Sworn To Conflict: Courtlight #3
Page 18
She didn’t complain, though. Inga was worse off than she was, and rapidly losing blood, as well. They had to make it. Finally the frost giant stumbled. Ciardis was surprised Inga had made it this far. The blood was pouring down her arm, which hung straight down limply with torn flesh. The blue color of her skin had darkened until it was almost purple. And the damage to the rest of her body was just as extensive. Inga didn’t let that stop her, though. She got up as quickly as she had fallen, but Ciardis didn’t think that was a good sign.
“We’re almost there,” she told the swaying warrior.
“I know,” growled Inga.
They stumbled forward some more, but there wasn’t any hope of Inga getting any farther. She had endured too much damage and lost too much blood. In a panic, Ciardis contemplated running for the camp. But a running lurch would be as fast as she go. She also knew that it was at least a mile away and it felt like frostbite had already set in in her toes.
Still she stood up. She had to try. For Inga.
“I’m going,” she declared with chattering teeth. “I’m going for help.”
“You’ll never survive,” murmured Inga, in a daze. She was half-collapsed on her side in the snow.
“We don’t have a choice,” Ciardis said.
Inga didn’t respond. She was barely keeping her eyes from closing.
And then Ciardis felt her hand throb. At first she ignored it as an effect of the hypothermia. And then it itched and pulsed with power. She looked down at it in disbelief. “What now? You’re the cause of this, you know.”
Inga was too far gone to castigate her for talking to her hand.
The power in her right hand pulsed again, and then suddenly a bright flare of power rose from the hand and moved out to surround her and Inga. Ciardis stared at the golden shield that surrounded them and then through it. It had gone opaque. Like a fine golden mist had decided to settle in a half-circle around them. She blanched at what she saw on the other side. She didn’t know how they hadn’t seen it before.
It must have concealed its approach with its own power...or its stealth, she realized.
In either case she saw a chimera rapidly approaching them at a full-out run. And it didn’t look friendly.
“Inga!” Ciardis called out in warning. When she got no answer, she turned her head to the side while keeping her left eye firmly trained on the approaching predator. She lost her concentration when she noticed Inga lying flat on her back, unconscious and bleeding.
“No, no, no!” Ciardis shouted. “Wake up, Inga!”
Ciardis cursed a blue streak and jumped in front of her fallen friend’s body. If the beast was going to eat anybody, it was going through her first.
She still had her knife on her and not much else. She shook her hand in desperation. “If you’re going to do something, now would be the opportune time!”
Her hand didn’t pulse or twitch. She shook it in irritation. “Hello?”
She growled as she saw the golden shield disappear, as well. “What use are you, then?”
She watched the chimera gain ground on them. It was running as fast as the wind with mighty leaps and bounds: forty feet...thirty feet...ten feet.
Death was coming, and Ciardis Weathervane, as usual, was ill equipped to meet it.
But she was fortunate in one sense: She had the gods’ own luck on her side. Because the chimera coming forward didn’t pounce on her in a running leap. In fact, it slid to a stop in a spray of snow directly in front of her. With cat breath in her face, the urge to pee her pants became ever larger. Through massive amounts of internal will she fought the urge back. Besides, the pee would have just frozen down her legs.
She didn’t say anything or move, just stared into its large eyes as it breathed heavily. She waited for the fierce predator to strike. Ciardis knew there was not a thing she could do to dissuade it. It was unencumbered by any sort of adornments, except a small bag that hung in the hollow its throat, sharp teeth, and razor-like claws. Still, Ciardis had no doubt that the knife in her hand was useless. The thing could claw off her arm before she’d moved an inch. But she wasn’t going to run and she wouldn’t step aside. It would have to go through her first.
And then it spoke. “Ciardis, what happened?”
Ciardis opened her mouth in astonishment.
She said, “Maris?” in a voice filled with wonder.
Then she fainted into the snow.
*****
Maris stood over the two unconscious bodies in the snow, breathing hard. She had been on the hunt for days in the mountains. It was only luck that she had come down into the plains.
She stood up and reached for the collar at her throat. She crushed the contents of the bags and threw it to the side. The beacon inside would activate upon impact and the search party would come with healers and soldiers. She could only hope that they came soon enough.
Hours later, the search party descended and carted them off to camp, following Maris’s terse directions. The first thing Ciardis did when she woke the next day was ask after Inga. Informed that she was mending well, she told the hovering attendants to bring Prince Heir Sebastian quickly.
He came without delay, and as soon as he walked in she pulled him down to her side.
Taking a shuddering breath, she said, “What if I told you that I knew the real reasons we were in this war?”
He looked down at her in surprise. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“The Sarvinian mines,” she said flatly, holding on to his hand with a grip of death. She wanted to read his emotions, see the knowledge in his eyes. He couldn’t lie to her. Not this close, and not flesh-to-flesh.
“What are you talking about?”
Turning from her to a healer standing three cots over, he said firmly, “I think she’s still fighting the effects of the cold. Can you bring some pain medication for her wounds?”
Grimacing, Ciardis sat up, grabbed a fistful of Prince Sebastian’s cloak, and yanked him down to her level. “My brother lives.”
