Alric, or the person pretending to be him, jumped when Leaf showed herself. He tried to get past me, but I wasn’t going to let that happen. I grabbed his arm as he tried to get by and pushed it high up against his back. A few things popped in it. I leaned in close. “I don’t know who you are, what in the hell you were doing in our rooms, nor why you look like Alric. But I will break your arm in three places in two seconds if you don’t drop the glamour right now.”
Leaf stayed where she was but she kept her eyes narrowed and still had that low growl going on.
Recently I’d started seeing through glamours. Yet this one had worked on me. Maybe it was because of the trip back in time, but I didn’t like knowing that the ability to see through them wasn’t as consistent as we thought. Since none of us knew why it had started, there was no way to know what might change it. The glare I gave the person before me went up a few notches.
I knew a glamour was simply surface, there were no real changes to the person. But I almost dropped the man’s arm as the skin rolled under my hand. The handsome face before me changed and went longer—like as in a syclarion snout longer. He also went a bit taller, but shorter than most syclarions.
I really hated syclarions and this one was not changing my feelings about them. “Where the hell is Alric?” I asked and pushed his arm higher. It wasn’t easy when he was Alric’s height—a few more inches made it even less so. I managed to keep it up there.
“I don’t know. Stop it! I don’t!” He twisted as I pushed his arm higher. “Please. I was told to come here and get you to come with me. Your husband was gone, but then I was attacked in your rooms. I saw you come in here so I tried again.”
We’d been behind the rack for too long, eventually someone was going to come around the corner. I needed to get him out of sight.
“You will change back into Alric and we are going to walk back to our rooms. Smile and nod at people, but say nothing.”
He had been looking concerned but now looked confident again.
“And if you do anything to annoy me, or endanger anyone, I will have Leaf give you the bite of death. It’s a slow and painful way to die.”
Leaf played it up and leaned forward and bared her teeth. The syclarion almost broke his neck pulling back, but nodded and changed into Alric.
Well, sort of Alric. I might have scared him too much as his attention to detail from before was seriously lacking. This Alric was pale, awkward, and had stooped shoulders. Anyone who knew him wouldn’t be fooled for a moment. Luckily, I was really the only one who knew him in this time.
I lowered his arm but hung on to it tightly. We almost made it to the stairs when I heard someone calling my name. Nasif. I nudged the fake Alric to move faster, but Nasif was fast when he was determined.
“Taryn! And…Alric?” His greeting ended in a glare as he got close enough to really see the person next to me.
Okay, so this copy was now so bad you didn’t have to know Alric well, just have seen him once or twice.
“Nasif, we have a situation, and I need to get him back to our rooms. Immediately. And he might not want to go.”
Nasif nodded for a bit. I was afraid he was going to start drawing calculations in the air. The fake Alric was getting twitchy and I didn’t know if I could hang onto him if he made a run for it.
Finally Nasif grabbed the fake Alric’s other arm and turned to face the people below us who were now starting to look up. “I believe you are correct, he doesn’t look well at all. Come along, let’s get you back to your chambers.”
Nasif wasn’t much taller than me, but he was wider than any elf I’d met and the bull-dogged way he strong-armed the fake Alric up the stairs told me I was probably right about his mixed elf/dwarf heritage.
We got up to the suites and Nasif nodded to the main door. “Siabiane would have keyed this to you both. Place your hand on that part next to the handle.”
I did and the door popped open. The same worked for the door to our suite.
“But then how did this one get in? Leaf and Crusty said he broke into our rooms after Alric had gone.”
“Wouldn’t be the glamour spell,” Nasif said as he shoved our prisoner into a chair. “You had a door breaker spell too, didn’t you?” He sniffed the fake Alric carefully. “And it wasn’t yours. Neither was the glamour you had. This one wouldn’t fool anyone.”
“Show him what you really look like,” I said.
The syclarion dropped his sad excuse for a glamour and Nasif jumped back.
