This is, in fact, the last part. This came as quite a shock to me... So the odd explanation: some ends are left untied - that's because I'm going to deal with them in the next story (and it quite surprised me that there *is* a next.) In a piece of blatant and tacky advertising: it's called A Lady's Shield.
Apologies for the time this has taken - since January, my life has been one long trawl of exams, mock-exams, tests and examlets. Blame the British education system. :-) But they're over (you might be able to hear me screaming madly wherever you are) and I'll have summer to write.
The next story, I promise, will be better written. This is the first time I've ever written - or attempted to write - a TP fanfic, so I'm sorry about the mess this story has been. I have a lot clearer idea of what I'm doing with the next one, and hopefully, you'll enjoy it.
Lastly - and most importantly - thank you so much for all your comments, your ideas, your suggestions, your rants and encouragement and for the response you gave me. I have been *totally* floored. You've been utterly phenomenal - thanks for putting up with me!
You will recognise Ryan's story as a variant on a common fairy tale - I've torallan-ised it. (Gods know with all the hubbub going round about plagiarism lately, I have no urge to get my account evaporated.)
Part Nineteen
Two weeks and everything had changed beyond Kel's grasp.
~ Enjoying the sun, mortaling? ~ a lazy voice said.
Kel turned and jumped. Somehow, the forty foot dragon had managed to sneak up on her.
*There* was one huge change. Master Salmalin had brought Jademirth over from the Dragon Realms by mistake, and now he didn't seem inclined to leave. The elegant, gorgeously beautiful collection of green leanness with eyes that shone like turquoise in the sun winked at her.
It winked. Dragons, she was sure, shouldn't do that. She couldn't get used to the fact that Jademirth wasn't quite like other dragons. ~ Don't worry, I won't tell them you're shirking your duties. ~
"I've had enough of washing bandages," she said tiredly. "It's women's work."
It arched its long neck until the triangular head came close to sniff at her. Its breath smelled of pine and sap. Jademirth, it had turned out, was the Immortal Realms' only vegetarian dragon. ~ Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't you a female? ~
"Yes," she said grumpily, "but I'm a knight."
~ Ah. I thought mortal women couldn't be knights? Or have things changed since I was last here? ~
"They've changed," she answered. Then, piqued by curiosity, she added, "When *were* you last here?"
The bass voice rumbled. ~ Three thousand years ago, give or take. And in three thousand years, I didn't see as much excitement as I did in one day here. Times have changed! ~ It grinned, showing dozens of pearled spiky teeth. ~ Why are you so miserable, mortaling? ~
She shrugged. "I don't know. Everything's changed all of a sudden."
She remembered a week ago, when the enormous dragon had walked into the camp with Master Salmalin and a strange lady mage at his side. She had later been introduced as Laird, a red-robed mage and former prisoner of a magical beast called an Arachon. Flanking them had been Cleon - who Kel was delighted to see - and Joren - who Kel was less than delighted to see. And on the dragon's back had been a crippled boy introduced as Marcus of Kennan, Cleon's brother (apparently this had been as much news to Cleon as to her), and a little girl who said nothing but stared at everyone with big, dark eyes.
And of course, Andrea.
She was comatose. In seven days, she hadn't stirred from the deep still slumber she had fallen into after helping Ryan. The healers said it was exhaustion, nothing more, after too many days of beatings, torture and overwork. Now, they were starting to look uneasy.
Most of the Riders were gone to meet the King, who was riding up to meet them with an armed force that hadn't been seen since the War.
~ Change is unavoidable, ~ the dragon murmured. ~ Usually, you mortals thrive on it. ~ He had sunk onto his side, the long neck stretched out on the warm ground, glistening in the sun.
"Kel?"
She half-smiled at Ryan as he approached. The streetboy grinned at her, and dumped the basket he was carrying. "More of them damn bandages. Healer's have told me I'm to help ye." His smile dimmed. "Andrea still ain't awake." His soft grey eyes hardened to flint. "If I ever meet that monster that put all them cuts on her, I'll kick it from Midwinter to Mithros, an' let *him* fry it."
"I know," she said. "I'm sorry about that."
"Ain't your fault, Kel," he sighed and sat down to dangle his feet in the stream. "King's men have just arrived, by the way. I'm supposed to tell ye, you're to go-"
Kel was a disappearing blur in the distance.
Ryan blinked, and smiled. "-meet them," he finished softly. "Hey, lizard, you look after the laundry? I want t'go an' see this."
~ I'm not a lizard, ~ Jademirth retorted. ~ But run along, mortaling. I think I'll catch up on my sunbathing. ~
Ryan snapped him a cheeky salute. The dragon swished its tail at him half-heartedly, and sprawled in the light.
* * * *
Kel skidded into the main camp as the hordes of armoured knights poured in, trailing banners and squires and laden saddlebags. Her breath caught in her throat at the sheer magnificence of it, and for a moment, she was intensely proud to be Tortallan.
"-dozens of places like this on the way up," she could hear the cool tones of the King saying to her brother. "We passed through entire villages of people who had barricaded themselves in their homes. And there were some Stormwings who actually asked us for sanctuary." He grimaced. "I suppose this means long sweeps across country in the hope we can flush these creatures out of their homes."
"Not at all, sire," Inness said. His eyes noted Kel, waiting unobtrusively to one side. He nodded curtly. "Their leader is the father of the Lady Bruna. You might remember her, sire."
"I do." The King's pained tones left no doubt as to just what he thought of Bruna. "Lord Farbrook? As far as I am aware, he is utterly against magic."
"From what Lady Bruna says," Inness answered, grimacing, "he is against magic, but entirely for power."
"I see. Would it be possible to talk to Lady Bruna?"
Her brother sighed heavily. "Lady Bruna is not...herself."
How true that was! When the girl had awoken from her healing, Kel had expected her to be her usual scything self. But instead, it was as if all her life and cruelty had been drained from her and left only a semblance of a person who flinched at every shadow, who said not a word and stared as vacantly at Jademirth as at Kel.
There was, to put it kindly, no one home.
"Kel?" The voice froze her solid for a moment.
She turned around slowly, feeling a knot of emotion surging in her stomach and spreading across her body like a cascade of boiling water.
Those green eyes...they had been far gentler when she looked at them last, and the smile hadn't been quite so hesitant, and he hadn't been wearing the gleaming plate armour.
She had thought that her feelings for Neal had been a phase. Out of sight, out of mind, she had thought, and enjoyed the quiet company of a streetboy who was a mage in muddy disguise.
Wrong.
"Neal?" she managed to get out, completely thrown.
Her first thought was: he's even more handsome
Her second was: oh Goddess, *Ryan*.
Her third was: aaargh!
"You look like I just rose from the dead!" he said brightly, blissfully unaware of the fact she had been dead a scant fortnight ago. Then he stopped, and hesitated.
Dozens of silent words hung between them, as she looked in the depths of his emerald eyes, as elusive as a jungle, and wished she had the courage to say some of them aloud. She was torn again; here was Neal, the dream, the fantasy, the chimera. And there was Ryan, the surprisingly sweet reality.
"How have you been?" was all she did say.
He shrugged. "Not too bad. The Lioness is working me in to the ground, as ever." His smile, as startling as sunlight hitting a cobweb, flashed. "Life was quiet without you around...everyone missed you. *I* missed you."
He said the last more quietly, as though he didn't want anyone else to hear.
The words made her both glad and sad. "Me too." Only half a lie; she had missed him, but not in the same way she once would have.
Silence again, quivering like a hummingbird.
Neal sighed suddenly and then stepped forward and gave her a hug. She clung onto him briefly, her stomach churning with too many feelings. "Dear girl, we have *got* to talk when this is all over."
"We will," she promised. She couldn't read the look in his eyes, and it worried her. What if he wanted...things from her? She couldn't give herself to him now, and Kel wasn't even sure if she wanted to. At least, not in the same way.
"For now..." he put one hand to his forehead theatrically and proclaimed, "I must seek out the traitors and punish them! As is the calling of a young and fearless squire such as myself," he added loftily.
Kel snorted with laughter. Some things about Neal would never change.
"This from the person who can't stand spiders?" Cleon demanded, joining them. He was dressed for battle too, she noticed wistfully. The healers had banned her from fighting for a month, until they were certain she had suffered no ill-effects from her little...sortie into death. "The only way you'd catch them is because they were laughing too hard to move!"
"Better show them your face then," Neal countered. "I hear you've been having adventurous fun with our friend Joren?"
"I've spent most of the last couple of weeks wanting to throttle him if that's what you mean," Cleon admitted. "And...I've found my brother."
"So I hear," Neal said. "Your parents went home with him last week, didn't they?"
"We're not far from home here," the redhead admitted. "it's strange though - I don't know him at all. And my parents seemed so...hesitant. Like they didn't expect him to react how he did."
She remembered the day Marcus had left. The little girl, Shari, had gone with them too.. Cleon definitely had his father's build, but his smile was all his mother's, a tiny delicate woman who had smacked Cleon around the head when she saw him and demanded to know why he hadn't written in half a year.
But Marcus had simply stared at them, his eyes too old and too wary for someone of his age. Shari, the child who looked like an angel with her masses of white-blond hair and pale, supple skin, had buried her head in his chest and clung to him.
"Marc?" Yvette Kennan had asked softly, swallowing hard. She had stepped forward, and then stopped, as if she wasn't quite sure what to expect.
"Mother," he had said. His voice cool and almost emotionless. Then he had bowed his head and said. "I'm sorry."
She had run over then, and embraced her missing son, while Cleon's father had added in his gruff voice, "What happened to you, son?"
He had pushed away his mother - for a moment, Kel had thought him cruel and cold, but then she had realised just how incredibly damaged he had to be. He had survived nearly ten years of torture and loneliness, having no one but himself and a few other mad or hopeless prisoners. He had been beaten, crippled, left to die.
He didn't *know* how to act with people.
"It's a long story," he muttered, then patted Shari reassuringly. "Mother...this is Shari. She was a prisoner in the same place I was. I'm all the family she has. Do you think she...?"
That day, the Kennans gained a son and a daughter. It was obvious Shari regarded Marcus as her protector, and would only be prised away from him when he told her quietly that no one would hurt her, and that he wasn't going anywhere.
Kel had to wonder what on earth his future could hold. He was a mage, but an untrained mage who had had his power devoured by a monster for years.
She had the feeling though, from the determined look in his eyes, Marcus of Kennan would leave an impact on the world somehow.
"Still," Cleon continued now, "I suppose after what he's been though." His face hardened slightly. "That place was...*dreadful*. I don't know how anyone could survive."
"Luck, probably," Neal said solemnly. "Any idea what's going to happen here?"
Cleon shrugged. "They're sending that girl - Andrea - back to the palace. The healers here think Duke Baird might be able to wake her up. And the mage Master Salmalin found...Laird? For the university magi to talk to." He gave Neal a sly look. "You university people. You're not happy unless you can dissect everything."
"That's because we have inquiring minds," Neal declared haughtily. "Unlike you hopeless ruffians."
"That's why you talk so much rubbish," Kel put in, grinning at him.
His eyebrows arched, a smile playing about his mouth. "I resent that bitterly, my dear. Don't discount my higher ideals just because you can't understand them-"
"Neal," she said sweetly, "Do you want me to break your nose?"
"-though of course," he said with hardly a pause for breath, "I don't really know what I'm talking about."
"Neither does anyone else," Cleon muttered, shaking his head.
For a moment, Kel caught Neal's eyes and the emotions swirling in them made her breath catch. Her dilemma crashed back on her with a resounding thump. What was she going to do about this?
* * * *
Ryan Talver had watched Kel while she talked to the tall boy. When he asked Miri, all too casually, who he was, she had told him that was Nealan of Queenscove.
Nealan. Ryan stored the name away, and watched them a little longer.
It had dawned on him over the last two weeks, when he spent so much time with Kel, laughing and joking, and when evening drew dark and close, talking of more serious matters, that she was probably his best friend.
His best friend. And his sweetheart. The most important person to him.
When Kel went back towards the stream, he followed her on light feet, silent as a ghost. "Kel," he said, when they were far enough from the camp.
