For only the second time in almost a week, I was awakened by something other than a bad dream, explosion, or raid. As the sound from the world beyond my eyelids came through as something more understandable than "mffefffuffaffufloof," I realized that morning had come far too soon for my tastes.

"Miss Riiiiiinaaaaa!" sang a bubbly voice. The incessantly joyous nature that underlied it was almost enough to make me cast Sleeping on myself. I am the kind of person that enjoys sleeping in whenever she can take the opportunity to do so. Then, I didn't know how long it would be before I got to do it once again.

Just shut up and leave me alone. Where's a 'do not disturb' sign when you need it?

"Miss Rina!" There was that cheery voice again. Finally unable to get back to sleep, I swatted my arms wildly at the source of the voice. Hitting only air, I used the momentum caused by my slender arms to sit up in bed. I cracked my eyelids open to give the area a once-over through my swollen, bloodshot eyes. I felt the tears forcing themselves out to assuage the itchiness in them.

"MISS RINA!"

I flipped over my bed's edge in surprise. Emilia popped right out of my vision and into my face without me expecting it. Then again, my reflexes are a little slow in the mornings, especially after a day of sneaking around and kicking ass. Even though I didn't really do much besides cast a few mid-level spells and drop-kick a few bums calling themselves "soldiers," yesterday was still exhausting. The adrenaline in my system had me on edge nearly the whole time, and a few close calls put me on the way to a panic attack.

Just to put it into an example showing how ineffectual I am in the mornings after just waking up, I couldn't bother myself to get back at Emilia — in any way — for startling me right off of the bed. Yeah, it's that bad.

Watching Emilia zoom around the room she and I shared was enough to exhaust me for the rest of the day. My arms and legs literally felt sore from all the activity I was seeing. What was Emilia doing? Your guess is as good as mine. Only she could find a way to stay constantly active in a small inn room.

"Emilia," I slurred while still sitting on the floor besides my bed in a nest of bedsheets. "What the heck are you doing...?"

Emilia stopped running back and forth between the same two points and addressed me with her eyes. "Huh? Warming up for the day, of course." She turned to the window, admiring the lovely view of the dirty street below. "A true Champion of Justice is always prepared to fight the forces of evil. And today, we fight the villain that has done this to my city!"

As I was about to reply, my mind slow to process what Emilia was doing and saying, the door to our room shook with a violent knocking that caused the two of us to jump and eep.

"Will you shut the hell up in there?" It was a man's voice, but neither Kari's nor Judas'. I guessed that it was another one of the patrons staying on this floor of the inn. "It's too damn early for this racket!" the voice continued.

You have my sympathies, angry voice.

After it was silent for a minute, and we heard the creaking of floorboards as the man outside the door walked away, Emilia shot me a glance and flashed an innocent, anxious smile.

"I think that's enough warming up for now, anyway..."

break-&-

Kari, Emilia and I met in the guys' room after I was certain that Karius was awake. As it turned out, Judas left earlier than even Emilia would have dared to. She was in a more sober mood, but I could feel that she had the energy canned up for later. It was evident in how she jerked her head rather than turned it, and darted her eyes around rather than shifted them. Everything about Emilia's person exuded a force of liveliness that could make a yellow lily in bloom look wilted by comparison.

Kari was even less of a morning person than I was. From what I could tell, his armor was on backwards and his sword was positioned over the wrong shoulder. Despite appearances, I couldn't help but wonder if I had been shortchanging Kari. He carried that sword and seemed so comfortable in the face of danger that he would make seemingly stupid decisions with the full faith that his sword would carry him through. Then again, I knew plenty of boneheads like that who have slashed themselves into the obituaries for underestimating a situation. Perhaps it was Kari's "gone fishing" demeanor, but he seemed to have a quiet, unboasting confidence about his skills that was unique to him.

Kari yawned hugely, apparently not having the reserve energy to raise a hand to stifle it. His new lion's mane hairdo was all over the place, too, a golden puff of fuzz that just brought the "I have the brain of a clam" look together perfectly. "Good morning," he slurred through a gargle of saliva to us as we walked in.

"Mr. Kari? Your armor..."

He looked down and stared at his chest for a few seconds. "... What? Is there something wrong with it?"

