Chapter 7



Teela was under Evil-Lyn's control. Adam's voice was frozen. And anyone passing would expect him to have a glum expression. He thumped his head back against the stretcher repeatedly, trying to think. Beastman cleared his throat and Adam looked up to see the minion staring suggestively at Teela's back. Adam, his gut roiling and clenching, let his head fall back again and stayed still.

How long had Evil-Lyn and Beastman been in the palace? What were they going to do with him in the eastern tower? It made no sense. Unless . . . What if she had some spell that would take them straight to Snake Mountain? Or there were always the griffins that seemed to be on call whenever Beastman wanted them. Either way, he and Teela were in serious trouble.

Evil-Lyn, in her guise as Lady Asala, simply walked beside the stretcher. This plan was terrifyingly perfect. His father and Man-at-Arms were undoubtedly at the walls, fighting off whoever was attacking this time. No one would even know what had happened to him until they found Lady Asala herself - and Fenella - in whatever condition they were in by now. Even then, no one would be sure until Skeletor chose to reveal his. . . his . . . Adam turned his thoughts resolutely aside.

They started up the stairs, Teela going first. Adam thought furiously. They were running out of time. At the second landing, Teela stopped dead and appeared to be fighting against whatever power Evil-Lyn had over her. ** Go Teela, ** Adam thought, but Evil-Lyn took a few steps forward and waved that blue crystal before her eyes again. "Do as I say," she murmured. "The top room, now!" Teela shuddered and began moving forward again.

Adam stared at the witch's hand. The crystal. It was obviously the basis of her control over Teela. He had to do something or all was lost. He'd be at Snake Mountain, again. Without his sword, again. And this time the goal wasn't to lure anyone there, as far as he knew. The goal was to do away with him, which made it seem unlikely that he'd last the day. And just what were they planning to do with Teela? He took a deep breath to steady himself down. Even his thoughts were babbling.

Evil-Lyn was walking just to the right of the stretcher, the crystal in her left hand. The blanket over him fouled his legs, but there was only one thing he could do. Sweeping the blanket out of the way as best he could, he let fly a kick at Evil-Lyn's hand. The crystal went sailing and shattered with a loud concussion against the wall.

At that moment, Teela's back stiffened. Adam's momentum had carried him halfway off the stretcher. His right leg and his hip were hanging off, but the rest of him was firmly on it. He tried to yell to Teela to let go, but his voice was still paralyzed. Teela let go anyway and turned to face their enemies. The foot of the stretcher hit the steps sharply, jarring Adam, and throwing his balance even further off. Beastman dropped his end and bent down sharply, scooping Adam up around the waist. The prince wound up doubled up over Beastman's shoulder, his head hanging down by his belt buckle. Adam was glad to know that the spikes that stuck up out of Beastman's shoulders and chest seemed to have disappeared in his transformation.

The hairy minion jumped clear of the sliding stretcher and started running up the stairs. Teela tried to block him, but he thrust her roughly aside. She grunted as she hit the wall. Adam craned around, trying to see what was going on. Evil-Lyn was nowhere in sight. She was probably already on her way ahead of them. Adam's left leg thumped agonizingly against Beastman's back with every step.

Something struck Beastman from behind, and he stumbled, his grip along Adam's back loosening. With a great backwards heave of his body, Adam thrust himself free of Beastman's hold. He flew backwards off Beastman's shoulder and fell through open air, arms bound, leg heavy and stiff with the cast. If he could have made any noise, he would have let out an embarrassingly loud and panicked scream.

Teela threw herself at him to break his fall, and they tumbled back down the stairs together. Adam caught a glimpse as Beastman flung his hands up in disgust and turned to run up the stairs. There came the shriek of one of Beastman's griffins, and then no further sound from the tower room. They'd come to rest partially on the landing, partially on the stairs. Adam's legs were above him, but his torso was bent backwards over Teela. He craned his neck to see what state his cast and stitches were in.

His heart sank as he gazed up at his body. His right leg lay at a very odd angle. The moment he saw the injury, waves of pain cascaded through him. "Teela?" he said weakly. He blinked - his voice worked. Perhaps Evil-Lyn had to be nearby for the spell to work.

"Adam?" Teela exclaimed from beneath him. "Are you all right? Adam?" she demanded in a frantic voice. She dragged herself out from under him, and started to get up. When her right ankle collapsed under her weight, she caught herself against the wall. "Guards!!! Father!!!" she shrieked, her voice echoing in the stairwell. "Ram-Man!!! Stratos!!!! Somebody, help!!!"

Adam began to wish devoutly for unconsciousness as Teela started to babble. "Can you tell if they're gone? Are you hurt? I mean more hurt? You're bleeding! Not too much though - the stitches must have broken open." She paused in her prattle. "I'd better go make sure that they're gone." She extended her cobra staff and, using it for a crutch, she hobbled upstairs.

"Teela, no, they've got to be gone or they'd be down here!" Adam called, but she ignored him, passing out of sight around the corner.

Adam lay back, breathing hard. Surely someone would be along soon. He wouldn't be lying alone on this staircase, bleeding and in agony, for too much longer.