She spun around, her hazel eyes alarmed until she recognised him. "You have *got* to stop doing that. One day I'm going to drop dead of fright."
"Can't have that, can we?" he said, grinning. "Look, I want to talk to ye about somethin'."
Uneasiness flashed in her eyes. "What?"
So there was some truth to the rumours. "I've been hearin' things, lass," he said quietly. "'Bout you an' Nealan of Queenscove. An'..I know I'm just some streetrat, an' I ain't at all suitable for you, so if you...want to end it, I ain't goin' to kick up a fuss."
There was silence, and the gold flecks in her eyes seemed to spread and swell like butter melting.
"Sometimes, Ryan Talver," she said slowly, "you're incredibly stupid."
He blinked. "Huh?"
"Rumour's...rumour. There was...something," she said, and gave a little shrug. "And he's still my friend, and I don't think that'll change. But he's not *you*."
He could feel a wild joy beginning to sizzle inside him, but Ryan kept his expression carefully controlled. "Lass, I saw your face when you were talkin' to him-"
"I was shocked," Kel said bluntly. "I thought I would still feel something. And maybe I do, just a little, because liking Neal is a habit I got into." She smiled faintly. "It's a hard one to break. But I don't feel the same way about him as I do about you. I just...don't know how to tell him."
By now, she was a deep, and rather touching, scarlet.
"I hate emotional things," she said. "Fighting is so much easier."
"If you think you're pummellin' *me* to work out your problems, think again!" he said, finally letting his smile appear. "Really?"
He didn't like sounding so insecure, but he couldn't help it. Almost everyone he had known hadn't wanted him, one way or another. It was hard to believe Kel would be any different.
Kel rolled her eyes exasperatedly, but it was softened by the hug she gave him. "Really, you idiot."
"By the way," Ryan murmured into her ear, taking the opportunity to hold her close a little longer in one of the few moments of privacy they had had lately, "I can't help but notice that ye've got pine needles in your hair, lass."
"Oh," she said, and submitted as he picked them out. "That's...observant of you."
"I'm a thief," he said dryly. "I have to be observant. An'..." He left one arm around her waist, and tilted her chin up. "Ye've somethin' on your mouth, lass."
She frowned. He adored the way it made lines at the corners of her eyes and mouth. I'm obsessed, Ryan thought ruefully. I notice the most insanely stupid things about her. "What?"
He couldn't stop his smile as he leaned in and kissed her, delighted at her startled breath, and then the way she melted into him. He drew his head back finally. "That," he said, and would have said more if she hadn't kissed *him*.
They ended up sitting at the base of a tree, hidden by the screen of trees and plants from the occasional person, with her coiled comfortably into his arms. Ryan sighed contentedly, all his worries about Nealan of Queenscove vanished, and closed his eyes against the spattered green light slipping through the leaves.
Kel tilted her head on one side, twisting to look at him. She would, he thought absently, be a stunner with the right style of hair and some of the face-paints Hana had in such abundance. "I've been meaning to ask you something."
"Aye?" he said, wondering what it could be
"Joren keeps finding things of his go missing, and then turn up in strange places," Kel said sweetly. He couldn't stop the wide, feline smile that curled over his face. "I couldn't help but notice that it began the day after you overheard him calling you a common peasant pretending to be a mage."
"He must just be forgetful," Ryan said innocently. "I'm always pickin' things up an' forgettin' where I put them down."
"I doubt he put all his clothes in the centre of the stream," Kel remarked. But he could see she was struggling not to smile. "You're irrepressible!"
"I don't even know what that means," he said cheerfully. "So I'll take your word for it. Don't tell me you didn't think it was funny."
She nodded, then blinked. "I did, true." She chuckled, a rich earthy sound that grazed his ears like raw silk. "His face...and speaking of problems, have you thought about trying to heal Andrea? Did you tell me you two were bonded?"
He made a face. "Aye, lass, but she's the healer, not me. I tried to reach the Goddess, but she ain't answerin' right now. Probably found some poor devil to send on an impossible quest."
"It wasn't impossible," Kel protested. "You found her, didn't you?"
"Well, actually, Stone Mountain's first troll an' your mate Cleon did," Ryan said glumly. "But it ain't right, Kel. I could always feel her before, you know, in my head, like. Nothin' now."
"Why don't you try waking her with a kiss?" she suggested lightly. The poisonous look she got as an answer would have killed bears at fifty paces. "Have you tried praying?"
"Prayin'?" His eyes narrowed. Really, Kel thought with an inner sigh, he should have been born noble. There were going to be a lot of court women hunting him down until he opened his mouth and they realised he wasn't as pureblooded as he looked.
"It is the method of choice to commune with your gods," she pointed out. "It helps if you beg and plead a bit, too."
"Beg?" Just as she had thought. Ryan's method of talking to the Goddess had probably involved shouting and swearing at her very loudly in the privacy of his mind. "That work?"
"Sometimes," she said. "Maybe you just need to be a bit more polite."
"Well..." he said dubiously. "I'll give it a try. Ain't anythin' else left."
* * * *
The inside of the tent was light and cool, but it made no difference to the girl huddled in a corner, shaking. She might have been plunged back into the pitch darkness that so much of her life had been spent in.
No one who had known Lady Bruna of Farbrook would have recognised her. The features were the same, but the expression was filled with a slack terror, and shadows flitted about her eyes like ghosts of yesterday.
She could only remember the dreadful, gripping fear of seeing her father there. Her father, the executioner of the Gifted, with his black, black eyes that were like falling into two pits, and the light playing across them was like the sweep of a blade towards her. Her father, with his handsome face and his empty smile. With a voice like honey and a soul like rotting flesh.
He used to lock her in the cellar, for hours and hours on end, screaming at her that her Gift was nothing but a blight that would be cut out of her if she did not control it. She had always hated the dank, dripping sounds that rattled about the place, where the rats that were big enough and fearless enough to come and nip at her.
Every morning, he would drag her from there, and every evening, when her Gift was still there, he would throw her back. Fling her, like a piece of trash.
It might have been different if her mother had lived. But she had died giving birth to Bruna, to this cursed creature.
And 'might have' had made no difference to the bleak existence that had dragged out for years until finally, her father could send her away to a convent, where she hid her powers from the priests, terrified that they would treat her the same.
It had been years before she discovered that the Gift was something to be proud of.
She had been able to hide her fear under a pretty smile, and her lack of confidence under coldness and cruelty. It had been easy; she had made herself a shining, beautiful court creature and no one had seen through to the ugly, shattered thing she was.
For a while, she had even thought that those black memories were fading. She lost herself in a world of riches and romance, flirting with men and snubbing women, and the cellar seemed an illusion she had once had.
Until this trip. Until she had seen her father again.
Part of her whispered that he had stolen magic himself, that everything he had preached to her was a lie. The other part whispered that what her father had could not be true magic; he would never stoop to that. He was not cursed by the gods as she was.
Logic told her he loved power more than ethics.
Fear told her that he was right and she was just a filthy, tainted monster.
She no longer knew what to think, so she let her mind drift through waking dreams of the court, of the cellar, until she didn't know where reality ended and memory began.
When hands nudged at her, and pulled her, she let them, unknowing of how wide and blank her eyes remained, and how they would sometimes spill tears down her smooth face. She didn't care how she would sometimes scream, and sometimes lie unmoving, or how she was scratching her hands into pieces.
She only knew that the mask she had built up so carefully had fallen away, and however she tried, she was still that ugly, ugly monster that her father had beaten.
That was all.
* * * *
"Well, well, Lady ha Minch," Hakuin Seastone said gleefully, as she strode into the practice room of the Palace, feeling very apprehensive. Unbeknown to anyone, she had spent an hour doing the stretches and flexes that Neal and his friends had taught her over the past weeks in the faint hope she'd withstand this hour of gruelling punishment with the Shang.
"At least you've dressed appropriately," the Wildcat remarked, her hands on her hips. She examined Pip with sharp grey eyes. "We had to teach some of the wretched creatures basic exercises and they all turned up in their nicest dresses and make-up, determined to outdo each other."
"Now…" The Shang Horse rubbed his palms together. "What shall we start with, Eda? The Queen wants us to make sure you *work* today."
"No gallivanting off on hurroks," the Wildcat put in sternly. "Let's start with what we taught those overdressed idiots. Some stretches." Her heartless smile warned Pip she was in for trouble. "Right girl, by the end of a few lessons, we'll have you doing *this*."
The Wildcat slid into graceful splits, then stretched forward until her upper body was flat along her leg.
Pip gave her a sweet, naïve smile then copied the movement perfectly. She remembered the year when her parents had hired a tumbler in the hope he could keep Pip out of trouble. He had...only instead of watching him, Pip had made the poor young man teach her acrobatics. He had quit a year later, saying there was no point in him staying, much to the bafflement of her parents.
Both Shangs stared. Then the Wildcat flashed a cool, slightly startled smile. "Well...how about this?"
She sat up again, then put her hands behind her. A lift of her legs brought them together, then with sheer upper body strength, the Wildcat turned her body over into a backflip.
It was a move Pip had spent *hours* practising, and it was ridiculously easy. Especially after she had taught - or tried to teach - Neal and Seaver. Her muscles moved smoothly under her, and then she was upright and looking at the respectful expression of the Wildcat.
"My," the woman said. "Hakuin, I think we have a trapeze artist here."
"Hmm..." The Shang Horse circled Pip, eyebrows drawn together and his forehead knotted. "All right, girl, what Shang moves do you know?"
Pip shrugged. "Not many. Only what the boys showed me."
"They shouldn't be teaching," the Wildcat muttered. "Half of them can't even get the moves right." She nodded. "Show me all the punches you know."
All? Maybe it would just be easier to show them the routine she did every night. Her parents her had given her a music-orb for her birthday; it was a crystal that a mage had trapped a song in, and Pip danced to it. She loved dancing - though she never *ever* danced in public - and it was an easy way to tire herself out so much that she fell asleep before the dreadful snores of Lady Faline down the corridor kept her awake.
Here the opening bars, she told herself, imagining the light, merry sound of the violin opening the dance. *One*-two-three, *one*-two-three...
The steps fell into her head easily, and she began to move through the sequence of stretches, punches, kicks, pirouettes and acrobatics that made the two Shangs exchange a meaningful glance. In her head, the music sped up, and she with it, as the flute and pipes accompanied the strings. Faster and faster and fater, until the final kick that spun her around and brought her back to face the pair.
Silence. Resounding, complete silence.
It must have been wrong, Pip realised, feeling a flush creep over her face.
"Mithros defend us," the Horse said weakly. "Eda, do you think...?"
"You're good," the Wildcat said crisply, and flashed a toothy grin. "Very good. How would you like to become a student?"
"Be a Shang warrior?" Pip squeaked, her eyes widening.
The woman shook her head vigorously. "No! Nobles can't be Shang. But we'd like to teach you. Maybe you won't be Shang, but you'll be nearly as good. If you'd like the lessons."
"I'd love them!" Pip said enthusiastically. Finally! Something to do in the Palace apart from sit around and watch the other girls gawp at the men passing through. "When can I start?"
The Horse snorted with laughter. "Will now do?"
* * * *
Evening found the knights, Riders and rest of the camp sprawled out around where the King was standing, looking stern and grave. Kel looked around at the bristling weapons, the serious faces and the dozens of banners, and realised she had never appreciated just how many people it took to defend the kingdom.
The King held up a hand for silence, and the babble died away.
"Welcome to all of you," he called. His voice carried easily, deep and resounding. "Thank you - I know you have been riding for some days now. But I have good news. We know who the leader of these...magical thieves is."
A startled murmur washed around the gathered knights.
"We will ride to Fief Farbrook now," King Jonathan said, his eyes like sapphire stars, twisting and glittering brilliantly. "We will attack under cover of darkness; Master Salmalin will search out the way for us. I must also caution you not to fire at *anything* on the way. No deer, no animals, especially not birds. You will be divided into groups of eight by My Lord Commander."
