Chapter Five
FROM HERE:
Once at the castle gates, Angus grumbled. "I told you she wasn't right."
"I wouldn't go making judgments so swiftly, master-of-terrible-excuses," warned Sam. "I understand you don't trust me. I accept that…in fact, I implore it. You shouldn't trust me."
"You see, I told you!" shouted Angus, stopping in his tracks.
"Angus, bite your tongue," said Ivar. "I think she's trying to make a valid point."
Angus did bite his tongue, metaphorically speaking; however, he seemed smitten with anger and ready to explode.
Sam nodded. "Those who have put their trust in me always have a bad ending. I say this to warn you in advance. It's not that I have put to harm the others I have met. It's this…thing that follows me everywhere I go that always seems to cause destruction."
"Well, then, I guess if you just leave, we should be all right," said Angus, crossing his arms.
"No," she said. "Those villagers disappearing are partially my doing. I didn't cause it but I sure as hell know who did. And if I'm to prove myself to all of you, I think this would be it." She glanced at Ivar. He nodded.
"It's a conspiracy, I swear," muttered Angus.
"And why would anyone want to conspire against you?" asked Rohan. "Not that you don't possess that charm that everyone wants."
Angus was shaking his head. "You're all against me."
Sam stood in front of him and leaned down, her face so close to his, he smelled a mint aftertaste on her breath. "Now that's just crazy, sir Angus."
Rohan sighed. "Open the gates," he said to a guard. The gates opened. "You know, you don't have to put 'sir' before our names."
"Yeah, well you're humble," said Angus. "I'm not. You can keep saying it for all I care," he nodded to Sam. She blinked once and then turned away from him, leaving him with an involuntary sense of guilt at his selfishness. He shook away the feeling and followed them inside the courtyard.
"Well this is painfully familiar," she muttered as they passed under the arches.
The king, upon arrival of the knights, was informed that the knights had arrived with news of the village people disappearing and that they had brought with them a stranger. This had made him anxious, though he did not display this to any of his guards as they passed in and out of the throne room.
Rohan and Ivar led Sam inside the castle, though Angus had resolved himself to walking behind, cautiously keeping an eye on the 'she-devil.' He knew that as soon as she had started conferring with Ivar that something was wrong. It wasn't often that women tended to flock towards the intelligent man in the group. And she was smart; cunning was the word. When he had attempted to persuade her to him, dolling out his usual uplifting charm (a favorite), she was quick to respond with a remark that was both insightful and a slap in the face. This had never before happened with any other woman besides the princess; however, even Deidre had a limit on where she would go in the conversation. Sam was just a veteran, like an old soldier, trained, broken in, flawless. But she was real, too, and that jilted him a little more than frightened him. Her sense of realism was both a stab in the back and something else, something…decent.
He shook his head again.
Upon entering the throne room, Sam felt a tension but the king was not the source. It lurked somewhere in that room, registering from above. She glanced up and saw a closed door on a balcony.
She glanced back at the throne and standing just beyond it was a middle-aged, rugged-looking man with a crown above his head. When she was introduced, Sam bowed her head and looked back up into the king's eyes.
He seemed wary. "Tell us, stranger, where are you from?"
Sam breathed. "I'm…from here."
The king frowned. The knights shifted behind her.
"But from another time."
The king raised his brow. "Please…explain."
"Among other things, I'm a time traveler. But you will have to bear with me because my story is quite long and I'd rather be preventing useless deaths than talk for the better part of a day. No offense," she shrugged. "Oh, your highness," she added for good measure.
Out of an adjourning room, a young woman in an elegant gown and a crown above her head strode through the throne room, followed by a young man in fine clothing and a smug on his face. The woman's face was furious. "Excuse me, father, but I must have a word with you."
"I'm sorry, Deidre, but you will have to save your marriage arguments for another time. The village has just been emptied of its people and we apparently have encountered a time traveler in our midst that will, in due coarse, explain her purpose here. I hope," he added.
The woman looked confused. She blinked. Then, she looked over at Sam, eying her clothing critically. Sam bowed. "You are Princess Deidre?"
"Yes," Deidre said abruptly. "Who are you?"
"Sam Fitzgerald. You…are a knight as well, then?"
Deidre gave Rohan a look. "Yes, I am. How did…?"
"The guys told me," she indicated with her head. "And you sir," said Sam, glancing at the smug-looking man standing behind Deidre. "You're Prince Garrett."