I quietly put a palm to my face, having been watching this exchange from behind Emilia. Kari somehow couldn't tell that his armor was in reverse, unless he was making a terrible joke. I hoped it was a terrible joke, but I had a sinking feeling that it wasn't.

"Hmm. It seems that Mr. Judas has already gone ahead."

"He said he would be back in the afternoon," Kari informed us with the most genial of smiles. It was by then that I couldn't stand it, and I walked up to Kari. I grabbed him by the collar of his armor and dragged him to the mirror in a corner of the room.

"You look like an idiot, Kari." I forced him onto the available stool with only minimal resistance. "I'm taking it on myself to fix you up. I can't be seen with you looking like this!"

Emilia chuckled a bit from where she stood, and I gave her a smile and a wink. Even wordless responses can speak volumes, you know.

Perhaps against what would probably be Judas' advice, the three of us headed down into the inn's restaurant for a bite to eat. Emilia, of course, had the privilege of wearing a cloth hood that obscured her face. We garnered a few glances from the sparse clientele as we took a table for ourselves, but from the murmurs I could make out stuff like, "A cleric..." and, "Is she with the League?" Pretty obvious, stupid comments on their own, but they assured me that no one knew who Emilia actually was.

Obviously, we all registered at the inn under aliases. I'm a notorious personality on my own; the mere mention of my name has caused disaster on its own just by the people who tried to flee once they heard it. Judas, a wanted fugitive on the run from the Clerical League, probably had his name littered all over the city by posters. I think I can safely assume that everyone in Saillune knows the name of their own princess. About the only person among us who was immune to immediate identification was Kari, but I didn't know if I wanted him to think he had that much room for error or not.

"So, Miss Rina," Emilia piped up over her steaming cup of tea. "Do you have family?"

As I poured myself a cup of that tea, I gave Emilia a strange look. "Why the sudden interest in my family?"

"Well, I can't think of anything else to talk about." She paused to take a sip of her cup. The refinement in her manners was evident in even the way she drank her tea. Emilia's upbringing must have been strict, even if she was a little, um, fanatical about justice. "Besides, I think we're going to be here a while. A few hours, at least."

I sighed. The subject of my family wasn't one that I relished sharing. Part of the reason I left home is because I got fed up with them. The other half was my brother thinking that I was immature and needed to do some growing up by seeing 'the real world.' In my arrogance, and with full faith in my sorcery, I took him up on his dare and looted the family heirlooms, and I took off without looking back.

After a few weeks of starving and wandering aimlessly, I found out that blowing up bandits and robbing their camps was a rather quick, easy and morally acceptable way to get rich. I felt kind of stupid with how I didn't see the possibilities in it from the start, but you live and you learn. In the process, I was also doing civilization a favor by getting rid of these bottomfeeders that prey on helpless passers-by. Now I don't hit bandit camps so much for the money as I do for the treasure they may have — treasure such as that troublesome little statue that has dragged me kicking and screaming into the situation I was now embroiled in.

"All right. All right," I muttered with a defeated expression. "What do you want to know?"

"Um... do you have any brothers or sisters?"

"Yeah. My big bro."

"Ah..." Emilia looked stumped for a second, as if she didn't know what to ask next. "... What's his name?"

"Uh, Runé..." I glanced over to Kari to see if he was following this slow conversation of mine. To my surprise, I caught sight of him staring straight up at the rafters, mouth ajar as his eyes closely followed a moth as it fluttered against the ceiling.

"What are your parents like, then?" As I looked back to Emilia, I noticed that she looked awfully intent, leaning forward a bit.

"My parents are... okay, I guess. My dad's sort of weird and my mom's a cleric... sort of."

"Oh! Um, 'sort of'?"

"Yeah. The other clerics at the temple in my town kind of kicked her out when she badmouthed the head priest."

"I guess it runs in the family," Kari stated in a matter-of-factly voice. Leave it to Kari to say something prickish like that at the most opportune moment, even if he looks like he's sleeping with his eyes open.

Dirty hit, Kari. Dirty hit.

Emilia seemed to ignore Kari, not even paying him a glance. "That's not good..."

"Eh." I shrugged limply. "She didn't seem to care that much about it. I only found out about it because my dad and I hung out a lot and he always told me stories — about everything. She knows a lot of magic and she's very good with it, but she hated how I was always playing around with black and fire magic."

