Walking through his stunned men, Conlan took Will’s arm, as if pulling him into a confidence, but Will could feel his muscles trembling, looking for support.
“We need to talk—the five of us,” Conlan said in English. “About gunpowder.”
Will looked behind Conlan’s back and glared at Eleanor, who walked just behind. She gave him a flat expression in return. She told him! Went behind my back and never gave me the chance to present my case! Duplicitous little…!
Helping Conlan back to their cart without making it seem like he was helping, Will fumed, his grinding headache exacerbating his anger. He had assumed, when Eleanor had not mentioned her gunpowder idea again, that she had dropped it, realised that he was right and thought better of it. Will had never, for one moment, considered that she would just override him. How dare she! He guided Conlan up the steps and to the day sofa at the far end of the cart, where he collapsed, panting, into the cushions, a soft groan escaping clenched teeth. Freddie gently released Arran onto one of the side beds. He was asleep again almost before Eleanor and Amelia made it into the cart. Eleanor sat next to Conlan, while Freddie and Amelia sat at the table, and as Will’s gaze travelled over their faces he realised that neither of them was surprised. She told them all! They’ve all discussed it and kept me out of the loop! Angry beyond all rational thought, Will glared at them.
“How long have you all been talking about this behind my back?” he snapped.
“We weren’t talking about anything behind your back,” Amelia said, confusion knotting her brow. “Eleanor told Conlan about her idea so that he would fully understand what we were discussing when we talked about it. Conlan spoke to Freddie and me, independently, yesterday, so that we could have time to think about the idea without the influence of anyone else before we did decide to discuss it. This is the first group conversation we’ve had.”
Will tried to get a grip on his anger, but it kept slipping through his fingers, making his tiny spark of energy pulse, stabbing at him sharply. He glared at Eleanor, further infuriated by the calm stare she gave him in return.
“You went to Conlan without telling me—did the one thing I asked you not to do. How dare you!” Will hissed. “What gives you the right?”
Eleanor paled, but her voice was firm, her words measured and careful. “I have the right to draw Conlan’s attention to something this important, especially if I think you’re wrong.”
“You arrogant child!” Will snapped. “You don’t have enough experience to even begin to understand what’s at stake here.”
“Really?” Eleanor asked, her soft, calm voice grating on Will’s frayed nerves. “Because the last time I checked, I’m the only person in Mydren with experience of being shot to death.”
She has a point! Will ignored the rational little voice in the back of his mind; he did not want to hear it. Eleanor’s actions had hurt and upset him, pushing his headache to such pounding intensity that he just wanted to retaliate.
“Yes, your death. If gunpowder hadn’t existed, you would carry a lot less guilt for that stupidity,” Will sneered without thinking.
An uncomfortable silence filled the cart as Eleanor fought a losing battle to hide her horror, her body trembling as she pulled her knees into her chest, wrapping her arms around them. She trusted you with the insides of her head. You promised never to tell. Will felt his anger suffocated by the stinging voice of his shame. She had overstepped the mark, but so had he. And what of your secrets? She knows them all. Fear slid a cold hand up Will’s spine.
“What are you talking about?” Freddie asked Will, anger sharpening the words.
“Nothing, Freddie, I spoke without thinking,” Will said, desperately hoping this would be enough. There was another silence, and then, wanting to move the conversation on, Will turned back to Conlan.
“Eleanor has no appreciation of the potential ramifications of her actions, and her desire to use gunpowder is no exception,” Will said with all the calm control he could muster. “Had I been given the opportunity to explain this to you when Eleanor presented her notion, you might have a better understanding of the risks and have seen why this is such a bad idea.”
Emerald eyes, glittering with indignation, bored into him, and the last vestiges of Will’s anger dissipated into a wave of unease.
