Chapter Six
Anger that Desires Vengeance
The world was spinning, and she couldn't breathe.
"Lady!" he was screaming for her. "Help!" But they were riding away. She was running after them, but they were riding away too quickly for her to keep up. She ran hard and soon sweat was pouring down the back of her neck, but she couldn't reach them, no matter how hard she ran. Then…they were gone. They were out of sight and sound.
She looked up and was in his study again; she could see him, speak with him. "Why can't you stop?" she screamed and advanced, but when she reached out to hit him, her hand went right through. He laughed and shook his head at her stupidity.
"My dream, my magic flowing through your body, my rules," he told her. "I like to play games, don't you? Hide and go seek is my favorite. You're better at it than anyone I've ever played with. You almost won once, that's why I have to hide in better places now."
"You sick…" Kel gritted her teeth and kept her emotions down. "Why don't you stop? Don't you care about the people you're hurting? What do you have to gain?"
"Well keeping Jonathan sick has been tiring, so I have to have my fun too," he responded casually. "And I think using his people as sacrifices for his disease is quite clever. Won't they be devastated to know that they were the ones who killed their King?" he was mocking as he played with her.
"Liar! Jonathan is getting better!" Kel shouted at him, but he just laughed his twisted laugh again.
"Stupid girl, think! I thought you were smarter than that! I have to keep Jonathan alive until that fool of a son Roald takes over. He's so young, so weak, so…easily taken over. If he dies before Roald returns someone may have the chance to coup in his absence and destroy my chance of getting next to his side."
"What?" Kel's eyes widened in horror.
"Don't you think every King needs a chancellor by his side? An educated, older, powerful chancellor?" he questioned and looked at the cup in his hand.
"I'll stop you. You'll never destroy Jonathan or harm Roald, or any of Tortall!"
"So young, so angry, so…naïve…I don't like to lose Lady Keladry of Mindelan. I haven't lost yet, and I'm not going to lose to you, a fickle girl. If you get close to me I will kill everyone around you, everyone you care for. I will start in your homeland, and I will work my way closer and closer to you. You think your biggest problem is that I have your boy Tobe and I've destroyed a few measly villages? Think again, it gets worse Keladry, much worse…"
The image faded, and Kel woke, sweat pouring down her back, and fingernail cuts in her hands. She stood and walked from the tent she was in, looking at the slowly rising sun and needed a bath. She needed to cleanse the feeling of him on her. His words haunted her, "It gets worse Keladry, much worse…"
She walked down to a nearby river and cleaned her face and hands. When she looked up she saw a glint in between a patch of trees and squinted. She pulled out her spyglass and looked toward the light. She gasped and put a hand over her mouth when she saw an encampment of men that were shabbily dressed, but very well fed. They stumbled about as if they had had a heavy celebration last night, but one man in particular interested her. He was very clean and wore the robes of…she quickly replaced the glass in her belt loop and sprinted back toward camp. She had no idea that he had visions too, and was smirking at her stupidity.
*
By the time she had woken up and assembled a small group of men and reached the encampment across the river all that was left was a smoldering fire and a few leftover scraps of meat and discarded utensils.
"Dammit!" she screamed, and Peachblossom snorted in agitation.
"They've been here Kel," Dom looked at the ashes and a few broken branches where they had made their escape.
"We might be able to track them yet," Neal held out his hands and summoned his green magic to his fingers. Kel watched him anxiously as he picked up something, a trace of a strong magic and grinned slightly. "I think we may have it. We'll be back in Corus by Midwinter after all!" He led them into the woods, following the leftover trace of magic.
*
He watched from a nearby hill, using his magic and laughed, shaking his head. "Not even the Mage knows. I'm insulted, he thinks I'm that stupid, that I would leave traces and paths behind me. Sometimes I wonder about Mages these days…" he signaled to his men, who laughed and headed back toward where the rest of Kel's small squad was still sleeping.
*
Neal led them deep into an opening in the forest, right to a note that was stuck into a tree by a poorly crafted arrow. Kel ripped it off and read it quickly.
