Goddess of the Moon (Young Ancients: Tiera)

by P. S. Power

  "Move silently. We need to practice that all the time now." The order, and it was one of those, came from a familiar voice. Baron Havar. Then things got a lot quieter. She could still hear people walking, coming down the ramp and moving out with their gear onto the smoothed paving stones. It really wasn't loud however. She had better hearing than most people and nearly lost them, with only the occasional rubbing sound or misplaced footfall letting her know it was more than one person. Havar was the noisy one too. He was, no doubt, simply too big to really vanish that way.

  Someone took the craft down, and she could hear it being put away the same way her own was. That indicated something to her, in that whoever had done it was little. Not just small, but under five feet tall. Or at least hunched over. That could be Gerent, she thought, but the scent was wrong. Everyone here smelled of apples to her, since a lot of people had been eating those as their primary source of fruit for a while. Gerent had a more varied diet though, being a gardener. Even in early spring he'd kept plants going all the time.

  She didn't know the plan, but everyone just stood there, waiting for something. Nothing happened for a few minutes, and she risked casting her mind out, to see if she could figure out the plan. Havar was just going to wait there, until someone came. Kolb was just going to let them wait, to build up patience, and the kids were wondering what the heck was going on.

  Rolling her eyes she grinned, not dropping her trance that much really. She had to a bit, in order to be able to speak however.

  "Come this way. Don't make any noise. We'll go inside for a moment, then move out into the woods for the night." Because it was pretty clear that no one else had a real plan yet. Not even as to where the kids would stay. True, they could have separate comfy beds in the Timon Craft, but that was hardly an adventure, was it? She didn't know what these kids had been trained for, but she'd always liked camping out as a child, well enough at least.

  No one called her on it anyway, or told her to stop interfering, so she walked toward her own room. It wasn't a big space, and her roommate might be in there, or not, but that didn't matter too much, did it? They just needed a place to discuss things and she needed a few moments to make certain she had an actual idea ready for them all.

  Not thinking about it, and not even considering for the moment that with the lights off in most places there would be one on in the room, she pulled the door open and started to usher everyone inside.

  It wasn't hard, since the kids moved quickly, and filled the space without hesitation, with Havar coming in right before Kolb. It was, most likely, a bit embarrassing for Karen, who was an Instructor at the school, and Sam Builder, who was a student there, since they were busily cuddling on the bed. They had their clothing on though, and no one as much as snickered at them for it. A few of the kids went wide eyed, including, she realized, Terry, her younger brother. Her second heir too. She didn't question what he'd been doing there, since it became obvious to her what he'd been up to. Piloting.

  "Sam, Karen... Good." She had no plan, but spoke anyway, as if it just made sense that she'd be in charge. Havar stared at her, but didn't speak at all. No one else did. No one except Sam even breathed too loud. Karen swallowed, because she looked like someone had just jumped into the bath with her, but the rest were using good noise discipline. Including Terry. That probably meant he was with the new group, didn't it? There were ten short people and Havar, like she'd been told, which meant a lot, didn't it?

  She didn't mention it.

  "We're going on a night operation. This is unknown territory for some of you, so you'll want to get with one of the tall people as a guide. We're moving off into the woods for the night. No light, and no sound. Hide, and don't let anyone see you. People will be around to try and find us, so be ready for that. In the morning, at first light, everyone will meet up in the weapons square. Do that without being seen if you can. Do you all understand the mission?" She whispered the words, as if it were a secret, but no one asked any questions. She waved at two of the kids. One of them was her brother.

  "Terry, you and your buddy will be with Sam. He's a full builder and a good one, so use that, if you can. No real skill at hiding or combat, so a burden that way. It's up to you two to guard him and keep him safe. He knows the area however, so use that too." She glanced at the two small girls in the group, and nodded at them, deciding that a tiny bit of propriety might be in order. Not a whole lot, but they couldn't have been older than nine or ten at the most, so no one would bother them about it really.

  "You two are with Karen. She's a Knight and has been in real combat before. Follow her lead." Shifting she selected two others and pointed at Havar, and did the same with the remaining four, leaving her with two very different looking small boys. They were both tiny and probably the youngest in the bunch by a year or two. Otherwise they looked pretty similar, having black hair and slightly Vagish features. A lot of people from Austra did.

  "My team and I will go and set up the searchers. The rest of you have an hour to get in place and get anything you can come up with together. We have shields and so will the searchers, so if cornered, fight. Attempt to escape and not be captured before morning. If taken, it's your job to try and get free and hide again. It everyone clear on that?"

  She looked around and only Sam looked baffled. She smiled at him, attempting to make it a little flirtatious, but he gave her a little glare back.

  "I have a build tomorrow..."

  She nodded. "All right. I want you to try doing that while Terry and..." She looked at the other boy, who was a light blond.

  Terry filled in the name, staring at her more than a little too. "Gary."

  "Terry and Gary will be responsible for you then. I expect you to have something for us when we meet in the weapons area." It was being all kinds of high handed, but other than the highly disgruntled look he gave her, he didn't speak again.

