by P. S. Power
Looking down at the lovely white linen table cloth Tor felt the blood rush from his face. He hadn't known of course, about any of this. Burks had sent his mother into hiding and never even told Mary, who considered herself true family, that she was alive at all? Not even after the whole thing had been uncovered nearly a year before? Gods. So now Tor had to explain it all to her?
Well, that was fair.
Just like his mother too, dumping all the unpleasant tasks on a boy. Taking a deep breath he decided to do just that, since Mary Cannor deserved to know as much as anyone in the world, and spoke uninterrupted for nearly five minutes, the woman shaking and finally tears coming down her face. When he ended the story he expected her to storm out, probably taking the kids with her.
Who could blame her? Insane or not, and Tor was starting to think she was closer to high strung than crazy, someone should have told her. It also shouldn't have had to be him. Seriously, he was so going to have to talk to his mother about it. Count Lairdgren too. Him first probably. You didn't do things like that to people!
Instead of going wild and trying to hit him or even screaming, though he was braced for it, the woman walked around the table slowly, her steps making just the faintest clicks on the hard marble under her leather soles. When she got to him the woman swallowed and slowly, almost as if wary herself, pulled him into a gentle hug.
“Laurali's alive? And… I have grandchildren?” She whispered in his ear.
Tor nodded and said yes. He left out exactly how many grandchildren, not wanting to overwhelm the poor woman. There were eleven of them.
Blood relative or not, if the woman had grieved for his mother, thinking her dead for years and called her daughter, that counted, right? Apparently it did to Mary Cannor, since she didn't let go.
Chapter Two
Tor discovered two things about Mary Cannor very quickly. The first was that she had a kind of off-putting body odor. That was probably due to the fact that she'd spent the last week riding in one form of carriage or another without stopping for anything. Awful things, carriages. Slow and bumpy rides at the best of time, probably a lot worse on the unkempt roads between the major cities. Plus hot in the spring and summer when you got near the Capital. The second thing was that she might be crazy, but that didn't mean stupid at all. She'd come for the kids, true, they were her heirs and family, her great nephew and niece, but also to try and score some better weapons for her forces. She almost instantly tried to get Tor to agree to make some for her people for free.
Before he could agree, since, obviously he was going to help out family that way, Gerald stood and cleared his throat.
“Aunt Mary?” He sounded tentative, but by calling attention to himself he almost instantly found himself wrapped in the much taller woman’s arms. He did a credible job of hugging her back at least, even if she did smell.
“Um, sorry, I was going to say that there's a waiting list for things from Master Tor. He put me in charge of scheduling and, well, I've decided that the counties around Ward need to be provisioned first. That means Printer, Morris and Callwood. Then other people who might be attacked by Austra or the Ward's directly. After that, well, since Cannor is sending all their forces to fight, we need to get them in too, but Master Tor can only do so much work in a day…” After he spoke he looked down, then, without anyone saying anything his eyes popped open wide and he gulped, looking directly at Tor, seeming a little scared suddenly.
Tor just shrugged. It was a plan and when he stopped to consider it, one that made sense. Better than his just doing what everyone asked, which had been the previous idea. Ward was his major concern at the moment too after all. Down the table Holly agreed vocally, letting them all know that it sounded like a good idea, even if she did benefit from it directly. From the other end of the table Rich cleared his throat.
“Indeed. Don't forget the kingdom in there though Squire Gerald. Oh, that reminds me. Would you Gerald Negev Cannor and you Gemma Negev Cannor, both please rise?” Smiling the King walked around the table, coming to them, and having them kneel. The words were familiar to Tor, basically telling them that they were good people and great things were expected from them. The — or else — was implied.
“Arise Sir Gerald, Sir Gemma.” A large hand had been placed on each of their heads with a big smile, even though the King had to go to one knee himself to reach that low in a dignified manner. They all stood.
“Sir Gerald.” Tor said softly. “Sir Gemma.”
That was the one weird thing about all this. When a woman became a Knight, she was called “sir” not lady. The same was true for a Squire, though after the first ceremony the sir didn't get used at all, they were just Squire whoever and that generally only when being introduced to someone new, with a full explanation of their situations. The King stood and spun on Tor.
“I know this may seem a little odd, but your assistant isn't going to be your Squire, Tor. Instead I'm putting him with Sir Kolbrin. The truth is, you just don't have time, or need, for a real Squire. Squire Gemma…” The King chuckled. “Karina, you asked to do the honors…”
The Princess rose and walked around the table not stopping until she reached Trice.
“Lady Patricia Alyson Morgan, Ducherina third, please rise.” She said it with such a serious tone that Trice’s eyes went wide. Probably scared that Karina was going to lop off the other arm. Fair enough. Even if it had been for her own good, that kind of thing had to leave scars. Trice managed to find her feet though.
“Please kneel…” The little ceremony took longer, because there was a listing of deeds needed for a Knight. You only needed three, which Patricia had, even though it was news to Tor. The first one listed, everyone knew. She'd heroically saved them all not a week before. Hard to miss that.
