by Edun, Terah
Sebastian was more direct. “It’s not important. Just know we’ll be relocating soon. We’ve discovered it’s not safe to be in residence in a place so publicly known.”
“Not under the protection of the guards at the imperial court, sire?” Meres said. “Wouldn’t it safer for you there?”
“Not at this moment, it wouldn’t,” said Sebastian, his voice dark.
Meres’s face turned pragmatic. “If you need my swords, my lord, I am no more than two days’ ride from your city.”
“We are in need,” Sebastian admitted reluctantly. “The courts have changed much since I left two seasons ago. Allies have become enemies and enemies become rivals. With our goal in peril, I cannot trust the imperial guardsmen.”
“And what goal is that?” asked Terris slowly.
Ciardis turned to look at Terris as she said with grave concern, “The survival of this very empire.”
“It’s never simple with you, is it?” Terris said, “Not that I’d ever expect ‘simple,’ but maybe less complicated.”
“You’re one to talk,” shot back Ciardis. “I seem to remember someone else chasing after Barren in the dead night because he ‘needed our help’ and having us run straight into the hands of the Shadow Mage.” The same Shadow Mage who had then set about interrogating Ciardis before he had tried to kill her.
“I never said we weren’t two of a kind,” Terris said with a wink and an impatient toss of her thick braids over her shoulder.
Meres lifted his left hand and put it on his charge’s right shoulder. And Ciardis noticed something strange. He was wearing a wedding band.
What in the world? she had time to think.
Sebastian caught her thoughts and the direction of her confusion quickly. Now is not the time.
I was just curious, she grumbled internally while eyeing the ring speculatively.
Ciardis gave Terris a grateful smile. “Well, twin of my heart, we have more trials to face. Which is why I want you by my side. But more than the desire for your presence, I need your help in the Ameles Forest.”
A sound echoed in the distance and Thanar stood up slowly and glared down the hall. It had sounded like footsteps, but no one else was supposed to be upstairs.
He began to walk off. “I’ll see what it is.”
Sebastian stood as well and unsheathed his sword, but he stayed at Ciardis’s back to guard her.
Terris and Meres still waited for more information.
Hurriedly, Ciardis said, “I’m on the trail of something. We all have known for a long time that the princess heir chained something deadly in that cage in the center of the forest. But it turns out it has a purpose—even after her death. She hired a satyr with mind bending skills to ensure that.”
Meres frowned darkly. “That doesn’t sound good. What manner of beast was it and what purpose was it set on?”
“All we know is that she ordered it to destroy the city of Kifar on the harvest moon,” Ciardis said.
“Kifar?” said Terris, startled. “That’s many kilometers to the west. A week’s ride at best. Why would she want to destroy a city so far away? Yes, it’s large, but it’s not so important on the imperial scale of things.”
“Terris is right,” conceded Sebastian from where he stood facing the doorway, “but there must be something about Kifar that caused my aunt to focus her attentions there. Something that she wants destroyed.”
“Sire, it could be a sign of political instability if it’s destroyed. A flash in the flames and a blow to your father’s rule, certainly,” Lord Kinsight said.
Sebastian said, “It certainly could.”
Terris demurred. “But you’d think she’d choose a more important city, is all that I’m saying. There are least five in the empire whose fall would have a greater effect on its economic stability and political security.”
Meres said as he rubbed his eyes tiredly, “First things first. What kind of threat is this beast to Ameles?”
“We don’t know,” said Sebastian gravely. “Consider it dangerous for now. Don’t engage, but if any of your warriors have seen this mysterious entity, we’d appreciate a sketch and description when you ride in with your men.”
“Of course,” said Meres firmly.
“Perhaps we should start calling it the Kifar beast until we have a better idea of what we’re dealing with,” said Ciardis.
“Fine,” replied Terris.
Ciardis heard the sound of a commotion and some yelling. Quickly she turned her head and the mirror wavered in her hands. The connection was almost lost as the waves of magic jumbled in the mirror.
