On an impulse, he started kissing her ear. She shifted around and brought her lips to his in a long deep kiss. Their embraced tightened as they tasted each other’s breath, savoring the moment.
When their lips finally parted, Amber blushed. “I can’t...do this.”
Combing his fingers through her tangled hair, he said, “Yes, you can. Well, you‘ll be able to once we‘re married.”
She shook her head. “No, I...” She stopped as it dawned on her what he had just said.
Holding her face in his hands, he asked, “Amber, will you do me the honor of being my wife?”
The squeak of glee and how hard she hugged gave him his answer. Even though he ached, he still laughed. It was like he had finally been freed of something he never realized was holding him. In his happiness, he felt passion for her rise within.
“We better get married fast,” he chuckled.
The door by their heads squealed open and Zit appeared. “Tayan, Amber!” he cried merrily then his smiled dimmed. “Am I interrupting something?”
“Um, no,” Tayan said quickly. Amber helped him to his feet, her face flushed with joy. He helped her out then climbed down the ladder, ducking past the roofing timbers. Exiting the rubble, he saw Sylvanari elves packing the side street and moving along close to the buildings. “How’d you get here?” he asked Zit.
Zit frowned at him. “You think you were the only one that went to get help? We want it to be known we were here, too!”
Tayan had seen the manned walls, and he had charged in quickly with the wagon. There was no way they could have followed him in. “How’d you get into the city?”
“We’ve been sneaking in on hay wagons for the past three days,” Zit said proudly. “I’m awful glad you showed up--I was beginning to think we’d have to do it alone.”
Amber pointed towards the palace. “We have to get in there.”
A large explosion sounded, and the ground shook as part of the city ahead lit up in a blinding bluish light. Tayan ducked with Amber behind a pile of rubble, shielding her as a powerful blast of wind toppled buildings and filled the air with debris. A large ball of orange fire rose up, trailing thick smoke behind it. As it climbed, the fireball turned into dark smoke, making the plume look like a giant mushroom.
Once the explosion was over, they got up. Across the street, brown-clad elves were helping their injured fellows. The streets were filled with pieces of timber and rock. Moans and cries for help came from all around them.
Zit looked up at the ascending cloud. “Now that was a big bang.”
The palace wall facing the explosion had crumbled. Both towers had lost their tops, looking like giant broken bottles. Tayan pointed to the breech. “There is how we get in.”
Waving his bow at the mangled wagon, Zit asked, “How many of those things do you have here?”
The second wagon had taken another street. By his guess it was just about where the explosion was. “Only two. I think the other one was over there, in the middle of the big bang.”
“So much for that idea,” Zit remarked then ran over to his friends.
The side door of the wrecked wagon was forced partway open and a boilerman squeezed out. Seeing Tayan and Amber, he pointed back inside. “M’lord, both engines are broken and we’re out of water.”
The wagon was buried so deep in the rubble he didn‘t see how they would free it, even if it had been working. “Get everyone out, and bring all the weapons you have.”
Tayan led the collection of Sylvanari and a half-dozen wagon men towards the palace. On the way, they found more wounded peasants than soldiers. The few soldiers they met either surrendered or dropped their weapons and ran.
Amber insisted on helping each peasant. He would have been more upset over her delaying them, but by the time the elves had checked the area clear and tied up the captives she was finished, or close to.
Halfway down the street, they ran into nothing but wounded as they got closer to the blast site. Not one building was intact, and the streets were so littered they had to wind their way through the larger piles of debris. Amber put up a fuss, but he made her move along with them. He reasoned that the longer they delayed, the more time the enemy had to recover from the shock of the blast. Pain for the people was on her face, but she didn’t argue with him.
They had gotten within a hundred yards of the palace wall when they had to take cover from weak arrow fire. Cover was plentiful, and with return fire from the elves they quickly made the top of the breach. The defenders put up a counterattack; but being inside the courtyard and unprotected, most died before they got even partway up the rubble. The survivors who didn’t throw up their hands in surrender escaped into the palace.
