Amy helped her youngest sister off her mount as their fighters had a contest of wills with the Resistance fighters already present at Finaqua. She just hoped whoever was leading them since her brother ... vanished, knew the code words set up when he was still in charge.
She felt more than heard the palace doors opened while she was looking at the sky. There was a young man returning with the guard that had gone into the palace. Amy scowled: this couldn't be their leader, could it?
A hand rested itself on her arm and she turned to look at her youngest sister's all-knowing eyes. "All is not as it appears to be, Amy. Don't judge him by his age or appearance."
Amy smiled tiredly at her sister, "I know, J, it's just ... I'm tired of fighting all the time."
Jael simply nodded sagely, knowing it was not the time to speak verbally. The boy-commander had reached them. He had fiery blue eyes and dirty blonde hair that vaguely reminded Jael of someone she once knew quite well.
His voice was hard as he spoke, "You say your name is Cain?" It was an accusation coming from him that didn't bode well in Amy's way of thinking.
She saw three people approaching from the side but kept her eyes focused on the man-child before her. "Don't sound so shocked. There's always been more than one."
He shook his head minutely, "Not around these parts."
"Wyatt?" Jael's startled voice broke through the argument. Her wide eyes were full of shock and amazement as the man started running toward them. "Wyatt!" Jael exclaimed again, her heart near bursting with happiness.
"Jael," he replied, catching her in a hug. He turned to look at his other sister with a look of amazement on his face, "Amy."
Amy's own blue eyes were wide as she took in the picture of her brother. "You haven't aged at all," she whispered as she eagerly went into his embrace.
Thia nudged DG with her elbow. Speaking out of the corner of her mouth she said, "Tell the soldiers to go set up camp."
"Oh, right," DG said, raising her voice a little to be heard by the siblings. "Mr. Cain, you never said you had sisters." She smiled widely at him, her head tilted to one side, "Care to introduce us?"
Cain untangled himself from his sisters and nodded once toward DG, "Princess, these are two of my sisters, Amy Cain, and Jael Cain. This is Princess DG."
DG held out her hand and gave them her winning smile, "Pleased to meet you both."
Jael took her hand with a small smile of her own, "And you, as well."
"We'd heard that you were dead," Amy said, a frown on her sun tanned face.
DG's smile fell, "Once. But I am back now, and together we're going to heal the O.Z."
"There is so much that is too far gone already," Amy replied with a sad shake of her head. She looked back at the soldiers fanned out behind her. There were exactly eighty-seven men and women come from the north. There would be one hundred and thirty-two additional soldiers come when it was proven safe.
"You must be beat from the trek south," Jeb said with authority, not bothering to introduce himself. "Jamison," he addressed a man at his side, "Show them where they can pitch their tents if they want to stay outdoors. Otherwise, take 'em to Molly so she can get 'em set up in the barracks with the rest of the men."
Jamison inclined his head slightly, "Yes, sir, Captain Cain." Jeb shot a glare to the man's smirking face but it did no good, he had already blown his cover.
Amy took a good look at the man-child the man Jamison had just identified. She squinted her eyes slightly. "Jeb?" she asked curiously. With a small smile at his nod she added, "You've grown."
Jael attacked her nephew in a massive hug, "I'm so glad that you're alive and safe. Praise Lurline."
Her nephew had to bite back a comment about Lurline and returned his aunt's hug reluctantly.
"What news do you bring from the north?" Thia asked, redirecting the Cains' attention to the more urgent matters at hand.
Amy's blue eyes met the dark brown eyes of the "Elf" with curiosity. "The Resistance is holding strong. Most of the Longcoats and Coaters left the area after the Eclipse."
"Are these all your troops?" Cain asked with a slight frown, not seeing the mighty gryphons or elementals that made the northern mountains their home.
Amy shook her head as Jael replied, "I'll be sending a message back for the rest of them. After the scourges no one wanted to take any chances that the Witch was still alive."
Cain nodded tensely, motioning with his head that they should all go into the palace. "We'd better go revise the maps then."
"And we must return to your lesson," Thia told DG in a way that left her no way to back out and witness more of the family reunion.
Amy gave the "Elf" an appraising look before watching the princess disappear around the bend with her. She had a sinking suspicion they'd have the same walk if the prior was not pregnant.
"Leave it be, Amy," Wyatt said from her side. She gave him an accusing look and he shook his head, "Just leave it be."
