Sparo. That the lands we had already discovered, and the frozen realm of Avalon were not the only pockets of life left on the planet after the Great Impact... and that Emily knew this.
How had she kept it from everyone for so long, and how had we not known she was not a noble, well a noble of Sparo at least? Everyone just assumed she belonged with her bearing and authority she just seemed to project. I think the fact that most of the men and even a few women of the Keep had crushes on the diminutive woman might have played into it in some way.
I love her like a sister who I now called mother since she married Prime Techromancer Donovan, Celeste's father. And I find it endlessly amusing that she is the only woman I know of who is shorter than me. I am five foot one, well almost, and Emily just tops out at five foot even.
She is also one of the rare blondes in the kingdom. There are only a handful of blondes in each village of the realms. I hear there are more in Highland than any other location. I myself personally only know a few. And her hair, in a braid, touches her ankles, that would mean that it would brush the ground like the train of some sort of golden cape if she were to take it out of the braid.
And she... is the reason for our early departure from my respite in the Great Mother's garden. Rain and Syl volunteered to retrieve us when they heard of Emily's plans as they Carnivaled at the gates of Wexbury Keep.
If it was what I believed it was, I was more than happy to cut short my vacation from the responsibilities piling up around me, threatening to drown me. I really hated politics.
The girls turned the tables on me and ran ahead, dragging me helplessly giggling behind them. Ok, they loved Emily as much as I did, who'd have thunk it? It may or may not be the tomes of fictional tales of romance that Emily smuggles out of the library to read with them whenever we were in town or whenever we had to leave the girls with my mother when we went to political events they could not attend.
They were all helpless romantics. Ok, I admit I may have read one or two of them as well.
That was neither here nor there, as we had to clean the road grime off of ourselves and get to the Keep. Hmm... perhaps we can make some time to visit the public bathhouse while we are there. A sponge bath just isn't the same.
My mind absently drifted to the fire-heated metal tubs in Journey's End in New Home. How decadent to bathe like that in your own residence? Perhaps I should look into building something similar in the Hall? I looked over at Celeste longingly and then harrumphed at her little smirk. I cross kicked her butt and then ran off squealing with her in hot pursuit.
Chapter 2 – Sparring
We made good time, and before long we were riding into Wexbury Keep. Sylvia's band of the Lupei family was at the outer gates of the secondary wall where they Carnivaled for the Keep. Dozens of colorful Mountain Gypsy wagons forming an arc around the outer portcullis of the secondary wall that was built to contain the swelling population like at Templar Hall.
People came from all the various realms for the Library, and for the latest innovations our dear Lord Bexington, our scatterbrained but brainy knight dreamed up next. Many people chose Wexbury as their home instead of just visiting because of all the new opportunities here. And no other realm except Solomon had adopted as many of the ways of the Mountain Gypsies as Wexbury. That is excepting, of course, New Home, which was founded by the lost band of Gypsies, the Cristea.
It was exciting to see the blending of cultures as they spread through the land. And the People were even adopting some of the traditions of the Altii and incorporating them in their own bands.
The one thing I hadn't expected but should have, is that some Altii petitioned to join the Gypsies, and we saw some Altii in the various bands as they Carnivaled in the other realms. That showed that the grand idea between King George and Ranelle when she was Great Mother,
was working and our cultures would be stronger because of it as something new arose from it.
I knew why we didn't see as many Mountain Gypsies petitioning to live in the villages of the realms, as they have done that already for centuries, the hidden fourteenth band.
These loners who traveled through the villages and keeps of the Altii, to learn about our culture and to discretely keep an eye on us were known as the Rovers.
In effect... spies.
My father, Nicholas was one such Rover but made the delightful mistake of falling in love with a woman of Wexbury and settled down. That woman was my mother. It is said that in her youth she was a beauty beyond compare, she is still quite stunning, and he was enamored upon his first glimpse of her. I wish I had known my father, but he had died when I was young. I can barely remember anything of him, and I still carry his tools with me everywhere I go, though I still do not know the uses of some of them.