"So you were close to your dad?"

I smiled softly at the thought. "... Yeah. Dad taught me how to handle a sword and he helped me get into the Sorcerer's Guild." As I recalled, my smile slowly faded during the pause I took. "No one wanted me around for some reason. The temple clerics said I was 'possessed,' the Sorcerer's Guild seems to have something against my family, and the kids at school just plain didn't like me."

"I'm sorry to hear that, Miss Rina..."

I smirked confidently. "Hey, I can live with it." I added a wink for reassurance.

We got a full-course breakfast soon after Emilia and I concluded our conversation. Emilia was not quite the big eater that Kari and I were, so she sat back a little further once we really got going. If there was one thing that Kari and I had in common, it was a competitive streak. And what was the one thing that we could fairly compete in? Eating, apparently.

It was a nice break from all the worrying.

The feeling that something has gone very, very wrong is a distinct one. Every person has their own reaction to it, but it is almost always accompanied by a heavy, burdensome feeling of dread in the pit of the stomach. Long after breakfast was through, Emilia, Kari and I lounged in the restaurant until lunchtime, during which we pigged out again. And then we waited some more. There were some times when I got uneasy watching Emilia. From under her hood, she was giving passing soldiers outside the window fierce glares, the kind of looks that could make a plant shrivel up. I was half afraid that she would break out into a loud, long-winded speech like she had the previous day, but it thankfully never happened.

I heard Kari's exaggerated moan, and I glanced over to him as he was picking at the ends of his hair. "Judas is sure taking a long time..."

I slapped a hand down on the tabletop and shook my head at Kari. "Have you ever tried to meet a contact before?" He shook his head. No surprise there. "Well," I continued, "you would be surprised to know that the guys that usually set the meetings up are the ones that either don't show up or show up late."

Kari raised a hand to his chin, clutching it between his fingers. "... Isn't that a rule? You know, to throw off anyone following you?"

.

Where does he get these ideas?

I planted my face in my palm once again. Though I wanted to, I didn't scream into my hand, as that would have attracted attention to us. The boredom, uneasiness, and Kari's stupidity were starting to mount on me.

"Kari," I started slowly, composing my voice. "There is a rule out there. A popular proverb, if you will. It goes, 'If it sounds obvious, then it probably is (twit).'"

"Do you have to call me names?" he asksed, frowning.

"That wasn't me. That's how it went in the book I read it in."

Kari blinked cluelessly, but then he waved me off dismissively. As I began to wonder what he thought, he intercepted my question before I spoke it. "Books are for losers."

THUD. I just leaned back in my chair too far this time. The lack of depth that Kari possessed, and his rampant attention-deficit, had finally driven me to the point of giving up. I smiled pleasantly where I laid, and I giggled somewhere deep in my throat. As I met Emilia's gaze upon me, she seemed to become troubled and averted her eyes to less uncomfortable sights... like the floorboards.

I stopped as quickly as I had started. Placidly, I stood up, rearranged my chair, and sat quietly at it. Gathering my hands together and twiddling my thumbs idly, I watched as Kari and Emilia gave each other unsure, cautious glances. At one point, it looked like they were mouthing short sentences to each other. Things like, 'Is she okay?' and 'I'm hungry.'

I dunno. Maybe I really have lost it.

We stayed silent until dinnertime. There was pretty much no crowd to speak of, but we had already gotten used to the abnormality by then. I beckoned the closest server to our table with a forefinger. We had our third feast of the night going right then and there, and I was intent on burying my worries with all the variety of eats that this place had to offer. The three of us continued to eat until we heard the gates on the inn door close shut, followed by the sound of a bar being dropped in place.

"Huh? Is it closing time already?" I asked vacantly. Kari was beginning to rub off on me.

"Well duh, Rina..." Kari was always cruising for a bruising, wasn't he?

"But Judas still hasn't come back," Emilia mewled, somewhat sadly. She had the appearance, too, looking down at her plate like that. Kari reached a long arm over the cyclone zone that was our dinner table and patted her head.

"Don't worry, kid." Kari ruffled her hair, or he must have with the twisting of his hand that rocked her head and hood back and forth. "Judas can take care of himself, I'm sure."

