Chapter Three-
The figure at the top of the dune lifted one hand to shield his eyes from the sun. The rest of his face was concealed by a dust-colored cloth that wrapped around his head and, like his attire, seemed almost to vanish into the bleak desert landscape. Yet two sharp violet eyes glittered out the shadows of his face and gazed across the miles of sand towards the city.
Another figure appeared beside him from over the top of the dune. Smaller and slighter in frame, she, too, shielded her eyes and followed his gaze. Quiet words in the desert tongue passed between the two, followed by furious gestures.
"Can you not find some other way? He will not keep his word," the woman argued.
"He has promised me," he reassured her. "He owes me his life, and I have not yet made demands. He must know that I would come sometime."
"Those men are always treacherous, and do not value we who do them services. I would rather that we—"
"Let our men fight them? Let them continue to accuse us of thievery and other dishonors as we have not committed? No."
"What care we about our honor in their eyes?" she cried in exasperation. "So long as they leave us be."
"But have they? Will they? The women in the north cry out for protection, those from the inlands want vengeance, and our men are restless. Besides," he said with a tone of finality, "I have other reasons for going."
"Those dreams?" She said it more as a statement than a question, and knew that she had lost their argument.
Behind them, several Bazhir tribesmen led stubborn packhorses to the bottom of the dune. They watched the arguing pair without judgment, waiting patiently while readjusting packs and drinking from canteens. One of them quipped a joke and the others laughed tiredly. The voice of one tribesman called out to the man at the top of the dune, "Illiah!", followed by some questioning words in their language.
The man placed a comforting arm around the distraught woman and answered the tribesmen affirmatively, pointing towards the horizon. One Bazhir tribesman separated from the others and spurred his horse in the direction that the man had pointed. The rest of the company waited a moment, watching his movement disappear into the mirage of the desert. Then they began to pick their way onward across the miles, following the rider and the small man treading ahead of them who was their leader.
Illiah the Healer-Who-Has-Seen-Death was coming again to Corus.
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Gary saw Alanna, every so often, lurking about the edges of the courtyards, observing fencers at practice. He didn't know when he would find her there, but he was never surprised, in the middle of sparring, to catch her watching him from the shadows of his vision's periphery.
It was their unspoken agreement that he never approach her about it. Actually, much that passed between them was unspoken, particularly references to the events of that day. Alanna was as unpredictable as before, speaking to him for long afternoons and then ignoring him for days afterward, completely disappearing from public sight. She seemed uncertain and indecisive, confiding in him and then, as if having second thoughts, contradicting it in whatever manner she could. Yet there was some understanding in their interactions, for Gary acknowledged her internal conflicts and saw them as the natural accompaniment to her gradually growing trust in him.
He was not, however, always so patient.
"Where have you been the past week?" he demanded, cornering Alanna in a hallway where he happened to glimpse her. "I've been looking everywhere for you! You haven't been to banquet or at the practice courts, and I've waited every morning in the library."
"You know that I don't go to the library any more," Alanna responded coldly. "And why would you think to find me in places of men? Perhaps you should have sought me in the embroidery rooms with the other ladies."
"Don't give me any of that," Gary snapped. "I know you wouldn't—" He stopped and inhaled sharply, his mouth pressed tightly into a sharp frown. "And, milady, has this occupation also claimed your evening hours as well?"
"Oh, I was at banquet," answered Alanna. She smiled rather cruelly when recognition failed to register on Gary's face. "What, sir knight? Do not be so sure that my time is yours so exclusively. There might be other knights who might wish to—" Alanna laughed, a small bitter bark that Gary had come to realize was common to her and, one he learned what it revealed, reflected her innermost more than anything else.
"I see," he replied, in a tone to match hers. "So that is the game you play, then?" He spread his arms. "I cannot bind you to me, lady, and if your favor is to be given to other, worthier men, then—"
"Oh, stop it!" Alanna often grew irritated and hostile when Gary turned her own methods upon her. "It's not as if my favor matters to you. What does my favor get you, anyway? Will you marry me, will you keep me from poverty? Then I will find some man who does seek more than conversation, before my dowry has gone to waste." Her mouth clamped shut, a sign that she had said too much. Turning and fumbling with the keys, Alanna struggled to unlock the door to the rooms she shared with the other ladies from the Convent.
"Is your dowry what has been troubling you?" Gary prompted with more tenderness, a frown creasing between his brows. "Maybe then, I could help you. My family is more than wealthy, and for a friend, I could—"
"What was that?" Alanna stopped and stared at him. Gary took the keys from her hand and unlocked the door for her.
