The Tempest Sea
Page 1
The Tempest Sea
Robin D. Mahle
Copyright © 2018 by Robin D. Mahle
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
“Not all who wander are lost”
— J.R.R. Tokien
Contents
Map of the Ceithren Empire
Prologue
The Protector
Chapter One
The Protector
Chapter Two
The Protector
Chapter Three
The Protector
Chapter Four
The Protector
Chapter Five
The Protector
Chapter Six
The Protector
Chapter Seven
The Protector
Chapter Eight
The Protector
Chapter Nine
The Protector
Chapter Ten
The Protector
Chapter Eleven
The Protector
Chapter Twelve
The Protector
Chapter Thirteen
The Protector
Chapter Fourteen
The Protector
Chapter Fifteen
The Protector
Chapter Sixteen
The Protector
Chapter Seventeen
The Princess
Chapter Eighteen
The Princess
Chapter Nineteen
The Princess
Chapter Twenty
The Princess
Chapter Twenty-One
The Princess
Chapter Twenty-Two
The Princess
Chapter Twenty-Three
The Princess
Chapter Twenty-Four
The Princess
Chapter Twenty-Five
The Princess
Chapter Twenty-Six
The Princess
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The Princess
Chapter Twenty-Eight
The Princess
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The Princess
Chapter Thirty
The Princess
Chapter Thirty-One
The Princess
Chapter Thirty-Two
The Princess
Chapter Thirty-Three
The Princess
Chapter Thirty-Four
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Robin D. Mahle
Prologue
Today was Gunther’s birthday. Not the one the general had given him to commemorate his adoption all those years ago, but his actual birthday. The one he never wanted to think about again.
Gunther had believed with every fiber of his being that no birthday could match the horror of his seventh, the last one he had been forced to celebrate. Here he was, though, pulling a dying girl off a raging, chaotic battlefield. One brother was missing, and the other was being hauled away by Director Kensington’s men, mere moments after the Director had inexplicably stepped in to save Clark’s life.
Kensington had stabbed Jayce through the abdomen, while Clark had gotten him in the shoulder. Then, before Gunther could even yell out a warning, a Red Son had knocked Clark out from behind. Everything had gone wrong so quickly.
Where was Xavier? He should have been fighting at Clark’s side. Addie was also gone. The crypt door was gaping open. The clearly-empty structure was once again guarded by two towering statues, the one on the left having resumed its position after leaving the machine monster in a pile of irreparable rubble.
Gunther finally got Nell to a sheltered spot behind a grouping of trees, and he pulled his shirt off from under his suspenders. Xavier wore them for fashion, but Gunther actually needed them to keep his pants securely on his lean frame. He ripped the shirt in half at the seam, placing half underneath Nell and half on top. Gunther lacked Xav’s medical training, but he knew enough from textbooks and experience to put pressure on the wound.
Nell’s eyelids fluttered. Her hand limply moved toward her pocket. She was mouthing something, but Gunther couldn’t discern the words. Between her weakness and the dim lighting, reading her lips was impossible.
He dug in her pocket, apologizing for the invasion, and found a metal tube. It looked like a tube of toothpaste, but somehow Gunther doubted that was its purpose. Nell gestured wanly between her wound and the tube before passing out completely.
Gunther furrowed his brow. He held up the metal tube, inspecting it. It had seemed as though she wanted him to apply whatever was inside to the wound.
It wasn’t like Nell had anything to lose at this point. His leather-gloved hand unscrewed the cap and squeezed until a translucent, pearly substance breached the mouth of the tube. He peeled his bloodied shirt off her wound, then tore away hers so that the gaping hole was fully exposed.
Gunther’s stomach twisted in knots at the slashed muscle, the blood filling a cavity that pierced Nell’s body all the way through. Hoping he was doing the right thing, he held the tube over the wound and squeezed.
The outside of her wound began to knit itself together. He couldn’t see what was going on inside, but the repairs to her skin were remarkable.
Gunther stared, wide-eyed, tentatively touching the place where the sword had impaled her. The skin was smooth under the smearing of blood.
What the hell? He held up the tube, mesmerized for a moment before realizing her back was still in need of repair.
He hated to move her, not knowing if the medicine had penetrated deep enough, if it had healed her insides. Wincing, he turned her over and repeated the process, watching again in awe as the wound closed itself. He tried to rouse her, and when that didn’t work, he turned to her teleportation bracelet. There was no way he could carry her to safety. Nell was easily as tall as Gunther and built like a warrior. Gunther hadn’t done much physical training since his father had no longer been around to make him. Just getting the girl this far had been a challenge.