She narrowed her eyes at her older brother, but nodded anyway, following her nephew into the palace to get to work stopping the Longcoats.
Bing was sparring with Ding when he felt the paper jab him in the ribs. "Ow," he said, motioning for his brother to stop fighting so he could see what was in his pocket that he had clearly forgotten about.
Ding scowled at his brother, "What's wrong?"
His brother's eyes widened in horror as he looked at the paper he'd had in his pocket. There was a note to him on the front that was clearly written in the Prince-Man's writing. "Give this one to him first," it read.
"Ut oh," Bing said, showing the letter to Ding.
"Yeah," Ding replied, dropping his fork as he patted his brother on the back. "Nice knowing you."
Bing glared at his brother, "Why just me? Prince-Man Bog all of us when he finds out."
Ding shook his head, "If he finds out."
"If?" Bing screamed at him, "He's Prince-Man! He always finds out!"
"Prince-Man always finds out what?" Thia asked from the doorway as she and DG moved into the indoor practice court to work on self-defense.
Bing quickly hid the letter behind his back, the two goblins looking up at their mistress with wide eyes. "Nothing," they said in unison.
Thia gave them a hard, appraising look. "Care to rethink that statement?" DG would never admit it, but she was a little jealous with how well her double was making her voice and face become the same icy cold that her mother used when she was upset.
Ding and Bing looked at each other before Bing slumped in defeat and shuffled forward to hand his Princess-Lady the other letter.
As her hand closed in on the letter, Thia raised her eyebrow. Without spending much time looking over the paper in her hand, she tucked it into her belt to look at later.
Just then Azkadellia came flying into the room with Glitch hot on her heels.
"We're not late, are we?" she huffed as she looked at the guards and the two versions of her sister. "And why do you look like an Elf?"
Thia smirked slightly, "No, you're not late. And I look like this because it'll be a lot easier to explain an Elf than it will an alternate version of your sister."
"Good idea," Glitch said with a quirky smile. "So, oh-mighty-one, what's first?"
"Stretches."
That night at dinner, there was little talk at the Gale side of the table as the Cain sisters explained what was going on up north. Dg listened intently as Amy explained what the problems were for the towns in the north, as well as what the problems were for the Resistance faction they led.
"How are you going to send a message back to the rest of your army?" DG asked at a lull in the conversation between siblings.
Jael sent her a small smile, "I already have. They will be able to travel much faster than we were -- the rest of your forces should be here by the rising of the second sun."
DG raised her eyebrows in surprise, "I thought it took you three days to get here?"
"They won't be walking, DG," Thia said softly, drawing some attention to herself as she explained to the younger princess, "In the morning, look to the north and you'll see."
DG frowned, "See what?" she asked, turning to Cain.
"A sight worth waitin' for," he replied cryptically. His eyes softened around the edges watching her, but that was the only outward sign of his emotions. After the letter from Thia's version of him ... he had no idea what to think. Were his feelings for DG preordained?
Jael watched the interaction before skillfully interjecting, "Gwen had another baby, Wyatt."
"Really?" he replied, remembering his bubbly older sister who seemed to always have a little one around. When the Witch had taken control, she had gone underground, doing everything in her power to keep her children safe. "A boy or a girl?"
"Boy," Jael replied. "She named him after you."
Thia had to look down at her plate to hide the tears that brimmed her eyes. Her sister-in-law Gwen had died an annual prior, from what the doctors on the Other Side used to call typhoid. She hadn't been able to see a healer until it was too late to do anything but make her comfortable. Now her widower was left raising their ten living children by himself.
She desperately wanted to question about the rest of the family, but she couldn't force the words past her throat. It was Jeb who did what she found she could not.
"What about Babette and Hanah?" the young man asked curiously. "Where are they now?"
Amy cast a wary look toward where Azkadellia sat beside her sister, "Last we heard, they were running courier for the Eastern Resistance."
Thia's eyes remained fixed on her plate, unable to look up and face Jael's knowing eyes as Jeb continued, "And Uncle Elliot?"
Jael shook her head, "No word since he was arrested at the cell that fell the same day your father ..."
Cain brought his head up and gave his youngest sister a hard, icy glare, "Say it, Jael. The day I screwed up and got caught."
At that Thia looked up and glared at him, her gaze stopping him from continuing. She turned to Jael and Amy, "And your parents?"