"Aye," said Garrett. "A knight as well."
Sam nodded. "Well, as I understand it your holiness, your kingdom has been at war with another kingdom nearby and its queen has had many attempts to destroy you all but has failed every time." The king nodded. "Except," she continued. "Now she's stolen your village people yet these men behind me don't seem to think that she's capable of that kind of magic."
King Conchobar glanced at Rohan. "Oh? How so?"
"Well," she shrugged. "They're right. She's not. She may be evil but she would have needed help. A lot of help."
"She's got Mider," said Angus.
Sam frowned. "Who's that?"
"A fairy," said the king.
"Another one?" asked Sam.
"Yes."
"And he's a baddie?" she asked.
"Oh yes," said King Conchobar. "A real corrupt fairy," he sighed, leaning on his throne. A slap in the face could not have better described what he better needed.
Sam sighed. "Listen, for some reason my mission has sent me here."
"Which is?" asked Angus rather hotly. He was given a glare from the king.
She turned and looked directly at Angus. "As I have already informed you, master Angus, I must send all of the guardians of the Divine Gates back to their posts before a very gritty, endless and disastrous war begins, starting with annihilation of the human race."
"And just who are the 'guardians of the Divine Gates'?" the king asked.
She paused. Then a small, sad smile crept upon her face. "They're sentinels."
"That…thing…you helped us destroy," said Ivar, adding weight to her words.
"More like beheaded," added Rohan.
Sam nodded. "Yes. That was a sentinel. Actually, it was rather deformed. However, he was a sentinel all the same."
She turned back. "My wings, milord, are a mark of my commitment to this war of unnatural beings. I…."
The king interrupted. "You…have wings?"
Instead of answering, Sam backed up into the middle of the room, removing her suit jacket and then zipping off her vest, chucking both on the table. She breathed. She knew it was not beneficial to open her wings more than twice in a day and she had been using her wings so often, she felt her spine split a little every time she did it. However, the king needed proof and she needed information. Ona wasn't providing any help as of late and Sam was most likely better off in a rock in a hard place. She looked up at the king as she unfolded her wings. Her hands curled up into her fists, nails digging into her skin. There was a rip. No one could hear it but she certainly could feel it. She breathed again. It was harder to take them out because they relented when overused. Sam's body heat increased and she felt like sweating. However, from the corner of her eye, she saw the feathery white tips of her wings. When they were fully expanded, she let go of the breath she had been holding and closed her eyes. She said, "It's a common misconception that all angels have white wings. White is a symbol of purity. They have wings of gold. A symbol of pride." As she said this, she glanced at Angus, who met her stare. He turned his head away and then proceeded to lean against a wall.
"And you're pure?" asked Angus.
"Still relenting, my friend," she asked, opening her eyes. "No," she shook her head. Her wings flapped a little, blowing a calming breeze into the throne room. "I'm anything but pure. It's more…it's a mythical thing. I never could understand it myself."
"Magnificent," whispered the king, who had been gawking, wide-eyed as two wings began to rise up from behind her. White, long, downy. It reminded him of a soft bird, the feeling of spring as it took flight in its wings. It was dangerous to be this pure. "How…how can this be a mutation?"
Sam suddenly looked pained. "I'm sorry. I can't answer that question for I do not know. I just have them. I always have. Don't know if I always will, though. It's that sort of logic that keeps the two Houses spinning," she shrugged, looking at Angus. She hoped she could appeal to him somehow.
"Houses?" Deidre asked.
"Heaven and Hell."
"So…this is a battle of good versus evil," said the king.
Sam suddenly grinned. "My majesty, if I may say so, you seem like an old warrior who misses the call of battle. You must have a firm appreciation for the honor of it all."
"Oh, aye," he nodded. He stood up straighter as though the rich clothing he wore everyday had been wearing him down.
"Well, if everything evolves the way I think it will, you shall have that battle returned to you. This is a war long overdue," she sighed, placing her arms on her hips. "And you're smack in the middle of ground zero, whether you like it or not."
"Between God and the Devil, you mean?" asked the king.