He could, I thought. But deep inside, as I glanced out onto the lonely streets of Saillune City, I couldn't shake the feeling that it all went wrong.

We decided to retire for the night without knowing if Judas was safe or not. We had no choice, really. We were the last group still in the tavern and the staff wanted to go home. We allowed ourselves to be kicked out without protest, so long as there was no actual kicking involved. As we walked up the stairs to our floor, Emilia expressed her concern.

"I feel... an evil presence."

Whoa. Now that was some heavy stuff. I tilted my head, not quite sure what to make of it. I knew that those with training could utilize a sixth sense to sense the presence of people, such as a group of bandits who lay in ambush down the road from you. With her upbringing and her status as a cleric, I had little doubt that Emilia could utilize that sense. The problem with what Emilia was saying was that I couldn't sense anything. I sneaked a peek at Kari, and he shrugged quietly as if he knew the question I was asking with my glance. I turned back to Emilia and poked her shoulder.

"We can't sense anything, Emilia," I whispered, hinting to my colleagues that it was best that we stay quiet when name-dropping around here.

"That's because it's not close to us, Miss Rina... It's pretty far." She froze. "... The Palace."

I walked past Emilia, shrugging. "It was there before, right?" But the answer didn't come as quickly as I expected it to. I walked up the flight a couple of steps before stopping. I looked back slowly, and Emilia stood there shaking her head.

"No. It wasn't," she murmured quietly.

Well, that's not good.

Kari looked up at me, apparently needing guidance. "What should we do, Rina?"

"I want to go to the Palace!" Emilia cried. My ears rang in the silence, and my heart kicked up its beat so much that I thought it would explode at that outburst. I gestured for Emilia to pipe down with a pleading look in my eyes.

"All right, all right. But I have to get my gear first," I grumbled. A day of food and sleep was going to lead into a night of skulking through soldier infested streets in a powder keg of a city. As you can imagine, I was just giddy with the thought of possibly meeting my maker that night.

I brandished the key to my room and put it in the keyhole. But as I heard the tumbler click, I heard something else beyond the surface of the door; one of the beds screeched across the wooden floorboards. The air around the three of us became like ice, a cold sweat forming on my upper lip.

"Miss Rina?" Emilia could sense it, too. Kari had his back turned to us, his head slowly shifting direction as he watched for signs of movement from either side of the hallway. My hand clutched the door handle, but I was debating how to enter the room: kick it in and catch the perp off-guard, open it slowly as if I didn't hear his presence, or just walk away and listen to hear if anything else happens.

"... Right," I whispered. "Let's act as if nothing happened. Maybe we can catch whoever is in there if he thinks he's still got the element of surprise." Emilia looked up to Kari, and then they both nodded. A minute passed. I pushed the door open as if nothing had happened. I stepped in. I yawned and stretched. Then I got a signal from that little voice in the back of your head.

As I was walking in, I muttered a few chanted words under my breath. When I felt the presence of the intruder, I turned immediately to where it came from.

Behind!

"Lighting!" Zero duration, maximum brightness. The pitch black room lit up like day, and I heard the unexpected cry of the intruder as he clawed at his eyes. I couldn't see either, as I brought up my forearm to shield me from the flash of light. I assumed that neither Kari or Emilia could see for the same reason, or the other one. The three of us leapt onto the intruder, but something went terribly wrong. I felt the wind rush out of my lungs well before I felt the burning pain of being hit in the gut with what felt like a brick. As I felt the wooden floor with my right hand, my left hand favoring my injured belly, I heard a squeak as Emilia's body landed on top of mine. Emilia's voice or mine, I couldn't tell.

"UGH! Owww..." I whined. This was not turning out well. The last noise I heard before the scuffle ended was Kari's pained yelping, followed by his voice exclaiming, "Ahh! My eye!"

THUD. I don't know how it happened, but this one intruder, despite being ambushed successfully, had defeated all three of us. I saw the ground illuminate under the glow of a dim lighting spell. I recognized the pair of feet that stood before me immediately.

"Judas?" The three of us cried at more or less the same time. Judas' grumbling was the next vocalization that followed, along with the inevitable scolding that would come with it.

"Why did you do that?" he asked irately as if what he was doing, lurking in our room, wasn't a suspicious thing. I opened my mouth to complain about my stomach when the four of us heard shouts outside.