Jael furrowed her brow, tilting her head to one side in a way that emphasized her short locks of hair. "Mom's with Gwen, helping her take care of the children. She moved there after Papa died three annuals ago. Why do you care, Thia?"
The color drained from Thia's face as she was confronted with how much this reality differed from her own. Jack's heart condition had been discovered early enough to fix in her reality. She didn't listen as Cain took in a deep, shuddering breath at the news that his father was dead.
"Excuse me," she said as she rose from her seat, hoping to calm her stomach and her mind. As she briskly walked from the room, Thia dropped her glamour and headed toward the one place she could find the answers that she sought.
Thia ran through the corridors until she came upon a seemingly innocuous mirror on the wall. To any passerby it would appear to be just like the dozens of other mirrors that lined the walls, but she knew better. Summoning up a mixture of light and dark magick, Thia focused it on the mirror. She had to know.
The picture that met her eyes of the Labyrinth was filled with horror and decay. A cry escaped her throat as she watched the decay worsen as her uncle did nothing to fulfill his duties as Goblin King. The desert at the edge of the Labyrinth all Runners started at had spread. Hoggle's hut was no more, and the desert now threatened the hedge maze and fiery's forest.
Unheeded, tears fell down Thia's face as she watched Sarah transport to a hospital bed inside the castle. It was all her uncle could do to keep the both of them alive: he forgot about the duties of his crown.
She felt arms wrap around her legs at the goblins watched the decline with her. Homes destroyed, lives lost, all in a desperate attempt to keep the Labyrinth alive.
A few minutes later, after witnessing what was annuals of neglect, Thia let her magick flow back into her with a gasp. Uncaring of the two goblins still attached to her legs, she began to run back to the dining room to alert the others.
After Thia exited the dining room, Cain gave his sisters his infamous Tin Man glare as he asked, "What happened to Dad?"
Jeb looked intently at his aunts as they fidgeted under his father's gaze. His mother had made sure they had little communication with his side of the family after Zero had found them. He hadn't known that his grandfather was dead, either.
Amy's sorrowful eyes met her idolized brother's reluctantly, "The medic said it was his heart." Her face became a stone mask as she switched topics, "Care to tell me who the hell Thia is? She doesn't walk like an Elf, or someone who's spent the last fifteen annuals under defective leadership."
"You're right," Cain replied, his voice even. "She's here to make sure we don't screw things up worse than they already are."
She turned her head to the Queen and Prince Consort, who were looking rather suspiciously guilty. The woman's dirty blonde hair whipped around her face as she turned to look at her brother and nephew again. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
Surprisingly for the Resistance fighter, it was Azkadellia who answered, "It means that you can tell the people in the north to get ready to harvest crops they didn't plant. She's going to help us save the people of the O.Z. from starving come winter."
The older Cain woman bit back an unkind response to the elder princess's concerns. It was Jael who added, "She will guide you to restore the Balance. Be wary, lest she takes too much upon herself. There are two roads laid out ahead of us, that one leads to horrors worse than what we've just gone through."
When DG looked at her, she noticed that the younger Cain's eyes had glazed over with a kind of silvery layer as she spoke. However, when Jael blinked, they went back to their normal shade of blue.
"Lurline sent her here," Jael said with confidence, explaining to her sister and confirming what everyone else already knew, "to prevent a civil war. The Balance has shifted and it needs to be compensated for, otherwise the O.Z. will fall."
"I'm afraid it's a bit more severe than that," Thia said from the doorway. Everyone turned to look at her, dread rising up inside them at the sight of her minus her glamour, and her three goblins dressed in armor with their forks drawn. "The Labyrinth is about to fall."
DG frowned at the panic that was rising in everyone around her. "That's bad?" she asked her doppelganger as Thia walked more fully into the room.
Thia nodded as Azkadellia replied, "There's a reason the Witch never breached the Labyrinth, Deej. It's the hub of dozens of different dimensions -- possibly hundreds. If it falls, then they will collapse upon each other in chaos."
"Oh. That's bad," her younger sister said, eyes widening as the severity of the situation hit her.
A/N: A cliff hanger because school is starting next week, I just spent $150 on only half my books and will have to pay about that for the other half, and because my birthday was on Wednesday. ... Mostly because my birthday was on Wednesday. I've been quitee eager to get to these scenes that are coming up. Are you excited? I am.