The War Horns of the keep shook the grasslands, announcing an approaching Royal. Grr. As we passed behind some wagons, I hopped off of Goliath and handed the reins up to Misty, who switched horses in mid-stride, handing her own reins to one of my guards.
I smiled at Lakettya, who was preparing behind a curtain strung up between wagons for her next performance of her hundred veils of wisdom.
She beamed at me and bowed, I winked and grabbed a colorful cloak in the colors of the Lupei and spun it over my shoulders as I shrugged out of my Hunter Green riding cloak which had so many charms and spells of luck on it that it made me hard to focus on, and grabbed a Carnival mask to place over my face as I tossed my cloak to Mist who silently donned it as she rode without missing a beat. Celeste just chuckled at our machinations as she kept riding.
I called up to her in my raspy voice, “Oh hush you.” Then I pointed at my guards and warned, “Not a word.” They feigned shock then fell back farther than I knew they were comfortable with and I appreciated it.
I made my way through the wagons and Carnival, pacing the horses as everyone mobbed them, bowing and calling out to “Great Mother Laney,” or, “Highness!” as Misty passed. She kept her face in the shadows of my spelled cloak and it obscured her features.
Did I really look that silly up on Goliath? Such a diminutive woman on a mammoth mount? We wouldn't be able to pull off this deception much longer as she was already a few inches taller than me and my mother believes Misty will be around five foot ten when she stops growing.
I danced and twirled through the crowd, forming hoops in the air with the mists that were pouring off of me. I wasn't as accomplished as the crier was, as she could shape animals and the like with her magiks, but it was enough to entertain and keep people from looking too closely.
A small boy tugged on my cloak and I looked down at him, moving my mask aside enough for him to recognize the scars on my cheek pouring misty magics from them. His eyes widened as I put a finger to my lips and winked at him. His smile bloomed and he placed his own finger on his lips.
Then I danced off through the gates, hopping on the back of a supply wagon heading in-keep, likely to the warehouse district, as I bowed to the people around us and spun for the guards at the gate who narrowed their eyes, then looked between “Great Mother Laney” who already went through the gates on Goliath, then me. Their shit-eating grins told the story as I tipped an imaginary hat to them for humoring me.
Once we passed the stalled procession of royalty on the crossbar heading up to the heart of the Keep, I smiled to myself, hopped off the wagon, and almost skipped up to Lord's Way to turn east to the huge and imposing Castle Wexbury. I snickered to myself when I gave a flourishing bow to the carriage carrying Duke Fredrick and Duchess Lucia which went thundering past to go meet the Great Mother of Sparo.
It would take Fred about fifteen seconds to wonder why Laney's personal guard was trailing a Gypsy performer by a hundred yards and turn back around. Mother Luna, I was acting all tricksy like Ranelle had when she was the Great Mother. I was being a scamp. I had often wondered why she had been so aloof and mischievous at times. But living under a glass can get so taxing at times that you need an escape.
I had a new respect for Rain now, but I wasn't going to let her know, she'd just chuckle and smirk at me in a knowing way, and I wasn't about to give the woman the satisfaction.
Jezelle, the leader of the Great Mother's Own, tweeted out a birdcall to me. I turned back to see the bronze-skinned woman with her flowing black curly hair nudging her head back as the guards all trotted up to catch up with me.
I sighed and nodded when I saw the Duke's carriage speeding back my way. Fred was slipping, it had taken almost thirty seconds this time. People in the crowded streets parted for him, inclining heads or bowing. A few seconds later my guards parted enough for the carriage to loiter beside me.
I grinned but didn't look over as Fred said though the window from his seat, “Nice day for a walk.”
Nodding I assured him, “Quite.”
“The Great Mother shouldn't be so sparsely guarded.”
Looking back to where Misty was slowly making her way up the Crossbar with our contingent, I shrugged and rasped out innocently, “Oh I don't know, she looks to be ok from here. As I am just a simple Gypsy minstrel, I know not of these things.”
He snorted and Lucia called out, “You two are ridiculous. Get in the carriage Laney.”
I looked over and she shot her husband a patient look. “You're slipping, Fred. I tasted her magics when we passed. And this isn't exactly the first time she's pulled this.”
