“The next time I see it, you’ll be put on suspension. Is that understood?” Mark growled, and the Cavalry all agreed in unison.
“Great, so now we’re going to…” Silas stopped and touched his shoulder. He looked at his hand and saw green paint on his fingers.
“Were you just shot?” Kralen asked, looking around the trees.
Silas grinned and yelled, “Emily!”
The Cavalry began to scan the trees, and Emily moved back behind one of the larger branches.
Mark’s eyes narrowed as he scanned the trees, “Team 4, go.”
Six of the Cavalry took off toward where Silas’ back had been facing. They moved stealthily through the trees, trying to catch the Winchester scent or any sounds.
“Team 2, flank her,” Kralen whispered, and another six heku took off to the east.
Emily saw the first group pass under the tree she was in and keep going. She turned around again, holding her breath, and looked toward the Cavalry.
“I swear… I told her not to slip her guards,” Kralen growled.
“She hasn’t slipped them in a while, maybe she got perm… damnit!” Mark said, laughing when he saw the splotch of red paint on his shirt.
“Team 1… She’s mortal for hell’s sake! Go find her,” Silas said, shaking his head. He watched as Team 1 followed the line-of sight from Mark’s paint stain.
“I’m a little embarrassed, actually,” Mark said, frowning. “We should have known she was by us.”
“I know. I’m sure she’s playing a game, but we’re predators. She shouldn’t have gotten close enough… snow or no snow,” Kralen agreed. He gasped when he felt the sting of the paintball explode on his back.
Silas grinned and whispered, “All teams out. The team to bring her to us gets a week-long vacation.”
“That’ll do it,” Kralen chuckled.
“I could find her,” Silas said, scanning the trees.
“Yes, but they need the practice,” Mark told him. “How are we going to get her back for this?”
Team four returned to their leaders looking irritated.
“What?” Silas asked.
They turned around and all six had paint marks on their back, “I think we lost.”
Mark sighed, “She’s mortal!”
“I know, I know,” the team four leader said, and they all moved to stand before the officers.
Emily took aim at another group and set her gun to auto-fire. She held her finger down and pegged each of them as she grinned.
“Gotcha,” she heard from behind her, and turned just as someone grabbed her and jumped out of the tree. She was thrown over a heku’s shoulder and blurred through the trees.
“Put me down!” she said, laughing.
“Seems team seven gets a week off,” Kralen said, amused.
“Get her gun,” Mark ordered, and a heku took her gun, even though she tried to hold on.
“Kneel her,” Silas said, sounding angry.
Emily was dropped to the cold ground and forced onto her knees. She looked up at Mark and grinned.
“Did you slip your guards?” Kralen asked.
“No, I had the Council back them off. This is all legal.”
“Legal, yes, but fair?”
“All’s fair in love and war,” Emily said, looking up at them and smiling.
“Now what to do with you,” Mark chuckled, and walked around her.
“Hot cocoa sounds good. It’s freezing out here,” she suggested.
“Hot cocoa… no… We need something to prove a point.”
Her eyes grew wide, “Like what?”
“Interesting use of the Cavalry issued fatigues,” Silas said, looking down at her.
Emily started to get up, but was pushed back to her knees, “Hey.”
Mark grinned, “You’re our prisoner.”
“I am?” she asked, her eyes wide.
“You got caught so… yes,” Silas told her.
“You two go find her horse and take it into the stables,” Mark said, pointing to two of the Cavalry.
“Get my truck!” Emily yelled after them, and tried to stand up again, but was pushed back to her knees.
She saw a member of the Cavalry hand Mark a pair of handcuffs, and she tried to run, but didn’t even make it a step before they were placed on her wrists, restraining them at her back.
“Start walking…” Silas told her, and pointed toward the palace.
Emily walked with the entire Cavalry behind her. She kept wondering what they were going to do, and even grew more nervous when the gate guards chuckled as they passed. She stepped into the palace and was led up to the council chambers.
Derrick grinned and opened the door. Emily walked in after Mark, Silas, and Kralen.
“Got caught, did you?” Dustin asked, amused.
“I took out a fair share first… including these three,” she told him.
“She shot you?” Dustin asked Mark.
Mark nodded, “Yes, but it won’t happen again.”
“So what do you plan on doing to her?” Quinn asked, pretending to be mad.
“She’s our prisoner, but we haven’t yet decided,” Kralen told him.
“I could use a nice swim,” Emily told them. Using what the Encala taught her, she very quietly slipped her hands out of the handcuffs. The guards were standing a bit ahead of her, so they didn’t notice when she slipped them into her back pocket.
“Swimming?” Mark grinned. “That’s too…”
He grew quiet and looked at Silas and Kralen. Emily stood up straight and brushed off her pants.
“Why are you in camo?” Silas asked her.
Emily smiled, “I was just going to go out for training, remember?”
Mark was looking around the council chambers, “What’d you erase? I don’t remember coming in here.”
“Em…” Chevalier chuckled, and then shook his head.
She turned and started for the door, but Kralen took her arm, “What did you erase?”