The palace doors and windows were shuttered and barred, keeping the elves out but also allowing them to freely take the courtyard without being fired on. By the time they had control of the courtyard, chugging noises came from down the street. Tayan looked to see a line of five tractors approaching, followed by a battlewagon. Behind them rode knights flying banners for Tolina and Paladnia. He had the gates opened and ran out with Amber to keep them from shooting the elves by accident.
Zodiac was in the lead tractor. Tayan told him the situation then went back to the courtyard with the knights as Zodiac passed word back to send up the battlewagon. The elves, although expert bowmen, wore no armor nor were they as good at hand-to-hand fighting as the knights were. They needed the knights for an assault into the palace.
Sir Parson knelt at the base of the steps with his men as the battlewagon and two tractors leveled their cannons at the doors and windows. Between the machines, Sir Tartan stood ready with a company of Paladnian knights to join the rush once a breach was made. Tayan stood to one side, holding his sword aloft. Before he could drop it, commanding the cannons to fire, the palace doors burst open.
The defenders ran out, arms over their heads, screaming that they surrendered. The knights began to funnel them to an empty area of the courtyard that still had the walls intact. Hoarcs came out also pleading for mercy, then Slavonic men and women and other servants emerged. The courtyard was filled to overflowing with prisoners.
At first, Tayan had thought they had seen the battlewagon and that was why they had given up, but the palace had no slots in the shuttered windows and the doors were also quite solid. They hadn’t seen anything outside that could have caused them to give up. As the last few servants ran out, he went up to the doors.
The next one to appear wasn’t a guard. Eric stepped out into the sunlight, battleaxe in one hand, sword in the other. Behind him was Shilo then a woman with stubs of horns on her forehead and small leathery wings on her back. The remainder of the group with them came out and faced the assembled armies.
The only one Tayan saw was Eric. He had come, and he was just as ragged and bloodied as he had even been. Beside him, Sir Parson was yelling for everyone to hold their positions. He barely heard him. Eric watched as he walked towards him.
Odif, covered in bruises and sporting purpled eyes, saw him. “Tayan!” she cried happily. Pulling loose from Scorpio and Jo-Jo, she limped over and flung her arms around him. “I thought you were dead,” she sighed.
To the side, Shilo waved Zit over and put an arm around him. Grinning broadly, he said, “Buddy, you’re gonna love this!”
Zit grinned anxiously. “What?”
Shilo patted him on the chest. “Let’s just stay back and listen.”
Tayan hugged Odif, but he and Eric had fixed their eyes on each other. Sensing the battle was over, the others formed a loose circle as the two men continued to stare. For a few moments, they just stood silently.
“I know you,” Eric said softly. “I though it killed you.”
“Lots of people thought that,” Tayan replied flatly. “Did you kill it?”
“Yeah.” Tipping his head to the woman with wings, he said, “Me and Samantha finished it.”
“Samantha?” Jo-Jo asked.
Eric tur
ned to give him a hard gaze. “I gave her a proper name. You got a problem with that?”
“No problem, I like it,” Jo-Jo assured him.
Odif pulled back and stood before her brother. “Tayan, before anything else happens, there is something I need to tell you.”
“That you’re my sister?” he asked.
She nodded and gave him a half-grin. “We’ve been bad. Please don’t hate me.”
Grasping her shoulder, he was sincere when he said, “I don’t.” Not wanting to talk about it further, he nodded towards Eric. “Where did you find him?”
She looked back. “Thump? We found him chained to a wall in the caves below. If it wasn‘t for him and Sam--I mean, Samantha--we‘d all be dead.”
Tayan raised an eyebrow. “You call him Thump?”
“Well, do you know his name?” she asked defensively.
Tayan cleared his throat. This was something that before this moment he would never have done. Eric had saved Odif and his other friends. The least he could do was admit who he was. He did keep his voice low. “Odif, that man is Eric, he’s our father.”