"Get inside the inn and check it out!"

Yup. It was bound to happen. I jerked my head in such a way that I could see the still-open door with the steps of armored feet resounding through the hallway as the soldiers, about three or four from what I could tell, stampeded up the staircase at the end of it. We didn't have time to organize, so we resigned our fate to Kari's able hands. It wasn't until I was shoved into the closet with Judas and Emilia that I realized that our fate wasn't in Kari's hands, but in his brain.

... Oh Lord.

The marching sounds stopped abruptly and the door creaked open. When we shut the closet door, Kari was situating himself on one of the beds.

"Huh? Oh, hey guys!" I could imagine Kari giving the soldiers a dopey smile.

"Um... hi," a gruff voice responded. "There was a disturbance in this room. Do not try to convince us otherwise; we saw the spells."

"Uh, y-yeah... about that—" Kari's voice tapered off, and it sounded like his voice droned on a single note before fading off into the distance of my aural threshold.

"... Sir?" A different voice from the gruff one sounded out. Kari suddenly shouted.

"THEY WENT THAT WAY!"

... This isn't going well.

Emilia's breathing was rapid and shallow. I couldn't see her expression, but she was holding back a light groan. I could hear little bits of it escaping through her nose. Judas was the first one into the closet, pulling the two of us by the collar. He kept his hard hands on both our shoulders and held us firmly in place. It was uncomfortable, to say the least. His grip was too tight and it was digging into my collar. Judging from the levity of his hold, he was nervous as well. A bead of sweat rolled down my cheek as I strained to hear what was going on.

"They? Were they... intruders?"

"Y-yeah! Uh, well, sorta'."

"Sorta'?"

"I didididididnnnnnDIDN'T get a good look at them, ma'm. I MEAN, SIR."

The unfamiliar voices began to talk among themselves.

"What if it was the fugitive? You know, the one from earlier."

Fugitive?

"Of course it was, you idiot! You two — go and interrogate the innkeeper, see if he saw anything! You, come with me. We're searching this room."

"Sir!" three voices replied. Emilia seemed to hold her breath. As the footsteps faded off into the distant end of the hallway, interspersed with harsh voices telling curious inn guests to get back to their rooms, I heard the sound of furniture being knocked over.

"What the—? ARGH!"

CLANK. THUD.

"What are you—? AAAARGH!"

THUD.

"Sorry guys..."

The closet flooded with the light of Judas' lighting spell as Kari opened the door.

"We have to go," Judas lamented, expressing no remorse for the soldiers that Kari had knocked out. Ignoring the bodies that sprawled on the floor, dented helmets being the only difference between them and other Saillune troops, I went straight for the door. I chanted a small spell as I creaked the door shut, and by the time the yells came from the guards at the ends of the hallway, it was too late.

"Lock." Although it looked like nothing happened, the door sealed itself shut. As an afterthought, I turned the actual lock and dropped the bar. Without waiting to see what would happen, I dove for my satchel, which contained all my gear.

"Alright," I asided as I looked over to Judas. "Let's beat it."

My bag gave an empty puff as it landed on the top of the roof that we had gathered on. As I tightened my gloves, I turned to Judas and spoke with a hushed voice.

"All right," I sighed. "What happened?"

"Everything," he mumbled. The four of us held low to the roof in case of lookouts posted on the walls that divided the districts. If there was any advantage to our situation, it was that the moon was not out tonight. Except for the street lights below, the area was completely obscured by darkness, and our silhouettes were nearly impossible to see against the pitch black sky.

"What do you mean?" Emilia continued to press, her voice urgent. "Did something happen to my family?"

"No," Judas grunted, "but if we don't move quickly, I can't say that they're safe."

"Wha—?"

Judas shook his head at Emilia. "Not now. There's no time." Following that urgent response, Judas pointed to the next building over. The palace was closely visible in the districts up ahead. "We need to jump across the rooftops until we can find a dark alley to drop into."

"Wait a minute, Ju—" But my protests went ignored. He took a headlong leap across the narrow alley onto the next rooftop, magically assisting his landing so that he didn't make a heavy noise. Emilia went next, jumping across the divide and dropping onto the surface of the roof with the aid of a levitation spell. Kari and I went together using the same method. We continued this pattern for a few blocks until we came to the dividing wall between this district and the vast palace grounds.