  Probably because of her being so tall now, she understood. He nearly had to do what she said, given that. It nearly made her pull that bit back, but she didn't, because Kolb nodded at the man.

  "I've heard of Tor doing things like that, so we need people that can do that on our side too. Good thinking. Tiera, I want a fresh build from you too. We have nine hours. Less after you get the searchers in place."

  That got several new stares as well, mainly from Sam, who didn't know she could build anything, and Havar, who actually blinked a few times.

  "Tiera?"

  She got it then. He hadn't recognized her at all. The jerk. Well, she did look a bit different, being taller like she was. He was also a bit blind to short people, she was willing to bet. Even the ones he liked. That left her feeling slightly upset and bitter for about half a moment, but she let it go. He really didn't have the ability to control that part of himself. Not on his own.

  "Argh." She said the word with no particular inflection, but the meaning passed along well enough, and some of the kids smiled at her. Most seemed a bit sad, but then they would, wouldn't they? "Let's move out then. Sam and I have builds, meaning our buddies have to watch out for us more. One hour."

  Possibly more, if she couldn't find anyone willing to search for them all night. Ideally she'd get people from the fighters section... Or, if she wanted to really be ideal, Tiera would get full working groups. Six fighters and a builder in each.

  That was a decent plan, so she sighed and moved to her gear, since she had an unlocked trunk at the foot of her bed, with some amulets in it, as well as some blank bits of focus stone, a few of which she handed off to Sam for his project, not really knowing what would be needed.

  Kolb looked in, over her shoulder, but didn't comment on the fifty weapons that were stacked off to the side. It was tempting to hand them out to the kids, but she didn't know if they could handle them without practice. It really did take a bit of focus to make them work right.

  "Buddies, with me, please." She smiled at her two, who gave her blank looks back, and shouldered their packs, which looked to be enough
for the night. Hopefully they had food too, or at least they could liberate something on the way into the woods. She was starving.

  The boys moved with her, and she didn't wait, touching each on the shoulder and pulling them gently toward the headmaster's offices. He lived in a set of rooms behind where he worked, so that he could always be found. It was very efficient, but didn't leave him with much of a life, she didn't think. He lived alone, and didn't have any family at all, for instance. If he had any vices of note, she'd never heard of it at all. No one claimed that he made them have sex with him, or dress up as a maid and clean his rooms or anything, even. That last one was probably even fair. Well, the cleaning at least. The costume might be too much, if he was getting noble students to do it.

  Her two kids followed along silently, their feet not making much sound at all on the hard stone, since they had soft shoes on. She checked, but her assumption that they all had shields was correct. New ones too. The good kind that had flight fields in them, Tor-shoes, and could clean and make air. That gave her an idea as to where to hide for the night too. She'd never tried it out, herself, but she was willing to bet it would work.

  When she got to the Headmaster's place she moved around to the side door and tapped gently. Just three times. It took doing it twice before the man noticed, and as soon as he opened the door, she put a single finger to her lips and waited for him to wave them all in.

  Servants or not, the interior was very tidy. Dark too.

  When the door closed he turned on a magical light however, which was still a sign of wealth and power. Most couldn't get anything like that, unless they knew the right people. Kyle Hardgrove did though, didn't he? Tor, and the Lairdgren Group came to mind. Their army of super builders, trained by her brother.

  The man bowed to her gently, as if they were equals, even though this was his place and he was in charge of her there, and then did the same with the kids. It was both cute and probably about correct, since they were the guests.

  Tiera smiled. She tried not to look blank about it either, meditating or not at the moment.

  "We have guests in. A special military crew." She gestured at the two with her. "Of short people. They're hiding in and around the school grounds. The rules said that they should be in the woods for the night, but if they don't all break that instantly, they deserve to be caught. We need searchers to try and find them, in an hour. I was thinking a couple of the combat groups? Only people with shields, since they have orders to fight in order to prevent capture. That, and escape if they can, if taken."

  She didn't have to say anything else, since the man bowed again.

  "I think I understand. One hour then, Countess Baker. Are you on the side of the searchers?"

  "Nope. Sam Builder and I have been assigned projects for the night, while our buddies keep us safe. We get about nine hours to come up with a full build. I don't even have anything planned."

  Her building at all was so new that the man looked at her skeptically for a moment, but she realized it wasn't that at all.

  "Then go. No spying on me to see what my plans are." He made hand motions at them to get them to clear out and everything.

  Tiera had a sneaking suspicion that he was about to change the rules of the exercise, a lot. Not that she blamed him at all. Military commanders did that. The good ones at least. You had to outthink your enemy and not be afraid to break a few rules, if you wanted your side to win.

  She jogged off, heading toward the woods, but patted her new friends after a bit and moved close to them, her words soft.

  "We're going straight to the weapons area. Use your shields so that you have air. We'll hide in the little pond there. Under the water. Can you do that?" She realized that they might be terrified of water now, what with giant waves having nearly killed their entire world and all that. The two kids just whispered back at her.