Odif gaped at him for a few seconds then turned to do the same at Eric. Looking back at Tayan, she smirked. “I’ve been real bad.”
It only took Tayan a second to realize what she meant. “You didn’t,” he breathed.
Seeing his stern look, Odif tried not to smile. “Well, yes.”
He flung an arm at Eric. “You did that with your own father?” he cried. “Is there any man you will not bed?”
Amber scowled at Odif. “Apparently not,” she snorted.
Eric’s face turned white. “What did you say?” he breathed.
Odif shrugged. “I guess I’m your daughter.”
Eric’s weapons clattered to the ground. Sam helped him sit down, or rather she controlled his fall as he sat to hold his head in his hands with a loud moan. Trying to comfort him, she said, “Dad, you didn’t know!”
“You, too?” Tayan and Odif cried together.
Sam looked up at them. “Yes,” she said in a small voice.
A peal of laughter rolled out from Zit. He held onto Shilo as he laughed so hard he cried. Shilo was chuckling but kept a close eye on Eric. He held Zit up as the elf doubled over, holding his sides. One foot kicked the ground in his mirth.
“It ain’t funny,” Eric growled as he looked up at Shilo and Zit. Louder, he said, “It ain’t funny!”
When he grabbed for his axe and shot to his feet, Shilo took off with Zit, who was still laughing hysterically. Shilo banked around and flew behind the palace. Just before he disappeared from sight, he yelled, “It is too!”
Eric gripped his axe hard. “I’ll kill both of them!”
“No, you won’t!” Tayan snapped. “It’s not their fault, it’s hers!” he said, jabbing a finger at Odif.
“Hey!” Odif yelled back at him. “He needed it! You should have seen the shape he was in when we found him.”
“So you had to go and..,” Not wanting to finish his sentence, he gave her a shove. “Keep your damn legs shut!”
She shoved him back. “Don’t you push me!”
“Don’t be such a slut!” he barked.
Odif’s face reddened as she jabbed a finger at him. “You know how the ritual is done, so quit calling me names!”
“It’s a name you deserve!”
“You’re a snob, but I don‘t go telling that to everyone, do I?”
They continued to yell at each other as Zodiac walked around them. He shook his head and faced Eric. “Anything left in there to fight?”
Still reeling from what he’d just learned, he mumbled, “No.” Tayan and Odif were now yelling at the same time with an occasional flail of an arm or a smack on each other’s shoulder. “They gonna kill each other?”
“No, this is normal,” Zodiac assured him. “They’ll scream at each other for a while then one will walk away. It’s nothing to be worried about.” Extending his hand, he introduced himself. “I am Lord Zodiac.”
Eric shook his hand. “I’m Eric, and this here is my other daughter, Samantha. You know the rest of them?”
“We’re all in that same Company,” Zodiac told him. “We could really use you, if you would like to join us.”
Loudly, Tayan announced, “That’s it!” as he threw up his arms. “I want nothing more to do with you!”
“Fine by me!” Odif yelled. “I don’t need your shit-assed attitude!”
“My attitude?” Tayan wailed. “You are the one who has to piss off everyone you know! Go back to the woods where you belong!”
“Great!” she spat, “I’m outta here!”
Odif turned to leave. Eric walked over and grabbed her arm. She stiffened and cocked back to punch him, hesitating long enough to see it wasn’t Tayan holding her. He waited until he was sure she wasn’t going to hit him then asked, “Before you go, could you tell me where to find my wife?”
“Sure,” she squeaked, her voice hoarse from yelling.
“Do you remember Lady Salinthia’s estate, in Tolina?” Tayan asked him.
Eric thought hard. “Think so. Real big house, with white stone columns in front.”
“Right. She’s still there waiting for you,” Odif told him.
Amber moved towards them, eyeing Odif and Tayan in case they started in again.
“No, she’s not. Belenaris Tolham took her to his estate. If she didn’t go, he was going to send Erica to an orphanage,” she explained.
Odif whipped her head around to stare at her. “He did what?”