The air beside him shimmered, and a voice spoke in his ear. "What makes you think we aren't down here?" Adam's heart skipped a beat. It was Evil-Lyn - and she looked like herself again.

He shrank back, trying to drag himself out of her reach.

"Teeeeelaaaa!" he yelled at the top of his lungs, his voice breaking on a high panicked note. Evil-Lyn winced back from the sound, and then he heard the blessed clatter of footsteps approaching from the floor below. Evil-Lyn reached for him again, but at that moment, Teela came canoning down the stairs. Evil-Lyn cursed and jumped to the window, leaving him behind.

As the witch stood there, Teela closing in, footsteps drawing closer below her, Beastman rode his griffin into view and she flung herself out of the window and onto its back. They flew away as Man-at-Arms, Mekanek, Ram-Man and the king came charging up the stairs - the whole group spearheaded by Cringer. ** Cringer??! ** That had to be wrong. Adam's vision went black around the edges just as his father reached him.

"Father," he said, "it was Evil-Lyn - and -" He passed out.



***



"I told you we should have pounded him in his bedroom," Beastman said for the twenty-third time since they'd fled the environs of Eternos. Evil-Lyn glowered at him, but did not reply. She was not going to be drawn into a debate with the hairy cretin. "But noooo, you said we should take him back to Skeletor. You said he'd be pleased."

They were approaching a hill. Evil-Lyn sent out a beam of energy from her staff, causing a column of rock to rise out of the crag just in time for her to jump off the flying beast and land on it.

"You go back to Skeletor and report failure!" she called after him as he stared over his shoulder at her in surprise. "I'm going to try again!"



***



Adam awoke to the gentle sound of his mother humming. His body felt leaden, and he didn't want to move. He considered for a moment going back to sleep, but, no. There were too many question whirling in his mind for that. He opened his eyes and turned his head. His mother sat in an armchair next to the bed, embroidering. The window behind her looked out over the plains beyond the palace and seemed quite a lot higher than his own bedroom window. Buzz-Off hovered into view briefly, peering in, then flitted off.

"Where are we?" Adam asked.

His mother looked up from her needlework. "The west tower. We thought it wise to move you, what with all the attention you've been getting. Buzz-Off and Stratos are keeping watch outside the windows, and some of the guards are flying a regular patrol around the palace." Her eyes strayed back to the green fabric between her hands. "There's talk of sending for some more Avions and Andrenids to augment our aerial defenses."

"Oh." Abruptly, he remembered Cringer sliding off his bed. "Where's Cringer?" he asked. "Is he okay?"

"He's fine, Adam," his mother said. Putting her embroidery aside, she bent down. "Cringer, come out, Adam wants to see you."

Slowly, Cringer crept out from under the bed. He looked very ashamed, and Adam wanted to pet him, but he wasn't in reach. "Come here, Cringer," he called, patting the side of the bed. It was a larger bed than he'd had before, he noticed. "Come up."

"Go on, Cringer," Marlena said, giving the cat a gentle shove.

Adam cajoled the great cat up beside him and started petting him thoroughly. "Hey, it's okay, Cringer. You stood up to Evil-Lyn." An embarrassing thought struck him. "You were right in the first place, when you were growling at her as Lady Asala." He scratched Cringer under the chin. "I should have listened to you, and that might not have happened."

"Not only that, but he's the reason your father arrived at the east tower when he did." Adam looked inquisitively her. "We gathered from Teela that Evil-Lyn knocked him out. When he woke up, he ran for your father and Man-at-Arms. It took him awhile to get their attention, but once he had it, he led them straight to you."

"How did he manage it?" Adam asked. He knew too well what his father usually thought of Cringer's behavior.

Marlena's lips twitched. "He bit your father."

Adam stared in shock at his cat, who buried his nose in his paws. "He what?"

"Your father decided that something serious had to have happened if Cringer was biting people, so he followed him."

"Good boy, Cringer," Adam said, rubbing both sides of his face. Cringer began to look mollified, and Adam lay back against his pillows, hand still on Cringer's head.

"Oh, Mother, what happened to Lady Asala and Fenella?"

"They're unconscious in the infirmary. According to Orko they're under some kind of sleep spell. He's trying to figure it out." Adam's thoughts quailed away from the thought of those two poor women at Orko's mercy. Of course, they wouldn't be aware of it from the sound of things.

"You gotta feel a little sorry for them," Teela's voice came from his other side. He turned his head to look at her. There was another bed alongside his, and Teela lay upon it, left leg propped up on pillows. The image of her ankle collapsing as she stood up on the stairs flashed through his mind.

"Don't tell me you broke your leg, too," he said.

"No, mine's just a sprain."

Dorgan's voice came from the doorway. "There's nothing 'just' about a sprain, my girl!" he said sharply. "A sprain can be far worse than a simple broken bone, and can take far longer to heal."

"See, Teela," Adam said, "I'll be out of bed before -"

"Don't count on it," snapped Dorgan. "Not one of the four separate breaks in your bones could be called simple. If you don't stay in bed this time, I will sit on you myself!"