The four of us dropped into the first alley we saw, and from there we began knocking off the patrols with my Sleeping spell as they passed by. Judas intercepted the falling bodies and carried them into the depths of the alleyway. Soon we had a neat pile of ten or fifteen soldiers sleeping soundly in the pile of myriad garbage and refuse.

Saillune's not as sparkly clean as the travel brochure implies.

"Okay, that's the last of them on this block," I whispered to Judas. "Now, tell us what's going on here?"

Judas hummed lowly, as if he was considering the consequences of what he was about to say. Given a moment of uneasy silence, he finally conceded. "Fine, but keep your reactions quiet."

That can't be a good sign.

Judas hit us with a grim tale of everything going wrong at once. "Syrius betrayed us all. Me, first of all."

Well, that doesn't surprise me a whole lot.

"He was at the place he said he would be waiting, but he was there with a host of guards. I could sense them, but I thought they were the normal patrol units that are all over the streets nowaday. It all went well until they congregated around the square in such a way that I couldn't escape unnoticed. I realized that I had been had when the gates of the district fell shut, and when the guards came to arrest me. They addressed Syrius, respectfully, though, and allowed him to leave without trouble. I, on the other hand, was escorted to the palace's prison. Or I was to be, that is."

"Heh. They made mistake number one, didn't they?"

"... I don't know what that is, but they did lead me into a lonely street with few patrols. With minimal effort, I broke my bindings and knocked out several guards."

Well, that's mistake number three. But I wasn't about to split hairs, so I let Jude go on.

"I then escaped and snuck my way gradually past the patrols to get back to the inn." Judas' tone took a graver edge than usual for the next comment. "Dragomir knows we are here. I'm sure that it was Syrius who told him this."

I glanced over to Emilia and Kari. "I guess that means that it wasn't your fault that the cottage was destroyed, Emilia."

"Dragomir is a busy man," Emilia chipped in lowly.

I made a growl deep in the back of my throat and glanced at the palace walls. "You said Emilia's family was in deep trouble. Well, deeper than they already were. What did you mean by that?"

Judas folded his arms, a cocky smile fogging over his beguiled expression. "Syrius divulged some information before he retreated from the square." Judas glanced aside to Emilia, the smile fading away. "Emilia, stay calm with what I'm about to say."

I could feel our throats get tied into a knot. I tried to swallow, but to no avail. By the time I tried again, the news was already upon us.

"Dragomir wants to dispose of the royal family."

"What?"

Talk about a rushed trial. As it turned out, Dragomir wanted to have the royal family removed and swept under the rug without anyone knowing it. This guy obviously had no intention of letting go of the power he had acquired. Typical megalomaniac behavior. Dragomir was smarter than the average dictator hopeful, though. News of this hasn't reached the outside world thanks to the quarantine. What kind of a political impact would it have on the areas surrounding Saillune if and when he decided to go bigtime — world domination? Would they try to appease Dragomir, or would they declare war on Saillune at the drop of a hat? I've always hated politics.

Why, oh why, did I have to be born into a generation that would be fighting one of those wars that you only ever read about in history books?

Of course, there was no war yet. We had an opportunity to stop it before it happened.

We slowly stepped up to the walls as a group. Looking up at the thirty-foot reach of the massive barricade, I slowly devised a plan. "All right... I'll cast a fireball over there. While they're flooding the area to see where it came from, we'll blast through the wall. Then we'll—"

"No." It was Judas who interrupted and shot down the plan pre-emptively, naturally.

"Let me finish before you say no!"

"No. It was a terrible idea from the beginning. Making so much noise would alert every guard in the city. And maybe it's your thing, but I wouldn't like to fight every guard in the city."

Hmph. I didn't like it, but Judas had a point. If they knew that we were in the city, they wouldn't look elsewhere if they got a clear signal about our location.

"Why don't we just Levitate over the walls?" Emilia asked. It was a simple solution... too simple. As it was, nothing that seemed simple to pull off has gone that way. There was something waiting to go awry with an what looked like an ordinary Levitation.

"No way."