Eric frowned at them. “Who’s Erica?”
Amber explained everything as well as she could. As she did, she noticed his eyes become harder. Although she knew she wasn’t in any danger, his penetrating gaze was enough to make her back off a few steps.
When she was finished, Eric was breathing heavily and quaking in rage. His voice was dead calm, though, when he shifted his eyes from Odif to Tayan. “If you two are done, could we go get my wife and daughter?”
Chapter 25
The after-dinner wine was spectacular. Aged properly, it was a delight to his pallet. The fragrance was as smooth as its taste and the color was a bright, clear burgundy. Heady with the superb drink, Belenaris tipped his head back and closed his eyes. If only everything were as perfect as his wine.
“Stephan, fill it again.”
“Yes, M’lord.”
Belenaris lazily raised his head and looked at Jeni, sitting in the upholstered armchair beside him. She sat bolt upright, not paying him any attention, as usual. Her radiant blonde hair was put up in wide, flat braids, each tied off with silver ribbon threaded loosely enough that they swayed gently when she moved her head. Her emerald-green gown was laced with silver, and her bracelets were the most expensive wrought silver money could buy. He bet that each of the stones on her ruby-encrusted wrists would go for five gold. With all that, her angelic face and her perfectly shaped elven ears, she should be the most beautiful creature in the world.
She wasn’t. The picture was ruined every time he glanced down and saw those large mounds that seemed to grow every day. The locket around her neck didn’t even lie flat on her chest. The gown cinched her breasts tightly, causing a deep cleavage the locket balanced on. It was beginning to look like she had her backside on her chest, which was not at all becoming for a lady of nobility.
“How can you stand to look like that?” he asked harshly. He waved his goblet so the liquid threatened to jump out. Stephan had learned to fill it only a third of the way full, or he would have splashed wine over himself and Jeni.
“Look like what?” she asked vacantly as she stared into the fire.
“Those things are horrid!” he said, poking a finger into her chest.
The instant he made contact, she raised an arm and knocked his hand away. She glared at him for a few seconds then returned her gaze to the fire. “I need to feed Erica. How I look is none of your concern.”
The entire first month s
ince becoming her consort he had taken pains to be decent to her. He didn’t send her half-breed daughter away, and he had put up with the occasional sight of her feeding the mongrel just as an animal would. She still ran a good portion of his coach line as well as the stone quarries. She was even allowed out of the palace from time to time, with the appropriate guard. He tried, and yet she refused to even be polite to him, let alone show any gratitude.
He settled back and lifted his goblet, taking a deep breath as he savored the bouquet of the wine before gulping half the contents down. He decided right then he would make her look like the lady she was supposed to be. Fine women, like a fine wine, had to be molded.
“Lady Jenesalinthia,” he slurred, “ I have decided that tomorrow we will seek the services of a wizard. I don’t care if he can shrink those things or removes them completely, but you will look like a lady and not some human beast.”
She was looking at him now, and her voice was as cold as her stare. “No.”
“No?” he repeated, amused that she was defying him.
Jeni stiffened. “Not before Erica is weaned,” she told him firmly.
He chuckled at her. She really meant it! He sobered as he remembered that “no” was one of her favorite words, especially when it came time to turn in at night. She kept her room locked up tight as a fortress. She even put a chair against the door handle. He was her consort, and bedding her was one of his rights.
Not that he was insanely attracted to her, but she did have a nice form, from the back. It was too bad she insisted on behaving like an animal. Then again, if she wanted to act and look like an animal, maybe he should mount her as one.
A sly grin came to his face as he slid up on the edge of his seat. He set the goblet down and envisioned taking her the only way she would understand.
“Stephan, that will be all tonight.”
“Yes, M’lord,” the footman said and walked out.
Jeni saw the look on his face and swallowed nervously. “It is getting late, I should get to bed,” she said formally.
When she stood up, he grabbed her arm and yanked her back down. “I think we need to be alone for a while,” he said, grinning broadly.
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