"I could always, milady, help you if it is troubles of… financial nature that are troubling you, after all—"
"Before that," Alanna interrupted. "What did you call me?"
"… milady?" Gary timidly suggested.
"You said," Alanna stressed angrily, "that for a friend, you could…?"
"Yes, Alanna," Gary said, bowing with some relief, "as my friend—"
"Ha! Friend is it?" she yelled, and entered her room, slamming the door in Gary's face. Dumbfounded, he stared at the polished wood, recounting his words.
"I wasn't aware that you would be offended by the… assumption," he said helplessly.
"Yes, assumption!" came her muffled anger through the wood. "Friend, I knew it! I knew it, I knew it, I knew that's how you were!"
"Lady, I don't understand—in what manner you are offended by… the word? I only meant you honor by it, truly."
"It's all you wanted then, was just to toy around with me and hold me to you while all the while you're just 'befriending me.' Friendship is an—abhor-able institution, almost as vile as love."
"I… beg your pardon, Alanna?" Gary coughed, aghast.
"At least, when men and women play games of courtship, both sides know that it's all just making a bargain, but friend! Friend is nothing, friend is wasting my time, friend means I have no chance; I don't need your friendship, fool!"
Her anger was thick enough that he understood her meaning even though half of her words were lost through the woodwork. "Did you… want more, my lady?"
"What do you think? Oh, go away you cheater!"
"If I have led you to… believe that I had other interests—"
"How could I have not, you wicked flirt, you devil!"
Gary, his mouth agape, decided not to accuse her of the same actions but instead settled on another tactic. "By friend, I mean that I consider you very close to me. I value your company and conversation more than … any other mere court lady's, and I would fight for your honor if ever you were slighted. As a friend, I mean that I…care for you, and—"
"But would not marry me!" Alanna yelled.
"Well… I had not thought of that, no, but—"
"Then begone! Away, fie! I have never been so humiliated. Go away!"
Gary wondered at the emotion resonating through her voice. He would never, upon meeting her that first night with her vacant and hostilely compliant demeanor, have imagined her capable of such fury. Her rage now racked him bodily, and he stepped backward away from the door.
While he listened to the shuffling silence, a blonde page scurrying down the corridor paused and peered upward into his face for a moment and, recognizing him, bowed.
"Sir Gareth, there's been an envoy that's just arrived, sir. Says that the mage is coming to Corus, sir, in a few days. The King wants all the important knights to meet on account of readying the city for what he wants."
"What mage?" Gary asked blankly. "What is he demanding? Are we going to be under siege?"
"No, sir. It's the mage Elijah, who healed the prince."
"What!" Gary cried in alarm. The page nodded excitedly.
"He's coming and will be here soon, we don't know when, but not long from now. The whole city has to be readied to welcome him, and the King wants to speak to all the knights. Prince Jonathan also wants to see you, says it's urgent."
Gary stared at Alanna's shut door and sighed. He could always talk to her later, after she had cooled down and decided to be a rational being again. With a nod, he followed the cheerful page in the direction of the east wing.
Inside the series of rooms, Alanna sat despondently in the chaise by the door of the bedchamber she shared with Meganne, waiting for the sound of Gary's footsteps to disappear down the hallway. When she was certain that he was gone, she pulled the practice sword out from under the bed. It was constructed crudely of iron, and far heavier than steel. She had sighted it earlier in the week, carelessly discarded about the practice courts, and managed to smuggle it back to her rooms beneath her gown.
Quickly shedding her garments, the nearly-naked Alanna was soon grasping the sword with both hands and, panting, clumsily dragging it through the air. She buckled many times under its weight and could hardly maintain a proper stance. When she lunged, her entire arm trembled with the effort of holding the sword alight, and Alanna soon heaved it to the floor.
She had not been completely honest with Gary. Many of her hours that week had been spent hefting the heavy object, not on embroidery, and her muscles were generally far too sore later in the day for the ordeals of dancing—and any such time was far better spent at the obsessive hours of secret practice, anyway.
Massaging her arms, Alanna allowed herself a moment of guilt over her lies. She hadn't, in truth, believed that Gary was interested in wedding her, but she was nonetheless shaken by his outright statement against it. Muttering bitterly against friendship, Alanna was on her feet again, pulling the sword into the air.
Several pages of the manuscript were memorized inside her head. She recalled the images as she shuffled into the various stances, attempting to keep her back straight and her head aloft, as was the dictated proper form.
