The Queen's Honor Guard
by Nyohah
VI.
Hua Quy Ling leaned against the wall and tried to stay awake. He was supposed to be guarding Emperor Yuen's study while he and General Li discussed important military details, and who knew how long that would take. Besides, no one was stupid enough to try and kill the emperor, and even if they tried, Quy Ling didn't care.
Let them kill him, he had decided, do us all a favor.
His mind was too preoccupied for him to be an efficient guard, anyway, lost in thoughts of her.
It had been a little over two weeks since she had miraculously survived the sphere with her consciousness intact, baffling all, and sending Emperor Yuen into a frenzy of paranoia.
Quy Ling wondered what sort of power this girl could have, with such strange powers, uncanny fighting abilities, and courage to brave a full day of the sphere. Would she be the one who would free them from Yuen's tyrannical reign? Would she unite the slaves and peasants into a mighty revolt that defeated even the Lin Kuei? Would she challenge Yuen to one-on-one combat, and defeat him blindfolded? Or would it be something simpler? A small dagger thrust through his heart?
He knew that if she ever tried to attack the emperor while he was on guard, he wouldn't make a move against her. He'd be more inclined to help her, actually. A work of art like that should never—
Did something just move over there?
He looked over the area, but saw nothing, and his thoughts turned back to Kei Sa. Yet he thought he saw something move again, and still, there was nothing there. Had he lost his mind?
He shook his head and tried to clear the thought, but when it happened a third time, he scrutinized the area, absolutely exasperated.
There—he could see it coming up from the floor and in front of the tapestries. Slight waverings, distortions. It was much like he had seen caused by the smoldering heat of Edenia's lava-rock deserts. But what was it doing in the palace?
He stared at the strange occurrence, completely mystified. Then, he jumped in shock when in the middle of the disturbance, a figure appeared, genderless and dressed in a white fighting uniform. It raised a finger to where its lips would be, underneath its white mask, mimicking a human gesture of silence.
He nodded at the warrior, raising his own finger in agreement. The figure disappeared, and the wavering air swirled through a small vent into Yuen's study, one much too small for Quy Ling to ever fit through.
What sort of ninjas were these, that they could become invisible and fit through that tiny vent?
Hua Quy Ling was mostly asleep when the sun's first rays lit up the palace halls through the frequent, huge windows. A nudge jolted him out of his sleep. A middle-aged slave holding a large tray of steaming food whispered, "You had best not fall asleep on the job anymore, son. You're dead meat if anyone not as nice as I finds you next time."
Still groggy, he stepped aside to let her pass. She knocked on the door, and commented. "Master likes his breakfast early after these all-night meeting, you know. We've been yelled at far too many times before." It wasn't until she opened the door that he suddenly remembered. He made a grab for her arm, but missed as she disappeared behind the door.
She took one step inside, and then screamed, the clattering of metal and china accenting her cry.
The palace reacted miraculously fast. Within minutes, other guards had seized Hua Quy Ling, and he was forced to sit on one of the study's couches while the emperor's twin children watched their father's lifeless body being prodded by a doctor. The body of General Li lay across the room, equally dead.
The doctor had just finished his examination when Li Wei Yong and his family stepped through the door. His mother, overly decorated with gaudy baubles as usual, shrieked and fell on the couch across from Hua Quy Ling, fanning herself and trying not to faint. His sisters, four of them, and all older than he, began to weep, clutching each other for support and wailing that they were going to be sick.
He didn't see their problem. There wasn't even blood anywhere. The two men looked quite normal, except that they were sprawled on the floor, and they were rather blue, and their faces were twisted into grimaces of pain. Wei Yong knew enough to recognize that as a sign of a slow death. If it had been quick, they wouldn't have had time to feel the pain. That meant their necks hadn't been broken, as he'd originally thought, due to the relative neatness of the scene.
His family was without a doubt overreacting. He had seen worse during training accidents. And Yuen Jer Rod and Yuen Ming stood side-by-side with perfect royal posture, looking down at the corpses serenely, completely under control. In a way, they seemed to be sharing the hidden joy that Wei Yong too felt. He was relieved to see he was not the only one pleased at his father's death, though he didn't like the way Ming was glaring at him with her pretty verdant eyes.
"Have you determined the cause of death?" Jer Rod asked of the doctor, and agreeable man, who hesitated, shaking his head slightly before answering.
"Asphyxiation."
Mrs. Li looked scornful. "How did they suffocate in an open room?"
"I'm not sure, madam," the doctor replied, wisely choosing to ignore her hidden insults. "I only know that all the evidence indicates a lack of oxygen. I would have to perform an autopsy to be certain."
"I don't understand," commented the princess.