Kel grinned as she saw Sir Raoul lift a hand so everyone could see him, off to one side. He must have seen her because he nodded in her direction.
"There will be at least one mage with each group," the King continued. "We will reach the Fief before nightfall, but the attack will begin under cover of darkness - so if it has human form, don't shoot. Chances are you might be hitting on of our own. Once the attack is underway, our mages will provide light. These...people have magic, but they can be killed like you or I." He went on to outline the finer detail of the plan, describing routes and the best weapons, as well as cautioning everyone to move within pairs once the attack began.
"Questions?" he said finally.
Lord Wyldon, looking as wiry and formidable as ever, stood stood. "Sire, how many are we fighting?"
"Hopefully," the low, quiet voice of Master Salmalin cut in, "I will find that out. All information will be relayed back to your mages."
"What happens if we're bitten?" her former teacher demanded. "Will it have any effect?"
The mage smiled grimly. "We have several people who were bitten by the creatures. All are fine."
"I heard that a girl went mad," a man called from the back of the crowd. "How do you know that wasn't from the beasts?"
The mage's dark eyes sought the man out. "Rumour runs ahead of the truth again," he said gently. "The girl in question recognised one of the people who attacked her. She was...extremely upset."
More questions came, and the sun was beginning to into the skyline before they were ended, and the knights and Riders sorted into groups. As people began to drift away to saddle mounts and ride out, Kel made her way over to her knightmaster.
"No, you are not coming," he said before she even opened her mouth. "Over my dead body."
Before she could turn to Lord Wyldon in mute appeal (after all, he had fought with a broken arm), her former teaching master smiled grimly. "And I'll be using his body as a barricade."
"But-"
"Youngling," Sir Raoul said, frowning, "the healers want you here and I agree with them. There will be other fights."
She held her tongue after that. She knew the stubborn look on his face all too well.
It was with a heavy heart she watched the train of men ride into the distance.
* * * *
Numair soared over the forbidding ramparts of Fief Farbrook, his hawk's eyes sharp even in the dim light. Moonlight spilled over the stone building like water, throwing a silvery light across the statues that lined the roofs. Statues of wolves, Numair noticed darkly, like the monstrous creature that had attacked them.
It froze his heart to think how close the three children - children who were *his* responsibility - had come to dying.
Dipping now, folding his wings to plummet into the courtyard and note the unearthly silence that lay over the place like a blanket. Where were the torches that should have been burning? The odd sound of the few people still awake?
He saw a heap of strange objects in one corner, and swooped to land above it.
The smell of blood hit him.
Oh god, he thought, as the heap separated into shapes, his brain making sense of the mess. That's where those people are. Bones, and hanks of things he didn't want to think about, flung together like waste.
Monster. Lord Farbrook was a monster.
He left the courtyard, winging through a slit of a window and praying that the same sight was not repeated everywhere. It was only a small fief; around a hundred people lived there, and surely they could not all be dead?
He searched for what seemed like hours through musty hallways and deserted rooms, until he came to the Great Hall.
There, and only there, he found the misshapen, distorted life he sought. Creatures were slumped before a roaring, crackling fire that threw hot orange light across their clawed, deformed bodies. Half in, half out of any recognisable shape; in their sleep, they could no longer control the magic.
How many there? Perhaps a score, no more. Others, no doubt, roamed the land, but Numair knew that with spells like this, removing the head of the magic would destroying the links of all the weaker creatures.
Kill the lord, and the others would become human.
They would face trial, he had no doubt. What else was there to do with them? They had killed - no, slaughtered - and they would face the consequences of it.
Among the sleeping shapes, he saw the one he wanted; an enormous black wolf, twice the size of any normal creature, that slept alone. The others huddled together, as if seeking warmth in the cold dark night of their souls, but this one was alone by choice.
I have found them, Numair thought. And now they shall see the King's justice.
He left, a shadow among shadows.
* * * *
The road was long and dusty, and the weapons weighed Neal down. The rhythmic crash of hundreds of horses' hooves hitting the path had become a dreary sea echoing in his mind. Although they had left the horses a mile or two back and now advanced on stealthy feet, he could still hear the phantom sound of their hooves. He had to fight to keep himself alert.
Above, the moon glided smoothly through the scudding clouds, graceful and distant, throwing a pale ivory light across the earth. Ahead, Neal could see the spiky turrets of Fief Farbrook, and he felt an inadvertent chill shiver through him. Something here felt wrong, so wrong, but he couldn't pinpoint it.
"It's so silent," the Crown Prince murmured close by, his eyes two black pools. Lord Imrah hushed him with a sharp word.
"Nothing alive here," the Lioness said gruffly. She was a dim, short silhouette before Neal, picking her way over the bumpy ground. "Gods curse it," she hissed, tripping. Neal steadied her. "I can't see a damn thing in this helmet."
A sapphire blue flame flared near her, and the Lioness cursed again. "What is it *now*?"
Neal watched, fascinated as she drew her hands together, and then apart. Between them, a globe of violet fire swelled, and in it was cage the face of King Jonathan, grim and satisfied.
"We've found him," he reported with a note of triumph in his voice. "Alanna, Numair is going to meet you at the castle gate. He'll direct you...your group are going in first. Wyldon is going in through the eastern gate, Raoul by the northern and myself by the west. The remainder of the knights will follow us if needs be. Good luck to you, Champion."
"Sire," the Lioness said, a wild grin flashing. The globe snapped out, and she turned to Neal, her smile gleaming in the gloom. "Well, Squire, you're going to see some excitement!"
"Oh, *yay*," Neal said glumly. "Just what I wanted."
* * * *
The alicorn stopped, and flicked her mane back, knocking away the flies.
So this was Tortall. This was the haven that the mortal boy had spoken of. It was a city like any other; there was no purity or beauty surrounding it, only the same mass of buildings you would find in any place. It had it slums, and its filth, and its scum...but out of this, the castle rose like a great white unicorn.
This was where she must go.
There was a woman here that she has glimpsed in the thoughts of the mortal boy who had saved her. He had not asked for Chantevol's help, but she would give it to him anyway, Kindness was a great rarity in this changing world, one to be treasured and cherished, and repaid where possible.
She had given the boy a vial, a magical talisman that would call her to him if ever he needed aid; but she would help in another, smaller way too; the horn of an alicorn had fabulous healing power, and there was one the boy had hurt terribly without meaning too.
She cast an enchantment as she entered the city, so no mortal would see her; instead, they moved from her way without appearing to realise, rolling back like some swollen sea. The squalor, the narrow streets filled with dirt, the sly whispers and crimes that evolved around her sickened the alicorn. How could mortals live this way, hemmed in day by day?
She passed through them like a ghost, until she reached the towering grandeur of the palace. And here, finally, she let her magic slide away like water until she stood before these strange uniformed and bedecked humans in all her immortal glory.
They gaped, and stared at her, and finally, when she asked them in the earthy richness of her voice, called a mage to see this fantastic being.
"I have come to heal," she explained simply, looking at this man who called himself Lindhall Reed, and whose dreamy eyes held a calm intelligence. "There is a mortal who rescued me, and it is to him I repay my debt."
"Who do you wish to heal?" the man asked curiously. She could see he was itching to ask her questions, but refrained. "I'm afraid there have been several attacks by immortals and I have to be sure that you mean us no harm." A cursory glance at the claws upon her hands.
"We are only the creation of mortals," she sent tranquilly. "Your Alissa Shandori made me with claws, and so claws I bear, but look..." And she bared her teeth; the flat, wide teeth of the herbivore. "I have no need to use them."
The mage thought for a long time, while she shuffled her long, shining hooves and flicked her tail. Then he nodded. "Very well, but I will accompany you."
She nodded, and the inky black wash of her hair shimmered. "Where is the mortal you call Hana Dharaz?"
"Ah, the...lady of leisure...that Numair's protégée blinded!" the mage said, and nodded eagerly. "You can really heal her?"
"Our horns are renowned for their healing power." Her eyes darkened. "Many mortals have killed us for them."
He glanced at her as she walked beside him, through the arching halls. "Not here."
"No," she agreed placidly. Minutes passed in silence, while Chantevol ignored the stares and gawping of the palace mortals, moving lightly as a summer breeze through their cold, harsh building. All the white marble in the world could hold the life of a clean glade, or the laughter of a stream. This was not her world, but she would suffer it to end her obligation.
They found the woman sat in a corner, trying to sew old fabrics under the stern eye of a palace woman. She winced often as she stabbed the sliver of metal...a needle, the mortal name...into her hand by mistake. The alicorn could not help but notice how many of the other mortal woman sneered a her, while the men's hungry eyes fell on her lovely face and the lazy curls of red hair.
"Jenna?" the mage asked softly. The overseer stopped watching Hana with her hawk's eyes. She blinked as she saw the alicorn, and her hand rose to her mouth.
"Master Reed," she said, awed, "what be that?"
Hana stopped her sewing, and looked in the direction of Jenna's voice.
"I," Chantevol said sharply, "am an alicorn, and I ma *not* a 'that'." She moved forwards, hooves clicking on the flagstones until she stood before Hana. "And I have come to heal you."
"Me?" Hana said, the milky orbs of her eyes gazing in Chantevol's direction. "Why?" Her voice was bitter. "I'm just a prostitute. Who cares about me?"
"Your Ryan cares," she said. "Your mortal youngling? He saved me, and now I will do something to help him, by helping you."
"Ryan?" the woman said, a faint smile touching her lips. "Is he gettin' into trouble again?"
"You mortals are always in trouble," Chantevol said. "Hold still."
The woman froze where she was, quivering slightly as the alicorn lowered her golden, glowing horn to touch Hana's eyelids, first one, then the other, a soft light haloed about her. Slowly, the milky white of her eyes thinned, became translucent, and then an emerald green circle appeared in the centre, a black dot sprouting from that, until Hana's eyes were whole and bright.
She raised her hands to her face, waving them as if she could believe it. And then hse saw Chantevol, and gave a little cry of shock.
The alicorn stepped back.
"Thank you," Hana said shakily.
She shrugged. What did she care for mortal thanks? "The debt is done," she said firmly, and left.
* * * *
It was all so fast, Neal could hardly comprehend it. One moment, pushing open the doors of the great hall and seeing the savannah idleness of the creatures spread carelessly about the floor.
And the next, that great black wolf raised its sleek head, its eyes flashing ember-red, and it howled.
The creatures were upon them so fast, Neal almost forgot what to do. Fight his way through them, battering them away with his shield, stabbing, swiping, chopping with his sword.
Before him, he saw the Lioness charge, a battle cry wild and fierce in her throat as the wolf sprang at her.
They met in a tangle of mortal and magic, metal flickering in the hellish firelight, teeth snapping. The Lioness rolled and twisted, incredibly fast and the wolf snarled, bit, attacked.
Hurry up, hurry up, Neal thought as the weight of bloodthirsty, enraged creatures pressed in on him. He heard the doors crash open as the other parties of knights entered the hall, and joined the fast and furious fighting.
The Lioness went flying, knocked backwards by the weight of the wolf. It crouched low, muscles bunching to spring, a shuddering mass of black-pelted venom. Muscles tensing, jaws opening, it *sprang*.
It didn't see Raoul of Goldenlake step into its path and swing the mighty axe he carried in one clean stroke.
But *everyone* saw the head roll to the ground.
The other creatures screamed suddenly, and curled in on themselves, writhing, screeching as their bodies began to contort and change. Neal was very close to retching as he saw the horrible mutations, and had to look away, though the sound of popping joints and creaking bones would haunt him for years to come.
With their leader dead, their ties to their stolen magic were severed.
It was ended.
* * * *
Ryan heard Hana's voice in his head, Hana telling him stories when he had been a child to lull him to sleep.
~ Once upon a time, ~ the ghost of her voice whispered in his head, ~ there was a princess. And she had hair like the sun trapped in cobwebs, and a smile to split the world asunder. She was lovely, perfect, dazzling except for a small scar on the bridge of her nose. ~
He had only seen Andrea's smile once or twice, but it had hung like a glittering crystal chandelier in his mind. He was supposed to protect her, the Goddess had told him that, and she couldn't be wrong *all* the time. 'Sides, he didn't mind looking after her. She had saved him, and she just an ordinary kid messed up in magic and madness, like him.
