A/N I'm truly deeply sorry that it took me so long to update. Really I am. But you really should thank me. For the last two weeks or so, everything I've written has been utter crap. Really... it was terrible. I myself couldn't even read it. It was soooooo bad. So... I took some time off and didn't write anything until I was bursting out of my skull with ideas and tada! A new chapter! And it's a good one. lol. Thanks to...

steph: Thank you

Sammey: Thank you!

Zerrin: You'll just have to read to find out. lol.

demented-dreamer: Once more I'm so so so sorry! But I'm glad you thought the last chapter was amazing. Hope you like this one also.

cloverluck11: Sorry. So sorry it took so long.

Randomisation: I'm glad you like it.

cylobaby: Lee does seem kinda evil, but I'll get into that later.

...: I don't know... lol. Maybe she will... maybe she won't.

Chapter Eighteen:

Ciem snuck into the palace near to midnight like a thief after a guarded treasure. Or an assassin after its target. He was confident that only his intended would know that he was there. After all, he had been taught by the best. As soon as he slipped into his parent's room his breathing settled to match that of his fathers. He had practiced this so many times with his mother, against his own father. The father that had a daughter from a different woman.

The anger rushed into him at the dark thought and he welcomed it. He had hidden it for so long from Torianna. She had always been so pale, so fragile, that he had been afraid the sight of his anger would have frightened her, break her. Which was silly, because obviously she was an amazingly strong woman. He had seen evidence of that several times.

But near the end of the journey, her face had been so pale, so thin… he had feared she was sick. But she hadn't faltered once during their long walks in between towns. And often he had called the breaks because he had suspicions that she would walk herself to death. Now that she was gone though, he needn't worry about her, so he let the anger spring forth.

Part of his anger was the fact that she was gone. They had shared a room, as they had every night for the past two weeks that they had traveled. Yet somehow, with all his training and light sleeping habits, she had snuck out of the room without him waking. The only other person who had managed that was his wife, and she had done it because she had been saving him from harm. What was Tori saving him from? Or herself from? She had left a letter to him, at least.

You can find your way to the capital from here. Your Highness.

-T

He pictured the scrap of dirty paper in his mind and nearly laughed. It hadn't been a letter, it had been a scribble on a scarp of paper. There was something not quite right about that girl, despite the whole "magical blood" thing. Something was definitely going on with her. No matter what way he looked at it, she was hiding something very important from him. Such as the reason she carried a sword and knew how to use it.

But that didn't matter now. What mattered was the fact that she had her father's face and he was going to find out why. Ciem stalked to his father's side of the bed, silent as a ghost and used his magic to lift up his father from the bed and carry him from the room.

Once safely into the hallway and several feet out his mother's hearing range, he ended the spell and allowed his cheating father to slam into the ground. Ciem took satisfaction in the fact that it hurt. He knew that it did. Burdock came back up spitting and mad as hell, his fists raised for a fight. Ciem would gladly have given him the fight he wanted he was so furious, but when Burdock saw his son, he dropped his stance and smiled, relief apparent on his face.

"I don't believe it. That girl really did it. She brought you back. You aren't harmed, are you?" he asked, gazing at him with loving eyes, a concerned frown on his face. A frown that Ciem had seen so many times on Tori's. The rage nearly consumed him and he needed an outlet.

"You bastard," he growled in a guttural tone even as his hands bunched into fists. He wanted so very badly to slam them into his beloved father's face, the face that was Tori's, but he had been taught justice. He would give his father a chance to explain, but he wouldn't hide his fury or disgust. "Who is she?"

"The girl? I don't know. I thought you could tell me that," he was still frowning and Ciem could see her face, so clearly in his mind. The pain stabbed his heart so suddenly that he nearly drowned in it.

When Ciem had been traveling here, so many different scenarios had played through his mind, different ways that he had confronted his father, different answers to his questions. He had seen his father begging for forgiveness at his feet, or laughing viciously in his face. He had seen him denying it or confessing with pitiful tears.

But never, ever, had he seen himself unable to condemn his father for the sins that were so evident to him.