"Huh?" To my surprise, it was Kari that rejected the idea outright. I furrowed my brows whilst addressing him. "What's wrong with Emilia's plan?"

Kari paced a few feet, stabbing at the air with a forefinger, his other arm folded across his chest. "I dunno if you hit your head too hard to remember, Rina, but there was that time when we were flying towards the city and—"

"—Oh yeah," I finished. We were shot down. "I see." Impressive of Kari to bring that point up, but I'm gonna have to subtract style points for insulting me as he made the point.

"The palace defenses are also probably stronger, and I dunno if I'm willing to chance that."

Kari drew his sword, turning away from us. "We're surrounded."

My blood ran cold when I scanned the area. Kari has some sharp senses to detect all these characters closing in on us. Judas and Emilia were equally surprised. I drew my sword, and Judas followed suit. Emilia stayed close to me and Judas, and Kari gestured over to his side.

"Follow me," he whispered intently. Kari led us out onto a wide street. It was broad enough so that the lighting from the street lamps didn't quite meet at the center, as if a black river ran through the center of the cobblestone. From the murky blackness emerged several Saillune soldiers, their weapons drawn. The one at the center of the formation with a more ornate helm, obviously the commander of the squad, spoke out to us.

"Tch. So you noticed us. It doesn't matter, as you must realize that you're surrounded."

"Typical soldier talk!" I shouted back. I spoke in a lower voice to Kari, Judas and Emilia. "I don't feel like talking it out with these guys, so let's just wipe the floor with all of them." Judas let out a heavy sigh and floated into a chant from the lowest note. Emilia sniffed deeply from behind me, however, and she stepped out boldly. She took down her hood and summoned up a lighting spell in dramatic fashion, the bright light reflecting off of her white clothes.

"Behold me! For I am Emiliana Mel La Saillune!"

The soldiers suddenly became a lot less brazen and began to break formation, each questioning the man next to him about the authenticity of Emilia's announcement. Emilia's very declaration seemed to demoralize many of the soldiers. But the captain's mouth dislodged and fell open as he immediately recognized Emilia.

"Silence. SILENCE. It is the princess!"

"I demand that you release my family at once!" Emilia boomed. "This is an order! Justice is firm, but it has a forgiving side as well! Cease your support for this usurper, Sorin Dragomir, and my father may overlook your traitorous actions! See that it is the truth that I speak, and not lies like—"

Emilia's speech, which had done a good job of confusing the guardsmen, gave Judas ample time to finish a powerful spell. He stuck out from our group as he simply followed through with his spell, unlike me and Kari who were frozen in place, and Emilia, who was loud, front, and center.

"Mega Brand!" Judas shouted. The ground rippled violently beneath our feet, but that wasn't the spell — the blast that threw the entire unit of soldiers into the air like so many scarecrows on a pile of fireworks was the spell. A few buildings were also torn from their structures, and the road was completely destroyed, and the sewer was exposed, and—well, you get the picture. But you do what you have to do to survive. The cloud of dust also probably gave us away to everyone, too.

"Great going, Jude," I snapped at him. And he didn't want me using explosive spells because they would have been 'obvious'?

Nope. That wasn't obvious at all, Judas.

"Well, now we have only one way to go!" I spoke with a laugh, deciding to make the best of it, and I ran back to the palace walls. I focused my mind on a chant while we took a short jog back to the great barrier. I slowed my pace just to get a little more time to finish the incantation and sheath my sword, and then I raised both of my hands and planted them both palm flush against the smooth surface of the wall.

"Blast Wave!"

The Power Words echoed in the night, leaving no doubt that I had shouted them. Nothing happened. Kari piped up as he approached from the back.

"... Where's the magic?"

"Damn it," Judas growled impatiently. "They've warded the walls, too."

"No!" I cried. I turned around instinctively. A powerful presence almost literally grabbed my attention and turned me around. The others sensed it too, taking a defensive stance. My heart rolled up into my throat as I made out a rather unique fellow among the second host of soldiers that had arrived. He was obviously a cleric, but not one of low rank.

"So these are our... guests," the newcomer drawled in a distinguished, even voice. Emilia needed nothing more than his appearance to know who he was.

"Dragomir!"