"Well, I'm sorry." The doctor threw up his hands. "Maybe next time I'll just make up something that fits."
"No, no, I believe you," Ming soothed. "I merely wish I knew what has happened."
"It does appear we have a witness," offered Li Wei Yong, indicating Hua Quy Ling where he sat, silent and ignored.
"Yes," said Jer Rod, clasping his hands behind his back and walking slowly to stand in front of his late father's unwilling servant. "Surely you heard something?"
Quy Ling hesitated for a second. No, he hadn't heard anything, but as he thought of the unforgiving Vendetta, he knew that even if he was truly ignorant, it wouldn't save him. "It was not what I heard, but rather, what I saw."
General Li's daughters gasped.
"Do you mean to say, you actually saw the killer?" asked the prince.
"I think so, sir, but I cannot tell you who, or what, it was." They didn't seem to understand, so he explained. "I was guarding as I was supposed to and I saw the painting at the end of the hall was being distorted in little waves, such as those caused by extreme heat. Then a figure appeared. It was dressed in white, though it wore a ninja-type uniform. I couldn't tell whether it was male or female, and I remember it had the deepest black eyes. It made a gesture for me to be silent, then disappeared. It went through that vent." He pointed to it, up by the ceiling.
'That vent' was too small for a child to pass through. The twins caught each other's eye, thoroughly confused.
Then Wei Yong spoke. "A disturbance...such as that...over there?" He pointed to an area just in front of Yuen's desk.
An alien voice formed in their minds. =We are here.=
Ming and Jer Rod broke their eye contact to stare at the disturbance as it faded into, not one, but five figures, all in white.
Jer Rod, always the diplomat, spoke first. "Don't be frightened," he said, raising a hand palm out. "We will not hurt you. We merely wish to know who has freed our people."
Hua Quy Ling would have registered that sentence and gained some hope for mercy from it, but he was too fascinated by the creatures in front of him.
Another alien voice took over, slightly different in tone. =We are not frightened. You cannot harm us; we cannot be harmed. You cannot kill us; we cannot be killed. We are Vyrenchi.=
Ming took a step forward, spellbound, reaching out her hand. "May I touch you?"
=If you wish,= said the original voice. =We will not harm you. We do not wish to harm you.=
She grazed the aura of the one farthest to the left and felt the energy course through her, raising the tiny hairs on her hand.
=We are Honor,= said a new voice.
"I thought you said you were Vyrenchi," she said.
"You people are all crazy," said a woman's voice, out of nowhere. Li Wei Yong's mother frowned. His sisters looked blank, as did the guards holding Quy Ling.
"Can't you see them?" asked Wei Yong incredulously. His mother shook her head slowly, regarding her son as though he were insane. The middle figure winked at him with its huge black eyes.
"Uhh...Mother," he said, feigning affection, "you've had a hard morning. Perhaps you should go get something from the kitchen. You too, dear sisters." He rounded them up and aimed them toward the door. "Oh, and we'll take care of him," he added, pushing the guards out after the women and shutting the door behind them. He turned back to the remaining four—Jer Rod, Ming, the doctor, and Quy Ling.
=We are Vyrenchi. We are called Honor.= The figure Ming was touching pointed to itself.
=We are called Honesty.= The middle figure, the first voice.
=We are called Virtue.= The fourth figure, the second voice.
=We are called Integrity.= A new voice.
=We are called Morality.= The last and farthest to the right.
"You are going to be rather difficult to distinguish from one another," commented Ming. She had not moved an inch. Honor cocked its 'head'. Then it became tinted a bright shade of green. The rest followed suit—red, gold, violet, silver.
"How exactly did you kill these men?" asked the doctor in the brief silence that had fallen over the small group, unable to contain his question anymore.
=We are composed entirely of energy,= answered the one now silver, Virtue. =We entered their bodies, stopped their lungs.=
"Why not their hearts?" asked the princess, rather morbidly.
=Too quick. Best when Evil suffers.= That was Morality, violet.
Without a warning, all the Vyrenchi disappeared. Ming retracted her hand sharply, as though burned. "They left!"
A quartet of Lin Kuei kicked down the unlocked door, without bothering to try the handle. Three hauled Quy Ling off the couch. Vendetta spoke. "We are trying this traitor. Do not dare try and stop us if you prefer your pharynx intact."
They dragged the boy into the pandemonium of the palace, random fear, anger, and joy.
=We wish to protect Yuen Ming,= said Honor, and the other four Vyrenchi were startled at his odd, independent thought.
They had left the palace to avoid the evil Lin Kuei and now they hung in the blackness of space, amazed at Honor's individuality.
=We do not approve,= said Integrity, and its sentiments were echoed by thousands of others from their home planet.