"How could you do it?" Ciem whispered, his voice chocked with the emotions. He could see his father, embracing a woman, holding her close like he had seen his parents do countless times before, the love clear on both their faces. Only the woman who he held was someone else, someone without a face. Someone who had made his father no better then a common adulterer. How could his father look at his mother with such love then conceive a child with another woman?

"Do what? Ciem? What is it?" he reached out to touch Ciem's shoulder, but Ciem jerked back as if his father's touch would be poison. He stared at his father, his eyes wide and bewildered, hurt. Before he allowed his father to see the hurt, he turned away and began pacing furiously, his fingers delving through his hair, pulling at it, making it wild.

"You can't tell me you didn't notice. That girl, Torianna. She has your face!" he shouted the last part. "Who was it? Hmm? Who did you sleep with? Was she Tortallan? Or Seridian like Mother? Who? Who could be so desirable that you could betray my mother, betray your love for her?"

"I… I don't know what you're talking about. Ciem…" he watched his son pace back and forth, back and forth, his fury evident in the length and speed of his stride. Burdock's breath rushed from him as if he had been punched in the stomach when he saw the look in his son's face. Hurt and betrayal. Emotions so fierce he felt pain at the thought that his son could believe things of him to cause these emotions. "What… what do you think I did?"

"Don't tell me you didn't notice? Brown hair, green eyes, the little line between your brows when you frown. She even walks like you do, with her shoulders back slightly, her chin up, even if her eyes remain downcast. She's a mirror image of you Father. And I want to know who the mother is," Ciem shouted the last as he stopped his pacing to look at his father. Who's face had gone pale. Deathly pale. If Burdock's hands hadn't been hidden in pockets he was certain he would see them shaking.

"How… how old?" Burdock chocked off a whisper from a throat clogged with hope and pain. A hope that he had thought had been squashed so long before. All that searching, all that disappointment. Could it be true? Could she be? He forced the thoughts away and concentrated on what his son said.

"Eighteen, maybe nineteen. But I'm guessing because we didn't speak much," Ciem looked at his father quizzically when he made a strange noise in his throat. There were emotions in his father's eyes that he had never seen before. But he was certain there were emotions in his own that were new also.

"Where… where is she now?" he asked, his green eyes searching the corridor. He had to see her, had to see for himself. He could conjure the memory of her in his mind, so sweet, so innocent, so… him. But he didn't trust the memory now that he knew there was a chance that he was her daughter. His hope would twist her features, make her different then she truly was. He had to see her again, before this bittersweet hope died or killed him.

"She left this morning. I assume she had other business to return to. Now… who is the mother?" Ciem demanded. He nearly growled in frustration when Burdock broke down and cursed. His voice was rough when he prayed to one of the Gods. The Gods of fortune.

"Oh Ciem… Oh my sweet sweet son. You have no idea what you have done." He began to laugh as he headed back down the hall to his room. He didn't need to see the girl's face again. His son's convection of him was enough. His son believed she was his daughter and that was good enough for him.

"Novellee!" he shouted, over and over so excited he could chock, running down the hall and kicking the door in with his foot he. "Novellee! Wake up! Wake up!"

She grumbled and sat up, her face tangled around her hair and gave him a deceptively sweet smile even as her eyes flashed daggers. If there was one thing she hated more then anything, it was being disturbed from her sleep. "What?"

"I found her! I found our baby girl!"

Derek turned once more in the bed that had become over heated with his angry body energy. He was now facing Torick's bed and he supposed that was the problem. He hadn't gotten a good night sleep in two weeks. The two weeks since Torick was gone. And it was frighteningly clear to him now, why he couldn't sleep.

Torick was gone.

He had vanished. Derek had given him a few days off, one or two at the most, and Torick had taken the days and run. But Derek refused to believe he was a deserter. No, there was something more to this. All of Torick's things had been found, including his horse Wildfire, with the Own things. There was no reason for Torick to leave all his things behind if he was never coming back. No reason to leave him.