The next Tor suspected, but hadn't known for certain. She had, under orders from the King himself, sacrificed her love, him, he realized instantly, to infiltrate the Ward estate and seek evidence on them. Apparently calling him names in public counted as heroic now. Hearing it said out loud made him cringe.
Then his stomach and heart fell horribly, a deep plummet that made him wonder if things inside him had actually come loose for a moment. After all, he'd nearly killed her for that, for hurting him, and built a weapon that probably shouldn't exist to take out almost everyone else too, after hearing her malign him in a restaurant about nine months before, or was it less? Tor didn't even know what day or month it was to tell the truth. His head hung a little thinking about it. About Trice.
She'd been ordered to say those things by the King? Probably forbidden to tell him either, so that it would all look real. God. Why? Taking a deep breath Tor turned to stare at the King, who at least had the grace to look embarrassed. Connie looked down too. She knew the whole time? All that, the hurt he'd felt, the pain, his anger and tearing himself apart over it for most of a year and she knew? But… She was supposed to like him.
The last deed was about something that he'd never even heard of, saving some woman's life. The name wasn't familiar at all, Deborah Harding? It meant nothing. Something about a waterfall?
Looking at Rolph, Tor realized something then, his friend, his best friend in the whole world, had known. It was there in his eyes, the shamed look on his face. How long? Across the table Varley looked down after catching his eye. Her too? Gods, had everyone known the whole time?
Probably not, Rolph wasn't such a good actor that he could have hidden it from him, not at the restaurant or in the days after. Was he? Tor started to shake with rage. Next to him Ger went pale and suddenly skipped back, pulling Gemma and Mary away with him and, rather wisely, triggering his shield at the same time.
“Please rise, Sir Patricia!” Karina, down the table a ways said loudly. Just to be cute she tapped Trice on the nose. “Bodabink- you're a Knight!”
Everyone not staring at him and moving back, laughed.
Tor stood himself.
“Sir Patricia.” He said, his voice going dark and b
itter, even to his own ears as the combat rage took him. She'd not only humiliated him in public, something he'd basically made peace with, because she claimed that she was doing it to try and find the people that tried to poison him after all, but the King made her do it? And even after everything, no one had told him? They were all just laughing at him then? Having a go with him? Was he just a joke or a game to them all then?
Without moving or gesturing at all the table blew away from him, lifting up and over the chairs on the far side easily and crashing into the wall behind them, some forty feet away. Everyone at the table stayed in place, having shields on, he realized, but most of them still moved away, running for the side of the room. Tor tried to calm himself, he'd done it before, but this time he couldn't care enough to drop into the needed trance state.
Instead he glared at the King.
“You! It was all your doing? What did I ever do to you? You know… Forget it. I'm out of here. Don't talk to me again. Ever!” He shouted the last part, knowing that it sounded childish but not caring. Everything had been a set up, Rich had ordered his fiancee to tell the world about how much she hated him and how stupid and ugly he was? Fine.
They could run their little war without him then. He almost demanded all the money that the kingdom owed him, but decided to just forget about it. He didn't really need gold. They could take it and shove it up their collective royal asses for all he cared.
They'd probably enjoy it even, stupid royal freak perverts.
Tor stormed out just heading towards the nearest exit once he got into the stone lined hallway. It was hard to navigate the palace, it was so huge and he'd spent most of his time in his room here, not exploring or learning the place.
That didn't matter. All he needed right now was to get outside. For a second he was tempted to just build an explosive field and blast his way through the walls, but realized that there might be innocent people on the other side. Even enraged he wouldn't risk killing an innocent person. Not just for this. Instead he stopped and looked around.
“How do I get the hell out of here?” He asked the air, his voice and body trembling hard. After a moment a man, who looked about forty, giant of course, wearing the black and purple of the Royal Guard stepped out of the wall. A panel had opened up from behind a cloth hanging.
“Follow me please, sir.” He said, his voice sounding humble and a little scared. Normally being scared of a giant Royal Guard was Tor's job, not the other way around, but that didn't make a difference right now either. Tor followed. If the man was misleading him, he'd… Well, he'd probably run away. It wasn't the guards fault if he worked for jerks, was it? They were selected for training as tiny children, it wasn't like he'd ever had a real choice in the matter or anything.
They walked down a half dozen hallways, maybe more, switching back and forth, before they reached a door that took them outside. When he got there twenty armed Royal Guards stood waiting for him. No one pointed their weapons at him at least. They didn't move on him either.
“Master Tor sir…” One of them said, a woman he didn't recognize really, but who felt familiar, if that was a thing. “We, ah, we don't really know what to do. It… wouldn't be good for you to go into town in this state, but…” She didn't shrug or do anything he could take the wrong way. Right, he was insane right now, wasn't he? But not crazy enough to stay here with these monsters that had done what they did to him. Why? Just to get the Wards? They still could have told him at any time, even if it had really been the only way, but no, he didn't rate knowing why people were destroying his life, did he?
All he had on was a shield. Not even a temperature equalizing field. Screw it, he decided and closed his eyes for a minute, still shaking. He'd built a thousand flight fields hadn't he, ten thousand? He could make one now that would be good enough to get him out of there. Raising his left hand he lifted into the air and started flying, in the dark, towards home.
