by Jamie Davis
“Damned right I’m angry.” Cari kept her voice low so Liam couldn’t overhear from the other end of the stable, but there was ice in her words. “They took this wonderful place from me and told me I was crazy for having dreams about it all the time. Now I discover it was real after all? Yeah, you’re damned right I’m pissed at them. Wouldn’t you be?”
“I’m not the daughter of a hero, or a princess-protector of the realm. I don’t know what I’d be in your shoes. How did you come to be here? Did your father finally relent and offer you a chance to return?”
“They have no idea I’m here,” Cari snapped. “I came on my own. It was by accident.” She shared a brief account of how she’d come to find herself in Fantasma. At the end, she finished by saying, “Now, I’m just trying to figure this place out and what I should do here.”
“To me, it sounds like a summoning.”
“A what?”
“A summoning. Someone here summoned you to come for a purpose. They may have been trying to call upon your father and got you by mistake, but your appearance in this place and at this time can’t be accidental, Your Highness.”
“Don’t call me that. I’m no princess and I don’t want to be known as one.”
“Oh, no, but you are. You cannot ascend the throne, but your title and rights are still yours whether you want them or not. Still, that is not what is important. What is important is your presence here in Fantasma. I suspect you have a very special purpose to fulfill. I’ll keep your secret for now, at least until we discover what it is you’re expected to do. Your family has a history of great acts of bravery and heroism in the service of the realm.”
Chance stopped talking and picked up his blade and whetstone again. He shot a glance of warning at her when she started to speak. She hadn’t realized Liam had drawn close again.
He broke the momentary silence as he walked back to them from the other side of the stable.
“I don’t know what’s taking that boy so long. I’m hungry enough to start munching on moldy hay myself. Maybe we can pass the time more constructively than just sleeping our lives away like old Thad there.”
“What did you have in mind?” Chance asked.
“Our young lady here clearly has a few limited skills with that fine blade she carries, but she could learn a few things. Perhaps we can spar a bit and see what she knows and what she still has to learn.”
Cari bristled a little at the insinuation that she didn’t have good enough skills with her sword. She was among the best with rapier work in her HEMA gym at home.
Liam must have seen her back stiffen and her expression change. He laughed at her reaction.
“You take offense at my suggestion you need work on your sword skills? Perhaps you’d care to teach us a thing or two?”
Cari opened her mouth to argue and defend her abilities with him. She stopped herself. A common guard had nearly killed her. If she hadn’t used that burst of speed skill in the duel earlier, she might have been killed before help arrived.
It helped as well that she’d witnessed the amazing skill Liam and the others demonstrated. She knew she could learn a great deal from them. Cari took a calming breath before saying anything.
“No, you’re right. I still have a great deal to learn if I’m to remain here.”
“What a strange thing to say. Where would you go if you didn’t remain here?” Liam asked.
“I think the girl means she intends to remain with us for the time being,” Chance suggested.
“Well, in that case, stand up and assume a fighting stance, Cari. Let’s see what you know and don’t know.”
Despite her fatigue and injuries, Cari stood and drew her sword and dagger.
“A two-weapon technique, I see,” Liam observed. “And you hold your dagger in an appropriate grip and not like you’d hold a hammer. Someone has at least taught you the basics well enough.”
He tapped his chest. “Come at me. Try your hardest to strike me. Don’t worry, you won’t hurt me.”
Cari’s eyes narrowed at the challenge. Here was another man discounting her abilities just because she was a woman.
Quest accepted: Train with Liam.
She assumed a guard position and then lunged at Liam, her blade snaking out at top speed while still retaining enough control to retreat and parry if needed.
Liam met her blade with his, pushing it aside easily as he smiled.
“Again.”
The smile infuriated Cari for some reason, and she launched into a series of her best attack moves until she’d exhausted her repertoire and herself. Each time he blocked her attacks, he returned to the “en garde” position and repeated his order.
“Again.”
After more than two dozen attacks, she was unable to get past his guard. The exertion of the sparring, along with her injuries, taxed her strength and left her gasping for breath.
“You’ve got some excellent basic moves, but your style is too formal, as if you’re in a contest and not the fight of your life. There are no rules in a real fight, and anything you do has to focus on disabling your opponent as quickly as possible. Chance, come here and join me. Let’s see how she does against two opponents.”
The elf stood and readied his blade. Cari had never trained against two opponents at the same time before. It wasn’t something she’d typically see in a competition, so she’d never learned how to manage it. She tried to twist and turn to keep both of the men in front of her.
They both lunged at her simultaneously, and she attempted to parry one with her sword and the other with her dagger.
She managed to block neither attack very well, and she received a painful tap with the flat of each of her opponents’ blades for the failure.
“You can’t block each of us at the same time,” Liam advised. “You have to move so as to keep us from coordinating our attacks. You must feint at one opponent while launching the real attack at the other. Then you repeat the process right away against the other. By mixing up these shifts between attack and defense with each opponent, you disrupt their attacks long enough to break through their defenses. Now, do it again, this time the right way.”