Man-at-Arms came in behind the healer. "Now, that's hardly fair, Dorgan. It's not as though Adam volunteered to be grabbed by Beastman and Evil-Lyn." The healer snorted and walked up between the beds.

"How do you feel?" he asked the prince, first touching his forehead and then taking his pulse.

"Bruised," Adam said.

"You feel bruised?" Teela exclaimed. "You landed on me!"

"Well, you're not exactly soft!"

"Children," Marlena said reprovingly. "Adam, you don't seem nearly so - disoriented. How's the pain?"

Adam shrugged. "I can feel it, but it's bearable."

"After you tried to get out of bed last night, Duncan insisted that Dorgan find you a medication that didn't leave you so dazed."

"Yes," Man-at-Arms said, giving Adam a look that made him wonder what he'd done or said. He dimly recalled waking up in the night. "I thought it was interfering unduly with your studies. You still have a test tomorrow on the roots of the Pelian war."

Adam and Teela glanced at each other in dismay, but then Adam said, "Where's Dad?" Teela's eyes lightened and she grinned. "Maybe, if he has time later, he could come in and tutor us some more." Man-at-Arms looked startled, but Marlena smiled.

"Randor's always been a good storyteller," she said, a laugh in her voice. "I think he could be persuaded to lend some help."

Man-at-Arms nodded thoughtfully. "I'm sure that he could. Now, I'd like to get an idea just how far along you two are in your review of the events surrounding the war. Can either of you give me an understanding of how the farmers' uprising affected the beginning of the war?"

Adam exchanged a puzzled glance with Teela. "The farmer's revolt?" he asked. "That didn't happen till nearly the end of the war, when the battles led to famine in -"

"Unless you mean the problems in Velnan," said Teela. "But that really happened enough before the war that I don't think it had any affect."

Adam nodded. "Which do you mean?" he asked Man-at-Arms. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed that his mother was stifling a grin. Man-at-Arms was just staring at the both of them, mouth hanging slightly open.

"I think they've grasped it, Duncan," she said.

"I think you could be right." He gestured to the table between the two beds. "Go on with your studies. The king will be in later once he's made another survey of the defenses."

"Oh, is he on the walls?" Adam asked.

Man-at-Arms bit his lip, and looked oddly abstracted for a moment. "No. He's surveying the extended perimeter defenses. There is now a ring of troops a half-mile out from the walls."

Adam gaped at him. "Extended perimeter?"

"Yes. And, since you clearly don't need me to guide your studies, I'd best get on to the assignment your father has given me."

"What?" Teela asked curiously.

"I'm to devise some form of shield that will, if possible, block bolts, whether magical or mechanical in origin. Oh, and he wants me to develop some early sensors that we can place at various points between here and Snake Mountain to give us some advance warning should more attacks be launched against. us." Man-at-Arms left the room, and Adam turned slowly to his mother.

"What else has Father been doing?"

Marlena returned to her embroidery. "He's just taking steps to make sure that the kingdom and his heir are safe from attack."

Adam sat back against his pillows. He wondered bleakly if it had been Skeletor's goal to turn Eternia into an armed camp. In a sense, he supposed it was - just on with his own guards holding the weapons. Something really had to be done about that would-be tyrant. Something less defensive, perhaps.

He looked back, startled, as Teela tapped him on the shoulder with her cobra staff. "We're supposed to be studying, fly boy," she said.

"Fly boy? What's that supposed to mean?"

"Well, you looked kind of like you were trying to fly when you pushed off from Beastman's shoulder." Adam glared and rolled his eyes at her.

"Have I thanked you yet, Teela?" Adam's mother asked suddenly.

Teela looked startled. "For what?"

"For breaking his fall. His injuries from that could have been much worse if you hadn't been there." Adam boggled at the thought of his injuries being much worse than they already were. But it was just wrong to think of Teela stuck in bed for weeks. She was gonna go stark raving nuts. On the other hand, this could get fun.

"But Queen Marlena, if I hadn't let myself get ensorcelled by Evil-Lyn, he wouldn't have been up there in the first place!"

"Don't be stupid, Teela!" Adam exclaimed. "That's just -"

"I don't think you're going to make her feel better by insulting her, Adam," his mother said reproachfully. Adam scowled glumly. If he gave Teela a compliment, she'd just get suspicious. His mother simply did not understand their relationship. "Now, Teela," she said. "The key word there is 'ensorcelled.' You were under a spell. You couldn't have helped it."

"Yes, but he saved himself!" Teela moaned. "He saved us both. If he hadn't kicked that crystal out of Evil-Lyn's hand, who knows where we'd all be right now!"

Adam cocked his head, perplexed by this line of reasoning. "Is that a problem?" he asked. "I mean, so it was sort of a group effort. So what? If I hadn't broken the crystal, we might both be dead now. If you hadn't cushioned my fall, I might have broken my neck instead of my leg."

A gasp sounded on his other side. Adam turned to stare at his mother, who had clenched her fist in her embroidery. She pulled the needle out of her hand and stood up without looking at them. In fact, she seemed to be shielding her face somewhat. "Excuse me," she said, and slipped quickly out of the room.