“A syclarion? But you are friends of the elves, why would you spy on one of our guests?”
I refrained from saying what I thought of that friendship but did set Leaf on the arm of the chair. She must have been taking lessons from Garbage, her scowl was almost as fierce. The growling was all her though. Until she did it earlier, I’d never heard any faery growl. Maybe they’d spent too much time with their kitties.
“Where is the real Alric?”
“I don’t know…I was hired to do this. Well, convinced to do this, as I don’t think there will be any payment really. And I don’t believe in their cause.” He turned to Nasif. “We are friends, our peoples, right? Why would we need to change that? What happened long ago shouldn’t matter now.”
I looked over his head to Nasif. He wasn’t making a lot of sense but what he said didn’t sound good. A cause? I hadn’t known that the syclarions and the elves were friends. But that they were not going to be possibly in the future couldn’t be a good thing. No elf had mentioned the syclarions as an instrument of their downfall. It was the Dark, the threat from within the fabric of the elven empire, that almost destroyed them.
Nasif kept watching him, but worry was slowly growing on his face.
“Leaf, is he telling the truth?” I asked.
She was already right next to him but she moved closer and touched his arm. That was new.
She sat back on the arm of the chair after a few moments. “Yes. Is ungood, but bigger bads around.”
The syclarion was ungood, not bad. I knew the faeries didn’t communicate as clearly as would be helpful, but there was usually a reason for the distinction. Most likely, the one before us wasn’t evil, but his friends were. Great.
“What happened long ago?” Even if he wasn’t out to destroy the world, I knew for a fact many of his people were—definitely in my time, and possibly in this one as well.
“Our people were destroyed by the Ancients. They say the elves and other races stood by and let it happen.” He shrugged. “It’s an old story, one not believed by most of my people.”
“The Ancients are gone, wiped out completely by someone. But your people remain. How can you say they were destroyed if the other side is gone?” A thought hit me. “Were your people the reason the Ancients were lost?” I’d never heard anything even close to that until now, but of course the Ancients were all destroyed and most of this area was a wasteland. There weren’t a lot of people in the area at the time. There would have been no one to tell the truth.
A chill went down my spine.
“The myth says the Ancients ruined our people in the final battle. And that they destroyed themselves as well. Our people used to be far stronger and bigger. They caused a sickness to weaken us. We lost most of our race.” He held up a hand. “But even if true, there is no reason to blame the elves. You’re our friends.”
This was all new theory to me, and all I had was a confused and scared syclarion—interesting, I’d never seen either reaction in any syclarions I’d met. Nor had I heard of this myth and I knew if there was even a whisper of it in our time, Covey would have been aware of it. As thought provoking as this was, I needed to find out his plan, and if it involved Alric. I wasn’t beyond thinking that Alric and Siabiane might have gone somewhere and they didn’t want to disturb me. I would hold that thought close until it was ripped from me.
“Who has Alric?” I’d have to hope once we found Alric we could get more information out of our friend here.
<
br /> “I don’t know. They told me he was gone, and for me to get you outside. That was all.”
“Who is behind this?” Nasif had been silent, but now broke in. He was almost such a clownish character that to see him serious was like seeing a totally new person. “There is someone, here in the palace, who put you up to this. Who is it?”
The syclarion looked to me but I folded my arms.
“I don’t know.”
I waved for Leaf to go touch him again, and he fluttered his hands at her. “I can’t tell. They will kill me.”
Nasif leaned close into the syclarion’s face. “We will kill you if you don’t. That faery looks sweet, but could kill you in such a way you’d take days dying. Tell us who was behind this.”
The syclarion looked ready to cry—again another first in my interaction with this race.
“The ambassador,” he said it so low that I could barely hear him. Nasif had far sharper hearing though.
“Ghilonious? My friend? I have breakfast with him twice a week. He doesn’t have any hidden agenda against elves. Who are you really working for?”