But then again, his boy didn't exactly have the same feelings towards him. Derek might think of Torick as a brother, but that didn't mean that Torick saw him as such. For all he knew, Torick hated him and only put up a show so that Derek didn't kick him out. But that didn't seem like something that he would do. Not that Torick did anything normal. Torick was well, different. Derek frowned as he thought back on the boy. So many things didn't add up with him. For one, the hair that he had seen, sticking out over his ear. It had been dark, and long. Nearly to his chin. Even if a he was concealing hair, why would it be that long? What was the purpose of having hair that long? And the time when Derek had broken his leg in the river. He had dosed fitfully and had dreamed, dreamed that a woman was taking care of him, but when he woke, there was only Torick.

And when he slept, and had nightmares, he sometimes spoke, in a voice that was not right. In his dreams, Torick's voice was dark, husky, feminine. If he hadn't known that Torick was a man, he would have been attracted to that voice.

But that's just it, he thought, finally coming to a revelation. He wasn't at all certain that Torick was a man. There were just so many things that didn't add up with that kid.

Derek turned over once more before deciding he would never get any sleep. It was best if he went for a walk, around the halls, through the barracks, maybe even in the stables. It didn't matter. He just needed to walk. Maybe that would make him tired, maybe then he would be able to sleep. But he knew that it wasn't a fact that he wasn't tired that kept him awake because in truth, he was tired. It was his thoughts.

His troubling thoughts that maybe…. just maybe…. Torick wasn't really who he said he was. Wasn't the man he said he was.

With a frustrated sigh he pushed to his feet and into breeches and headed out into the open hallway.

It was as he was walking a deserted hall that he saw a slight figure, one that he was certain he recognized, one that he had wanted to see for many a night, slide into a brightly lit closet.

Tori, her heart pounding, fingers shaking with anxiety and fatigue, quietly closed herself into the closet. First things first, she thought and grabbed the wig from her pack. She had been glad to see that her things had been left untouched. The money that she had left on the top of the stack had been all there. If any one had gone digging through her things, surely they would have taken the money or shifted it in the least. Since it was still in the same spot, she could rest assured that no one has seen her wig or the corset.

With deft movements, she twisted her hair up into a bun on top of her hair and slapped the blond wig onto her head. She took the pins from her mouth and began shoving them into place.

She thought back on the day's events and nearly sighed with relief. It had been hard, very, very hard for her to escape Ciem. But she had outsmarted him. The night before, she had left her home rock in the stable, up in the hayloft under a huge stack of hay. After leaving him the scrap of paper, telling him to get a move on, she had used her field rock to get into the loft. Then it had simply been a matter of climbing out of the loft and heading out.

Tori had blessed her luck when she had found one of the stable boy's extra clothes and she had changed into them. It wasn't good for a woman to be seen walking around the Own buildings. So, using her cloak as cover, she had hidden her hair under the hood and her figure by wrapping the loose ends around her body and allowed the breeches on her legs to show others that she was indeed a young man.

Then she had diddled away hours in the city, waiting for night and the others to sleep so she could sneak back in and change into Torick. She would change and then sneak into the barracks, get into her bed and in the morning, simply explain to them the lie that she had been working on for the past two weeks. She had had a lot of time to work it out while Ciem had tittered on about God's knew what. Her lie was nearly perfect.

She had taken the two days off with the intention of sitting alone on the sands and working through her grief by herself, of course. But then, unexpectedly, her parents had showed up and taken her with them back to their estate to be with the family for the anniversary of her brother's death. It was a story easily believed and she had run through the scenario over and over until she knew it as if it had actually happened. If any chose to ask her repeated questions to catch her in a lie, that would be impossible. She knew her story far to well.

Once her wig was in place, she reached to grab her corset from the bag, dropping her cloak to the floor, revealing her petite figure. But as her hand stretched out to dig into the bag, she felt a tickle in her nose. She sucked in her breath and closed her eyes and gave a dainty little sneeze, one loud enough that the man standing outside the door heard and hesitated.

I had better not be getting sick, she thought as she lifted her shirt up and slipped the corset on. With practiced moves, she pulled the strings tight, tied them and paused to sneeze again. The door opened with a slight creak seconds before she allowed the shirt to drop down into place.

Tori lifted her eyes to the man's face and was horrified to see that it was Derek. Of all the people to see that, it had to be him.