Liam’s attitude frustrated Cari. She wasn’t used to being unsuccessful in her sword skills. Gritting her teeth against making a snide comment about his teaching style, she raised her sword and dagger and faced off against the two dragoons.
As soon as she raised her weapons to the ready position, the two moved forward to attack again.
This time, she was a little more successful but still wound up getting whacked with the flats of their blades across her back and thigh. She huffed in frustration.
“It’s not fair. You both know what I’m trying to do.”
“It’s never fair,” Liam countered, his voice taking on an angry tone. “We’re trying to kill you. Do you think we care if it’s a fair fight? Any opponent worth their salt is going to know how to fight multiple opponents, too. Therefore, they will try to predict what you will do based on the same training. Now, swords up and try again.”
This time, she didn’t even get a chance to raise her blades to the “en garde” position before Liam leveled a slash at her head, forcing her backward into Chance’s attack on her back.
Cari didn’t want to get slapped by their blades again, and she was tired of the humiliation. Anger flared inside her as she moved on pure instinct. Cari bent at the waist and twisted as she snapped a perfect back roundhouse kick at Chance’s face. She knew she wasn’t close enough to connect, but he danced back with a shout anyway. Having made him commit to moving away, Cari continued her spinning move while she crouched down and lunged at Liam on the opposite side.
She forgot for a moment she wasn’t using a blunted blade. Had she connected, Liam would have had a nasty sword wound on his thigh. He managed to parry her blow at the last instant, but she saw the surprise in his eyes as he danced backward away from her dual attack.
Quest completed: Train with Liam.
200 experience points awarded.
Skill learned — Multi-foe tactics.
Approval showed in Liam’s smile and he nodded at her, raising his sword in front of his face in salute.
“Well done, Cari. You nearly had me with that one.”
“Agreed,” Chance added. “Had that kick connected, it would have broken my nose at the very least. What do you call that technique?”
“It’s called taekwondo where I come from. My father had me study with a friend of his for a while in an effort to get me to stop my fencing classes and get my head out of the fantasy world. All they ended up doing was give me the additional skills and balance needed to take my fencing even farther.”
“It’s a good complement to your fencing style,” Liam said. “Chance is right. It caught us both by surprise, which is the point in a fight. Don’t get stuck in a rut with your attacks. It makes you predictable, and that makes you vulnerable. Always be prepared to improvise with any skill you have. It could be the difference between life and death.”
A knock at the door interrupted the lesson.
“That’s the boy coming back with our supper,” Liam said. He pointed to her shoulder. “Your wound is seeping through the bandage. Let Chance take a look at it and see if he can do anything with it now that we’re not moving anymore.”
Cari hadn’t even noticed the burning pain in her shoulder in the midst of the sparring. Her anger had blinded her to it. Now, however, the pain burst through her awareness, and she drew in a sharp breath as she flexed her arm to sheath her dagger.
“Liam’s right. I’d forgotten your injury. I should have tended to it as soon as we arrived. Here, let me take those bandages and dressings off and have a good look at them.”
The elf took her over to stand next to the lantern, and his skilled fingers unwrapped the bandages on her shoulder and forearm. Both wounds had broken open again and were seeping bright red blood through the dressings.
Cari wasn’t shy about the sight of blood, but she was concerned about the scars those two wounds were going to leave behind. It wasn’t like she was going to find a surgeon or even a decent doctor in a place like this to stitch them up. Her mother was going to kill her.
“Hold still,” Chance said.
He placed a hand over each wound with his palms, covering the injuries beneath. The elf closed his eyes and muttered something under his breath Cari couldn’t quite make out. A gentle warmth flowed into her arm, growing in strength until it was nearly hot enough to burn her. A yellow glow showed beneath his palms where they covered her wounds.
“Hey!” Cari tried to pull away from the uncomfortable sensation.
“Hold still,” Chance hissed at her. “I’m almost finished.”
Cari steeled herself for what she knew was going to be excruciating pain and held still. The sensation didn’t intensify as expected, though. Instead, the heat rapidly faded, and she was surprised to feel the pain leech away along with it.
Cure light wounds — +10 health points restored.
Chance opened his eyes and lifted his hands away. Cari stared at her right arm in disbelief. She could see the crusted blood and stains on her shirt from her injuries, but of the wounds themselves, there was barely any sign, just a slight scar.
“How did you do that?”
“I possess a small ability with earth magic. I asked my mistress to teach me before she left Fantasma. I cannot heal life-threatening wounds, but lesser injuries are within my ability to heal. Magic is harder to work now than it used to be. Back in my mistress’s day, such healing would have left no scar at all.”
Cari felt a little silly at her reaction to the healing — she guessed “spell” was the best term to use.
“Uh, thank you, Chance. I feel much better now.” Cari rotated her arm and raised it over her head to show him she didn’t have any lasting effects from the wounds.
“I’m glad I could help, Your Highness. I’m sorry I took so long to remember you needed healing.”