=We were to destroy the evil and leave immediately. We are late in returning.= That was Virtue.
=Late, late...= echoed the Population.
=We did not find the desperate girl who called us with her mind.= Honor tried to persuade them to allow him more time.
=A secondary goal, only. We should return now,= said Honesty.
=Then we will return,= agreed Honor, =We will seek approval.=
=Yes,= said a myriad of voices in a chaotic wave, the Population's approval.
By the time Ming and her brother arrived in the courtroom, a large crowd had already gathered and the so-called trial had begun.
It was more of a shouting match. Numerous members of the Lin Kuei and high-ranking military officers condemned the poor boy simultaneously, yelling not only with anger, but with the need to be heard over both the crowd and each other. Unsurprisingly, Vendetta was prominent among them.
As Ming made her way to sit beside Kei Sa in her designated spot, she looked to the front of the room and found her answer to why the Elders did not call for absolute silence, or even quiet the din. Three of the four chairs were empty, Emperor Yuen's and General Li's, understandably. But where was Yuen Po? The only Elder seated was a senile old man, who had been old when he supported a young Emperor Yuen.
The old man finally called for silence, and Ming was relieved to see that perhaps he wasn't completely deaf, after all. But instead of calling for an orderly presentation of evidence, he said, "I have decided that Hua Quy Ling shall be decapitated for his crimes of treason."
Vendetta seemed almost satisfied.
So this is it, thought Quy Ling, as an Earth elemental ninja forced him to his feet and pushed him toward the executioner. He was to die a martyr. Perhaps someday he would be considered a hero... Probably not.
As he was marched by, he couldn't help but notice Kei Sa where she sat by the princess, who was looking very distressed. Kei Sa herself looked merely resigned, and she closed her eyes as though she did not want to see his execution, blotting out the only true color she had besides her pink lips. The pallor of her skin nearly matched the pure shade of the princess's painted face beside her.
He was slightly disappointed that she did not seem more melancholy that he would soon be dead. He hoped it could be attributed to the fact that she rarely showed much emotion over anything, but what reason would she have for being upset? He had never even spoken with her. And now he never would.
He cursed his own stupidity as they shoved his head down on the block. His executioner raised the axe.
"Stop this at once." The unmistakable voice of Yuen Po rang through the room. She walked to her seat and as she passed Ming and Jer Rod she whispered, just loud enough for them to hear, "I am sorry I did not arrive sooner, but I could not rush. It is still very early and I am a very old woman."
She sat in her designated chair and assumed command. "I will not allow you to kill this boy without a fair trial. Now, what is his crime?"
Vendetta stepped forward. "Madam, he was guarding the emperor's door when the assassins came. He did not raise an alarm, run to get help, or even try to stop them. I believe he may have even wanted our emperor dead."
"We all wanted our emperor dead," she replied coldly, sweeping her arm around to indicate the royal family, the slaves, the civilians in the crowd. "He shall not be punished for allowing his tormentor to die. In that, he has set us free."
"But Madam," Vendetta protested, hovering on the fine line that separated his controlled anger from mad rage. "This boy is a traitor to his emperor and cannot be trusted!"
"No," countered the old woman. "It is the Lin Kuei who are the traitors, not to the emperor, but to the Mandalorians people, those who truly matter. From this moment on, the Lin Kuei are officially disbanded, and anyone who is found wearing their insignia or even speaking the name shall be tried for treason. Out of my sight!" She waved the ninjas away. They left, reluctantly at first, then more quickly when they realized she was serious and they had little time to get out of their uniforms.
"You will be in charge, then?" called a civilian from the crowd.
"No," said Yuen Po, "I am too old. I will likely die soon. I hereby give command of the Mandalorian Empire to Yuen Jer Rod and Yuen Ming."
"What is your first order of business?" asked another citizen of the twins.
Yuen Ming looked to her brother, and through his eyes, through their hidden communication link, she saw he agreed with her thoughts. "We shall free the slaves."
From somewhere in the crowd, a slave woman ran forward and knelt before them. It was the messenger, Lyn Sa. "Please," she asked, "Let this be my last message."
"Certainly," said Jer Rod. Lyn Sa cartwheeled and skipped out the door, racing to spread her joy to the others.
"I also think," continued the new king, "that before we become ensnared in affairs of state, we should all go and celebrate this joyous day." The crowd cheered and swarmed out the door.
Except for one person. Rah Cai Yue rushed up the stairs to Ming. "Is the new queen," he ventured, "too high to be escorted by an ordinary fellow like me?"
"Certainly not," said Ming, smiling and taking his arm.
Together they walked down the steps and out the door, to the jubilant parade that had already begun.