“You really shouldn’t use your abilities on the Equites,” Dustin growled.
Emily ignored him and pulled her arm out of Kralen’s grasp, “It was nothing, really… I better go, my guards are waiting.”
She grinned and left the council chambers.
“What did she erase?” Mark asked the Elders.
“I don’t believe it requires Council attention,” Zohn said, grinning.
Emily quickly ran up to the eighth-floor, and headed into a storage room. The door was old and stiff, but she managed to get it open, and then shut the door behind her. Inside was a dark room, long abandoned, and full of old furniture covered with dust cloths and stacked high, almost to the ceiling. She sat down on a dusty couch and started to read the book she grabbed on the way up.
Silas frowned, “Was it something bad?”
“No,” Chevalier told him. “Though I would suggest you may want to keep her in sight until you remember.”
Mark nodded, “Go find her.”
Kralen and Silas disappeared from the room.
“Good luck,” Kyle chuckled.
“Perfect”
“Mark, one more thing,” Quinn said before he left.
“Yes, Elder?”
“Lately, she seems particularly upset with Frederick’s disappearance.”
“I’ve noticed… She’s been asking a lot of questions.”
“Like what?”
“Things about the banished. Is a heku aware when in ash form? How long before they naturally heal? That sort of thing.”
“So she thinks he’s been banished?” Zohn asked, frowning.
“I’m not sure, but I think so,” Mark told him.
“Her dreams have nothing about the Equites banishing him,” Chevalier said.
“Just keep an eye on her. She may try to protect us if she thinks we’ve banished him and run the risk of an Encala attack,” Quinn said.
Mark nodded, “Yes, Elder… though, we already are watching her closely.
We’re still waiting for her to seek revenge for Jaron.”
Chevalier nodded, “It’s coming.”
Kralen came back in with a confused look on his face, “We’re not catching a recent scent. It’s hours old.”
“She masked it,” Kyle told him, and went back to reading a ledger.
“What did she do?”
Dustin sighed, “She interrupted your guard training to play one of her games.”
Mark’s eyes narrowed and then he grinned, “I have paint on my shirt.”
“So do Silas and I,” Kralen told him.
“Damnit,” Mark chuckled, smiling. “She’s supposed to be our prisoner.”
“She is?” Kralen asked, eyes wide.
“Just go find her.”
He nodded and walked out of the council chambers.
“We need to find a way to avoid that,” Mark told the Council.
“Yes, we do,” the Chief Interrogator said.
The Council all grinned when they heard Silas and Kralen cursing as their memory came back. They called for the palace guards to help find her.
“You may go,” Chevalier told the General, and Mark disappeared from the room.
“I wonder if the Valle have Frederick,” the Chief of Defense said, mostly to himself.
“Why though? What could they gain?” Quinn asked.
“Causing tension between the Equites and the Encala,” Kyle suggested.
“It’s time, I think, to pay the Valle a visit,” Zohn said, and turned to Chevalier. “We could send our Interrogator and ask them outright if they have Frederick. Then we can address the tensions between Thukil and their Weber Coven.”
Chevalier nodded, “We’d risk being taken captive though.”
“So send Emily,” Quinn said, thinking. “They wouldn’t dare take us with her there, and it would give her something to do other than decide when to attack.”
Chevalier sighed, “I don’t know…”
“It would give her more purpose. We’re still seeing the effects of her conversation with Wen,” Zohn said.
“Get this trial out of the way. I’ll talk to Em, and we can send a delegation next week.”
“Good, Derrick, bring in…” Quinn stopped when he heard a blood-curdling scream from Emily. The Council rushed into the hallway and followed her screams up the stairs to the eighth-floor.
Mark, Silas, and Kralen were already there, frantically searching through the rooms. Her screams stopped abruptly, but Chevalier was picking up a strong fear from her.
Mark tore open the storage room door and saw her almost immediately. She was on the floor in a tiny ball on her knees. Her arms were covering her head, and she was whispering something into the floor and shook with fear.
He quickly moved to her and knelt down, “Em?”
The others appeared in the doorway. The Council returned to the chamber, except for Chevalier and Kyle. They both moved into the room.
“Get’em away… get’em away,” she was whispering, over and over.
“Em, what’s wrong?” Chevalier asked as he knelt down and bent over closer to her.
“Get’em away,” was all she said.
Kyle quickly scanned the room and then laughed, “Em, are you afraid of bats?”
Silas looked up at the bats swarming around the ceiling of the storage room. He reached out and easily caught one, and it emitted a piercing high screech that made the heku in the palace cover their ears.
Silas quickly let the bat go and winced, “Sorry.”
Mark grinned and got up off of the floor.
Chevalier tried not to laugh, and put his hand on her back, “Is it the bats?”
He was surprised that she was shaking with fear, and when she didn’t answer, he picked her up, still in her ball, and moved her out into the hallway. Silas shut the door to the storage room and watched her in a tight ball on the floor.
Kralen thought for a moment and then went back into the storage room, shutting the door behind him. The palace again filled with the terrifying screech of bats and the heku covered their ears in pain. A few minutes later, the screeching stopped and Kralen stepped back out into the hallway, again shutting the door behind him.
