Now he had to find the horses and help Rhoie get to Kraal.
~Æ~
Rhoie sloshed through the swamp towards the horses. Battle sounded around him, but his path was relatively clear. He kept the horses between himself and the skirmish between Blade and Gastious. As he neared his objective, he saw the creature hovering over Blade.
Rhoie slowly made his way up to the horses and around behind them. They shifted and snorted as he neared. Gastious’s back was to him. He was far enough away from them that he was certain he could have managed to mount a horse and make an escape, but Blade was in trouble. He decided to close in.
~Æ~
Blade saw Rhoie coming around the horses. It was a mistake. The Polly was not following orders. The Bok heard Rhoie coming, and he readied his sword arm. Blade prepared to move for a knife as he watched the horses run off.
~Æ~
Gastious turned around for a quick swing. The young man was startled and unnerved at the sight of Gastious’s prosthetic weapon, but the boy was quick. Gastious missed his target, and then felt a searing pain in the back of his leg.
~Æ~
Rhoie swung his sword at Gastious, but his swing was easily blocked. Gastious was injured, and Blade was drawing a knife while Rhoie took another swing. Then, from around the Foganta, came a huge horse with a mace-wielding Bok mounted upon it.
In desperation Rhoie threw his sword at the oncoming rider. It spun once and cut the Bok on the arm, deflecting the swing of his mace. The blow barely missed Blade. Gastious fell to his knees, and then rolled into the shallow water. Blade’s second knife had struck him in the leg. Rhoie wanted to attack him again while he was vulnerable, but now the huge Bok on the horse was splashing towards him.
Rhoie ducked under the swinging mace, but it was only a feint, as he found when the Bok thrust a sword at Rhoie’s chest. Rhoie was barely able to dodge, but again he saw the huge mace coming at him. Rhoie steeled himself, as he knew he could not dodge its full force. The blow glanced off of his ribs on his left side.
~Æ~
The horses had charged towards Dilano. He had spent three years on his uncle’s ranch in Graukopf, working with horses. Eventually his uncle’s beatings had became too much, and he ran away, but not before becoming a fairly adept horseman.
He stepped aside of the charging horse, and grabbed its reins. He took two steps alongside it, and pulled himself up to the mount. He caught up to the smaller horse, took its reins, and slowed both of them down, trying to comfort them with soothing tones. A battle raged behind them, but he needed to go back in to find Rhoie.
It did not take long. Rhoie and Blade were at the edge of the fight, and they were both in trouble. His first impulse was to charge in to help, but he thought better of it. He found a few branches that looked familiar, just a little bit thicker than the ones around them.
~Æ~
Rhoie pulled his longer knife from its scabbard on his calf. This was his last weapon. He readied himself for a counter-attack, but he realised it would be an act of desperation with only one arm. Then a blurry vision descended from the trees. It was Dilano. He landed full on the back of the beast and thrust a knife into its shoulder. The knife hardly seemed to bother it, but it was distraction enough for Rhoie to strike a killing blow in its belly. The horse reared and threw Dilano and the dying Bok into the swamp. The Bok landed on top of the Talon. Rhoie quickly moved to help his friend, who could drown under the weight of the beast.
Rhoie splashed towards Dilano. The Bok took a clumsy swing at him. Rhoie ducked and stuck a dagger into its neck. He pulled Dilano out from under the body of the weakly squirming Bok, and then he heard a thrashing sound behind them. They turned to see a horse, about twenty feet away now, turning in circles. Rhoie could not quite accept the vision of Blade thrust over the saddle of the horse like a sack of grain. Then Gastious laboriously mounted behind him, and rode off.
“I’ve readied the other two horses. Let’s get to them before one of these things does,” Dilano said.
Rhoie tried to ignore the pain in his side, and the vision of his leader being carried away. “Let’s go.”
~Æ~
Through the trees, Antok could see his father charging in to pursue the little men near Gastious. He watched with pride, sure his father would dispatch them quickly. He was not certain, but it seemed that Gastious had captured their leader, and now Oktook was about to kill another of them. Then one of the Talons dropped from the trees onto his father’s shoulders, and he fell over into the swamp. Antok charged towards the scene.
He found his father alive, but mortally wounded. He held his head in his arms, and found him smiling. “Ha ha,” he said between laboured breaths. “You are now the leader of the Bok. You will do well, son. Do not trust Arconus.”
~Æ~
When Maurious completed his turn, he found his staff a few inches from the throat of the seer. The seer was not at all what Maurious expected. Instead of a tall, shadowy, dangerous figure, Maurious found a very small man, cowering slightly, looking back at him with eyes of pure black.
XXVI
Liam Foster laboured for a while through the labyrinth of the fates, unsure of where he was, or where the crooked paths might lead him, but uncertainty does not suit a man like Liam Foster.
Eventually he decided to cut his own route.
– Fedora’s Tales of My Homeland
“This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever done,” Travis moaned as they approached the palace gate.
Liam said nothing, but was also very uncomfortable with their predicament. When they started from the inn that morning, Liam felt a fool dressed in his costume, and had questioned his ability to reason.