The syclarion started shaking. “I tell the truth. I live on a farm five days ride from here. I was told to come here and wait until needed.” He looked panicked now, like he couldn’t get his words out in time to stop us from hurting him. “They didn’t plan on this, what I did today, but I was waiting for them to call me to infiltrate something, not sure what. Yesterday there was a lot of concern, and I got called in, and spelled, you’re right they weren’t my spells, to come get the lady when she was alone. They weren’t going to hurt you, just talk to you.”
I’m sure my face went pale. The syclarions in my time were hunting for me, at least the ones working with the Mayor of Kenithworth. But how could ones a thousand years in the past know of me?
22
“I need to speak to Ghilonious,” Nasif said as he jumped to his feet. “This has to be a mistake."
“And if it isn’t? Do you think he’s going to come out and say it? Alric and I are trusting you because Siabiane and Lorcan both trust you—and we trust them. You can’t risk it.”
Nasif stopped at the door, but then shook his head. “I’m not going to ask him anything about this, but I need to see him. I will not give anything away.”
He was almost out the door, but turned back. “You, what is your name?”
“Dueble.”
“Excellent, Dueble. You will stay here and obey Lady Taryn in anything she says until I come back, is that understood?” The flighty elf-breed of before was replaced with a shorter and rounder Lorcan in terms of personality.
Dueble nodded slowly. If he hadn’t been a syclarion, I’d feel sorry for him. He really did appear to have fallen in with people way over his level.
Nasif shut the door and Dueble and I stared at each other for a few minutes.
“Are you…crying?” I asked. He had his face partially turned away from me, but there looked to be a wetness on his cheek.
“No,” he said with a quavering voice. He also wiped at his face quickly. “Maybe. I was trying to make a name, and maybe some money. There’s a girl back on the farm next to ours. But she says I’m not ambitious enough.” He looked down at himself. “And I’m too small. I can’t do anything about my size, but I thought I could change my fortunes. I wouldn’t have wanted anyone to hurt you though.”
“I’m glad to hear that.” Alric’s voice was a welcome sound, but he always disturbed me when he snuck in like that. “I would have hated to explain to Siabiane why there was blood in her lovely suite.”
I turned and wasn’t too surprised by what I saw. Alric stood next to the wall, his sword out, and Garbage was on his shoulder…in war feathers.
Leaf immediately flew to Garbage. Crusty must have had some special sense. She’d been asleep inside my tunic this entire time but kicked her way out and joined her friends.
“Who we war with?” Leaf asked with a little too much enthusiasm.
“Him, you watching him.”
Leaf turned and looked at Dueble then lifted her shoulders in a shrug. “He ungood, but not bad. Scared.” To demonstrate, she made a fierce face and lunged back at Dueble.
Even though she was five feet away from him he flinched enough to rock back the chair he was sitting in.
Alric put away his sword. “So where did he come from then?”
“He was pretending to be you, we had a discussion, and Nasif and I brought him here.”
Leaf puffed out her chest. “And me!”
“Yes, and Leaf. He also broke into our rooms after you left. You could have left a note, you know.”
Alric had been moving closer to Dueble, but more out of curiosity than anger. That changed when I told him what Dueble had been doing.
“I did leave a note. Siabiane wanted to show me some…things. You were exhausted so I left the note.” He looked down at Dueble. “Hand it over.”
“I…okay.” Dueble reached into his tunic pocket and handed it to Alric. Who handed it to me.
“Going with Siabiane, back soon. Taking Garbage with me.” I read aloud. “That wouldn’t have helped much even if your copy hadn’t picked it up.”
I wanted to know what Alric and Siabiane had gone to go see. But Dueble already knew about the faeries, he didn’t need to learn any more secrets.
A light knocking came from the front door. I got to my feet and motioned for Alric to stay. “You keep an eye on him.”
I opened the door and found Siabiane and a fuming Nasif. His heavy brows were so drawn in on themselves I could barely see his eyes.
“I believe there is a confused syclarion here?” Siabiane walked into the room. Nasif stalked behind her.