Ciardis’s statements were coming fast with no explanation. She knew they didn’t seem like the words of a lucid or a sane person. Looking at Sebastian’s expression, she knew he was beginning to doubt if she retained her sanity.
She frowned and amended, “At least he was alive a couple of days ago. With the explosion, I don’t know—”
“What explosion?” said Sebastian sharply as he tried to pry her fingers from the firm grip she had on the cloak at his throat.
“Doesn’t matter right now,” she hissed. “What matters is that the Sarvinians are hiding in the Sanctuary to get away from slavers and my brother—”
“Did you say the Sanctuary?” Sebastian exclaimed with a startled laugh. “That’s nothing but a legend.”
“I assure you, it’s very real,” Ciardis said grimly, “and General Barnaren knows about it. He hasn’t been able to get to it yet, but he’s searching for it.”
Prince Heir Sebastian looked at her, astonished.
“Don’t you remember the conversation we overheard? The escapees? They’re from the mines.”
“I don’t know, Ciardis,” he said hesitantly.
“I know how this sounds,” Ciardis pleaded. “Believe me, I know.” She remembered very well her own disbelief when hearing the same story from Caemon and Thanar.
“But the Daemoni were right—”
“The Daemoni?” said Sebastian slowly.
Ciardis narrowed her eyes not at Sebastian but at a disturbance in the folds of the door at the front of the tent.
Speak of the demon and the demon will come, she thought.
Through the entrance walked General Barnaren. He was at the opposite end of the huge healer’s tent, but approaching fast.
Turning to Sebastian, she pleaded, “You’re the one who said the general was hiding things from you.” A reasonable point.
“Yes,” Sebastian said warily.
“Then trust me,” Ciardis said. “I know he’s behind thi
s. And he can’t know I know, or where I’ve been.”
General Barnaren reached them and looked Ciardis over.
“Well, Miss Weathervane, you certainly have a flair for the dramatic,” he said. “I’ve sent my men searching high and low for you.”
Ciardis nodded. “So Prince Sebastian has told me.”
Sebastian nodded, his face guarded.
Sebastian said, “I was just about to ask Ciardis where she’s been.”
Ciardis thought, Oh no.
And then his voice changed. “It’s not often I kiss a woman and she disappears into thin air.”
She unclenched her jaw. Maybe he would play along.
The general cleared his throat uncomfortably. “Yes, Ciardis. Where have you been?”
“I don’t know,” she said weakly. “Inga and I disappeared and then we got lost in the snow.”
“For two days?” The general’s voice was skeptical.
Ciardis shrugged while wincing through the pain for maximum effect. “Inga was able to guide us away from the mountains until we finally spotted the camp in the distance.”
“They must have walked in circles,” Sebastian declared. “You saw the frost burns on Inga’s body, and they were both suffering from severe hypothermia.”
The general nodded. Score one for Sebastian.
“Will you be coming to the meeting, Prince Heir?” said the general.
“I need a minute more with Ciardis.”
“I’ll be outside.” The general walked out.
“I think he might have believed us,” Ciardis said with dry wit.
“Where have you been?” he said.
“I told you.”
“No, I mean you smell like coal. I only noticed because I’m leaning over you,” Sebastian said.
She just barely held back from pushing him away. “I do not smell like coal.”
“You’re covered in it,” he pointed out.
“I do not smell like coal,” she growled.
“All right, all right,” he said hastily. “You don’t smell like coal. Sheesh, women.”
Somewhat mollified, she said, “It came from the Sarvinian mines.”
He dropped her arm and took a step back to get a full look at her face.
“The ones a few hundred miles away?” he said flatly.
“Yes!” she said, exasperated with his doubt. “Crazier things have happened!”
He raised an eyebrow. “The meeting with the Land Wight,” she said pointedly.
“That was in the Aether Realm. The mines aren’t.”
“So?”
“It’s a different plane of existence that can be accessed from anywhere. The Sarvinian mines are across the border and a tough trek across a few dozen mountain peaks. And as far as I’m aware, teleportation outside of the portalway is impossible. Unless you flew there.”
A guilty expression crossed Ciardis’s face. “You flew there?” he exclaimed.
“Of course not,” she snapped, “but...well, there was a portalway, and I have teleported.”
He rubbed his face with a tired hand and held out his other to help her up. “Come on.”
She took it unquestioningly. Once standing, she asked, “Where to?”
“There’s a lot we need to talk about and something you need to see,” he said dryly. “In addition, I have an impatient commanding general waiting.”
She pressed her mouth into an irritated line but followed him outside where the general waited.
“General Barnaren,” said Prince Heir Sebastian, “Ciardis and I need to talk. I’ll join you for a strategy session at a later time.”
“Talk?” said the general without expression. Ciardis saw the flatness of his eyes for the first time. She didn’t know what she had found so desirable about him. Particularly as a potential Patron.
“Yes,” said Sebastian, putting a firm hint in the word. A hint that the unmoving general didn’t get.