"Well, no." She paused. "You see the Sentinels on both sides had once been on similar terms. They were never at peace but they had an understanding. The God you all know had decided that he would use Sentinels as a means of protecting His kingdom from being overflowed with the spirits of the dead, especially His latest creation, humans. Of course, the Devil was jealous and decreed he would use Sentinels to protect His gates from angels attempting to destroy Him. The Sentinels were a single race, then, of beings, neither living nor dead. They just were. And when they were called upon to perform their duties, they had to be split up; one half would go to God, the other half to the Devil. The Sentinels were allowed to converse amongst each other as they always had done but they had to remain loyal to their master.
"However, as all good stories go, something happened, something sent a rippling effect among the opposite sides. Sentinels were becoming more and more isolated from their own kind and eventually were only dedicated to their masters. The angels and the demons saw this happening and for the most part, they wanted to prevent their gates from being attacked. Or at least that is what I have been told. It's very speculative whether or not the angels were acting upon their own accord but it is very likely the demons were under orders. They are under a tight leash for the most part, as well as you can understand.
"The next thing to occur was probably one of the most significant moves in pragmatic dogma. Angels had taken upon themselves to keep the division of the Sentinels and had thus infiltrated both sides with hollow lies. And as someone once said, 'The bigger the lie, the more you tell it, the more people will believe it.' And that's what happened. Soon, the Sentinels were clearly divided, some of the Devil's own taking upon a new form while God's sentinels sprouted more wings.
"Many years ago, when there were sentinels roaming the earth and when I had already begun my separate quest to find some answer to my mutation, there was an accident. The Devil's Sentinels had been mistaken for demons at a public outing and they were burned alive. Immediately, the Devil responded and sent out his most trusted Sentinels to find the arsonist. At the same time, He was criticizing the other sentinels for starting this division. His sentinels then began attacking God's sentinels on earth, in the view of the public. That was where I had been picked up. A sentinel by the name of Marock, who was the Devil's second-in-command, found me and told me I would find all the sentinels in this realm and send them back to their gates before they started interfering with mortal lives. He told me I had been gifted for this specific purpose and that I would be the only human capable of sending sentinels to Heaven or to Hell. But when he said all of the sentinels on earth, he also meant all of those sentinels who were residing in parallel universes. A fact, which has been my greatest pet peeve for many years."
"Whoa, man, wait a minute," said Angus. He had been swallowing up every word she had been saying. "Parallel universes?"
Sam sighed. "Had you not been listening when I explained this all to you on the way here?"
"He only likes to listen to himself talk, milady," said Garrett.
"I wouldn't talk if I were you," said Angus.
"You dare question me?" said Garrett.
"Gentlemen," said the king. "Let's save this quarrel for a better time."
For the moment, they stopped. Sam continued. "Parallel universes occur through the various dimensions of time and space. For example, there is another earth existing at this same moment, with the same people and the same effects but with different circumstances or different situations." She glanced at Garrett. "Your king could just be a knight on another earth while you sit on that throne and dictate," she said to Angus. This flattered him and he smiled a little. The king grumbled. "Well, believe what you will," said Sam to the king. "That's just the way it is."
"So, they're could be someone who is me," said Rohan, "But he's living on a different Earth?"
"Yeah." Sam nodded.
He furrowed his brow. "Strange."
"You have no idea," she mumbled. "Which brings me here, literally. Another sentinel I know has been my transporter, for the most part. But she's been quite silent for several hours."
"Hm," the king mused, stroking his bearded chin. He sighed.
"Your majesty," said Rohan, suddenly stirring from his thoughts. "Where's Cathbad?"
"Oh, he's in his chambers."
Rohan walked across the room and climbed the stairs. He opened the door that Sam had felt contained something of power inside. She stared at the open door and frowned. "Who's Cathbad?"
"He's a wizard," said the king.
She held her breath.
"What is it, Sam?" asked Ivar.
Sam spoke slowly. "Nothing. I just…I've never met a wizard before." She hesitated to tell them that she had felt the wizard's power even before the door had opened. Through the many years spent searching and killing sentinels, her mind expanded more, became more connected to her other senses, the ones that humans generally tended to ignore. As a result, she was in constant awareness of the shadows flitting around her.
Angus was looking at Sam. Something wasn't right with him whenever he so much as thought of her and his first instincts usually proved true. There was something he couldn't read, something he couldn't guess about her and that was unsettling. An expert thief, he had to be an excellent judge of character and when one person was hard to understand, he knew there was something worth discovering there. He smiled to himself.