“It’s the only way. You have to learn to trust me,” replied Lyra tersely.
“Trusting you is one thing, looking like a circus clown is another,” Travis sneered.
“Oh, you have no sense of fashion. I think you look quite dapper,” Lyra teased.
“I’m flattered,” replied Travis. “But these tights are killing me.”
Liam thought the King’s palace security uniforms were absurd, and was not accustomed to wearing costumes, but he was far more disturbed about the memories associated with them. These were the garments the King’s soldiers wore the night they killed his daughter and destroyed his tavern. “I understand that it might be necessary to walk through the city without being recognised, but I will not face the King dressed in a uniform of his design,” Liam said heavily.
“I know, Liam. You must face him in your own garb, on your own terms. I have prepared for this.”
“Do you expect us to change our clothes in the middle of the assembly?” Travis asked.
“That will not be necessary.”
Travis looked at her and shrugged his shoulders in capitulation. Liam decided that he would again put his trust in her.
Their walk through town was remarkably unencumbered. Guards were on the lookout for the three of them. There were drawings of their faces posted about the city. They were poor likenesses, but they were close enough to make Liam and Travis increasingly nervous as they neared the castle. The pictures of Liam had a stylised representation of his white hair with the shock of red at the front. Liam adjusted his hat, careful that his distinguishing mark was properly covered.
“How did they know we were travelling together?” Travis asked. “How do they even know about me?”
Liam wondered the same thing.
“I think it has to do with that little man who took your box,” Lyra answered.
“As if this weren’t complicated enough, now we have those psychic midgets to worry about.”
“They are not midgets,” Lyra corrected. “They are Mikraino, and they ...”
“Right, Lyra, I know. I don’t mean to be sceptical,” Travis explained, this time without humour or sarcasm. “You have proven to me, at the very least, that you have talents I don’t understand. And Liam, I hate to question your judgment, but right now I feel
we are taking on a challenge we cannot meet. This whole plan of yours to confront the King, it doesn’t seem much like a plan to me.”
“Maybe not, Travis, but seeing as how the two of you compose my entire army, storming the gates is not really an option,” replied Liam. “No offense to your skills as a soldier.”
“I might be offended if I had any skills, but storming the gates seems about as sensible as what you are doing now. Arconus will have you killed the moment he sees you.”
“Not if I can handle this the right way,” Liam answered. “Lyra will help me, and you will stand ready in case I need some help getting away.”
“Right,” muttered Travis, who had no idea how he would be of any use trying to sneak the most wanted man in Jeandania through the centre of the capital. “Right.”
~Æ~
Arconus walked with his advisors through the city towards the castle. He listened with only one ear to the yammering of his Secretary of the Interior. He understood the subject, and had already decided upon the matter which the secretary was currently trying to explain. In another mood he might have scolded his advisor for being so vacuous, but for the moment he was content to allow his underling to effect the pretence of kingdom business, while the King’s mind remained free to reflect on other things.
As far as he could tell, the country was under his control. But what was he to do about this damned Liam Foster? The people loved him. He already had their respect and loyalty. He was the kind of man Arconus’s father used to talk about, a man who inspired loyalty, rather than demanded it. The world had never been good enough for his father. He always complained about how things were spinning out of control because of the lack of order, of discipline, and of simple good manners that kept a culture together. His brother had been the cultured one. His brother, like his father, had an interest in things beautiful, orderly, and in proper good grace that Arconus had never shared. To distract himself with such petty interests would be to leave himself vulnerable to those who did not. His brother proved that. His brother had long been dead at Arconus’s order, and now Arconus was King.
Arconus had always known that he was not the favourite son, but his father and mother turned their attention to him after his brother’s death. They seemed to feel guilty that the young Arconus had been deprived of his brother, and in such a traumatic way. Occasionally Arconus thought he saw a glint in the eye of his mother, a suspicion that his brother’s death might not have been an accident, but this was usually followed by a guilt-ridden burst of generosity towards her second son, as if to apologise for the affront of suspecting the truth. It had occurred to Arconus that perhaps he should feel guilty that he manipulated his parents so. But it had always been a fleeting thought, easily snubbed by reason. How useless was it to feel guilt about something that helped him to achieve his goals?
But now it was time to stop this incompetent fool’s prattle.
~Æ~
The three ceased speaking as they drew nearer to the centre of the assembly. Liam again became self-conscious of the uniform he was wearing, but when he looked down he saw that the garments he wore were now his own familiar clothing.
“How did you do that?” Liam asked.
“A long time ago a man enchanted the entire road of Kraal, so that those who knew how to use the spell, could cast the illusion of a changing wardrobe. You actually pulled off your first spell, in a sense. Congratulations.”
“What do you mean?” Liam asked.
“Well, I helped you along. I set out the soldier’s clothes for you, but changed them to your own clothes without you noticing, before you put them on. That set the spell going. The trick is that you have to believe in your mind that everyone can see it, and since you thought you were putting on the soldier’s clothes, the spell worked.”
“What?” Travis asked, then thought better of it. “Never mind.”