Her hair, that glossy golden hair was fanned out on the pillow, and her eyelashes fluttered now and again. Ryan had always thought that sleeping people were still, but pale though she was, Andrea twisted and turned, and sometimes moans escaped her.
~ And one day, a curse was put upon this lovely girl by a man who envied her beauty and power, and she fell into a charmed sleep. She thought he loved her, you see, but he loved her face and her family's land, not her, and when she, discovering this, refused to marry him, he flew into a rage. She fell asleep, into a swoon on the ground, weeping even in her sleep. Years passed, and the princess still slept, hidden deep in a woodland bower by mages who sought to protect her. ~
Not years, only days, but it felt strange not being able to sense her. Before, she had always been there, a tiny moth-like presence deep in his mind. He had known if he desperately needed, she was there to reach out to. But now, a hush that made him feel choked and alone.
~ Centuries passed, and the princess's bowers became covered in weeds until there was only darkness. The mages died, and her kingdom fell into ruin and war, until all that remained in a destroyed wasteland was a palace of poison plants, stored safe in a vast ugly forest. ~
Poison plants? Only the poison of an Arachon monster, only the poison of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
~ Until one day - and fairytales live for one day - a lost traveller found himself in this land. Now, I should tell you that he was good and brave and true, and handsome as the night is dark, but all those things would be a lie. He was only a man, like you will be one day, Ryan, a man who lived as best he could, but did what he had to for survival. He had a little magic that he used for tricks and street shows, and could throw a knife like any street man, but he was nothing special. ~
That's what we all do, Ryan thought, balancing on the side of the bed so he could see her small, pale face fully, with the dark eyelashes lying on her face like two charcoal crescent moons. Just try and survive as best as we can. Some of us turn into heroes on the way, like Kel, but most of us are just people.
~ A storm had arisen, and it drove him to find shelter. He wandered deeper and deeper into the wood, hearing the howls of wolves behind him, shivering and miserable, and then he saw the thicket. It looked sturdy, he thought, and might be dry, so he crawled within to shelter, not minding the cuts that laddered his hand and the nettles that stung him terribly, he was so desperate to be dry. ~
And this storm had been worse than many. A storm of people searching for ordinary, thieving Ryan Talver and this sweet, innocent girl. A storm of magical creatures that killed, of knights to chop them down.
He smoothed a hand over her forehead, surprised at how soft her skin was, downy as rose petals. "Wake up," he whispered, as he so often had, but she remained locked in slumber. "Wake up, lass. There's people here who want to meet ye."
~ And imagine his surprise when he found himself in a hollowed cave, a cave carven not from stone but years and years of weed. Imagine him standing, stooping slightly because he was a tall man and the roof was low, and feeling his way through the darkness. Imagine his bemusement when he felt another person there, lying silent. ~
He remembered that first moment, being hurled into Andrea's world. Seeing her surrounded by enemies - a girl he didn't even *know* - and being furious at how callously they treated her. Meeting those extraordinary hawk-golden eyes, and hearing the first delicate chime of her voice. He had been so shocked, and so amazed and even - even - a little afraid at this unknown new bond between them.
~ He called his magic, and flung light into the corner of the cave. And the white light of his gift made the sleeping princess radiant. For a moment, he thought she was a goddess or a dryad, but then he saw the mark of mortal beauty on her; that one little scar. It was what saved her from sleeping eternally. ~
He called to her again, and then he called to his magic, and let it ripple over her. Trying to find the same spark of life he had found in Kel, and finding only an impossible slick wall that he couldn't break through.
~ He leaned over her. I know what you're thinking; he kissed her then, but he didn't. He tried to be a good man, and good men, he knew, did not kiss vulnerable sleeping women. He saw her tears, for the princess still wept at her betrayal after centuries asleep, and prayed to the gods to make this girl happy. ~
Ryan had never prayed. He didn't know how. But he looked at her face, and shut his eyes and thought simply, please, I need your help.
"My help?" The voice rang like a screaming osprey, harsh and hungry. "I am your Goddess, and you turn to me only when you want something? Where is your respect?"
Respect has to be earned, Ryan thought. All you have done is send me on a quest. You let Kel die. You let all those poor people die who didn't know any better, all they wanted was to feel magic.
Silence, but Hana's phantom voice filled it.
~ And because he was selfless in his wish, the gods awoke the girl. ~
"Fairy stories do not occur in real life," the voice of the Goddess said. He couldn't see her, but he could smell the incense of a temple, and the air was unbearably cold. "But...I will help you. You are rude, Ryan Talver, and you are impudent and young and foolish. Yet for all that, you are my Chosen, and you have finally asked for my help. I will wake her."
Then she was gone, and warmth seeped into his bones again. He opened his eyes, looking at her face.
"Wake up," he muttered, but she remained still and waxen. "Wake up, lass, you got to finish the story."
~ She heard this man praying for her, and when at last he realised she was awake, he was afraid of what she might think. But the princess reached out, and took his hand and- ~
Hana had never finished that story. He had fallen asleep.
So what, he wondered, half-afraid, would happen? Andrea's eyelashes lifted smoothly, slowly, and the blurred liquid of her golden eyes swirled hazily.
What if she didn't want him? He was only a streetrat, he had caused her so much trouble-
"Ryan?"
Her voice was rusty, but still sweet.
His grey eyes lit up. "Hello Andrea."
She sat up with a moan, blinking. "Is it you?"
"Aye, it is." He saw her look around, and smiled gladly. "You're safe now, lass. We're all safe."
She looked at him, a kind of shattering disbelief in her eyes. A long pause and then an incredulous, shy smile curled over her mouth. "You found me."
He laughed. "I had help."
She reached out one pale hand, and cautiously, he put his on top of it.
Fire blazed around them, an incredible emerald fire that was their two magics merging, and Ryan felt the world at his fingertips, waiting for them to reach out and take it.
"We're here," she said, looking at him steadfastly. "At last. Thank you, Ryan Talver."
"Thank *you*, Andrea Kirisra," he said solemnly, and they grinned at each other.
He wondered if she heard the voice that whispered once before she arose, before she went out to meet the people who would never lead her to the gallows or hunt her into hell. Andrea was Tortallan now.
But he didn't know what the thunderstorm voice was that echoed faintly in his ears.
~ You are Bound. ~
* * * *
~ The End - For Now. ~
Comments would be vastly, utterly and slavishly adored!
Yup. That's it. It is done with! So my thanks to these darling people who commented on the last part, and kicked my ass into writing this :-) If you're still reading, I think I should be handing out medals!
Thank you to:
Chip: Thank you :-) Well, I hope you enjoyed! I've loved hearing what you thought!
Orenda: I don't believe in perfect worlds. If I ain't living in it, why should anybody else? Besides...think how dull life would be if we were all perfectly happy! Thanks!
Shannon Cooper: Thank you :-) Oh no, it's not over! Well, it is now (oh my god, I can't believe I just wrote that. That was an unintentional quote of the football phrase...). Ack, there will be more cliffhangers to come!
:-) I have started the sequel - I have about 10 pages of bits and pieces done on it (hopefully it will have a few surprising plot twists...) Thanks!
Emy: Thank you very much! I'm honoured! I hope you've liked the rest of it :-) I do - or rather did - take Latin, but I am no longer bound to it's hellish lessons! I can't remember how you say thank you in Latin...so long...
Lady: I am all for people getting what they deserve :-) It's so much fun! Pip will get further desserts...Neal is in this part...and will be in the next story in a rather more substantial way I hope! I'll find out my exam results on Aug 16th (so you will probably be able to tell from my a) manically depressed or b) insanely happy tone.
Aquilla: LJS and TP are a tad different, aren't they! I keep finding myself wanting to write the wrong things in each story...I think bits *are* creeping in here and there! Thank ye!
Cass: It will ,I think, be back to cliffhangers, It took me yonks to get this out...I need the motivation of a cliffhanger. It kicks me into gear. Thanks!
Sakamoto Mizuki: god, no, don't throw yourself at my feet! The stench alone might kill you! Thanks :-) Well, it wasn't soon, but I finally got the more out! Sorry it took so long!
Quartz: I didn't think you were a jackass (is that also a kind of rabbit?) Don't apologise :-) I'm pretty difficult to offend. (With my friends, that is a good thing!) This chapter is / was very very long!
Ivy Leaves: Well, I thought Cruise was pretty cute in Jerry Maguire (when his age wasn't showing), but James Marsters, *well*. Oh, I've been hit with worse than a wooden plank. :-) Algebra gets easier :-) Trust me! I'm doing A-Level (high school senior) algebra. Was that just a confession of insanity?
Comicstar: Thank you! I've really enjoyed writing this :-) Thank you for the encouragement!
Jenn: I don't know - Kel is pretty young, about 14/15 I think, but Ryan's 16 and we all know what 16 year old boys are like... Oh, kittens are so cute! It's a pity they have to grow into cats.
Myst: That happened next! And what happens next should be more fun :-) I have plans. Mind you, I have fingernails too. (Random comment of the day.) Thank you for *all* your reviews.
Team Socket: Thanks :-) I've been reading Terry Pratchett lately. I nearly killed myself laughing. (Interesting Times - amazing book.)
Michelle: I have the feeling riding a hurrok would be like hitching a lift with an Indycar driver ;-) One wild ride. Thanks!
Saree: Thank ye very much! :-) What a lovely compliment!
Larzdinn: Oh dear god, I published this chapter in *May*? It's been two months? Someone kneecap me! That's disgusting! ::grimace:: Don't apologise for reviewing late, yell at me for taking so damn long! Nah, that wasn't the end - but this is! Thanks!
Maygwenda: Thank you! Sorry about the hurrying up ::cough:: Life got on top of me.
And last - but not at all least, Ra3212: Thank you :-) I know it doesn't fit in with Squire, but hey, that's why they put the 'fiction' in fanfiction!
And thank you to *everyone* who has commented I have been totally, utterly, astounded, gob smacked, thrilled and delighted at your comments and criticisms - thank you for reading! You have made the last few months a lot of fun!
Thank you: Aeris Cimorene ei Caeran, Alec, Angelique Hallowed, Angel of Death, Anjel, Anon Sara'a, AquariuSagE, Aquilla, Arial, Ariana, Arturo, Arwen, Arylia, Cait, Camilla, Cass , Catchfire, Chip, Comicstar, Cool, Daine, Danel, Dara, Dead Flower, Dee, Depressed Muse, Destiny, Diomede, Draco, Dreamgirl_j8, Elinar, Elizabeth, Emy, Euclara, Eviltama, Faerie Gurl, Fei, FireLily, Francesca, Gabs, Galli-vi, Gwyn, Harkly, Heavengirl221, Ivy Leaves, Jackal Nyte, Jaelawyn Noble, Jennifer, Jenn, Jess Elvenflame, Jessica, Jinx, Jodie, Cali Gurlie, Karalea Ethereal, Katie, Katya Thostova, Kibee, Kierce, Kira, Kitkat, Lady, Lady Silvermoon, Larzdinn, Leap, Leevee, Leila, Lily, Lily Potter, Maia Ariadne Athene, Marie, Magelet, Mage Melery, Maple, Maygwenda, Mel, Merc the Mage, Merlayne Q, Me, Michelle, Midnight Angel, Millennia, Molly-Ann, Myst, Naavi, Noelle, Obsessed Reader, Onua, Orenda, Peaches, Perfect1, Phantasea, Phoenix Girl, Quartz, Ra3212, Renegade Wolfe, Rici Stark, Sakamoto Mizuki, Saphron, Saree, Scarlette Faerie, Scyther2.0, Shannon Cooper, Silver Serpeh, Slim C, Sparrow, Star*, Starlight, Steph, Sulia Serafine, Tam Cranver, Tasidia, Tatra, Team Socket, Theladysong, The Silver Mist Tigress, Twiz*ler, Tyr the One-Handed, Wazzup Girl, Willows and last but most infinitly not least, :-)
You have been absolutely **incredible**. So simply, infinitely, eternally - thank you. Anything you have to say would be much adored. There will be an epilogue if you wish.