Out of nowhere Kane appeared and clasped Sebastian’s shoulder. Turning to the general, he said, “‘Talk?’ You know, General, they’ve been apart for too long. After that first kiss and all.” The emphasis on the last sentence could not be mistaken.
Ciardis was wondering what happened to the stoic and reserved Kane she’d met earlier in the week. But Barnaren didn’t question it after pausing for a minute.
“Very well, Your Imperial Highness. I’ll notify your guards to join you here.”
Sebastian nodded.
When Barnaren left, Sebastian and Ciardis turned to Kane in surprise.
“What was that?” she blurted out.
Kane turned his normally sharp gaze on her. “Inga told me what happened. What you saw. She sent me to warn you to not tell anyone else, but obviously the cat is out of the bag with the Prince Heir.”
“Obviously?” said Ciardis.
Kane shrugged uncomfortably as he mumbled, “Figured with the way you two got along during the meeting with the Old Ones it would be a moot point...” He trailed off seeing Ciardis’s indignant face.
“So I can’t keep a secret—is that what you’re saying?” she snapped.
“No, what I meant was now that you’re sleeping together—”
“We’re lovers now?”
“That’s so not how this conversation is supposed to go. It’s just that companions—”
Sebastian was bent over double at this point, laughing his head off. He managed to straighten briefly enough to say, with tears pouring down his cheeks, “I’d stop right there. You’re never going to dig yourself out of this hole.”
Ciardis had long ago pulled her hand from Sebastian’s hold and stood with both fists balled angrily at her waist, eyeing Kane and Sebastian for good measure.
“Right,” said Kane, easing away. “I’ll catch up with the two of you later.”
“We’re not through yet!”
He was already ten feet away and gaining speed.
Sebastian kept laughing.
Chapter 19
Ciardis stood with her arms crossed and her outraged gaze on Sebastian.
He finally straightened up and held up his hands in surrender. “Don’t be mad at me. I didn’t say it.”
She wasn’t appeased.
He shook his head in amusement and explained, “That’s the most I’ve laughed in months.”
“I’m glad you’re amused,” she said huffily, “It’s my reputation on the line.”
His face turned serious as he took a step forward. “I know that, and I would never let anyone disparage it. Even if you are slightly crazy—”
She huffed, “I am not crazy. I just know when to call a spade a spade and when to believe what I see. If I didn’t we would all be dead many times over and—”
He put a finger to her lips to silence her.
“For once, Ciardis, can I have the last word?”
She glared at him. “No. Not if I have something to say that’s important. I don’t care—”
He cut her off again, but this time she really didn’t care. Sebastian moved forward to press his lips against hers. She felt that flip of her stomach and the world around them disappear, just as it had when they first kissed in the chasm. A pleasant feeling filled her and she leaned in to his touch. When he broke off the kiss, he pulled back with a pleased smile.
“I promise,” he said quietly.
“Promise what?” she said, leaning back from his face and unlacing her hands from around his neck to place them on his shoulders.
“I’m on your side. Always. Through hell I’ll be there.”
“Even when you don’t show it?” Doubt laced her voice and her body was stiff with tenseness. Ciardis was thinking about all the trouble she had encountered at court, the lies she had faced from enemies, and the torture from friends.
“Always,” he said firmly.
She sighed and said, “So what’s next?”
He frowned and his eyes darted away. “I need to show you something.”
“What?”
“I don’t remember much about that,” she admitted.
“But do you remember what you saw?”
She turned to him as they began to walk toward the temporary stables. “Yes.”
“And what was that?”
She frowned and turned away. Anything to keep her mind off the memories of her first night in the North for just a few more seconds. Ciardis turned toward the stable boy, who was leading over a roan mare, well tacked and strong. With relief Ciardis noted that the mare had a smaller back and was more spirited than the one she had ridden before. Hopefully this one would give her a smoother ride than the last bumpy one she'd had on the mare that had been one step away from death.
Once they were mounted up with Sebastian’s personal guard ringed around them, she looked over at her prince. He has truly grown into a man, Ciardis realized as she watched the wind tousle his hair.
He turned to her after thanking his groom. “Ready?”
She nodded and they were off.
When they’d ridden for a few minutes, side-by-side, she answered him. “A deep and wide canyon in the ground. At its base thousands of kith soldiers walked. Gray of skin, broad of shoulder, and like no other kith I’ve ever seen.”
“I saw the same thing. It’s why I asked. If we both saw those foreign troops and the Sarvinians say they aren’t theirs, then either the general or the Sarvinians are lying. They can’t both be right.”
“Or we have a bigger problem than we thought,” Ciardis muttered to herself.
“What?” said Sebastian.
“Nothing,” she said hastily. “Where does that canyon lead?”
He said, “It opens at the Gates of Ban.”
She turned to him. “The gates of what?”
“It’s the name for the wall and gates erected by the builder Ban centuries ago. They are hundreds of feet tall and resist all the elements. It and the mountains are the only things that separate Sarvinia from Algardis.”
“And the canyon?”
“The only large thoroughfare between the two nations. Otherwise that army, would have to travel through the small goat paths of the Northern Mountains. An impossible feat.”