It was a fantastically stupid thing to do of course.
The second the combat rage stopped, he'd be stuck, forced to land, if not just plummeting from the sky to his death. Well, he had a real shield, so he'd live. Most likely at least. A few people had crashed while flying, but so far no one died, the shields took care of that.
Torrance was tempted for a moment to turn the shield off and just let it happen. Instead he focused on the flight and twenty minutes later, as he started to calm down, he just landed, going so slowly and carefully that when the field cut out he was still nearly twenty feet up in the air. The ground cracked and thumped when he hit and his legs buckled, slapping hard into his chest, pain ripping through him.
As he lay on his side he got it. When he'd thought about deactivating the shield, his personal intent had done it. Oops. Combat rage led to direct effect, which in this case apparently led to broken legs. He felt them with his hand. No blood at least. They were broken, sure, resting at funny angles both, but not that badly, he'd live. Probably.
The worst was his right leg, halfway to the knee. There was a lump that wasn't normal at all, and it hurt a lot, so Tor did the only thing he could and dropped into a work trance, fighting to build a field around himself in the cool night air. What could he do though? A though occurred to him, one that he'd never even considered before. Could he build a healing field? They existed, Master Builder Maris made most of them of course, putting out about one per year. She only made one-ups and they cost tens of thousands of golds apiece. She only built them for a specific person too, Tor had heard. One that worked for one person didn't do it for another at all.
What did it take though? Did he have to understand the healing mechanism or… What would happen if he just told the injury to go back to the way it was before? Fix the field? Could he do that? It took hours of focus, but he had time, so just worked without concern for anything but the field he held.
Finally there was a pop, a sense of movement from his right leg, and a sudden absence. At first he wondered if he'd made his leg go away somehow, but that wasn't it, the pain was just gone. He held the field, but nothing new was happening. That being the case he forced himself out of that deep state and tried to climb to the surface, near where everyone else lived most the time. Once there Tor looked around. It was still pitch black out and he was lying on his side in the dirt. Poking at his right leg gently he found that it was there still, and more, it didn't hurt. It felt… normal. Gingerly, ready to fall down in pain again, Tor stood. The leg held, both did. It didn't even ache.
So healing could be done just by reminding a body to be healthy and making that idea strong enough? It should be possible to make an item for that. One that would work for anyone too. Complicated but doable.
Tor slapped his shield on, using it as a buffer against the dirt and lay down again. He was exhausted. Combat rage, no matter how good a reason you had for it, or even that you didn't get into a fist fight with the object of your anger, did that to you. Tor dreaded the headache he was going to have in the morning, but he'd live.
He just wouldn't want to.
Everyone had known? What the hell? There had been signs now that he knew about it himself. Ursala and Sara had both refused to tell him why Trice had done it, but they knew that she didn't mean the awful things she'd said. He'd always thought they were just standing by their friend, but now… Had all his friends been in on it the whole time?
No. Kolb didn't know… did he? Tor didn't know that, honestly. The man was an enigma. A deadly fighter, Knight and even head of the King’s secret army, but Tor had set him up in that last bit, hadn't he? So the man might or might not know.
Major Godfrey… Well, there was no reason for him to know and Sorlee wouldn't have been told anything either. She'd have probably let it slip to him, right? Even though there were no debts between friends, she still acted like she owed him for helping to save her parents farm. That had only taken gold though.
Tor dozed and, as he figured he would, woke up with an almost crippling headache, it was bad enough that he dry heave
d for a while before he started walking north, towards his house. The near vomiting did nothing to make him feel better. Actually it made his head throb and feel like something inside was about to burst. He didn't know how far he'd gotten towards it the night before, the wasteland looked pretty much the same through about a hundred and fifty miles past the Capital, then the only change would be that it had a little more rock on the reddish surface. There was no water in this part, unless the falcons was up and running. If that was the case he could get some there, which shouldn't be more than fifty miles or so ahead, right? After another ten minutes of walking he had to start laughing.
He was a builder.
Duh.
The reaction headache must be making him stupid he decided. That, Tor knew wasn't even just him being hard on himself, it really did kind of knock the intelligence down for a while, messing with how the brain worked until you recovered. Thinking was hard and slow for him in the moment, which probably meant it would be a good idea to avoid life changing decisions for the time being too. No one was at their best after something like that.
Tor looked down and found two small rocks, both nicely smooth and red colored. One was shot with a deep black and a little bigger than the other. Sitting down he made a Not-flyer, a military grade one, into the stones. The bigger piece went into his inner pants pocket and the other he just held in his right hand, palm down. Reaching over he just tapped the back of his own hand, using focus to send a jolt of intent to the stone clutched inside. He rose four inches off the ground and after a few seconds started moving forward at about eighty miles per hour. The Falcons river, the floating one that he'd built the year before to help reduce the effects of a drought in County Ford, wasn't turned on at the moment it seemed, which made sense; if there was no need for it, why bother? That didn't matter, because, with only a little searching he found the front gate of Wilderness Station easily enough. His home.