So the big cheese just so turned out to be a handsome guy. Probably old enough to be my dad, but that didn't mean he had to be bad-looking. His hair was jet black and cut short, giving him an air of simplicity and sophistication. He was about as tall as Karius though not built as powerfully. The folds of white silk from the robe he wore flowed along with his movements as if they were liquid rendered into cloth, and a golden mantle rested firmly upon his shoulders. He bore a crozier in his right hand that was topped off with a centric cross set in a ring made of silver. It shone with a Lighting spell, acting as a torch. The jingle from the silver tassels that hung from his shoulder guards broke the otherwise still air as Dragomir extended a hand to Judas.

"Syrius did well, for once," he spoke with a peaceful voice. "Now if you will please come along with me, there is much to discuss before your imprisonment, Judas and accomplices."

The guards approached us without so much as a direction from Dragomir, but the observers soon saw that that was as bad an idea as any. Emilia, brash girl that she can be, began the attempt to break through the line to get to Dragomir, and she started by running up to the encroachers with a loud battlecry.

"PACIFIST CRUSH!" She proceeded to contradict herself by kicking the living daylights out of them, even from her relatively small height. The energy she had been damming up all day suddenly exploded with a body count to prove it. It certainly explained Emilia's choice in footwear, and I marveled at her ability as the helmets flew and the armor dented.

Wow. I'd hate to be one of them right now.

The shrill sound of swords being drawn én massé came next. Kari responded quickly, shouting as he whirled his sword around himself in a great arc. The wind just passed over the top of my head with a whistle as several sharp clinks resonated off the stone road. The sound of swords clattering to the ground followed a second later, or rather the sound of sword blades, which Kari had hewn right off their hilts with his own.

Very impressive, Kar.

Me, I was chanting a spell during all this. I was itching for some carnage, and now I had an excuse to get it.

Metal retains heat well, right?

"Flare Arrow!" As I announced the Power Words for the common spell, a dozen streaks of flame soared from the hand above my head and hit the soldiers who were still in awe of Kari's swordskill. The sound of their defeated screams was like music to my ears. Didn't this violate Emilia's 'do not kill' rule? Well, they should be pretty badly burned, but not badly enough so that they would die from it. At the moment, Emilia didn't seem to care much about her own decree, either.

Ahh. Revenge at last.

Judas jumped into the crowd of those that had not been hit by my spell and began cracking heads. I angled my head over to Dragomir and began to chant a full-power Fireball.

"O Source of all power, light which burns beyond—"

"My, my!" Dragomir's voice pierced ominously through the rumble of the flames, and even over the cacophony of battle. "You are a lively bunch. It's no wonder that the entire convoy was destroyed just outside the city." The priest stepped through the flames as his goons retreated, undaunted by our display. That wasn't encouraging. He glanced over to the melee around Emilia and spoke a few words beneath his breath, a serene smile on his face the entire time.

... A spell! "Emilia! Watch out!" I cried, but perhaps too late.

"... Rayfreeze."

A golden glow of light surrounded Emilia. She stopped moving, and she widened her eyes just before she realized what was happening. She was then buried beneath a mountain of armored soldiers.

"No!" Judas shouted. In response he chanted furiously, attempting to finish a rather dangerous spell before Dragomir could counteract it. But Dragomir didn't try to chant a counterspell. Instead, he just smiled to us and shook his head.

"No. That's a very bad idea, my friends. You see, the princess is in my possession now. It would be a shame if she got hurt, wouldn't it..."

Judas stopped his chant by biting his lip, as if he had to or else he would have finished it to completion. An angry growl echoed up through Judas' half-open mouth. I shook my head lightly as a signal to Kari, who stepped up behind me with his sword at the ready.

"Fine," I spoke for the three of us. "We surrender."

Kari looked at me as if I had completely lost it; for the second time that day, maybe I had. But as far as I could see, we weren't going to get into the palace without being allowed in somehow. From the easing of Judas' posture, he was fully compliant with me in giving up for the moment. The fake soldier routine probably wouldn't have worked again, as security was probably tighter at the palace, and the failed attempt at blowing the wall up with Blast Wave came as a real shocker to all of us. I just hoped that they wouldn't retain us so tightly that we couldn't possibly break out, either.

"... I'm glad we can agree on this." Dragomir turned to his guards and bobbed his head lightly to us. As I was being bound, I shook my head in regret.