“Eleanor gave me all of your concerns when she came to me, which is why I was reluctant to pursue it until now,” Conlan said in a voice of cold steel, a reprimanding growl of contempt beneath the English. He held Will’s gaze with a withering one of his own for a moment, then saw the looks of confusion and curiosity on Freddie’s and Amelia’s faces, both of them staring at Eleanor’s obvious discomfort. He sighed and spoke to Eleanor in a soft, loving voice. “Eleanor… tell them what Will was just referring to. Tell them what happened with the robbery. Tell them why.”
Eleanor gasped, her head snapping up. “You know?”
Conlan gave her a smile. “When you died, I was in your head. Your guilt at your actions only presented the worst parts of what you had done. It made me pause and question your integrity. I asked the shamans to dig deeper, beyond your self-hatred, to find out why. So yes, I’ve always known.”
“You never mentioned it,” Eleanor whispered, stunned.
“It caused you pain and it was in the past, where it should have stayed,” Conlan said, giving Will a dark glance. “You are not a bad person, Eleanor. You made some mistakes, which you paid for with your life.”
“What happened?” Freddie asked.
Eleanor sighed, wiping away a few tears that ran down her cheeks. “My father had an affair. He was at a low point in his life and he regretted it. However, after he broke it off, the teenage son of his lover came to me with photos and explained that he would tell my mother and destroy their marriage if I didn’t help him rob the jewellery shop I worked in. I should have said no, I should have let my parents’ marriage die if it was meant to, but I couldn’t do it. I was frightened, for my mother and myself. So I came up with a plan. There weren’t meant to be any guns involved, and they were supposed to wait until only the store manager and I were left. Nobody was meant to get hurt… But they didn’t follow my plan; they just took the information out of it they needed for their own plan. They shot Elaine, my manager, before I even knew what was happening, and then they were going to shoot Becky, the gem appraiser. She had children. I couldn’t let them do that… so here I am.”
Will felt his skin prickle with shame. He should have known Eleanor’s guilt would have hidden the deeper reasons for her actions, but unlike Conlan, he had never chosen to dig any deeper. You didn’t want to know, the vicious voice in his head hissed at him. You liked the idea that someone else had made stupid decisions that had stained their hands with blood—that it wasn’t just you. The accusation was a bitter weight in his stomach, causing another wave of nausea to roil through him.
“Conlan is right, Eleanor,” Freddie said. “It’s in the past. You made a mistake and died trying to fix it. End of story.”
Amelia nodded her agreement, giving Eleanor a sympathetic smile. “Will, you owe Eleanor an apology,” she said, her tone giving no room for argument. Still feeling sick and uncomfortable, more sharp jabs from his energy needling him, Will resisted the urge to snap at Amelia for making it sound like he did not know he was wrong when she was only trying to keep the peace. His anger evaporating as quickly as it had come, Will nodded, dropping his head, unable to look any of them in the eye.
“I’m sorry, Eleanor. I promised not to tell anybody about what was in your head, and I broke that promise. Please forgive me.”
Moving off the sofa, Eleanor came to stand in front of him, close enough that she could look up into his face. Chocolate brown eyes met his, and Will could see the pain he had caused her within them—but also her love for him.
“I’m sorry I went behind your back,” she said. “I just wanted Conlan to fully understand what gunpowder was and how it worked, so that we were all talking
at the same level when we came to discuss it. I should have told you. I’ll forgive you, if you’ll forgive me… ”
Not feeling that their ‘crimes’ were the least bit ‘comparable’, and certain he was getting off easy for losing his temper, Will nodded.
“Good, can we get to the matter in hand?” Conlan asked. Eleanor took her seat again next to Conlan and Will sat down next to Amelia, who gave him a disapproving glance. Conlan looked at him with an icy demeanour that made Will think that he was not the only one who thought Eleanor’s forgiveness had been too easily gained.
“So,” Conlan said, his frigid tone matching his expression. “Eleanor has proposed the use of gunpowder. We all know how you and she feel about this, Will. Now I’d like to hear from Amelia and Freddie what they think of the idea.”