“Lady Siabiane! I have…I mean I didn’t…I don’t know what I was doing!” Dueble completely broke into tears, gasping and sobbing like a four-year-old who lost their stuffed dragon. “Don’t do anything to me.”
Had he seen the look on Nasif’s face, Dueble might have realized there was a larger threat close by. I wasn’t sure what kind of magic user Nasif was, but I knew Siabiane was insanely powerful. She wasn’t the one looking like he was going to explode.
“Now, Dueble, is it? Yes, I have heard about you. Our problem is that there is something going on and some high-ranking syclarions are missing. The ambassador’s entire entourage for one thing.”
Dueble’s eyes went huge, which for a syclarion wasn’t easy. They had long narrow eyes that weren’t prone to roundness. He managed though. Then he threw himself on the carpet and started sobbing harder and rolling on the ground.
Seriously, this was the most un-syclarion syclarion I had even seen. Siabiane was trying to talk to him, Alric was making sure he didn’t try to roll away, and Nasif looked ready to chew a hole through someone.
I called the faeries over. “Can you go snap him out of this? The way you did me?”
Had Dueble seen the grins on their faces he would have snapped out of it himself.
They swarmed over to him, Leaf on the right cheek, Garbage on the left, and Crusty on his snout. I was going to call Crusty off, but they moved too fast. A few strikes later and he’d stopped wailing and fought to sit up on the carpet.
“Girls, he’s done.” I had to call them back, they were having a bit too much fun. They reluctantly flew back to me. Garbage peeled her war feathers off her overalls and shoved them in her tiny bag.
“I don’t know anything.” He sat there sniffling and looking at the carpet. “The ambassador and his people are part of the warrior caste and they do what they want.”
The faeries had gone back to the mantle, but Garbage got to her feet. “I’ll talk him.”
I wasn’t sure if she was going to make him talk, or talk at him until he surrendered in terror. But Siabiane stopped her.
“Thank you, my dear. But I think Dueble, Nasif, and I need to have a private talk.” She got to her feet and Nasif came forward to help Dueble to his. “We’ll be in my suites.” She gave A
lric a small nod, and they left the room.
I waited until the door shut before finding out what was going on.
“Okay, now what was so important that you took off on me like that?” I didn’t add that after last night I had hoped some of his sneaking about would stop.
Alric’s sword had vanished again. At least both of the swords were behaving better in this time than they had been back in Null. Mine had popped back up in the closet with all of the clothing and it was still there when I got dressed.
He ran his fingers through his hair, and flopped down on a sofa. “She showed me Padraig. He collapsed a few weeks ago and Lorcan and Siabiane were able to create an enclosed protection spell. Otherwise the spell that hit him would have destroyed him. They have no idea what caused it or where it came from. Which was pretty much what we knew in my time.”
I knew seeing his friend like that must have torn him up. In our timeline, Padraig was brought out of his sleep right when Alric was a young boy, but seeing his best friend like that must have been horrifying.
He closed his eyes. “It’s so hard knowing what they will be facing. And that we can’t warn them even if we get stuck here.”
“We stop it.” Garbage and the girls had been sitting on the mantle swinging their legs. They were bored since their toy Dueble had been taken away.
Which might have been one of the reasons he was taken away.
The idea of the girls trying to stop what was happening was almost as scary as what was about to happen. “No, I think they don’t need us, or you, stopping things. Besides, Queen Mungoosey wasn’t happy about your interference in Beccia, what would she think of this?
Garbage stuck out her lower lip and sat back down. “You right. She not like.” Her face perked up. “We go drink.”
All three flew into the bedroom without waiting for us to say anything.
“I don’t know what we can do. If we get trapped here, we’ll need to stay out of the way. Live far away from everyone. If we survive.”
He was echoing some of my darker thoughts from this morning, but it seemed worse coming from him. Or maybe just worse being said out loud.
The Golden Basilisk (The Lost Ancients Book 5) Page 16