Men are so lucky, she grouched to herself. Even their formal clothes are mostly suitable for a variety of situations.
She, of course, couldn’t say the same. So when the female guard, the mind mage Rosea, came up to the Lady Companion and quietly offered a change of clothes, her only spare set, Ciardis couldn’t help but thank her profusely.
Blushing Rosea said, “They’re just simple things milady. Nothing fancy – an old set of riding clothes I keep in case of need.”
Ciardis asked without even a hint of irony, “Have you ever tried to ride sidesaddle in a gown?”
Rosea replied nervously, “No.”
“It’s something I learned during my training and have rarely put into effect again,” Ciardis said solemnly. “I can’t imagine I’d project much confidence falling off my horse as we jumped a creek.”
“I don’t suspect you would,” Rosea said through choked laughter.
So Ciardis took the garments gratefully and changed looking up at the midday sun all the while, knowing they had hours to get their side of the ley lines activated or all of this strife would have been for nothing.
Each of the minders quickly grouped with their loyalists and the attendants assigned to them, they all said perfunctory goodbyes — even the triumvirate — and prepared to ride off. Ciardis personally wanted to get to her coordinates before the sun set. After conferring with the lieutenant, she knew that it wasn’t far away, in fact the separate activation points were practically atop of each other. Whether that was a bit of luck or by design she didn’t know. But it meant that it would only be minutes to get there which were still precious time indeed, when the gods had stripped them of days of preparations in their quest to save them.
Face hard as she mounted the horse that would cross the rest of the way with her contingent, Ciardis said, “We’re going to come back home. To Sandrin. All of us.”
Sebastian said solemnly, “From your lips to heaven’s ears.”
Then he seemed to realize what he had just said and stood mortified.
Then Thanar started laughing and Ciardis couldn’t help it, she did too. Even Sebastian joined in.
When they looked back up at each other, Sebastian said, “Well maybe not all of heaven’s ears.”
Grinning, Ciardis urged her horse ahead and she and her contingent moved out — hoping against hope that she would see them soon. Very soon. But knowing that regardless of when that occurrence happened, she would get her part done and they would too.
It didn’t take long to get to the destination point, side-by-side with Terris. Ciardis dismounted and stared at a green hedge that was long enough and tall enough to hide the secrets of the world behind its greenery.
“It’s through here?” Ciardis asked the lieutenant who had been assigned to ride as point with her and her contingent.
“It is,” said the lieutenant while stepping back after looking at the opening with sufficient suspicion. He clearly had wanted to see if any attackers were waiting beyond those hedge walls. Ciardis couldn’t see any further into the hedge shadows than an arm’s length and she doubted he could either but she let him complete his assessment. He had a job to do after all and so did she.
The lieutenant then waved forward a master mage and that man too checked the perimeter for any deceitful tricks or worse…traps which would foil their plans.
When the mage turned around and Ciardis saw his face, she thought that whatever it was he found was worse than a trap.
“What is it?” Ciardis demanded urgently while striding forward.
Stress on his face the master mage hurried to meet her and said, “This is the entrance to where the ley line lodestone you’ll need to overpower the barbarian horde lies.”
“But?” Ciardis asked impatiently — sensing that there was something he was not saying and wanting to know immediately.
“But,” said the master mage halting nervously as he picked up on her mood.
Ciardis supposed he could have also been scared of the little lightning fingers that were now radiating off her hands, but she wasn’t going to quell them. She wanted to be mad and she wanted to stay mad. From this point on she needed to be ready for the appearance of a goddess at any time, and having her magic on edge would help with that. She might have only seconds to activate her side of the ritual and she was losing precious time to do that even as they spoke.
“Tell them,” snapped the lieutenant now while looking at the master mage with no little irritation.
Gathering up what spine he had left, the master mage quickly said, “There seems to be a binding on the entrance. Only the ones who will activate the ley line lodestone itself can enter. I could possibly override this feature though…with time.”
“How much time?” Ciardis asked.
“Four days,” the master mage replied. “If I’m lucky.”
The guards stayed silent but the non-militia attendants were more vocal in their dismay. They knew what such a delay would have on the safety of the empire, their family, their friends, and their homes.
The lieutenant growled, “We don’t even have that many hours, can’t you do it any quicker man?”
“I can’t,” the master mage said back in a harassed voice. “Trust me, even if it meant burning out my mage core I would do it. But all you would get is four dead mages and no entrance into the hedge if I tried.”
“Fine,” Ciardis said while thinking rapidly then turned to the lieutenant. “You’ve escorted us this far. Terris and I will go in alone.”
“Lady Companion,” the guard immediately said as he began to object.
But Ciardis outranked him and she knew that. Holding up a hand, she said, “Please do as I ask. Let the master mage and an apprentice seal the hedge entrance behind us to prevent anyone else, including enemies, from following us through, leave three guards behind for prowlers, and then take the majority of your forces to the front lines.”
Shock, then respect, grew in the lieutenant’s eyes as he listened to her instructions.
The last request initiated a query for clarification from him though.