A worried frown appeared on Terris’s face. “Sounds like you have company?”
“Yes,” said Ciardis reluctantly.
“Then I’ll let you take care of that.”
Ciardis nodded. “Perhaps we’ll see each other again sometime.”
“Perhaps?” barked Terris, “What, do you think I’m staying in Ameles? There’s no way, girl—you need my help. I’m there.”
A small smile appeared on Ciardis’s face as she fought back tears. “I should be trying to dissuade you right now. But honestly, I can’t. I want you by my side.”
“Of course you do,” said Terris smugly.
Then an impatient squawk interrupted their conversation. Terris cooed at something off screen and then a griffin kit impatiently pushed its way into her robed lap.
“Wow,” Ciardis said. “They’ve certainly gotten bigger.”
The golden griffin was butting at Terris’s free hand, which she obliging shifted to scratch its tufted ears as its long and feathered tail twitched back and forth in enjoyment.
“Can they talk yet?”
“Not yet,” Terris said. “He’ll be talking soon enough, though. It takes griffin kits about eight months to learn human sounds, and then they develop the ability to mentally speak with beasts outside of their race a year after that.”
Ciardis nodded as she eyed the golden griffin.
“I’m glad you stayed to care for them,” she said softly, “Sometimes we need that in our lives. The innocent. The uncomplicated. The soft and cuddly.”
Terris gave her a small and understanding smile, “Especially after what we went through with that Shadowwalker and that blasted wendigo. Did I ever tell you it landed on top of me? It was when we went after Barren and the Shadowwalker kidnapped you. Grossest thing ever having its slime dripping down my back while I knew it was seconds from piercing my neck with those disgusting, razor-like teeth.”
Ciardis grimaced. “You went through a lot for me. I wouldn’t trivialize it.”
Terris scoffed and waved her mirror-free hand, which the baby griffin promptly protested with a high-shrieked bark. She returned to petting its head.
“I went through a lot for myself – to grow, to learn and most of all because I believed in what we were doing,” Terris said.
Ciardis nodded.
Terris waved her hand impatiently, “Now you know I would do anything for you. Anything. So spill.”
“The mirror in your hand and the sketch of the Kifar beast. We need both here in Sandrin within three days. And it’s not just that. We aren’t the only ones seeking information on the princess heir—either to destroy it or use it. We’re not sure yet. We’ve already been attacked twice. You have to travel fast, travel light, and trust only those you know.”
Meres and Terris exchanged a glance. They both nodded grimly.
Terris laughed. “Like I said. It’s never easy with you. So how’s Vana?”
“Always into trouble. Your mentor has a dark side. A very dark one.”
“No kidding,” Terris quipped.
For a minute all was silent. They looked at each other. Memorized each other’s faces. Noticed new features and smiled sadly. They had grown so much since their first days as companion trainees in the halls of the infamous guild. Then their moment was broken. A second griffin baby had decided that the golden one in Terris’s lap was getting m
ore than enough attention. He reared up and bit Terris’s left hand. Not hard enough to break the skin, but certainly hard of enough for her to startle and cry out as she dropped the mirror from the wounded fingers.
As it fell to the ground, Ciardis winced, expecting it to shatter into a million pieces on the hard wooden floor. But it didn’t shatter and the connection didn’t falter. Terris and Meres’s frantic faces appeared side-by-side above the mirror, Terris’s left hand clutched to her mouth in horror.
She dropped the hand and exhaled in a long sigh of relief as she said, “Thank the gods. The thick blankets on the floor broke the fall.”
But Ciardis wasn’t paying Terris’s words the least bit of attention. Her gaze was focused with eagle-sharp vision on Terris’s now visible left hand.
Ciardis’s mouth dropped open. “Terris Tatiana Kithwalker, is that a ring on your finger?!”
Terris grinned sheepishly. “Um, yeah.”
Terris and Meres looked at each other and then back at their audience.
“We’re married,” they said quietly. Ciardis heard trepidation in both of their voices.