There was another uncomfortable silence, which made Will feel like he was a small child being punished. Well, you’re behaving like a child! the voice in his head snapped, sounding far too much like his dad for Will’s comfort. You berated Eleanor for betraying your trust and then did exactly the same thing to her. ‘Two wrongs don’t make a right’, the voice said, using a phrase his dad had used often. Will cringed. Now the thought had occurred to him, every time the nasty, vicious, truthful voice in his head piped up, he would hear his father. The man had not crossed Will’s mind in years. They had fought over his mother as she was dying—her treatment, her care and, in the end, even the colour of her nightdresses. They had managed to hold it together until after the funeral, but their grief had torn them apart. There had been one last acrimonious argument and they had stopped talking to each other. Up until his death, Stevie had been trying to reconcile them. His brother’s funeral was the last time Will had seen his father. The last thing he wanted to be hearing now was his dad’s critical, demanding, condescending voice in his head. Somebody’s got to talk some sense into you, boy!
“… understand, but I don’t think it would be good for Mydren and I’m not sure we can make pure enough gunpowder in large enough quantities for it to be that big an advantage anyway,” Freddie said. Will realised he had missed Freddie giving his opinion.
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Freddie,” Eleanor said in a flat tone. “It won’t be good for Mydren if we fail either, you know.”
“I know, and I didn’t mean any offence, Eleanor, but this seems wrong to me…” Freddie murmured. Will was impressed. He had not expected Freddie to see the sense in his argument and agree with him. If Conlan was going to follow the majority, Will might get his way after all when Amelia went against Eleanor too.
“He’s entitled to his opinion, Eleanor. Amelia, what do you think?” Conlan asked, looking expectantly at Amelia.
“I wasn’t sure,” Amelia said, her eyes holding Conlan’s. “But now that you’re set on attacking the North Tower… well, if we can make gunpowder, we should do so.” Will realised he must look as astonished as Freddie did when Amelia glanced between the two of them and shrugged. “I don’t know why you both look so surprised,” she said. “I’ve always been a pragmatist. And I think we need to end the battle before us now, then worry about what may or may not happen in Mydren centuries from now.”
“We can’t interfere with their development! We can’t get involved. We don’t have that right,” Will said, horrified that Amelia seemed able to pass off potential world war with such ease.
Amelia snorted. “If you really believed that, Duncan would be dead, so would Arran, and probably Conlan. Just because healing isn’t destructive doesn’t mean you’re interfering any less. I wonder how many people Duncan has told about his operation?”
“Okay,” Will conceded. “But stitching a hole in someone’s belly is a little different from offering people the means to annihilate each other.”
“Will, we’re seriously outnumbered!” Amelia shot back. “And, no offense Conlan,” she added, nodding in his direction, “we’re massively outclassed! We need to use every resource we have.”
“So much for ‘war not existing if women were in charge’!” Freddie muttered.
“What do we want?” Amelia snapped at him, slate grey eyes boring into him.
“To win…?” Freddie ventured, looking a little uncomfortable. Amelia rarely got angry, and nobody liked being on the receiving end when she was.
“It’s war, Freddie. Nobody ‘wins’,” Amelia muttered, shaking her head. “However,” she continued, her voice stronger, “do you think the conflict we’re heading towards could be ended with negotiation and concessions?”
“No, probably not,” Freddie said.
“So war is inevitable. And if we have to fight, then I want it to be quick, decisive and final, with the smallest number of casualties on our side. And the best way to achieve that is by having an overwhelming force. There are twelve of us…”
“Eleven,” Conlan corrected softly, and Will saw Eleanor wince, no doubt feeling his grief.
Amelia sighed. “Yes…” Her eyes filled with tears, but she managed to stop them from falling, forcing strength into her voice when she spoke again. “There are eleven of us, going up against a whole tower full of armed men. I want our first strike to be so hard that surrender seems the only sensible option to them. Gunpowder would give us that edge.”
There was a pensive silence. Conlan had the final say, and they all turned to look at him.