Lady Keladry~
If you're reading this, my game seems to be going my way. I thought you would be smarter than to leave what you love so sorely unprotected. Oh well, your traveling will be lighter.
Come and Find Me
Kel's eyes widened in horror as she threw the note to the ground and threw herself back onto Peachblossom. "Come on, he's tricked us," she urged Peachblossom into a full-out gallop, the others close behind her.
They ran hard, but by the time that they reached their camp there was nothing left but smoldering tents, and charred bodies. A few soldiers stumbled to her from the woods where they had hidden and tried to explain, but all they could do was mutter their terrifying words. Neal calmed them with soft words and some magic as Dom handed them a canteen full of whiskey. When they were calmed they gave their story to Kel, as best as they could without their words running together. It seemed to be a struggle for them to form sentences, and Neal's brows creased as he stared at them. He shook his head and seized one of their wrists. They looked at him as if relieved, and then Kel was the one to look at him perplexed. "What?" she asked.
"They've been spelled not to talk," Neal answered. "But whoever did it was very inexperienced," and he began the long process of taking off the spell. When he was finished they were able to tell their story with much more ease.
"We were just waking; it was just after you left with the others. We were getting ready to go, and out of nowhere we were ambushed. The men panicked. We ran into the woods to find you and the others, but couldn't. When we came back everything was gone. It was burned to the ground and all traces were hidden. There was no one left alive," they looked around them with terror in their eyes.
"How many?" Kel swallowed hard and tried to listen as he answered.
"Fifteen, half the squad My Lady."
"Fifteen! Goddess Bless," Dom whispered and glared. "I knew I should have stayed. We could have gotten them if I had stayed."
"Don't blame yourself," Kel said softly. "I was the stupid one. I should have known he would trick me. I should have known he was too smart for something so easy."
The rest of the day they counted their losses and buried their dead. Kel shed a few tears, but no one mentioned them. She wouldn't eat or drink anything, and she barley spoke.
Neal and the others knew she was taking a hard hit, but she was staying strong for those that were left. They all knew she blamed herself, but they also knew that she had to recover or they would never accomplish anything. That's why he went to see her when she had retired for the night.
"Kel," he said softly, and she looked at him with a blank expression. "I know you blame yourself, but…you can't…"
"He's right," Dom added, coming behind him, and Kel winced and turned away.
"If I had stayed…" she started. "Or if I had taken everyone. I shouldn't have split up the group. If I had been stronger and told them to all come when they wanted to sleep. I'm just a weak leader. Lady Alanna never should have picked me for this."
"Stop," Neal ordered. "Alanna does everything for a reason. She knew you were the only one strong enough to do this. You are the only one who can catch him, and she knows it."
"You need to stay strong, because of that," Dom told her gently. "Because we need you to lead us."
She nodded and breathed in deep, "Yes," she said softly. "I will."
They nodded to her and each embraced her quickly before all of them headed to bed.
*
"Damn you!" she screamed in her dream. "Why did you kill my men?! They did nothing to you!"
"It's part of the game," he answered, fingering his glass as he looked into the fire. "Don't you want to play anymore?"
"People's lives are not games!" she couldn't contain her emotions. She wanted to rip him apart.
"No," he said softly and shook his head. "You're wrong. It's survival of the fittest, and I'm the fittest. They're weak. You and I, we're strong. We live off of the weak. We're the strongest in the pot, and we feed off of the weaker ones."
"What are you talking about?" Kel didn't want to sit here and let him play mind games with her, but she had no choice.
"Yes, that's the way it is. We destroy whatever gets in our way so that we can be the strongest and happiest. That's the way of life. At the moment you and your men are in my way, so I killed them. Soon, I'll kill you too, but for now I like to admire your beauty and your strength. You're the best playmate I've had in a long time. No one normally plays the game so well. They normally are begging for death after a few days, but not you, not you," he stood and came toward her. He touched her cheek softly, and Kel's flesh churned. "Come and find me," he whispered in her ear and then kissed it gently before the dream faded, and Kel awoke, drenched in sweat, like so many nights before.