She processed that. She wanted to leap to reassure her close friend and the man she trusted that she approved of their union. But she couldn’t. Besides, her eye was twitching.
“And when did this happen?” Ciardis spluttered as she sat back, flummoxed.
Terris and Meres looked at each other as she said, “Recently. After caring for the kits and being paired together after the Panen people discovered how similar our gifts were. I started rehabilitating the survivors of the Shadowwalker’s attacks and Lord Meres came with me to assist. We truly belong together, Ciardis. I know that.”
“Well then, what else can I say than that I’m happy for you? I am. I truly am,” she said while looking back and forth between them.
Terris laughed. “I’m so relieved. I was kind of scared for a moment. There’s so much I need to tell you. About Meres’s powers. About mine. But what do I want to tell you most? That he is perfect for me.”
Meres smiled at his wife and took her hand.
Ciardis nodded. “Then that’s all I need to know.”
Terris gave her a grateful smile.
Sebastian said, “Congratulations to the both of you. I’m sure we’ll hear more when you arrive. Lord Kinsight, you’ll have to direct your troops to station themselves in Lineaus for proper documentation and entrance to the city. But from there it should be easy for you to get a small group of loyal men into Sandrin.”
“Of course, sire!” Meres said respectfully. Never mind the fact that Sebastian was five years younger than him. Meres Kinsight was still his vassal and Sebastian his liege lord.
Sebastian nodded. “Then we will see you in two days. Try to enter the city undetected.”
Ciardis set the mirror down and it faded to grey.
Chapter 18
Thanar returned a few minutes later.
She turned around as Sebastian greeted him at the door. “What was it?”
“Nothing,” said Thanar with a shrug of his winged shoulders.
“Nothing?” replied Sebastian in a dubious tone.
“A couple of servants came back.”
“And that’s it?”
“Isn’t that what I said?” The edge in his voice could be heard from where Ciardis sat.
It made her even less inclined to believe a word he said, but they didn’t have time to play Three Questions with Thanar. The brisk sound of knocking and the front door being opened came. Vana, Caemon, and the lord chamberlain walked upstairs one after the other in short order.
“It’s lifted,” Vana said shortly, taking a drink of ice water from the offerings the servants had put out for them.
“Good,” said Lillian. When Ciardis glared at her mother, she retroactively added, “Thank you, Lady Vana.”
Surprised, Vana looked over with a raised eyebrow. Lillian might not be Serena anymore, but she still acted like her sometimes—conceited, spoiled, and entirely ungrateful. And besides, her reluctance was written in every word. When she saw Lillian’s daughter beaming over at her, Vana lowered the brow and took a long swig of water as if she wished it were whiskey and she was in a bar drinking her sorrows away. That, or she wished she’d garroted Lillian when she’d first had the chance.
“What now?” said Caemon as he, too, grabbed a glass.
“We go to the imperial court,” said Lillian. “We find out about the trial of the duchess of Carne, if the duke was really behind these attacks, and who among the Shadow Council supported him, if so.”
“But your trial is in just two days,” protested Ciardis. “Shouldn’t we be doing things in preparation for that?”
“Like assessing allies and enemies?” snapped Lillian. She had a fair point. If they went to court they could find the motivation behind the attacks as well as who would back their mother in her case before the imperial tribunal, and who would try to undermine her, not least of which would be the duchess of Carne. But Ciardis was more worried about the emperor’s tasks and proving her mother innocent of the crimes charged, than building allies at the moment. Both of which were more immediate problems in her mind’s eye.
Unfortunately what Lillian wanted, Lillian got. And what Lillian didn’t want right now, or seemingly ever, was to talk about the former empress’s death. As she swept out of the room to get ready to go to court, she whispered something in her son’s ear. Ciardis strained to hear but was unable to make out the words. But from her twin’s facial expression, it wasn’t good.
Sebastian came up to her and intertwined his fingers in hers. “It’ll be all right. One thing at a time.”