“Look there,” Liam said. He could see that the assembly was stirring at the other end of the open hall. Liam felt a surge of anxious energy rise in his chest. That was sure to be the King and his entourage passing through the crowd. Lyra had been right. She had timed this encounter perfectly. He turned to remark about what a good job she had done, but Lyra and Travis had disappeared.
Liam found himself standing at the centre of the assembly, and the King was walking straight towards him. As he removed the last remnant of his costume, his hat, people recognised him immediately. It was time for Liam to face his daughter’s murderer, and the one who drove Rhoie to his death.
The King was speaking harshly to one of his advisors as he passed through the assembly, not paying attention to his surroundings. The crowd parted for him as he moved, and parted around Liam as the King grew closer. Liam stood his ground, blocking the King’s path, and the entourage stopped in front of him. Some of the King’s escort looked up, affronted at the gall of a man standing in the path of the King. Others looked on in shock, as they saw who it was who dared insult the King.
If the King were surprised, he did not show it. “Well, Mr Foster, we finally meet,” he said almost jovially as he glanced around the assembly, no doubt assessing whether Liam was alone.
“Arconus,” Liam finally acknowledged with a snarl and a nod of his head. The image of Brandi lying dead on the floor of his tavern flashed in his mind, then the image of Rhoie in the mouth of a windcat.
“That’s King Arconus,” he spat, pretences aside now. “You know I could have you killed for sedition right here in front of me.”
“I want a trial.”
~Æ~
Arconus’s brows furrowed. He was backed into a corner. Finally he had Liam Foster in hand. To kill him without a trial, after he had expressly asked for one, could be disastrous. Many of the people of Jeandania were behind this man, and Arconus knew that a dead martyr could be a more powerful foe than a live hero. He would have to dismantle the hero before disposing of him. He could not kill him now.
“Guards!” bellowed Arconus, trying to control his anger. “Please take Mr Foster to his cell. Be sure he is comfortable. We will hold a trial on the third day of the carnival.”
XXVII
Most attribute the emergence of the Mikraino with eyes of black in the time of the Foster Rebellion to fanciful legend. But some regard the many, varied stories of their presence as evidence in itself that they were real, at least in some form.
– Little’s Encyclopedia
Rhemus relaxed his senses as he sat comfortably in a bedroom of Filos’s modest home in the capital. He reached out through the city and beyond, to absorb the energies swirling about. He was learning how to swim in the æther. It was a term Bandalanu had used. Rhemus found Bandalanu’s memories disjointed and incomplete, but they were a great help to him as he tried to adapt to his new life. In many instances he could recall words and phrases, and even specific thought processes that Bandalanu had experienced in his lifetime, but the actual comprehension of many of the concepts could only be assimilated through experience. Æther was the word Bandalanu, and some teachers before him, had used to describe the patterns of energy, the balance of events, of wills and probabilities that defined the fates of all living things.
Rhemus focused. At the moment the æther seemed to be coalescing. As rain on a hillside eventually finds its way back to the ocean; events, thoughts and happen-stance all seemed to be flowing towards a specific inevitable destination. Rhemus could not see the outcome, but he could sense the flow, and now it flowed through the castle, where Liam Foster was kept awaiting his trial. He could feel disparate energies flowing through the city, some with purpose, some caught in the current, but all moving towards the castle. Rhemus did not understand how, but he was certain that the resolution of the conflict between Foster and the King was the only way to keep the æther flowing in the direction most important to him, to a place where he might be able to bring his people together again.
Filos had encouraged him to explore his gifts, to travel through his own mind as if it were a journey al
l its own, and Rhemus was beginning to solve the mystery of his condition, and that of the other Mikraino.
Before Bandalanu’s death, Rhemus had not understood the extent of his gifts. He was eight-years-old and had little concept that the manner in which he perceived the world was much different than it was for anyone else. At first it seemed very odd to him that others did not behold the world the way he did, but now he realised that others must feel the same way about him. He was becoming more curious about the concept of sight. It was clear that this sense was something others relied on heavily, and sometimes with great pleasure. Colours were very important to them, and apparently certain members of the opposite sex were much more visually appealing than others. He understood the appeal of the opposite sex, but he could not imagine how the reflection of light from their bodies or faces might be more attractive on one person, and less attractive on another.
Nor could he understand why one would enjoy a painting. Filos had described to him some of the paintings they passed as they walked through town, Rhemus posing as a toddler in a pack on Filos’s back. To Rhemus, a painting was no more beautiful than the sand on the ground, or the bricks in the walls. It was lifeless, with very little distinction from the lifeless objects around it. But Rhemus knew beauty. He understood the sense of pleasure and pride in humanity that Filos spoke of when discussing art. He had similar feelings when experiencing a sunset, or walking through a healthy forest, or simply witnessing the wondrous warmth and beauty of a human being in an act of kindness. This appreciation of earthly beauty had always been with him, but through the spirit of Bandalanu, that appreciation seemed something far more meaningful, something exquisite. He believed somehow that appreciation must, in some way, be similar to what people felt when they interacted with art. It amazed him that such a lifeless object could elicit those feelings.
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