Apologies for the time this has taken - since January, my life has been one long trawl of exams, mock-exams, tests and examlets. Blame the British education system. :-) But they're over (you might be able to hear me screaming madly wherever you are) and I'll have summer to write.
The next story, I promise, will be better written. This is the first time I've ever written - or attempted to write - a TP fanfic, so I'm sorry about the mess this story has been. I have a lot clearer idea of what I'm doing with the next one, and hopefully, you'll enjoy it.
Lastly - and most importantly - thank you so much for all your comments, your ideas, your suggestions, your rants and encouragement and for the response you gave me. I have been *totally* floored. You've been utterly phenomenal - thanks for putting up with me!
You will recognise Ryan's story as a variant on a common fairy tale - I've torallan-ised it. (Gods know with all the hubbub going round about plagiarism lately, I have no urge to get my account evaporated.)
Part Nineteen
Two weeks and everything had changed beyond Kel's grasp.
~ Enjoying the sun, mortaling? ~ a lazy voice said.
Kel turned and jumped. Somehow, the forty foot dragon had managed to sneak up on her.
*There* was one huge change. Master Salmalin had brought Jademirth over from the Dragon Realms by mistake, and now he didn't seem inclined to leave. The elegant, gorgeously beautiful collection of green leanness with eyes that shone like turquoise in the sun winked at her.
It winked. Dragons, she was sure, shouldn't do that. She couldn't get used to the fact that Jademirth wasn't quite like other dragons. ~ Don't worry, I won't tell them you're shirking your duties. ~
"I've had enough of washing bandages," she said tiredly. "It's women's work."
It arched its long neck until the triangular head came close to sniff at her. Its breath smelled of pine and sap. Jademirth, it had turned out, was the Immortal Realms' only vegetarian dragon. ~ Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't you a female? ~
"Yes," she said grumpily, "but I'm a knight."
~ Ah. I thought mortal women couldn't be knights? Or have things changed since I was last here? ~
"They've changed," she answered. Then, piqued by curiosity, she added, "When *were* you last here?"
The bass voice rumbled. ~ Three thousand years ago, give or take. And in three thousand years, I didn't see as much excitement as I did in one day here. Times have changed! ~ It grinned, showing dozens of pearled spiky teeth. ~ Why are you so miserable, mortaling? ~
She shrugged. "I don't know. Everything's changed all of a sudden."
She remembered a week ago, when the enormous dragon had walked into the camp with Master Salmalin and a strange lady mage at his side. She had later been introduced as Laird, a red-robed mage and former prisoner of a magical beast called an Arachon. Flanking them had been Cleon - who Kel was delighted to see - and Joren - who Kel was less than delighted to see. And on the dragon's back had been a crippled boy introduced as Marcus of Kennan, Cleon's brother (apparently this had been as much news to Cleon as to her), and a little girl who said nothing but stared at everyone with big, dark eyes.
And of course, Andrea.
She was comatose. In seven days, she hadn't stirred from the deep still slumber she had fallen into after helping Ryan. The healers said it was exhaustion, nothing more, after too many days of beatings, torture and overwork. Now, they were starting to look uneasy.
Most of the Riders were gone to meet the King, who was riding up to meet them with an armed force that hadn't been seen since the War.
~ Change is unavoidable, ~ the dragon murmured. ~ Usually, you mortals thrive on it. ~ He had sunk onto his side, the long neck stretched out on the warm ground, glistening in the sun.
"Kel?"
She half-smiled at Ryan as he approached. The streetboy grinned at her, and dumped the basket he was carrying. "More of them damn bandages. Healer's have told me I'm to help ye." His smile dimmed. "Andrea still ain't awake." His soft grey eyes hardened to flint. "If I ever meet that monster that put all them cuts on her, I'll kick it from Midwinter to Mithros, an' let *him* fry it."
"I know," she said. "I'm sorry about that."
"Ain't your fault, Kel," he sighed and sat down to dangle his feet in the stream. "King's men have just arrived, by the way. I'm supposed to tell ye, you're to go-"
Kel was a disappearing blur in the distance.
Ryan blinked, and smiled. "-meet them," he finished softly. "Hey, lizard, you look after the laundry? I want t'go an' see this."
~ I'm not a lizard, ~ Jademirth retorted. ~ But run along, mortaling. I think I'll catch up on my sunbathing. ~
Ryan snapped him a cheeky salute. The dragon swished its tail at him half-heartedly, and sprawled in the light.
* * * *
Kel skidded into the main camp as the hordes of armoured knights poured in, trailing banners and squires and laden saddlebags. Her breath caught in her throat at the sheer magnificence of it, and for a moment, she was intensely proud to be Tortallan.
"-dozens of places like this on the way up," she could hear the cool tones of the King saying to her brother. "We passed through entire villages of people who had barricaded themselves in their homes. And there were some Stormwings who actually asked us for sanctuary." He grimaced. "I suppose this means long sweeps across country in the hope we can flush these creatures out of their homes."
"Not at all, sire," Inness said. His eyes noted Kel, waiting unobtrusively to one side. He nodded curtly. "Their leader is the father of the Lady Bruna. You might remember her, sire."
"I do." The King's pained tones left no doubt as to just what he thought of Bruna. "Lord Farbrook? As far as I am aware, he is utterly against magic."
"From what Lady Bruna says," Inness answered, grimacing, "he is against magic, but entirely for power."
"I see. Would it be possible to talk to Lady Bruna?"
Her brother sighed heavily. "Lady Bruna is not...herself."
How true that was! When the girl had awoken from her healing, Kel had expected her to be her usual scything self. But instead, it was as if all her life and cruelty had been drained from her and left only a semblance of a person who flinched at every shadow, who said not a word and stared as vacantly at Jademirth as at Kel.
There was, to put it kindly, no one home.
"Kel?" The voice froze her solid for a moment.
She turned around slowly, feeling a knot of emotion surging in her stomach and spreading across her body like a cascade of boiling water.
Those green eyes...they had been far gentler when she looked at them last, and the smile hadn't been quite so hesitant, and he hadn't been wearing the gleaming plate armour.
She had thought that her feelings for Neal had been a phase. Out of sight, out of mind, she had thought, and enjoyed the quiet company of a streetboy who was a mage in muddy disguise.
Wrong.
"Neal?" she managed to get out, completely thrown.
Her first thought was: he's even more handsome
Her second was: oh Goddess, *Ryan*.
Her third was: aaargh!
"You look like I just rose from the dead!" he said brightly, blissfully unaware of the fact she had been dead a scant fortnight ago. Then he stopped, and hesitated.
Dozens of silent words hung between them, as she looked in the depths of his emerald eyes, as elusive as a jungle, and wished she had the courage to say some of them aloud. She was torn again; here was Neal, the dream, the fantasy, the chimera. And there was Ryan, the surprisingly sweet reality.
"How have you been?" was all she did say.
He shrugged. "Not too bad. The Lioness is working me in to the ground, as ever." His smile, as startling as sunlight hitting a cobweb, flashed. "Life was quiet without you around...everyone missed you. *I* missed you."
He said the last more quietly, as though he didn't want anyone else to hear.
The words made her both glad and sad. "Me too." Only half a lie; she had missed him, but not in the same way she once would have.
Silence again, quivering like a hummingbird.
Neal sighed suddenly and then stepped forward and gave her a hug. She clung onto him briefly, her stomach churning with too many feelings. "Dear girl, we have *got* to talk when this is all over."
"We will," she promised. She couldn't read the look in his eyes, and it worried her. What if he wanted...things from her? She couldn't give herself to him now, and Kel wasn't even sure if she wanted to. At least, not in the same way.
"For now..." he put one hand to his forehead theatrically and proclaimed, "I must seek out the traitors and punish them! As is the calling of a young and fearless squire such as myself," he added loftily.
Kel snorted with laughter. Some things about Neal would never change.
"This from the person who can't stand spiders?" Cleon demanded, joining them. He was dressed for battle too, she noticed wistfully. The healers had banned her from fighting for a month, until they were certain she had suffered no ill-effects from her little...sortie into death. "The only way you'd catch them is because they were laughing too hard to move!"
"Better show them your face then," Neal countered. "I hear you've been having adventurous fun with our friend Joren?"
"I've spent most of the last couple of weeks wanting to throttle him if that's what you mean," Cleon admitted. "And...I've found my brother."
"So I hear," Neal said. "Your parents went home with him last week, didn't they?"
"We're not far from home here," the redhead admitted. "it's strange though - I don't know him at all. And my parents seemed so...hesitant. Like they didn't expect him to react how he did."
She remembered the day Marcus had left. The little girl, Shari, had gone with them too.. Cleon definitely had his father's build, but his smile was all his mother's, a tiny delicate woman who had smacked Cleon around the head when she saw him and demanded to know why he hadn't written in half a year.
But Marcus had simply stared at them, his eyes too old and too wary for someone of his age. Shari, the child who looked like an angel with her masses of white-blond hair and pale, supple skin, had buried her head in his chest and clung to him.
"Marc?" Yvette Kennan had asked softly, swallowing hard. She had stepped forward, and then stopped, as if she wasn't quite sure what to expect.
"Mother," he had said. His voice cool and almost emotionless. Then he had bowed his head and said. "I'm sorry."
She had run over then, and embraced her missing son, while Cleon's father had added in his gruff voice, "What happened to you, son?"
He had pushed away his mother - for a moment, Kel had thought him cruel and cold, but then she had realised just how incredibly damaged he had to be. He had survived nearly ten years of torture and loneliness, having no one but himself and a few other mad or hopeless prisoners. He had been beaten, crippled, left to die.
He didn't *know* how to act with people.
"It's a long story," he muttered, then patted Shari reassuringly. "Mother...this is Shari. She was a prisoner in the same place I was. I'm all the family she has. Do you think she...?"
That day, the Kennans gained a son and a daughter. It was obvious Shari regarded Marcus as her protector, and would only be prised away from him when he told her quietly that no one would hurt her, and that he wasn't going anywhere.
Kel had to wonder what on earth his future could hold. He was a mage, but an untrained mage who had had his power devoured by a monster for years.
She had the feeling though, from the determined look in his eyes, Marcus of Kennan would leave an impact on the world somehow.
"Still," Cleon continued now, "I suppose after what he's been though." His face hardened slightly. "That place was...*dreadful*. I don't know how anyone could survive."
"Luck, probably," Neal said solemnly. "Any idea what's going to happen here?"
Cleon shrugged. "They're sending that girl - Andrea - back to the palace. The healers here think Duke Baird might be able to wake her up. And the mage Master Salmalin found...Laird? For the university magi to talk to." He gave Neal a sly look. "You university people. You're not happy unless you can dissect everything."
"That's because we have inquiring minds," Neal declared haughtily. "Unlike you hopeless ruffians."
"That's why you talk so much rubbish," Kel put in, grinning at him.
His eyebrows arched, a smile playing about his mouth. "I resent that bitterly, my dear. Don't discount my higher ideals just because you can't understand them-"
"Neal," she said sweetly, "Do you want me to break your nose?"
"-though of course," he said with hardly a pause for breath, "I don't really know what I'm talking about."
"Neither does anyone else," Cleon muttered, shaking his head.
For a moment, Kel caught Neal's eyes and the emotions swirling in them made her breath catch. Her dilemma crashed back on her with a resounding thump. What was she going to do about this?
* * * *
Ryan Talver had watched Kel while she talked to the tall boy. When he asked Miri, all too casually, who he was, she had told him that was Nealan of Queenscove.
Nealan. Ryan stored the name away, and watched them a little longer.
It had dawned on him over the last two weeks, when he spent so much time with Kel, laughing and joking, and when evening drew dark and close, talking of more serious matters, that she was probably his best friend.
His best friend. And his sweetheart. The most important person to him.
When Kel went back towards the stream, he followed her on light feet, silent as a ghost. "Kel," he said, when they were far enough from the camp.
She spun around, her hazel eyes alarmed until she recognised him. "You have *got* to stop doing that. One day I'm going to drop dead of fright."