“Milady?” the lieutenant, who was becoming wise to the fact that Ciardis Weathervane was more than a pretty face, said.
“You heard me,” Ciardis said with a bark only softened by the soft assurance in her eyes. “Do as I ask, Lieutenant?”
He nodded and saluted, “Your will will be done Lady Companion Weathervane.”
“Good,” Ciardis said as she followed up with a concern. “Now I assume you’ve already gotten missives from the deployed conclave members on where they are most in need of aid and the battles they are fighting in the countryside.”
The man straightened with a snap of his heels. “Yes, milady! The Lady Danforth sent word this morning. The goddess’s forces have all left the gates of Ban and begun their march now.”
Terris edged forth upon hearing that. Interest sparkling oddly in her dead eyes.
The loyalist asked with quiet calm, “Where do you think they’re heading Lieutenant?”
He didn’t hesitate before answering. Terris and Ciardis couldn’t have been more grateful. She had noticed that some of the guards shied away from even looking in the loyalist’s direction. Whether it was the unique effect the transformation had on her skin, making her stand out as different, or merely the fact that she walked and breathed as they did while being technically dead — they still were skittish around her.
Ciardis knew that if they could have only known Terris as she had been before the awakening ceremony things would be different but neither she nor they had the time for such camaraderie.
Besides anything that is different is anathema in others’ eyes, Ciardis reasoned in her head.
She knew that even if they could enjoy Terris for who she was, they would never forget what she was.
“South,” the lieutenant answered while breaking Ciardis from her own musings. “They’re heading with overwhelming forces south as they cut through the land like a s
cythe.”
Ciardis frowned. That didn’t sound good.
“Trouble, Lieutenant?” Ciardis said.
“Very much so ma’am,” the lieutenant replied his eyes bitter. “The Lady Danforth reports that the horde is ravenous.”
“For what?” Ciardis said, her mouth suddenly dry as she imagined all sorts of unmentionable deeds — lechery, savagery, debauchery. None of them pleasant in her eyes but what he said next had even her stumped.
“Flesh,” the lieutenant replied grimly.
Ciardis thought she had misheard him. “Say again Lieutenant.”
Then the lieutenant met her eyes and repeated his statement while adding, “They’ve been eating alive everything they come across.”
“Livestock?” Terris asked horrified.
“Humans,” the man replied while fairly spitting with rage. “Beasts, fowl, kith. It matters not. Child or adult.”
“May the gods be merciful,” Ciardis said while muttering an old empire prayer — forgetting for the moment that the gods were the reason they were in this mess in the first place.
“Yes,” said the lieutenant. “So we must do what we can to stop them before they get to their ultimate destination.”
“Let me guess,” Terris said grimly. “The city by the sea?”
The lieutenant nodded. “Yes, the Lady Danforth indicated that the entirety of the conclave does believe that is their intended target. It would be the ultimate accomplishment for the goddess’ forces to take it, with or without her help, and we must do what we can to protect it.”
“Agreed,” said Terris with a fierce grin.
Ciardis observed their conversation quietly but didn’t intervene. It was good to see the spark of life, however fleeting, back in Terris’s eyes.
The lieutenant continued as he spoke to both of them, “Your efforts here will be the key to that, but now that you’ve given us permission to reinforce the militias on the front lines I believe that we too can make a difference.”
“That you can,” Ciardis said faintly while trying to keep her meager breakfast down as she thought about the swathe of blood and carnage the horde was already inflicting on the countryside. “May the wind have your backs.”
“Yours too,” the lieutenant said as he hesitated.
Thinking that he didn’t want to turn away from her even once, Ciardis reverted back to the formalities of protocol, bowed, and ushered Terris toward the maze entrance.
“And ma’am?” the lieutenant said when she had gone a few steps away.
“Yes?” Ciardis said turning around a bit annoyed at being recalled.
He gave Ciardis a short bow but indicated with his gaze that he’d been referring to Terris.
Curious and a little embarrassed Ciardis took a conspicuous step back as the loyalist, her friend, stepped forward.
Then the lieutenant straightened to his full height and the full contingent fell into arrangement behind him, not including two perimeter guards who were scouts to keep aware of any enemies.
Together, mages and guards, saluted Terris with the sign of the Algardis Empire.
And Ciardis watched as emotional tears fell down her beautiful, but dead, best friend’s face.
She didn’t ruin Terris’s moment by interrupting or interfering. She just watched as every man and woman shook the loyalist’s hand and then silently went to do as Ciardis Weathervane bid.
When Terris came back to stand by Ciardis’s side, she looked overwhelmed.
Ciardis tried not to stare as she turned away to look at the dark gate in the hedge.
Softly she asked friend-to-friend, “Ready?”
Terris squared her shoulders and then hesitated.
Ciardis wondered if she wanted to back out. Knowing she couldn’t. Ciardis had set her on a path that was irreversible.
But instead Terris held out her gloved left hand from underneath her cloak.
Surprised and wondering if that is what she meant, Ciardis let her own hand reach out. And their hands met. Side-by-side the two friends walked hand-in-hand into the dark maze.
29
Walking into the maze Ciardis felt her heart thumping loudly.