“We haven’t even discussed the regicide case,” Ciardis pointed out in frustration. “We don’t know what evidence the courts have, who will testify against her, or even how the empress died.”
“I might be able to help with that,” said the lord chamberlain. In his hands he held a thick binder full of loose pages, pamphlets, and drawings. He set the dusty tome down onto the table with a thump that raised dust in their faces.
“What is that?” said Ciardis.
“Courtesy of the magistrate courts,” said the lord chamberlain. “Three days late and highly disorganized, but here is everything that will be brought to bear against your mother as evidence of her crimes.”
Sebastian nodded as he said, “The magistrates are required by imperial law to provide all documentation of their prosecution before the trial. But the law doesn’t state by when. It’s usually up to the defense to demand the documents ahead of time if they want to see any evidence before they walk through the courtroom doors.”
“Which is exactly why so many people go to trial with incompetent defenses and end up in shackles unable to defend their positions,” said Vana dryly from where she leaned on hardwood-paneled walls.
Ciardis grabbed the dusty tome with a cough and eased it over. As she opened the dark vellum pages, drawings fell out. As one fluttered to the floor, she picked it up. She looked at it and saw a beautiful dusky-skinned young woman with voluminous curls down to her waist. She wore a loose empire-waist gown of shell pink with pearls embroidered in the seams. A shawl was loosely draped about her elbows as she relaxed on a blanket in the sun in the height of fashion for her day.
The lord chamberlain looked over Ciardis’s shoulder at the image. “Your mother. Ever the belle of the ball.”
“I still am,” said Lillian from the doorway, where she had returned suddenly.
Ciardis looked up at her in guilt, as if she had been caught looking at something she shouldn’t have. Lillian walked over and took the drawing gently from her daughter’s hand. She traced a lingering finger over the image’s edge. And then she looked around at the gathered group—her twins, Sebastian, Vana, Thanar, Stephanie and the lord chamberlain.
“I think it’s time I told you all what happened that fateful night in the empress’s chambers.”
She sat down on a couch and beckon
ed for them all to join and surround her, like a minstrel preparing to sing her tale before a packed house of appreciative visitors. This time she would tell the tale of murder and treachery that had started it all—the hunt for the Lillian Weathervane and the fall of the entire family.
Swallowing gently, she placed the palm of her hand on Ciardis’s cheek with a pained smile. “I think you know some of this, my dear. Remember some of this. But I shall tell it so we all know the idealism of youth, the treachery of court and the pain of losing everything you didn’t know you had.”
“When you were younger, Ciardis, I lived with you in a small village in the very center of the empire,” Lillian said with a sad smile as she let her hand drift down to grip Ciardis’s open hand. “For a short while it was a happy and idyllic time—everything I'd ever dreamed of as a young girl at court. The freedom of living in the countryside, the fresh air, the honest people, and the simple way of life.”
Ciardis squeezed her hand. For the first time, the emotion in Lillian’s voice wasn’t calculated. It was raw.
Lillian paused, closed her eyes briefly, and continued “But frequently I had to run and hide, just ahead of the emperor’s assassins. Fearing for you all the while. I longed to find your brother as well, longed to avenge my friend’s death—the Empress of Algardis—and, above all else, clear our family’s name. But I couldn't do it as I was. It was hard enough to keep us hidden from the imperial patrols with our distinctive heritage. Even harder as you began to grow and desired to venture out to play with children of your own age.”
“And then?” Caemon said, his voice strained.
“And then,” Lillian said with a catch in her voice, “I remembered a tale I had heard long ago from a vendor of fine fur pelts who came to Sandrin occasionally. He had told me of one particular village that was far to the north, that many at court whispered was the most far-flung place on the imperial road.”
Looking to Ciardis, she continued as she bit her lip, “I took you there, to Vaneis. I left you with a young family and paid them to keep you in safety until I returned for you.”
Ciardis frowned and shook her head. “What family? What safety? I was passed around like chattel. Always hungry, always sleeping on dirt floors with threadbare blankets. I would have been better off with you.”