“Stop calling me that,” Cari said. “I told you. I’m no princess, and one of the others might overhear you. We need to keep this between us for now. I don’t want the others treating me differently because of some legend.”
“My comrades are not stupid. Neither is Rodrigo. They will figure it out, eventually. You are your father’s daughter, and I suspect you have his knack of finding the center of the action without even trying. The first time you do something no one else can do, someone is going to put your name and the legend of your father together.”
“Well let’s just let that happen on its own, shall we?”
“As you wish, Your Hi — um — Cari.”
Chance punctuated his answer with a short bow of deference, anyway. She supposed that was the best she was going to get. As long as the others didn’t pick up on it, it was fine. She didn’t care that some legend labeled her a princess in this place. That kind of attention wasn’t something she needed to deal with right now.
Luckily, Liam returned from the door carrying a small crate loaded with food. Rodrigo was right behind him carrying another crate with several bottles and a stack of pewter tankards.
Food! Thank God. Every other concern melted away at the thought of eating something. She’d worry about the others finding out who she was at another time. For now, she’d eat and forget her troubles for a while.
Chapter 7
Cari leaned against the bale of straw behind her and let out a loud belch. The roasted half-chicken, small loaf of heavy brown bread, and two wedges of sharp yellow farm cheese filled her to the point of bursting.
“Ho ho!” Thad called out. “I accept your challenge, young lady.”
“What are you talking about?” Cari asked.
She was cut off by the single loudest burp she’d ever heard in her life. It went on for at least ten seconds and seemed to shake the stable’s rafters with its reverberations.
“I wasn’t challenging you to a burping contest.” Cari laughed. “I couldn’t begin to compete with that ridiculous sound, anyway.”
“I accept your concession.” The orc grinned. “I win again.”
Thad picked up another of the half-chickens and started tearing into it while she stared with her mouth open in shock. She looked at Liam.
“Where does he put it all? Isn’t that his fifth half-chicken?”
“Sixth, I believe,” the dragoon sergeant replied. “I gave up a long time ago trying to figure out that one’s eating habits. I will say he has much better table manners than when I met him.”
“He still eats like a barbarian,” Chance said. “You can’t take him out in decent company. He invariably does something embarrassing.”
“You don’t complain about me being around when there’s fighting to be done,” Thad interjected around a mouthful of food.
“True,” Chance agreed. “You are useful when a fight is at hand.”
“At least I’m not all uppity like you. I’m surprised you can eat at all without a properly set table in front of you.”
“I make do,” Chance said. He punctuated it by carefully folding his linen napkin and placing it back in his coat pocket.
“So, what do we do now that we’ve eaten and found a safe place to wait?” Rodrigo asked while he gathered up the empty wine bottles.
“We wait here and rest until early morning,” Liam said. “You told your uncle you were staying at the Empress’s Rest, didn’t you, boy?”
Rodrigo nodded.
“Then that’s where we’ll return the two of you. He’ll likely meet us there if I know him.”
“What about the Duke’s guard?” Cari asked. “Won’t they be looking for us in the morning?”
“You’ll be safe enough if you stay inside the inn. It’s a known haven for supporters of the Empress. They wouldn’t dare come inside to search for you there. Too many people to stand against them. Still, you both should make plans to leave the Crystal City as soon as possible.”
“I don’t w
ant to leave,” Rodrigo protested. “I came here to serve the Empress and become a dragoon.”
“Son, your uncle should have sent you on your way as soon as you arrived,” Chance said. “We told you. The Empress’s Dragoons have essentially been disbanded. We aren’t taking on any new recruits. It would be like asking them to sign their name and then step up to the headsman’s block.”
“Gloomy much?” Cari asked.
“Realistic,” Chance replied. “There’s no future for us. Those of us already sworn into the Imperial Dragoons will continue to serve the Empress as best we can, despite the obstacles placed in front of us, but at least we’re all realistic. There’s not much going in our favor. We’re certainly not going to take on a pair of youngsters like yourselves and ask you to deal with the same dangers we face in our hopeless quest to serve the Empire.”
Rodrigo started to protest, but Liam held up a hand to forestall him.
“Listen to what he says. There’s no future for you here, boy. Let those of us who know what we’re doing deal with the problems here. You’d be better served to go back to your father’s farmstead and take up an honest trade.”
Rodrigo turned away and stared at the floor. “There’s nothing for me there anymore. We’re on the coast, and raiders hit last year. I’ve got no one left but my uncle and the dragoons. I’m not giving up.”
The three soldiers exchanged glances. Liam started to say something, but Chance shook his head. Cari wondered what they would do with Rodrigo if he refused to leave the city. She decided to throw her hat in the ring to back him up.
“I’m not going anywhere either. You all stood by me when I was under attack by those thugs. I figure the least I can do is offer my sword to yours, Rodrigo. Besides, maybe someday, we can go after those sea raiders and get some revenge for you.”
“The raiders are a front for Charon,” Liam said. “It’s all part of his bid to destabilize the Empire just enough that folks think it’s time for a change of leadership.”