He searched the immediate area for assistance, staying low to the ground and peeking between gaps in the leaves. The field had almost entirely cleared except for a few men in white masks with black, reptilian slits for eyes. Jayce lay bleeding in the grassy field. Gunther shrank away, not wanting to catch their attention. He watched as Jayce held out his arm expectantly, and the masked men shook their heads and continued walking. Jayce’s pitiful pleading echoed through the woods, but the men hurried off, leaving him there alone.
By necessity, Gunther had been an exceptional judge of character throughout his life. Jayce’s whiny, underachieving façade had fooled even him. The man had tried to murder his brother, and Gunther should be happy he was dying. He couldn’t bring himself to feel those emotions, though.
Gunther shuddered at the memory of Jayce’s wounds. He couldn’t see them from here, but he had seen the gaping hole in his shoulder and knew Jayce would likely die without interference. There would be a certain amount of justice in that. After all, Jayce had tried to kill Gunther’s brother.
He might deserve to die, but do I want to be the one to leave him to it?
A rustling of leaves brought Gunther out of his thoughts. He snapped his head around to look at Nell, who, though still unconscious, stirred just slightly with a pained look upon her face.
Xavier’s coldly practical voice resounded in his head. Move on, Gunther. There’s nothing you can do for Jayce, even if he did deserve help. And you must get the girl to safety.
&n
bsp; But Gunther was not Xavier. He looked between the spot where Nell still lay unconscious and Jayce’s prone form on the battlefield, deliberating.
He had been a fool to think he could leave the birthdays of blood and scars behind.
The Protector
Xavier’s brothers didn’t remember their first lives, the ones before the general had adopted them. Clark had been so young, and Gunther so traumatized. Xavier remembered everything.
He remembered the smell of the village baker cooking bread in a hole in the ground in the middle of the square. He heard the song his little sister, Mara, would sing, when she rocked their baby brother’s crib, and the way their other sister had laughed when he snuck her an extra helping of sweet bread.
He could still see his mother coming in with a great haul from a long day of hunting and hear the sound of his father chopping firewood to help build the neighbor’s house.
But most of all, every night in his dreams, he smelled the fire that took it all away from him. He relived the moment he realized everyone he loved was gone, and there was nothing he could do to save them.
Chapter One
CLARK
If the armed guards rushing toward me didn’t manage to kill me, the piercing siren directly over my head might have just finished the job. My eardrums were splitting, and my head was pounding. Not for the first time, I found myself wishing Locke and I had stopped long enough to pilfer a couple Red Son uniforms. Their helmets provided protection against the sound.
Then again, if we had stopped for anything, I would have wanted it to be the vault with the data port for the Levelian cylinder in my pocket. That was the only way I was ever likely to get answers about the explosion that had killed Addie’s family and destroyed my own.
There hadn’t been time for that, though. The blinking red light of the camera trained on our prison cells had gone off without warning. Locke and I had only seconds to act, using the key the Director had slipped us to make our escape. I still wasn’t sure why he had done that or if it was some kind of trap, but it was the only option we had.
Besides, breaking out of a makeshift prison in a building full of trained guards was hardly the craziest thing I had done in my life. Hell, it wasn’t even the craziest thing I had done that week.
To my left, Locke readied his stance. The Red Sons, Redshaw’s elite forces, faltered as they took in the identity of my companion. Director Kensington must have kept it under wraps that he had arrested their former leader. Locke took advantage of their hesitation to go on the offensive.
“Strike to wound,” he said to me.
I always did, but now wasn’t the time to roll my eyes at him. We had stolen swords from a couple of guards directly outside our cell. They had been easy, unsuspecting prey. Though the ones before us now were more prepared for a fight, I counted only five of them, a mix of Red Sons and Peace Keepers. The latter were the less trained but more numerous forces of Redshaw. There should have been more of them. That was one more thing for which I could likely thank the Director.
Being grateful to that man for anything was enough to make my vision go red.
Locke took the initiative. He lunged quickly at one of the Red Sons and thrust his blade directly at his opponent’s shoulder. The man instinctively raised his own blade to block, but Locke showed off his legendary reflexes, changing the direction of his blade with lightning speed and slashing into the man’s leg. The Red Son yelped in pain and fell to the ground.
Not one to be outdone, I rushed toward my own opponent. The other Red Son was distracted by his fallen comrade long enough for me to land a kick to his chest that sent him sprawling into the men behind him. They all stumbled backward.