"Can't have that, can we?" he said, grinning. "Look, I want to talk to ye about somethin'."
Uneasiness flashed in her eyes. "What?"
So there was some truth to the rumours. "I've been hearin' things, lass," he said quietly. "'Bout you an' Nealan of Queenscove. An'..I know I'm just some streetrat, an' I ain't at all suitable for you, so if you...want to end it, I ain't goin' to kick up a fuss."
There was silence, and the gold flecks in her eyes seemed to spread and swell like butter melting.
"Sometimes, Ryan Talver," she said slowly, "you're incredibly stupid."
He blinked. "Huh?"
"Rumour's...rumour. There was...something," she said, and gave a little shrug. "And he's still my friend, and I don't think that'll change. But he's not *you*."
He could feel a wild joy beginning to sizzle inside him, but Ryan kept his expression carefully controlled. "Lass, I saw your face when you were talkin' to him-"
"I was shocked," Kel said bluntly. "I thought I would still feel something. And maybe I do, just a little, because liking Neal is a habit I got into." She smiled faintly. "It's a hard one to break. But I don't feel the same way about him as I do about you. I just...don't know how to tell him."
By now, she was a deep, and rather touching, scarlet.
"I hate emotional things," she said. "Fighting is so much easier."
"If you think you're pummellin' *me* to work out your problems, think again!" he said, finally letting his smile appear. "Really?"
He didn't like sounding so insecure, but he couldn't help it. Almost everyone he had known hadn't wanted him, one way or another. It was hard to believe Kel would be any different.
Kel rolled her eyes exasperatedly, but it was softened by the hug she gave him. "Really, you idiot."
"By the way," Ryan murmured into her ear, taking the opportunity to hold her close a little longer in one of the few moments of privacy they had had lately, "I can't help but notice that ye've got pine needles in your hair, lass."
"Oh," she said, and submitted as he picked them out. "That's...observant of you."
"I'm a thief," he said dryly. "I have to be observant. An'..." He left one arm around her waist, and tilted her chin up. "Ye've somethin' on your mouth, lass."
She frowned. He adored the way it made lines at the corners of her eyes and mouth. I'm obsessed, Ryan thought ruefully. I notice the most insanely stupid things about her. "What?"
He couldn't stop his smile as he leaned in and kissed her, delighted at her startled breath, and then the way she melted into him. He drew his head back finally. "That," he said, and would have said more if she hadn't kissed *him*.
They ended up sitting at the base of a tree, hidden by the screen of trees and plants from the occasional person, with her coiled comfortably into his arms. Ryan sighed contentedly, all his worries about Nealan of Queenscove vanished, and closed his eyes against the spattered green light slipping through the leaves.
Kel tilted her head on one side, twisting to look at him. She would, he thought absently, be a stunner with the right style of hair and some of the face-paints Hana had in such abundance. "I've been meaning to ask you something."
"Aye?" he said, wondering what it could be
"Joren keeps finding things of his go missing, and then turn up in strange places," Kel said sweetly. He couldn't stop the wide, feline smile that curled over his face. "I couldn't help but notice that it began the day after you overheard him calling you a common peasant pretending to be a mage."
"He must just be forgetful," Ryan said innocently. "I'm always pickin' things up an' forgettin' where I put them down."
"I doubt he put all his clothes in the centre of the stream," Kel remarked. But he could see she was struggling not to smile. "You're irrepressible!"
"I don't even know what that means," he said cheerfully. "So I'll take your word for it. Don't tell me you didn't think it was funny."
She nodded, then blinked. "I did, true." She chuckled, a rich earthy sound that grazed his ears like raw silk. "His face...and speaking of problems, have you thought about trying to heal Andrea? Did you tell me you two were bonded?"
He made a face. "Aye, lass, but she's the healer, not me. I tried to reach the Goddess, but she ain't answerin' right now. Probably found some poor devil to send on an impossible quest."
"It wasn't impossible," Kel protested. "You found her, didn't you?"
"Well, actually, Stone Mountain's first troll an' your mate Cleon did," Ryan said glumly. "But it ain't right, Kel. I could always feel her before, you know, in my head, like. Nothin' now."
"Why don't you try waking her with a kiss?" she suggested lightly. The poisonous look she got as an answer would have killed bears at fifty paces. "Have you tried praying?"
"Prayin'?" His eyes narrowed. Really, Kel thought with an inner sigh, he should have been born noble. There were going to be a lot of court women hunting him down until he opened his mouth and they realised he wasn't as pureblooded as he looked.
"It is the method of choice to commune with your gods," she pointed out. "It helps if you beg and plead a bit, too."
"Beg?" Just as she had thought. Ryan's method of talking to the Goddess had probably involved shouting and swearing at her very loudly in the privacy of his mind. "That work?"
"Sometimes," she said. "Maybe you just need to be a bit more polite."
"Well..." he said dubiously. "I'll give it a try. Ain't anythin' else left."
* * * *
The inside of the tent was light and cool, but it made no difference to the girl huddled in a corner, shaking. She might have been plunged back into the pitch darkness that so much of her life had been spent in.
No one who had known Lady Bruna of Farbrook would have recognised her. The features were the same, but the expression was filled with a slack terror, and shadows flitted about her eyes like ghosts of yesterday.
She could only remember the dreadful, gripping fear of seeing her father there. Her father, the executioner of the Gifted, with his black, black eyes that were like falling into two pits, and the light playing across them was like the sweep of a blade towards her. Her father, with his handsome face and his empty smile. With a voice like honey and a soul like rotting flesh.
He used to lock her in the cellar, for hours and hours on end, screaming at her that her Gift was nothing but a blight that would be cut out of her if she did not control it. She had always hated the dank, dripping sounds that rattled about the place, where the rats that were big enough and fearless enough to come and nip at her.
Every morning, he would drag her from there, and every evening, when her Gift was still there, he would throw her back. Fling her, like a piece of trash.
It might have been different if her mother had lived. But she had died giving birth to Bruna, to this cursed creature.
And 'might have' had made no difference to the bleak existence that had dragged out for years until finally, her father could send her away to a convent, where she hid her powers from the priests, terrified that they would treat her the same.
It had been years before she discovered that the Gift was something to be proud of.
She had been able to hide her fear under a pretty smile, and her lack of confidence under coldness and cruelty. It had been easy; she had made herself a shining, beautiful court creature and no one had seen through to the ugly, shattered thing she was.
For a while, she had even thought that those black memories were fading. She lost herself in a world of riches and romance, flirting with men and snubbing women, and the cellar seemed an illusion she had once had.
Until this trip. Until she had seen her father again.
Part of her whispered that he had stolen magic himself, that everything he had preached to her was a lie. The other part whispered that what her father had could not be true magic; he would never stoop to that. He was not cursed by the gods as she was.
Logic told her he loved power more than ethics.
Fear told her that he was right and she was just a filthy, tainted monster.
She no longer knew what to think, so she let her mind drift through waking dreams of the court, of the cellar, until she didn't know where reality ended and memory began.
When hands nudged at her, and pulled her, she let them, unknowing of how wide and blank her eyes remained, and how they would sometimes spill tears down her smooth face. She didn't care how she would sometimes scream, and sometimes lie unmoving, or how she was scratching her hands into pieces.
She only knew that the mask she had built up so carefully had fallen away, and however she tried, she was still that ugly, ugly monster that her father had beaten.
That was all.
* * * *
"Well, well, Lady ha Minch," Hakuin Seastone said gleefully, as she strode into the practice room of the Palace, feeling very apprehensive. Unbeknown to anyone, she had spent an hour doing the stretches and flexes that Neal and his friends had taught her over the past weeks in the faint hope she'd withstand this hour of gruelling punishment with the Shang.
"At least you've dressed appropriately," the Wildcat remarked, her hands on her hips. She examined Pip with sharp grey eyes. "We had to teach some of the wretched creatures basic exercises and they all turned up in their nicest dresses and make-up, determined to outdo each other."
"Now…" The Shang Horse rubbed his palms together. "What shall we start with, Eda? The Queen wants us to make sure you *work* today."
"No gallivanting off on hurroks," the Wildcat put in sternly. "Let's start with what we taught those overdressed idiots. Some stretches." Her heartless smile warned Pip she was in for trouble. "Right girl, by the end of a few lessons, we'll have you doing *this*."
The Wildcat slid into graceful splits, then stretched forward until her upper body was flat along her leg.
Pip gave her a sweet, naïve smile then copied the movement perfectly. She remembered the year when her parents had hired a tumbler in the hope he could keep Pip out of trouble. He had...only instead of watching him, Pip had made the poor young man teach her acrobatics. He had quit a year later, saying there was no point in him staying, much to the bafflement of her parents.
Both Shangs stared. Then the Wildcat flashed a cool, slightly startled smile. "Well...how about this?"
She sat up again, then put her hands behind her. A lift of her legs brought them together, then with sheer upper body strength, the Wildcat turned her body over into a backflip.
It was a move Pip had spent *hours* practising, and it was ridiculously easy. Especially after she had taught - or tried to teach - Neal and Seaver. Her muscles moved smoothly under her, and then she was upright and looking at the respectful expression of the Wildcat.
"My," the woman said. "Hakuin, I think we have a trapeze artist here."
"Hmm..." The Shang Horse circled Pip, eyebrows drawn together and his forehead knotted. "All right, girl, what Shang moves do you know?"
Pip shrugged. "Not many. Only what the boys showed me."
"They shouldn't be teaching," the Wildcat muttered. "Half of them can't even get the moves right." She nodded. "Show me all the punches you know."
All? Maybe it would just be easier to show them the routine she did every night. Her parents her had given her a music-orb for her birthday; it was a crystal that a mage had trapped a song in, and Pip danced to it. She loved dancing - though she never *ever* danced in public - and it was an easy way to tire herself out so much that she fell asleep before the dreadful snores of Lady Faline down the corridor kept her awake.
Here the opening bars, she told herself, imagining the light, merry sound of the violin opening the dance. *One*-two-three, *one*-two-three...
The steps fell into her head easily, and she began to move through the sequence of stretches, punches, kicks, pirouettes and acrobatics that made the two Shangs exchange a meaningful glance. In her head, the music sped up, and she with it, as the flute and pipes accompanied the strings. Faster and faster and fater, until the final kick that spun her around and brought her back to face the pair.
Silence. Resounding, complete silence.
It must have been wrong, Pip realised, feeling a flush creep over her face.
"Mithros defend us," the Horse said weakly. "Eda, do you think...?"
"You're good," the Wildcat said crisply, and flashed a toothy grin. "Very good. How would you like to become a student?"
"Be a Shang warrior?" Pip squeaked, her eyes widening.
The woman shook her head vigorously. "No! Nobles can't be Shang. But we'd like to teach you. Maybe you won't be Shang, but you'll be nearly as good. If you'd like the lessons."
"I'd love them!" Pip said enthusiastically. Finally! Something to do in the Palace apart from sit around and watch the other girls gawp at the men passing through. "When can I start?"
The Horse snorted with laughter. "Will now do?"
* * * *
Evening found the knights, Riders and rest of the camp sprawled out around where the King was standing, looking stern and grave. Kel looked around at the bristling weapons, the serious faces and the dozens of banners, and realised she had never appreciated just how many people it took to defend the kingdom.
The King held up a hand for silence, and the babble died away.
"Welcome to all of you," he called. His voice carried easily, deep and resounding. "Thank you - I know you have been riding for some days now. But I have good news. We know who the leader of these...magical thieves is."
A startled murmur washed around the gathered knights.
"We will ride to Fief Farbrook now," King Jonathan said, his eyes like sapphire stars, twisting and glittering brilliantly. "We will attack under cover of darkness; Master Salmalin will search out the way for us. I must also caution you not to fire at *anything* on the way. No deer, no animals, especially not birds. You will be divided into groups of eight by My Lord Commander."
Kel grinned as she saw Sir Raoul lift a hand so everyone could see him, off to one side. He must have seen her because he nodded in her direction.