It was quiet. Too quiet.
There were no rustle of leaves nor chittering sound of bugs. Jut emptiness. Even light did not penetrate its tall walls. Darkness awaited their every step.
That was the first and only thing she rectified immediately upon stepping foot inside. Ciardis figured a little light to see by couldn’t hurt them or trigger the traps the last reigning empress had presumably left behind. So she called all the lightning that was pleasantly jumping around in her hands to drift down from her fingertips and coalesce into a bright, glowing mage ball in the center of her palm.
Holding it up comfortably, Ciardis smiled as the light gave them a view far beyond what its little size would seem to be able to convey. As they rounded the first corner they dropped their clasped hands and prepared for battle — whatever came their way.
Terris drew a longsword from her back scabbard and held it confidently in front of her.
For her part Ciardis increased what perimeter defenses she could call up around both of them and kept her magical feelers out, looking for any intrusions in the area surrounding them. She found nothing.
Then Terris giggled a bit.
“What?” Ciardis asked curiously as she warily looked about.
“Did you ever imagine in the days of our first Companions’ Guild soirees that we would be halfway across the empire, sword in-hand and battling a goddess?” Terris finally asked. “I know this was not what my mother had in mind when she sent me away to finishing school.”
Ciardis’s mouth twitched into a smile. “Some finishing school.”
Ciardis could practically hear Terris’s eyes roll in response but all her friend said was, “I’m serious Ciardis Weathervane.”
“Well,” Ciardis said as she actually thought carefully about her answer to Terris’s question. “Yes and no.”
“What do you mean?” Terris quietly asked.
“Well look at our mentors,” Ciardis said honestly. “You have an assassin as yours and I soon found out that Serena was very much not what she seemed — being the most wanted woman in the empire for starters.”
“That is true,” Terris said ruefully.
“Yes,” Ciardis said. “While I didn’t expect this, I’ve grown into the role and adapted to its challenges. Now if you’d ask me if I wanted to join the Companions’ Guild as a young woman and having been given a brutal look at all the challenges I would face in doing so, I would have said no.”
“Then,” Terris asked in a leading voice.
“Yes,” Ciardis said hesitantly.
“And now?” Terris asked as they carefully made their ways around large roots from trees which were not visible in their row of the maze but presumably were nearby.
“What do you mean?” Ciardis asked, troubled. “I’ve made my bed. I can’t exactly undo my past.”
“No, you can’t,” Terris said quietly. “But no one’s going to force you to live a life you don’t desire. Least of all Sebastian. You could resign from the Guild. Live out your life, a simple one mind you, on the money you’ve gathered together already as an official Companion of so many years.”
“Of course I could,” Ciardis snapped defensively.
“But you don’t want to,” Terris concluded.
“No, I don’t,” Ciardis admitted without even realizing what she was admitting to. “What’s the point of this conversation Terris?”
Terris stopped and looked at her head on. “To remind you that you have choices.”
Ciardis opened her mouth feeling a little ashamed in the moment at the stark reminders on Terris’s flesh that she in fact didn’t possess the same options.
But Terris waved away any self-recriminations and said, “I’m not here to be your persecutor Ciardis, I just have some keen insights into life since dying and I just wanted you to know that ev
en when you feel trapped, there’s always freedom if you turn another way.”
She paused to look over and see if Ciardis was absorbing what she had said. When it was clear she had, Terris continued, “Now the ley lines are close. I can feel that. Two more turns in the maze and we’ll be there. Let’s go.”
Stunned into silence Ciardis Weathervane followed meekly behind the friend that seemed to have grown wiser each-and-every day.
When they finally reached the end of the maze as Terris had indicated, Ciardis was gratified to see that the edifice which held the lodestone wasn’t a grim, imposing structure with crumbling walls as she’d expected. Instead they were greeted by a small square building with high ceilings and made of a white stone of some sort in the center of the maze. Four stately columns lined the front of the exterior and soft glowing mage lights welcomed them to venture inside.
Wary but excited, Ciardis thought, Wouldn’t it be grand if all evil lairs were this inviting?
She was joking but it was a nice change of pace for the woman used to wading though cobwebs, waste, and dirt to get into the empire’s most secret chambers.
Calmly, quietly, she and Terris walked up the stairs and into the light that shown from inside the single-room building.
Inside the room was a simple arrangement, just a single altar in a bench format that was carved of pure white marble. It had veins of magic glowing in it that threw streaky shadows that glimmered all throughout the box of a room.
A little unsteady at the sheer beauty of it all Ciardis looked around for any nasty surprises coming their way but there were none. The floor was covered in the same marble as were the walls, but they didn’t glow with magic — just the central altar did.
“The ley line lodestone,” Terris said in an almost reverential tone.
Sharply Ciardis asked, “You recognize it?”
“Oh yes,” Terris said in a dreamy voice as she kept walking forward. “This is it.”
“This altar?” Ciardis asked skeptically.
Terris smiled and gave her an amused look, “The lodestones come in all different sizes. I can feel my fellow loyalists reacting to theirs just as I am reacting to mine.”
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