If she had stopped to think about it, even Alanna herself would not have understood the internal change that had come over her. Somewhere, in the weeks of Gary's company, she'd let a part of herself go. Who was she now that she could yell so angrily over some small hurt—who was she that she could now feel hurt? And who was she who stole practice swords and wielded them in the memory of some forgotten dream?
But such things had not occurred to her yet, and she merely went through the motions of fencing. She was in the process of feigning a series of parries when the door opened unexpectedly, and her roommate entered.
Alanna and Meganne stared at each other for a long moment, Alanna frozen mid-parry and Meganne shocked still at the door, her hand still on the knob. Quickly, Meganne looked away as Alanna threw the sword under her bed and flung herself again onto the chaise.
"Well," Meganne said uncomfortably, blatantly attempting to ignore what had just occurred, "Lara and I are going to the market to have our gowns fixed. Nelly is preoccupied with the Earl of Urlien, that decrepit old man. So, we're taking you with us, Alanna."
"Why?" she asked leisurely as she tried to regain a measured breath. Meganne frowned.
"Get dressed. Because someone important is coming to Corus, and we're all going to have to look splendid for the ball. The whole palace is in upheaval with preparations—you might as well come with us, it will be chaos here with all the servants running about, and you won't be able to have any peace and quiet or do… anything." Meganne gave her a meaningful look.
Wincing at her aching back, Alanna nonetheless acknowledged the logical argument by kicking the rumpled gown up off the floor and attempting to drag it onto her body. "Who is coming? Foreign dignitaries?" she asked with some interest.
"Foreign, maybe," said Meganne, tugging at Alanna's skirt. "The mage who cured Prince Jonathan during the sweating sickness—powerful man, and their Majesties owe him a great deal."
"A mage?" Alanna froze, the familiar sickening feeling returning to her stomach. All the years in Convent, she'd felt the use of the Gift by the mages-in-training in the buildings nearby, the magic pulling at her veins. She was insomniac for years, until, ironically, the Daughters resorted to subduing her into unconsciousness with their charms.
"Oh, Alanna, he's a good man, and powerful. There's nothing to worry about, you silly girl, he won't cast a spell on you."
Shaking her head emphatically, Alanna pulled away from Meganne. "No, Meganne, I think that I'll stay here—"
"Don't be ridiculous! If you're so afraid of mages, then in the marketplace would be the place to be anyway, not here in the palace where they're going to be. If you want to hide somewhere, it wouldn't be in this room."
Thoroughly chastised by Meganne's reasonable tone, Alanna finished dressing swiftly and allowed herself to be led away.
----------------------------------
The streets were no less chaotic than the palace—indeed, they were probably more so. It seemed that all the people were having the same thoughts as Meganne and Lara did because thousands were nearly walking atop each other, crowding and pushing through the streets and the alleyways and packed into the plazas.
Somehow, Meganne had manage to wrangle a poor squire who was now carrying three of Meganne's gowns, two of Lara's, and one gray gown that belonged to Alanna.—Meganne had insisted she bring it.
"I don't have money for this," Alanna reminded Meganne, but she brushed it off.
"You can repay me after you've married some rich man like Sir Gareth. Now, I know that there is an excellent seamstress somewhere in this district…"
Alanna eyed the elegant weaponry of the guards as they passed by the Temple District. There were more guards posted about that usual, and an abnormal number of knights hurried throughout the city, as urgently as the ladies who carried gowns with them.
A hand pulled her into darkness. Blinking rapidly, Alanna was able to make out the din surroundings of a store. Several other ladies waited about, and one fat woman in an obscene shade of mauve was taking the dresses from their squire.
"The blue and lavender ones are to be taken down at the shoulders, as in the latest style, and the skirts are to be lengthened in the back with a bit of a train," Meganne was instructing. "And the copper one is to be embroidered about the waist in the image of little lilies and cut in eyelets along the hem and collar. The grey dress with the lace is to be tightened at the waist and lifted all about, with lace trim and chiffon sleeves. Lara, how do you want your pink gown to be altered?"
"Take out the bottom foot and place in a red color, like this-here's hair," Lara said, pulling away some of the loose tendrils that clung to Alanna's neck. "And gather it about, like the queen's gown was at the last ball."
"And the grey linen gown?" asked the woman, hefting it contemptuously. "What of that one?"
Meganne pulled Alanna forward. "See her eyes? A violet embroidery all along the bottom, and up the back. Open up the back of the gown, and lengthen it. Take away the sleeves—"
"Keep the sleeves," interjected Alanna.
"Take them away, I'm the one who's paying," continued Meganne.
"I am the one who is to wear it," answered Alanna stubbornly.