She jumped up and walked toward Peachblossom, a note gripped firmly in her hand.
She pinned the note on Dom's saddle and mounted Peachblossom, clicking him into a canter and running from the encampment. She was so absorbed in her thoughts she didn't even hear the other set of hooves behind her.
*
Dom~
Don't be angry, I had to do this on my own. It'll be faster and more efficient if I go alone and unhindered. Take the squad back to Corus and report to Alanna. Don't come after me, you'll be hurt. Get the men out of this before they're killed too.
"Damn her," he muttered and cursed himself as well. He should have known she'd try something like this.
"Captain, Sir Nealan is missing as well," a man reported to Dom who's face grayed, and he grew angry with his cousin.
"Figures," he mumbled. "Prepare the horses; you men are to report back to Corus. You're in command to lead them back. Report to Lady Alanna on our whereabouts, and see what action she chooses to take upon us. May the Goddess grant her mercy that she doesn't have."
"Sir?" he questioned softly, but Dom shook his head.
"I'm going on after them. It would be useless for all of us to try and find them. I'll be much faster on my own."
"Of course Sir, good luck," he saluted him, and Dom returned the salute before tacking up and mounting, then taking off at a gallop in the direction Peachblossom's heavy hoof prints showed.
*
"So you think you're alone?" he appeared in her dreams. "You think you'll be able to stop me without men?"
"What do you mean by that?" Kel spat.
"See for yourself," he opened his hand and two images appeared in the fire. The first was an image of Neal who was very close by, sleeping in hearing distance of her, sleeping very lightly.
"Neal," Kel shook her head. "He's followed me…"
"That's not all," he smirked as the image of Dom riding hard in the middle of the night appeared. He wasn't far from Neal, and his eyes were dark and worried.
"Dom too," Kel gritted her teeth. "Why would you show me this?"
"Haven't you figured it out?" he laughed and shook his head. "Well I'm not about to tell you if you haven't figured it out."
She jumped awake and immediately tore down her camp. She tacked up Peachblossom and ran toward the place that she would find Neal.
*
Neal shot awake when Kel's hand touched him lightly. He stared at her and shook his head in disapproval. "Why do you make me do extra work?" he demanded irritably.
"You didn't have to follow me," she snapped back, but she was so relieved to find him unharmed that the response didn't carry much weight.
"How did you know I was here?" Neal could feel a trace of magic on her skin, and it unnerved him.
"He's been appearing in my dreams every night since we left," Kel said softly. "He showed me where you were. I thought he was going to hurt you. Dom should be on his way shortly."
Neal's eyes were clouded in worry, "He's that strong?"
"What do you mean?" Kel asked softly, and Neal shook his head.
"Communicating in dreams is one of the most advanced spells a Mage can perform. To do it every night for so long and have the strength to move in the morning…that's strong magic. That's unnatural magic," Neal shuddered, and Kel didn't like the fact that a Mage was shuddering over magic. "Wait…" he stopped and thought. "He saw me?"
"Yes, he showed me your image in the fire in the dream," Kel responded, and Neal's blood went cold.
"That's really unnatural Kel. He's sold his soul to a Black Lord. There's no way a human Mage could possess that much power. He's sold his soul to Chaos herself."
It was Kel's turn to shudder, and goose bumps grew on her arms. She urged Neal to stand despite his horror, and they both quickly packed and headed down the path that Dom was taking.
Two hours later they found Dom's horse tethered to a tree with a note stuck to the tree with a badly crafted arrow.
Lady Keladry~
It seems you still haven't quite managed to see all the rules of the game. Too bad, I've got two things you love with me now. They can at least keep each other company. If you want them back you better start playing by my rules.
Come and Find Me
Kel screamed and slammed her fist into the tree. She looked at Neal with an anger that desired vengeance. This wouldn't do. She would find him and kill him, no matter what it took.