Faster than I could blink, Locke incapacitated the two Peace Keepers closest to him, and I took out the third with a solid blow to the head with the butt of my hilt.
We made our way up another flight of stairs to the main floor. I was lagging due to the lack of food and the residual effects of my concussion. Locke outpaced me and flung open the stairwell door. There were no men in the lobby, but there was a small group at the door.
They spotted us as soon as we emerged from the hallway. Locke stopped to let me catch up, which wasn’t humiliating at all. I tried to pant as quietly as possible and prepare myself to fight, but my efforts proved to be unnecessary. There was a flash of light and a bang, and the men were thrown apart, clearing the doorway for us. A smile spread across my face, and I dredged up the energy to run the rest of the way out of the building. We burst into the street at a full sprint, and I quickly scanned the area.
There’s only one person I know with tech like that.
Sure enough, the afternoon sun glinted off my brother’s fiery hair and the lenses to his goggles, directing me to him like a beacon. He was standing at the corner of the building with a relieved grin.
His gloved hands made the signal for me to follow him, and he took off around the corner. The guards behind us were getting back on their feet. I tapped Locke on the shoulder.
“This way,” I said as I took off at a dead sprint.
Locke followed me as I pushed my body hard in a mad dash to round the corner before the guards could decipher which way we’d gone. As soon as we turned into the alley, Gunther sprang into action, not even blinking at the extra man. Father had taught us to roll with the punches, to explain oddities when there was time. My brother rushed to the back door of the adjacent building. I followed with Locke on my heels. Gunther then led us down a hallway and pulled me into a service lift. Locke jumped in after us, pulling the doors closed behind him while my brother cranked the lever up a couple of floors. He looked questioningly at the third man in the lift with us.
“Jeremiah Locke,” I explained.
“Locke?” he asked. “Addie’s bodyguard?”
I nodded.
“How?” I started to ask about Gunther’s coincidental presence at the time of our escape, but he shook his head.
“Not yet,” he said in his softly-accented voice.
I took advantage of the brief ride to catch my breath, scowling at Locke’s amused expression. He wasn’t at all short of breath.
They probably fed him before I woke up, I told myself. And he didn’t get hurt, so… yeah… I’d definitely keep up with him under normal circumstances.
He looked perfectly composed, his white t-shirt standing in stark contrast to his ebony skin. He held his sword tip down, resting his hand against his black cargo pants. I had heard legends about this man and had once been forced to steal clothes from his unconscious form, something I may have thought twice about had I known his identity.
Then again, maybe not. I had needed them.
I studied him out of the corner of my eye.
Does he know I’m the one who stole his uniform?
Not likely. In light of the current circumstances, it didn’t seem prudent to bring it up.
The elevator stopped after only a moment. Gunther opened the doors and led us down a wallpapered hallway with green doors lining either side, distinguishable only by their ascending numbers. He stopped at number 437 and pulled out a ring with multiple keys. It looked like our safe house keyring, but I had never seen this flat before.
The door swung inward, revealing a small, tidy apartment. The furnishings were basic but new. The only thing that stood out was a table of equipment that was purely Gunther.
The back of the couch was to us, so I was pleasantly surprised to see Nell’s head pop up when Locke closed the door behind us. Her normally brown skin was so sallow, it nearly blended with the single silver streak in her hair, and there were deep purple bruises under her eyes. But somehow, she was alive.
“You’re back,” she said with relief. She eyed me somewhat suspiciously. Then her gaze drifted behind me, and her eyes widened. “Locke?”
“He was with Clark, helping him escape, it looked like,” Gunther said.
“I know he works for Redshaw,” I added, “but Addie trusted him.”
“We don’t know that,” I responded.
The look she gave me bordered on pity, but she let it go.
“We heard the Director comment on the ‘oldest Noble boy’ kidnapping his daughter, taking her to the Court of Yomi. I don’t know how he figured out who we were.” Gunther’s tone was neutral.
I examined Gunther’s face for a sign that he believed the report. Did I? My head pounded with the uncertainty.
He caught my eye. “Clark, despite his bear-like personality and penchant for keeping secrets, Xavier is a good man. He’s our brother. Whatever he did, he must have had a reason for it. Do you honestly believe he would let any harm come to Addie?”
I considered that for a moment. Xavier could be an arse, but he was all about protecting those weaker than he was. It didn’t jive that he would hurt an innocent girl.