Prince Garrett had been still since the king had silenced them. He had shifted in his boots several times and felt like he needed to pace. But after hearing Sam's story, he felt like collapsing in a chair. What she was talking about was pure madness. If she were lying, she would be compromising the trust of the king and the rest of the knights. Angus would surely have seen right through her if she was but he didn't seem to be convinced of anything. He just looked…smug. Garrett sniffed.
Deidre heard him and crossed her arms. "Father, when do you think would be a good time for us to go over the initial contract of our marriage alliance?" Her eyes were steely but carried naïve concern in them.
Her father, the king, sighed. "I don't know, Deidre. We'll have to find out what's going on here first. My entire village!" he suddenly shouted. Everyone jumped.
Just then, Rohan walked out of the room above the throne and an elderly man with a very long, white beard followed him.
Sam suddenly tightened as he cast his glance over the room. He seemed to look straight through her but even as he did so, she felt it and it was unnerving.
"When Rohan told me we had a visitor who had wings, I wasn't expecting it," he was saying as he climbed down the stairs, slow at every step. Rohan walked to where Angus was leaning against the wall. They shared a glance. "Now, that's saying a lot for an old man who has seen so much and prefers to prevent strange things from harming this castle. But, I do not mean to infer that you, young lady, are a harm to this castle," he breathed as he reached the last step. He walked past Garrett and Deidre, striding with an effervescence that seemed unlikely for a man his age. He glanced Sam over and smiled kindly. He held out his hand in greeting. "In fact, if anything, you are a blessing to our turmoil."
Sam eyed him, feeling a sense of fear. There was something he knew about her already, or something that he had sensed about her mission. She shook his hand. "Well, I can guarantee you that that is the only time I've ever been called a blessing."
He smiled more, if it was possible. "Eh, you are a lively one, I can tell. And considering your task, that in itself is a blessing."
She frowned. "I don't understand. Do you know about the sentinels?"
"I have for some time seen shadows form in the corners of my room and not known what creature found itself taking up residence there. But up until this moment, I had not known that what I was seeing was real and not some trick of an old man's mind," he winked at her. He raised his hand. "You have only confirmed my suspicions and I must say it is quite a relief to be back in my normal frame of mind."
Angus snorted.
"What was that, thief?" said Cathbad with a sharp sneer.
"Thief!" shouted Angus, placing a hand to his chest. "Are you calling me a thief?"
"Is it that reallysurprising to you anymore?" asked Rohan. He didn't seem in the mood.
Angus stuttered. "Well, I…no, not really…but he…ah." He waved his hand in resolution.
Sam tilted her head, smiling.
Cathbad turned around. "Your majesty, I ask that you put your full trust in this girl. I have seen that she will come as a great ally in our own quest to end Maeve's terrible reign."
Sam was about to speak; however, Angus beat her to it. "No, I don't think that's such a great idea, Cathbad."
"And why should I believe the words of a thief versus my own advisor?" asked the king with a gruff manner.
"First of all, it's FORMER thief, remember? Second, she told us herself that she couldn't be trusted. Speaking from experience, milord, if someone tells you not to trust them, you shouldn't." He shot a look at Sam, who was gazing at the king.
The king shifted. "Is this true?"
Sam lowered her eyes. "Your knight means well. Although he is uncouth, he speaks the truth." She glanced at Angus and they made eye contact. She looked back at the king. "I had warned these men earlier of my past relationships with others. A fatal end met those who followed too close. I only wish you take that into consideration if and when you use me as an ally."
The king, pausing to think, slowly began to nod. "Nothing worth fighting for is ever easy and there are always risks worth taking."
Sam then bent down on one knee and lowered her head. Her wings were animated and flitting. She spoke. "Then I shall be your humble servant and God damn me if I fail you." She waited.
The king looked passively down at her. He straightened again. "Arise, young lady, and do what you have promised."
She raised her head and from behind light eyes etched in ware, she seemed to register a newfound intensity that emanated from a lost determination. She needed this. Sam stood to her feet and bowed again before speaking. "Your majesty, I first must go to Tir Na Nog and talk with the king there. He may have some answers for me that could help us all find the villagers."
The king nodded. "Yes, of course. Have Rohan, Ivar and…." He suddenly smiled. "Angus take you there."
Angus sighed and shook his head. He had wanted the king to dismiss her long ago but Conchobar trusted her. It was aggravating.
"Go now," the king said to the four of them. As one they nodded and walked outside the throne room.