“I am agreeing with Amelia and Eleanor,” Conlan said, his voice firm, although his body trembled with fatigue and pain. “I’m not hiding anymore. I want to take the fight to them. The sooner we start this, the sooner it’ll be over, and the less chance they’ll have to pick us off one by one. Eleanor, I want you to try making gunpowder—and Will, I want you to help her.”
“You know that once you walk down this path there’s no turning back?” Will said, determined to make one last attempt at saving Mydren from the horror and misery he knew gunpowder would create.
“Yes, Will,” Conlan said softly, sinking further back into the pillows. “Eleanor has told me about what I might be inflicting on my people with this choice. But I also know what will happen if I choose not to take advantage of any edge I can get. Besides, I wish to encourage science and learning when I’m king. I imagine we would stumble upon gunpowder eventually.”
“Of course, we’re currently ignoring the biggest advantage we possess,” Amelia said.
“I don’t want to bring in the Dwarves, the People of the Horse or the Elves until we’re in desperate need,” Conlan said.
“I think you have an odd notion of ‘desperate need’,” Amelia replied. “But they’re not the advantage I was talking about. I meant us—our knowledge, our learning. If we’re going to create gunpowder, if we’re going to interfere with the natural development of Mydren, then we have the ability to give you dominance over your enemies.”
“How?” Conlan asked.
“Well, how about something I’ve been thinking about for a while,” Amelia said. “We know how flying machines work, and while a plane is most likely beyond us, a hot air balloon might be possible. And, with the control we have of our elements, it could be much more manoeuvrable than they are in our world.”
Conlan looked confused. “Why are hot air balloons different from planes?”
Amelia smiled. “Because they don’t have engines. As the name implies, they just need hot air, which Freddie has in abundance.”
Freddie gave her a smirk and Amelia winked at him.
“Hot air balloons would make us airborne… you don’t need to worry about the how right now, just consider that if you let us try, we might be able to make it possible for you to attack your enemy from high above—to fire arrows from above a battlefield or over the walls of any tower—with minimal risk to your own men. That’s just one possible way our knowledge could be useful to you.”
“You all know how to do this?” Conlan asked, his expression a confused mix of wonder and scepticism, which quickly morphed into suspicion. “And you never told me?”
“What we know about science took us many years of study to learn,” Will said, wondering where Conlan’s thoughts were taking him and why Amelia had chosen to open this can of worms without talking to him first. “It’s not something we could just tell you; you would need a similar education, a frame of reference. Both Amelia and I have told you about planes and helicopters—you knew we could fly in our world. Besides, hot air balloons are going to require a level of control of energy that Freddie and Amelia have not had until recently.”
“A hot air balloon doesn’t have an engine… and you never told me that,” Conlan said. He was trying to appear angry and frustrated, but in his exhausted state he just sounded defeated.
“Well, now you know,” Eleanor said with a smile. “If you want to take the North Tower with a limited loss of life, we can help you. So let’s make some plans.”
They started talking strategy. Freddie was just running through some possible attack options when Will realised that Conlan had fallen asleep, his slack, pale face and shallow breath was worrying. He’s pushing himself too hard, too fast. Moving quietly around the cart, Will put some lepdrac and a large slug of his strong sedative into a mug of warm, honey-sweetened tea as the others talked about making balloons. ‘If you ever drug me again without my permission, I’ll make sure you regret it.’ Conlan’s words floated through Will’s head. He smiled; Conlan’s bluster had not frightened him at the time and did not frighten him now. Conlan’s displeasure at his methods was certainly not going to stop Will from doing his best to heal him. Wonder what bizarre punishment he’ll come up with… he thought as he sat next to Conlan and gently shook his shoulder.
“Conlan…?”
When they first met, Will had tried to waken Conlan this way and had found himself lying on his back, winded, with the razor-sharp edge of Conlan’s boot knife pressing painfully into his neck. Over the years this extreme reaction had mellowed, but Conlan still snapped his eyes open, wide awake, if a little confused, in a fraction of a second.
Will (Book 2) Page 38