"You're… you're…" he stared at her as all the pieces fell into place. Everything made so much sense to him now. How could he have missed that? It was so obvious to him, so bloody obvious. He almost called him… her… on it. But he could also see the terror in her eyes, see that she still didn't trust him, see that she still needed this disguise. And a part of him still deeply loved the boy that she had been. That love for the boy he had thought was a brother to him was transforming into a love for the woman who could be a sister to him. And he wanted to help her. And in order for Derek to be able to help her, she had to trust him.

"I can explain!" she nearly shouted, scrambling to reach him, to get him to focus on her face and not her body.

"… You're back," he said and smiled. He wouldn't call her on the lies, now that he knew what they were. He would let Tori come to him. It would strengthen the relationship and bring them closer. And that's what he wanted. To help her and be closer to her. He saw her relax and nod and try to give him a smile, that funny little tugged lip-corner smile and nearly sighed.

"Yes… and I can explain why I was gone so long," she nodded, grabbed her pack and motioned for him to lead the way out. She would feed him the fake story and hope that he hadn't noticed the corset. Her plans were so close to being complete, so close.

Only a little more time, she thought, and Robert would be able to rest in peace.

Zahib hissed as the master threw yet another plate against the wall, smiling when it made a pleasing crash. Really, this was becoming quite ridiculous, he thought, scrunching his face up as the master's shouted words reached his ears. He was quite tired of all of this. It was pathetic. The master was using his own lack of power to rage and rant. That would be over soon.

With a careless gesture, he dismissed the Bower's from the room. They followed his command without a thought, as easily as they would take a command from the master. Maybe they obeyed him so well because he was the Second, or maybe they did it because they could already feel the shift in power, feel through the connection that the Master was being overtaken. Whatever the reason, they left him alone with the master.

"Master," Zahib called as he rose to his feet, glaring. Already, he defied laws that had never, in the history of Bower's, ever been defied for fear of death. No one stood without permission. And no one glared. Really, how could no one have noticed before, the insolent looks that had become more of a habit then an emotion? But he'd like to see the master try and thwart him now. Now that he had so much power. "I do believe it's time we had a little chat."

"Not now Second. I'm angry. I wish to throw more things. How can that vile witch still escape me?" the master gave a nonchalant wave of his hand and reached for another plate. With an evil laugh, Zahib waved his hand, spoke a single word and had the pleasure of watching the plates scatter from the table and fall to the floor, the broken shards spiraling out in an intricate pattern.

"I don't believe that you will be throwing plates, for a very long time, Terry," he stood and slowly stalked to the man that had sat too long on a throne that he was no longer worthy of.

"How dare you take that tone with me Second! And you know that you shall address me as Master and only Master. I should have your head for that. Freknal!" he shouted, lifting up his hands and making a quick slicing motion where his hands passed over each other in the air. Zahib felt a slight tickle in his throat and laughed.

The hand motions were completely useless and had no meaning other then looking impressive. And that it failed miserably. Probably to lowly Bowers it looked amazing. But to Zahib who knew the truth, it was pathetic and pitiful.

He laughed once more as his hand grasped the hilt of the knife, not the same that had killed the witch's companion. She had kept that, and he liked to think that it was a token of himself for her to remember him by. And to find him by once more.

"Why… why didn't that work?" the master stuttered as the knife hissed, a sound that made the Zahib smile. He looked at the blade as it glinted in the light and then smiled, a strange, evil smile at the master.

"Haven't you figured it out yet, Terry? It's over. I'm Master now," he smiled again and used the glittering knife to slash through Terry's throat. As the man fell to the ground, Zahib kicked him in the shoulder, sending him falling backwards, sprawling on his back. Zahib knelt, his knee to the dieing man's throat, regardless of the blood that seeped into his clothes, and wrenched the man's mouth open. Using the glittering knife once more, he severed the man's tongue.

"Freecia!" he hissed and the tongue burst into the flame, reducing to ashes that Zahib blew into the man's face, as his last breath clogged in the bloody throat and he died.

"I'm Master now," Zahib hissed once more, his eyes glowing darkly, insanely. Then he laughed and sat himself down on the coveted thrown.

A/N Well there you go. Tell me if I cured my case of the bad writing. lol. Review me!

Nubia