"There will be at least one mage with each group," the King continued. "We will reach the Fief before nightfall, but the attack will begin under cover of darkness - so if it has human form, don't shoot. Chances are you might be hitting on of our own. Once the attack is underway, our mages will provide light. These...people have magic, but they can be killed like you or I." He went on to outline the finer detail of the plan, describing routes and the best weapons, as well as cautioning everyone to move within pairs once the attack began.
"Questions?" he said finally.
Lord Wyldon, looking as wiry and formidable as ever, stood stood. "Sire, how many are we fighting?"
"Hopefully," the low, quiet voice of Master Salmalin cut in, "I will find that out. All information will be relayed back to your mages."
"What happens if we're bitten?" her former teacher demanded. "Will it have any effect?"
The mage smiled grimly. "We have several people who were bitten by the creatures. All are fine."
"I heard that a girl went mad," a man called from the back of the crowd. "How do you know that wasn't from the beasts?"
The mage's dark eyes sought the man out. "Rumour runs ahead of the truth again," he said gently. "The girl in question recognised one of the people who attacked her. She was...extremely upset."
More questions came, and the sun was beginning to into the skyline before they were ended, and the knights and Riders sorted into groups. As people began to drift away to saddle mounts and ride out, Kel made her way over to her knightmaster.
"No, you are not coming," he said before she even opened her mouth. "Over my dead body."
Before she could turn to Lord Wyldon in mute appeal (after all, he had fought with a broken arm), her former teaching master smiled grimly. "And I'll be using his body as a barricade."
"But-"
"Youngling," Sir Raoul said, frowning, "the healers want you here and I agree with them. There will be other fights."
She held her tongue after that. She knew the stubborn look on his face all too well.
It was with a heavy heart she watched the train of men ride into the distance.
* * * *
Numair soared over the forbidding ramparts of Fief Farbrook, his hawk's eyes sharp even in the dim light. Moonlight spilled over the stone building like water, throwing a silvery light across the statues that lined the roofs. Statues of wolves, Numair noticed darkly, like the monstrous creature that had attacked them.
It froze his heart to think how close the three children - children who were *his* responsibility - had come to dying.
Dipping now, folding his wings to plummet into the courtyard and note the unearthly silence that lay over the place like a blanket. Where were the torches that should have been burning? The odd sound of the few people still awake?
He saw a heap of strange objects in one corner, and swooped to land above it.
The smell of blood hit him.
Oh god, he thought, as the heap separated into shapes, his brain making sense of the mess. That's where those people are. Bones, and hanks of things he didn't want to think about, flung together like waste.
Monster. Lord Farbrook was a monster.
He left the courtyard, winging through a slit of a window and praying that the same sight was not repeated everywhere. It was only a small fief; around a hundred people lived there, and surely they could not all be dead?
He searched for what seemed like hours through musty hallways and deserted rooms, until he came to the Great Hall.
There, and only there, he found the misshapen, distorted life he sought. Creatures were slumped before a roaring, crackling fire that threw hot orange light across their clawed, deformed bodies. Half in, half out of any recognisable shape; in their sleep, they could no longer control the magic.
How many there? Perhaps a score, no more. Others, no doubt, roamed the land, but Numair knew that with spells like this, removing the head of the magic would destroying the links of all the weaker creatures.
Kill the lord, and the others would become human.
They would face trial, he had no doubt. What else was there to do with them? They had killed - no, slaughtered - and they would face the consequences of it.
Among the sleeping shapes, he saw the one he wanted; an enormous black wolf, twice the size of any normal creature, that slept alone. The others huddled together, as if seeking warmth in the cold dark night of their souls, but this one was alone by choice.
I have found them, Numair thought. And now they shall see the King's justice.
He left, a shadow among shadows.
* * * *
The road was long and dusty, and the weapons weighed Neal down. The rhythmic crash of hundreds of horses' hooves hitting the path had become a dreary sea echoing in his mind. Although they had left the horses a mile or two back and now advanced on stealthy feet, he could still hear the phantom sound of their hooves. He had to fight to keep himself alert.
Above, the moon glided smoothly through the scudding clouds, graceful and distant, throwing a pale ivory light across the earth. Ahead, Neal could see the spiky turrets of Fief Farbrook, and he felt an inadvertent chill shiver through him. Something here felt wrong, so wrong, but he couldn't pinpoint it.
"It's so silent," the Crown Prince murmured close by, his eyes two black pools. Lord Imrah hushed him with a sharp word.
"Nothing alive here," the Lioness said gruffly. She was a dim, short silhouette before Neal, picking her way over the bumpy ground. "Gods curse it," she hissed, tripping. Neal steadied her. "I can't see a damn thing in this helmet."
A sapphire blue flame flared near her, and the Lioness cursed again. "What is it *now*?"
Neal watched, fascinated as she drew her hands together, and then apart. Between them, a globe of violet fire swelled, and in it was cage the face of King Jonathan, grim and satisfied.
"We've found him," he reported with a note of triumph in his voice. "Alanna, Numair is going to meet you at the castle gate. He'll direct you...your group are going in first. Wyldon is going in through the eastern gate, Raoul by the northern and myself by the west. The remainder of the knights will follow us if needs be. Good luck to you, Champion."
"Sire," the Lioness said, a wild grin flashing. The globe snapped out, and she turned to Neal, her smile gleaming in the gloom. "Well, Squire, you're going to see some excitement!"
"Oh, *yay*," Neal said glumly. "Just what I wanted."
* * * *
The alicorn stopped, and flicked her mane back, knocking away the flies.
So this was Tortall. This was the haven that the mortal boy had spoken of. It was a city like any other; there was no purity or beauty surrounding it, only the same mass of buildings you would find in any place. It had it slums, and its filth, and its scum...but out of this, the castle rose like a great white unicorn.
This was where she must go.
There was a woman here that she has glimpsed in the thoughts of the mortal boy who had saved her. He had not asked for Chantevol's help, but she would give it to him anyway, Kindness was a great rarity in this changing world, one to be treasured and cherished, and repaid where possible.
She had given the boy a vial, a magical talisman that would call her to him if ever he needed aid; but she would help in another, smaller way too; the horn of an alicorn had fabulous healing power, and there was one the boy had hurt terribly without meaning too.
She cast an enchantment as she entered the city, so no mortal would see her; instead, they moved from her way without appearing to realise, rolling back like some swollen sea. The squalor, the narrow streets filled with dirt, the sly whispers and crimes that evolved around her sickened the alicorn. How could mortals live this way, hemmed in day by day?
She passed through them like a ghost, until she reached the towering grandeur of the palace. And here, finally, she let her magic slide away like water until she stood before these strange uniformed and bedecked humans in all her immortal glory.
They gaped, and stared at her, and finally, when she asked them in the earthy richness of her voice, called a mage to see this fantastic being.
"I have come to heal," she explained simply, looking at this man who called himself Lindhall Reed, and whose dreamy eyes held a calm intelligence. "There is a mortal who rescued me, and it is to him I repay my debt."
"Who do you wish to heal?" the man asked curiously. She could see he was itching to ask her questions, but refrained. "I'm afraid there have been several attacks by immortals and I have to be sure that you mean us no harm." A cursory glance at the claws upon her hands.
"We are only the creation of mortals," she sent tranquilly. "Your Alissa Shandori made me with claws, and so claws I bear, but look..." And she bared her teeth; the flat, wide teeth of the herbivore. "I have no need to use them."
The mage thought for a long time, while she shuffled her long, shining hooves and flicked her tail. Then he nodded. "Very well, but I will accompany you."
She nodded, and the inky black wash of her hair shimmered. "Where is the mortal you call Hana Dharaz?"
"Ah, the...lady of leisure...that Numair's protégée blinded!" the mage said, and nodded eagerly. "You can really heal her?"
"Our horns are renowned for their healing power." Her eyes darkened. "Many mortals have killed us for them."
He glanced at her as she walked beside him, through the arching halls. "Not here."
"No," she agreed placidly. Minutes passed in silence, while Chantevol ignored the stares and gawping of the palace mortals, moving lightly as a summer breeze through their cold, harsh building. All the white marble in the world could hold the life of a clean glade, or the laughter of a stream. This was not her world, but she would suffer it to end her obligation.
They found the woman sat in a corner, trying to sew old fabrics under the stern eye of a palace woman. She winced often as she stabbed the sliver of metal...a needle, the mortal name...into her hand by mistake. The alicorn could not help but notice how many of the other mortal woman sneered a her, while the men's hungry eyes fell on her lovely face and the lazy curls of red hair.
"Jenna?" the mage asked softly. The overseer stopped watching Hana with her hawk's eyes. She blinked as she saw the alicorn, and her hand rose to her mouth.
"Master Reed," she said, awed, "what be that?"
Hana stopped her sewing, and looked in the direction of Jenna's voice.
"I," Chantevol said sharply, "am an alicorn, and I ma *not* a 'that'." She moved forwards, hooves clicking on the flagstones until she stood before Hana. "And I have come to heal you."
"Me?" Hana said, the milky orbs of her eyes gazing in Chantevol's direction. "Why?" Her voice was bitter. "I'm just a prostitute. Who cares about me?"
"Your Ryan cares," she said. "Your mortal youngling? He saved me, and now I will do something to help him, by helping you."
"Ryan?" the woman said, a faint smile touching her lips. "Is he gettin' into trouble again?"
"You mortals are always in trouble," Chantevol said. "Hold still."
The woman froze where she was, quivering slightly as the alicorn lowered her golden, glowing horn to touch Hana's eyelids, first one, then the other, a soft light haloed about her. Slowly, the milky white of her eyes thinned, became translucent, and then an emerald green circle appeared in the centre, a black dot sprouting from that, until Hana's eyes were whole and bright.
She raised her hands to her face, waving them as if she could believe it. And then hse saw Chantevol, and gave a little cry of shock.
The alicorn stepped back.
"Thank you," Hana said shakily.
She shrugged. What did she care for mortal thanks? "The debt is done," she said firmly, and left.
* * * *
It was all so fast, Neal could hardly comprehend it. One moment, pushing open the doors of the great hall and seeing the savannah idleness of the creatures spread carelessly about the floor.
And the next, that great black wolf raised its sleek head, its eyes flashing ember-red, and it howled.
The creatures were upon them so fast, Neal almost forgot what to do. Fight his way through them, battering them away with his shield, stabbing, swiping, chopping with his sword.
Before him, he saw the Lioness charge, a battle cry wild and fierce in her throat as the wolf sprang at her.
They met in a tangle of mortal and magic, metal flickering in the hellish firelight, teeth snapping. The Lioness rolled and twisted, incredibly fast and the wolf snarled, bit, attacked.
Hurry up, hurry up, Neal thought as the weight of bloodthirsty, enraged creatures pressed in on him. He heard the doors crash open as the other parties of knights entered the hall, and joined the fast and furious fighting.
The Lioness went flying, knocked backwards by the weight of the wolf. It crouched low, muscles bunching to spring, a shuddering mass of black-pelted venom. Muscles tensing, jaws opening, it *sprang*.
It didn't see Raoul of Goldenlake step into its path and swing the mighty axe he carried in one clean stroke.
But *everyone* saw the head roll to the ground.
The other creatures screamed suddenly, and curled in on themselves, writhing, screeching as their bodies began to contort and change. Neal was very close to retching as he saw the horrible mutations, and had to look away, though the sound of popping joints and creaking bones would haunt him for years to come.
With their leader dead, their ties to their stolen magic were severed.
It was ended.
* * * *
Ryan heard Hana's voice in his head, Hana telling him stories when he had been a child to lull him to sleep.
~ Once upon a time, ~ the ghost of her voice whispered in his head, ~ there was a princess. And she had hair like the sun trapped in cobwebs, and a smile to split the world asunder. She was lovely, perfect, dazzling except for a small scar on the bridge of her nose. ~
He had only seen Andrea's smile once or twice, but it had hung like a glittering crystal chandelier in his mind. He was supposed to protect her, the Goddess had told him that, and she couldn't be wrong *all* the time. 'Sides, he didn't mind looking after her. She had saved him, and she just an ordinary kid messed up in magic and madness, like him.