  "Yes, ma'am. We can do that. Baron Havar has us swim every few days."

  She smiled, but didn't say anything else. They got the idea. They'd go and sit in the pond all night and she could do her work. That was a different problem, since she wasn't a fast worker really. Not yet. Her one real build had taken nearly three days for instance. It was nicely complex, true, but nine hours wasn't a lot of time to do more than make some copies.

  Still, some builds weren't a lot more than a variation on someone else's work, were they? She could do that and it would count, she was willing to bet. What she needed to do then was something simple enough to manage in the time allotted.

  Tiera had no clue what that should be however. She knew that some things were needed, like a new communications network that Tor couldn't tap into instantly, but she probably couldn't do that at all, much less in a few hours.

  She and her new friends moved to the practice area, then, with their shields on to keep them warm and dry, sank themselves under the water. They were close to her, she knew, since both of them had an arm over her, she noticed. Then they held her down, gently, even though she wouldn't float anymore. Except that she would, she realized, since there was a lot of air trapped around her. For some reason she'd thought it was a tiny amount, but the bubble was a good two and a half feet from her body, around everything but her hands. That meant the kids were pushing down on her shield, so she could work without flying a bit toward the bottom constantly. It was really clever, and meant they understood a lot more than she would have guessed.

  She couldn't talk to her friends though, since the sound would carry through the water, and possibly be heard above them. In space you couldn't talk at all, since there was vacuum between people all the time. That gave her an idea for her build at least. It wasn't actually that simple of a project either, but she thought she could do it. Maybe.

  She held a little tile in her hand and let her mind go very deep, with her eyes closed. It was simple enough, really, once she had the right pattern in mind. Then she simply had to hold it until it took. There was no sigil on the tile. Not yet. She couldn't make them glow like Tor did, either. The others could be etched though, if it worked.

  Just as morning broke, she finished the project and managed to make some copies of the thing, which would be needed to demonstrate that it worked. If it did. She was hopeful, because it really was a good idea.

  Speaking, she started to try and sit up, the boys still managing to keep her in place, helpfully.

  "I think it's time to get up. Did you get any sleep?" She made that sound cheery enough that she got a response, from one of them.

  She couldn't tell which.

  "Yes, thank you. Should we wait longer? I don't want to get there too early, and lose."

  She thought about it, but the sun looked pretty bright already. It didn't feel right though, so she waited herself, and checked trying to find the right fields.

  Then, after a few minutes she spoke softly.

  "Good call. That's a magic light, not the sun. Cheaters." Tiera didn't really mean it though. That was totally within the rules. Luckily no one noticed that they were hiding and a second bright light, the real sun, came up about an hour and a half later, they did wait for it to be all the way up though.

  When she spoke, whispering to her people still, she said something that sounded overly cautious to her as well, but felt right, if that made any sense at all.

  "Fly straight up, to about a thousand feet, spread out a little in case this is a trap. I know that it shouldn't be, but... Well, it's what I would have done."

  One of the little boys, the one that seemed to do all the talking, spoke gently.

  "On three, then?" His accent was a little thick and clipped, but perfectly understandable to her. "One, two..."

  When the last word came they darted up, only to find themselves pursued by a half dozen people almost instantly.

  Tiera chuckled.

  Then she simply flew away.

  Chapter two

  Her two buddies weren't brilliant flyers, but she did pretty well, having spent years doing it, and even working with people o
n how to fight that way. The thing there however, was that the kids didn't run away, and when the six people from the fighters section hemmed her in, the boys used their shields to ram the others, so that she could escape. It wasn't elegant, but it worked, and a few minutes later they managed to get away clean. Then, since it wasn't an actual battle, they went back, but she had her weapon out, ready to take down anyone, if they were too silly to let them win.

  It was Kolb that called a halt to the whole thing, clapping his hands and smiling as if he were truly happy to be there. That was rare for him. Normally, after any kind of an exercise, he was a little dour. Most people didn't meet his expectations after all, especially in fighting. It was his life.

  "Not too shabby. Not from anyone. We'll go over what was done in a bit, but first I think that Sam Builder and Tiera Baker were going to show us what they built?" He didn't sneer then, but did give her a funny look, as if he were afraid she might well be embarrassed by her failure. She noticed that Sam wasn't getting that treatment at all. Then, he was one of the Lairdgren Group and she was just... Her. It made sense, when put in that light, didn't it?

  Sam just walked forward, took a single little focus stone tile out, which was nearly identical to her own, and set it on the ground then he tapped it once, with a soft grin. Making fabric appear. A whole, and nicely folded, pile of it. After a second she got it. Not just cloth, but soft, absorbent looking towels.

  She clapped, since it was a lovely idea. One of her own actually, though he might have thought of it himself too, since it was kind of a natural one really. Then, touching only the top towel, not the amulet, he started to change the color and then the size of the things.

  Tiera sighed a little.

  "Perfect, Sam. Wonderful. How well do they hold water?" It was a horrible question, she realized, since Karen decided it would be funny to test it by picking her up and tossing her back in the pond.