"I can get you a wrap later," she said, by way of mollification, "So, if you please, take away the sleeves, tighten the bodice, and add a stomacher—no bows, but embroidery along the edges, and along the waist as well."
"You're wasting your time," said the woman. "And your money. It won't make the gown look any better. You might as well get a new one."
"And a violet petticoat, too. Only one," replied Meganne, daring her to argue. The woman shrugged and carried the gown away.
"That will be thirty-five silver crowns, to be paid for on the day."
"How quickly can you have them finished?" Meganne asked anxiously.
"For an extra ten, the day before the ball," answered the woman.
"Excellent then," Meganne chirped, and the three of them were out into the streets once again. They were soon at the perfumery, where Meganne pressed her nose into several pungent scents.
"I won't stink like refuse," snapped Alanna, after Meganne and Lara had already selected a few concoctions for themselves and were attempting to coax her to brave an ominously ancient-looking bottle.
"It's from the Copper Isles, and it—"
"Is expensive," Alanna pointed out. "If you want, I have some rosewater already that I could bathe in."
Her two companions looked at each other and then pressed a small, nondescript green vial into her hand. "You don't want to smell cheap. This, I promise you, is worth your money," insisted Meganne.
"Who's even going to bother sniffing me?" cried Alanna. "And with all the women smelling so strongly of rubbage, it's not as if any man can discern my scent!"
"On the contrary," said Lara, "this will suit you. It is fresh, whimsical, light, and yet when you dance with a man, he will have one whiff and be utterly seduced."
Alanna was unconvinced, but again she found herself leaving the perfumery with an item she had not paid for nor wanted.
When they entered the jeweler's, Alanna waited uncomfortably away from the large baubles as Meganne and Lara held the gems against their skin. When asked if a gold medallion suited Lara's cleavage, Alanna's only response was a raised eyebrow.
"Oh, come now Alanna," bullied Lara, dragging her to the display. "You must find something that you like! You don't have any jewelry."
"Why do you suppose that is?" she answered dryly, glancing over the trinkets. A small piece of polished obsidian set on a silver chain glinted at her from the edge of the table. She lifted it off the cloth and fingered its smooth edges.
"Oh no," exclaimed Lara immediately. "You'd look like you're wearing a piece of coal about your neck!"
"How much?" Alanna asked, tracing the tiny etchings along the back. There was something within in the rock… something calming.
Ignoring Meganne's adamant protestations, Alanna purchased the rock for a copper penny, and the three left the stall, her companions considerably more drained monetarily than she.
Somewhere in the hustle of the streets, she felt curiously lighter on her right side and, when she reached into her pockets, realized that her purse was missing. When she stopped, she was knocked to the ground. A large, calloused hand appeared before her and helped her to her feet.
Alanna found herself gazing up at two friendly hazel eyes that leant an air of attractiveness to their owner, who was presently steadying her with concern.
"Careful in the big city, lass. You lost?" he asked, though his voice was far too jovial for the meaning of his words.
"No, I just stopped because I've been robbed," Alanna said, looking about for the thief. The man frowned, and then procured her purse from within his shirt. Her eyes widening, she quickly snatched the purse from him.
"You! You took my purse, and knocked me over, and here you are pretending to be such a good Samaritan!" Alanna hissed.
"Easy, lady. You should an eye more carefully on your things," he said. "And I didn't take your purse, you just dropped it."
"Oh, right!"
"I can tell you're not from hereabouts," he said, chuckling. "You're something else."
"And what of it?" she snapped.
"Well, if you ever need friends in Corus, George Cooper can be of help," he said sincerely.
"Friends?" Alanna barked. "That vile institution again. I'll have the guards on you, you pocketpicker!"
"Is that any way to treat someone willing to help you, lady?" he said, still complacently, opening his hands in a gesture of goodwill. "Maybe you're just too much of a noblewoman to have anything to do with us commoners." He studied her reaction for a moment. "Well, until next time then, Alanna."
Alanna gasped when he said her name, but the thief had disappeared inside the thronging masses.
AN: sorry for the delay in this chapter. School just started, and I am taking 5 AP classes. However, I shall be back on schedule and up to producing a chapter a week again. I can't wait until I reach the section in Chain Reaction where I actually wrote something of substance so that I can simply flesh out the chapters and alter them rather than having to completely rewrite them. I am also getting very tired of all this exposition, especially since the crux of my story is a character piece (my biggest flaw with the original, I think). Which is why I have taken to combining certain chapters and omitting other parts. But I will what I can do about getting up the next chapter ahead of time, to make up for the delay.