Her hair, that glossy golden hair was fanned out on the pillow, and her eyelashes fluttered now and again. Ryan had always thought that sleeping people were still, but pale though she was, Andrea twisted and turned, and sometimes moans escaped her.
~ And one day, a curse was put upon this lovely girl by a man who envied her beauty and power, and she fell into a charmed sleep. She thought he loved her, you see, but he loved her face and her family's land, not her, and when she, discovering this, refused to marry him, he flew into a rage. She fell asleep, into a swoon on the ground, weeping even in her sleep. Years passed, and the princess still slept, hidden deep in a woodland bower by mages who sought to protect her. ~
Not years, only days, but it felt strange not being able to sense her. Before, she had always been there, a tiny moth-like presence deep in his mind. He had known if he desperately needed, she was there to reach out to. But now, a hush that made him feel choked and alone.
~ Centuries passed, and the princess's bowers became covered in weeds until there was only darkness. The mages died, and her kingdom fell into ruin and war, until all that remained in a destroyed wasteland was a palace of poison plants, stored safe in a vast ugly forest. ~
Poison plants? Only the poison of an Arachon monster, only the poison of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
~ Until one day - and fairytales live for one day - a lost traveller found himself in this land. Now, I should tell you that he was good and brave and true, and handsome as the night is dark, but all those things would be a lie. He was only a man, like you will be one day, Ryan, a man who lived as best he could, but did what he had to for survival. He had a little magic that he used for tricks and street shows, and could throw a knife like any street man, but he was nothing special. ~
That's what we all do, Ryan thought, balancing on the side of the bed so he could see her small, pale face fully, with the dark eyelashes lying on her face like two charcoal crescent moons. Just try and survive as best as we can. Some of us turn into heroes on the way, like Kel, but most of us are just people.
~ A storm had arisen, and it drove him to find shelter. He wandered deeper and deeper into the wood, hearing the howls of wolves behind him, shivering and miserable, and then he saw the thicket. It looked sturdy, he thought, and might be dry, so he crawled within to shelter, not minding the cuts that laddered his hand and the nettles that stung him terribly, he was so desperate to be dry. ~
And this storm had been worse than many. A storm of people searching for ordinary, thieving Ryan Talver and this sweet, innocent girl. A storm of magical creatures that killed, of knights to chop them down.
He smoothed a hand over her forehead, surprised at how soft her skin was, downy as rose petals. "Wake up," he whispered, as he so often had, but she remained locked in slumber. "Wake up, lass. There's people here who want to meet ye."
~ And imagine his surprise when he found himself in a hollowed cave, a cave carven not from stone but years and years of weed. Imagine him standing, stooping slightly because he was a tall man and the roof was low, and feeling his way through the darkness. Imagine his bemusement when he felt another person there, lying silent. ~
He remembered that first moment, being hurled into Andrea's world. Seeing her surrounded by enemies - a girl he didn't even *know* - and being furious at how callously they treated her. Meeting those extraordinary hawk-golden eyes, and hearing the first delicate chime of her voice. He had been so shocked, and so amazed and even - even - a little afraid at this unknown new bond between them.
~ He called his magic, and flung light into the corner of the cave. And the white light of his gift made the sleeping princess radiant. For a moment, he thought she was a goddess or a dryad, but then he saw the mark of mortal beauty on her; that one little scar. It was what saved her from sleeping eternally. ~
He called to her again, and then he called to his magic, and let it ripple over her. Trying to find the same spark of life he had found in Kel, and finding only an impossible slick wall that he couldn't break through.
~ He leaned over her. I know what you're thinking; he kissed her then, but he didn't. He tried to be a good man, and good men, he knew, did not kiss vulnerable sleeping women. He saw her tears, for the princess still wept at her betrayal after centuries asleep, and prayed to the gods to make this girl happy. ~
Ryan had never prayed. He didn't know how. But he looked at her face, and shut his eyes and thought simply, please, I need your help.
"My help?" The voice rang like a screaming osprey, harsh and hungry. "I am your Goddess, and you turn to me only when you want something? Where is your respect?"
Respect has to be earned, Ryan thought. All you have done is send me on a quest. You let Kel die. You let all those poor people die who didn't know any better, all they wanted was to feel magic.
Silence, but Hana's phantom voice filled it.
~ And because he was selfless in his wish, the gods awoke the girl. ~
"Fairy stories do not occur in real life," the voice of the Goddess said. He couldn't see her, but he could smell the incense of a temple, and the air was unbearably cold. "But...I will help you. You are rude, Ryan Talver, and you are impudent and young and foolish. Yet for all that, you are my Chosen, and you have finally asked for my help. I will wake her."
Then she was gone, and warmth seeped into his bones again. He opened his eyes, looking at her face.
"Wake up," he muttered, but she remained still and waxen. "Wake up, lass, you got to finish the story."
~ She heard this man praying for her, and when at last he realised she was awake, he was afraid of what she might think. But the princess reached out, and took his hand and- ~
Hana had never finished that story. He had fallen asleep.
So what, he wondered, half-afraid, would happen? Andrea's eyelashes lifted smoothly, slowly, and the blurred liquid of her golden eyes swirled hazily.
What if she didn't want him? He was only a streetrat, he had caused her so much trouble-
"Ryan?"
Her voice was rusty, but still sweet.
His grey eyes lit up. "Hello Andrea."
She sat up with a moan, blinking. "Is it you?"
"Aye, it is." He saw her look around, and smiled gladly. "You're safe now, lass. We're all safe."
She looked at him, a kind of shattering disbelief in her eyes. A long pause and then an incredulous, shy smile curled over her mouth. "You found me."
He laughed. "I had help."
She reached out one pale hand, and cautiously, he put his on top of it.
Fire blazed around them, an incredible emerald fire that was their two magics merging, and Ryan felt the world at his fingertips, waiting for them to reach out and take it.
"We're here," she said, looking at him steadfastly. "At last. Thank you, Ryan Talver."
"Thank *you*, Andrea Kirisra," he said solemnly, and they grinned at each other.
He wondered if she heard the voice that whispered once before she arose, before she went out to meet the people who would never lead her to the gallows or hunt her into hell. Andrea was Tortallan now.
But he didn't know what the thunderstorm voice was that echoed faintly in his ears.
~ You are Bound. ~
* * * *
~ The End - For Now. ~
Comments would be vastly, utterly and slavishly adored!
Yup. That's it. It is done with! So my thanks to these darling people who commented on the last part, and kicked my ass into writing this :-) If you're still reading, I think I should be handing out medals!
Thank you to:
Chip: Thank you :-) Well, I hope you enjoyed! I've loved hearing what you thought!
Orenda: I don't believe in perfect worlds. If I ain't living in it, why should anybody else? Besides...think how dull life would be if we were all perfectly happy! Thanks!
Shannon Cooper: Thank you :-) Oh no, it's not over! Well, it is now (oh my god, I can't believe I just wrote that. That was an unintentional quote of the football phrase...). Ack, there will be more cliffhangers to come!
:-) I have started the sequel - I have about 10 pages of bits and pieces done on it (hopefully it will have a few surprising plot twists...) Thanks!
Emy: Thank you very much! I'm honoured! I hope you've liked the rest of it :-) I do - or rather did - take Latin, but I am no longer bound to it's hellish lessons! I can't remember how you say thank you in Latin...so long...
Lady: I am all for people getting what they deserve :-) It's so much fun! Pip will get further desserts...Neal is in this part...and will be in the next story in a rather more substantial way I hope! I'll find out my exam results on Aug 16th (so you will probably be able to tell from my a) manically depressed or b) insanely happy tone.
Aquilla: LJS and TP are a tad different, aren't they! I keep finding myself wanting to write the wrong things in each story...I think bits *are* creeping in here and there! Thank ye!
Cass: It will ,I think, be back to cliffhangers, It took me yonks to get this out...I need the motivation of a cliffhanger. It kicks me into gear. Thanks!
Sakamoto Mizuki: god, no, don't throw yourself at my feet! The stench alone might kill you! Thanks :-) Well, it wasn't soon, but I finally got the more out! Sorry it took so long!
Quartz: I didn't think you were a jackass (is that also a kind of rabbit?) Don't apologise :-) I'm pretty difficult to offend. (With my friends, that is a good thing!) This chapter is / was very very long!
Ivy Leaves: Well, I thought Cruise was pretty cute in Jerry Maguire (when his age wasn't showing), but James Marsters, *well*. Oh, I've been hit with worse than a wooden plank. :-) Algebra gets easier :-) Trust me! I'm doing A-Level (high school senior) algebra. Was that just a confession of insanity?
Comicstar: Thank you! I've really enjoyed writing this :-) Thank you for the encouragement!
Jenn: I don't know - Kel is pretty young, about 14/15 I think, but Ryan's 16 and we all know what 16 year old boys are like... Oh, kittens are so cute! It's a pity they have to grow into cats.
Myst: That happened next! And what happens next should be more fun :-) I have plans. Mind you, I have fingernails too. (Random comment of the day.) Thank you for *all* your reviews.
Team Socket: Thanks :-) I've been reading Terry Pratchett lately. I nearly killed myself laughing. (Interesting Times - amazing book.)
Michelle: I have the feeling riding a hurrok would be like hitching a lift with an Indycar driver ;-) One wild ride. Thanks!
Saree: Thank ye very much! :-) What a lovely compliment!
Larzdinn: Oh dear god, I published this chapter in *May*? It's been two months? Someone kneecap me! That's disgusting! ::grimace:: Don't apologise for reviewing late, yell at me for taking so damn long! Nah, that wasn't the end - but this is! Thanks!
Maygwenda: Thank you! Sorry about the hurrying up ::cough:: Life got on top of me.
And last - but not at all least, Ra3212: Thank you :-) I know it doesn't fit in with Squire, but hey, that's why they put the 'fiction' in fanfiction!
And thank you to *everyone* who has commented I have been totally, utterly, astounded, gob smacked, thrilled and delighted at your comments and criticisms - thank you for reading! You have made the last few months a lot of fun!
Thank you: Aeris Cimorene ei Caeran, Alec, Angelique Hallowed, Angel of Death, Anjel, Anon Sara'a, AquariuSagE, Aquilla, Arial, Ariana, Arturo, Arwen, Arylia, Cait, Camilla, Cass , Catchfire, Chip, Comicstar, Cool, Daine, Danel, Dara, Dead Flower, Dee, Depressed Muse, Destiny, Diomede, Draco, Dreamgirl_j8, Elinar, Elizabeth, Emy, Euclara, Eviltama, Faerie Gurl, Fei, FireLily, Francesca, Gabs, Galli-vi, Gwyn, Harkly, Heavengirl221, Ivy Leaves, Jackal Nyte, Jaelawyn Noble, Jennifer, Jenn, Jess Elvenflame, Jessica, Jinx, Jodie, Cali Gurlie, Karalea Ethereal, Katie, Katya Thostova, Kibee, Kierce, Kira, Kitkat, Lady, Lady Silvermoon, Larzdinn, Leap, Leevee, Leila, Lily, Lily Potter, Maia Ariadne Athene, Marie, Magelet, Mage Melery, Maple, Maygwenda, Mel, Merc the Mage, Merlayne Q, Me, Michelle, Midnight Angel, Millennia, Molly-Ann, Myst, Naavi, Noelle, Obsessed Reader, Onua, Orenda, Peaches, Perfect1, Phantasea, Phoenix Girl, Quartz, Ra3212, Renegade Wolfe, Rici Stark, Sakamoto Mizuki, Saphron, Saree, Scarlette Faerie, Scyther2.0, Shannon Cooper, Silver Serpeh, Slim C, Sparrow, Star*, Starlight, Steph, Sulia Serafine, Tam Cranver, Tasidia, Tatra, Team Socket, Theladysong, The Silver Mist Tigress, Twiz*ler, Tyr the One-Handed, Wazzup Girl, Willows and last but most infinitly not least, :-)
You have been absolutely **incredible**. So simply, infinitely, eternally - thank you. Anything you have to say would be much adored. There will be an epilogue if you wish.