“Are they dead?” Emily whispered, still covering her head.
“No, I let them out,” Kralen said. “No reason to kill them.”
She finally looked up and her eyes were bright red. She scrambled to her feet and quickly ran into Chevalier’s arms. He wrapped his arms around her and grinned.
“That was all over bats?” Mark asked, amused.
She pressed herself against Chevalier, and he shook his head when he felt her tremble, “They’re gone, it’s ok.”
They heard her sniffle slightly before whispering, “They were after me.”
Kralen chuckled but kept quiet.
“Bats don’t really attack,” Chevalier told her.
Emily pulled away from Chevalier and was still shaking when she walked down the stairs, “I’m moving.”
“You’re leaving the palace because of bats?” Chevalier asked, now frowning.
She nodded and went into the bedroom and began to pack.
Chevalier put his hand on her suitcase, “You can’t move out because of bats. They’re harmless.”
“They’re gone. I let them all go,” Kralen told her.
Chevalier glanced at the three guards, and they all moved out of the bedroom and stood post outside the door after shutting it.
He took Emily’s hand and led her over to the bed, then sat down and pulled her onto his lap as he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her forehead softly.
“They were after me,” she whispered, and wiped a tear from her eye.
“They aren’t in the palace anymore.”
“Can you smell them?”
“Yes”
“So you knew there were bats in here?” she asked, frowning.
“Yes, but they’re harmless.”
“They bite and carry rabies.”
“Very few of them carry rabies, and you’d have to really scare one to get it to bite.”
Emily’s eyes narrowed as she looked at him, “You’re a bat lover?”
“Not really.”
“Damned vampires,” she mumbled, and disappeared into the bathroom.
Chevalier chuckled and stepped out into the hallway.
“She leaving?” Mark asked.
“I don’t know… Now she’s grumbling about vampires and bats… I’ll be in a meeting,” he told the guards, and headed down the stairs.
“They are pretty much flying mice,” Silas said, looking around the fifth-floor.
“I already have a few of the Cavalry getting rid of the bats in the barn,” Mark told them. “I don’t know how she expects to work in a barn with no mice or bats.”
Kralen chuckled, “It’s funny how she can completely wipe out our entire species, and is afraid of mice.”
They turned when Emily opened her door and stepped out with a suitcase in one hand and Dain’s hand in the other.
“We’re moving,” Dain told them.
“Em, we got rid of the bats,” Mark told her, frowning.
“I’m going to stay at the other house for a while,” she told them, and started slowly down the stairs with Dain.
“We’ll just follow you there.”
“I figured. You can come in the Jeep.”
“I have a penis,” Dain told Mark, and the heku grinned.
“Dain, stop it,” Emily said sternly, and the toddler shrugged and then disappeared down the stairs. “Damnit!”
“I’ll get him,” Kralen said, and blurred after him.
Silas took her bag and also disappeared down the stairs.
Emily heard the Council talking to Dain, so she went into the council chambers to get him.
“I’m sure you do,” the Chief Interrogator was telling the young heku.
“Do you?” Dain asked.
He looked up at Emily and then smiled and answer
ed Dain, “Yes, child.”
“Mommy’s is gone.”
Emily gasped and grabbed him out of Kralen’s arms as the Council started to laugh, “Enough of that. I warned you.”
“Why?”
She started for the door, “Because I said so… that’s why.”
“Emily?” Quinn called out.
She sighed and turned around, “Yes?”
“Are you leaving then?”
“Yes, I’m going to stay in Exavior’s old place. I need to start throwing stuff out and making it livable.”
“Are you taking guards?”
“Do I have a choice?”
Quinn smiled, “No, I guess not.”
“Then yes, I’m taking guards.”
“You’re running because of a bat?” Dustin asked.
Emily glared at him, “I don’t like you.”
“I’m very much aware of that.”
She turned and walked out of the council chambers. A few minutes later, they heard the Jeep leave.
“Well… at least we know where she’s going and she has guards,” Zohn said, and called for Derrick to bring in the prisoner that was to be tried.
Emily had to drive slowly because of the snowstorm, but eventually made it to the dark house. She left the Jeep in front and unlocked the door, then flipped on the lights and the entire first floor lit up.
“It stinks,” Dain said, and looked around the foyer.
“That’s Valle smell,” Silas told him, and took his hand.
“Chevalier had the kitchen stocked,” Mark said, and locked the door.
Emily started up the stairs, “Pick a room… any but Exavior’s.”
Dain ran up the stairs and passed her, disappearing into the room Exavior made for Emily. She shut the door and started to get ready for bed.
“Check the doors and windows. See what security he has in place and get a count, we may need to call in more if it’s too open,” Mark said. “I’m going to go through the house real quick and check for any sign of a heku. Then I’ll lock up that ceremonial room and interrogation chamber.”
Kralen and Silas both nodded and ran off to check the main floor’s security.
Eternity of Vengeance : Book 7 of the Heku Series Page 2