Then she chastised me as I went to lean in the window of the now stopped carriage, “You're just as bad as Rain was, Laney love. I swear you two run from your titles instead of embracing them.”
I nodded with a smirk as I dropped the mask from my face. “That's sort of the point, Lucy.” Then I added, “How have you been?”
She shrugged and deflated and her mothering look was replaced with a wry smile. “As good as can be expected, trying to keep up with the growth of the Keep. Did you get the dispatches yet? Fifty-three more people have petitioned to move to Wexbury this month.”
I whistled. When I was but a serf, tending my chickens in Cheap Quarter, I was amazed at the size of our home. It was mind-boggling that seven thousand souls lived within the walls of the Keep. Now there were over ten thousand with more people petitioning every day.
Sure the number was a pittance compared to the sprawling metropolises of Highland and Solomon keeps, but it now rivaled the biggest villages in the other realms now. Wexbury has always been small. The third-smallest realm in the Lower Ten, but we did possess the fourth largest defensive force. But now with the influx of people in the keep, Cedar Ridge, and surrounding villages, Wexbury was rapidly climbing the population ladder.
Fred, always so impatient, asked, “You're here for Emily's announcement this afternoon?”
I nodded and pointed out, “But we thought we'd spar a bit in the training courtyard and use the bathhouse before then. We've just got in from Father Stone.”
Lucy sighed. “By horse. Why when you can request an airship at any time?”
“The world is already moving too fast. Sometimes it is good to slow down and appreciate the world we live in. It lets me decompress a bit when I get the chance to get away from all this Co-Ruler nonsense.”
Fred smirked. “Heavy is the head that wears the crown?”
I shoved his shoulder back into the carriage. “Oh hush, old man. You've a taste for it, being ruler of Wexbury. And I know you escape from it all from time to time unless you're some sort of masochist.”
Lucia chuckled. “She has you there, dear. Now come Laney, we can get you to the courtyard and we can talk.”
I shook my head and winked at her as I put the mask back on, then teased as I skipped away, “But I am but a Gypsy minstrel, the Great Mother you seek is back there on her beautiful mount.”
Fred chuckled as Lucy sighed in resignation then said, �
��That girl is getting too big to pull this off for much longer. Pretty soon you'll have to face your adoring public yourself.”
“But today... is not that day!”
I spun loops of mist for passing people and had to move aside when a stylish auto-wagon turned onto Lord's Way from the mansions in Uptown. More and more of them were showing up every year. I feared the day that horses would be no longer needed. It may not happen in my lifetime, but the writing, as they say, was on the wall. And we had tomes in the libraries that showed it was but history repeating itself, as the Wizards of the Before had replaced their horses with horseless iron conveyances.
Sometimes I pondered if progress was actually... well, progress, or if we were losing something of ourselves, our culture when we embraced convenience over substance.
It must have looked silly, the Duke following a performer in the streets all the way up to the castle gates. The guards knew me instantly, as this was not the first time I had done something like this. They just chuckled at me as I just dropped the mask and shrugged out of the cloak while exhaling in relief and passing into the courtyard beyond. I squished my face up and pointed at them menacingly, my finger right below my nose.
Ok, so not so menacingly as the brats just bowed and made an ushering motion with their arms. I let them know, “Smiting list.” They didn't seem worried as they chuckled again.
Lucia and Fred got out to walk beside me to the training courtyard, the duchess insistent, “At least take a moment to visit before Lady Emily makes her grand announcement. I don't know why she insisted on having a flash unit brought into the Library for it.”
Duke Fredrick was obviously frustrated as he added, “It isn't like her to be so secretive.”
I stopped short and he and Lucia would have run into me if they hadn't been trailing to my left. I turned to the man and looked up into his face, a brow cocked in incredulity at what he had just said, Lucy snorted. I prompted, “The woman who used her magic of the mind to make people not ask questions about her or her standing in the court? The woman who has been in Wexbury for forty years, through two dukes, your father and you and nobody questioned it? The woman who is in two generations of paintings of the court in the Library Vault collections?”
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