The Caravan Road

by Jeffrey Quyle

  “What about me?” Andi interjected. “Shouldn’t you take me with you?”

  “I want you to stay here and rest,” Alec told her. “Jasel will be fine for us. Hope,” he turned, “will you go find Lady Salem and ask if she is prepared to return to the palace with me?”

  With a slightly raised eyebrow, Bauer nudged Hope to leave the room.

  “I’ll go get the horses ready,” Jasel said, rising and hurrying after Hope.

  “Alfred has the funds. I’ll go tell him we need to make arrangements,” Bauer spoke quickly, and left the room as well.

  Alec analyzed the hasty departures. Bauer, did you leave on purpose? He asked.

  I think you and your patient need a moment or two more to talk, Bauer commented.

  Alec turned to look at Andi, who was looking at him with a petulant expression, her eyes stormy.

  “Is there something we need to talk about?” he asked.

  “Bauer thinks so, doesn’t he?” she asked.

  “That’s right,” she continued, seeing the surprised look on his face. “I’ve known you could speak to him and Hope with your mind for a long time. Now, I’m starting to hear you. You asked him if he left on purpose.”

  Alec sat back, surprised. “When I’ve done extraordinary things to save a life, it has often given a part of my powers to the person I healed,” he began.

  “Like with Bethany, when the lion killed her?” Andi asked.

  Alec felt another shock as he began to realize the unforeseen ramifications of their extraordinary experience. The Black Crag guard had exceeded his expectations for an exchange of psyches; he had never in his efforts with Imelda or Cassie or Bethany, or later with Caitlen, known someone to manifest energies so quickly after an intimate encounter of shared blood and psyches, or to so readily recall his own memories to him.

  “Bethany was one case,” he agreed, and paused. “Andi, may I examine you?”

  “In what way?” the girl asked, her defenses rising as she sensed Alec’s shifting consideration. “You’re not going to try to take anything away from me, are you?”

  “No,” Alec took a deep breath and bit off a stinging retort. “I want to try to understand how you can hear my messages with Bauer. I’m not surprised that you can, I’m just surprised that you can so quickly.

  “Look, it doesn’t matter right now,” he was exasperated by the reluctance he sensed she felt, the reluctance to let him control the situation as it applied to her.

  “Why aren’t you going to take me with you into the city right now? You want to take a blade along to help provide protection; you know I’m a better blade than Jasel, and you obviously know I’ll fight to the death! So why aren’t you taking me?” Andi demanded, sensing Alec’s frustration.

  “Because we need time apart from one another!” Alec replied loudly. “Listen to this conversation,” he waved his arms. “This isn’t the way we would have talked to each other a day ago.”

  “That’s because a day ago I didn’t know what it was like to be you!” she screamed. “I thought you were some higher being, carved out of stone, born as an adult the first day of your life. I didn’t know you were just a man who has all the feelings and emotions and desires that the rest of us have. I can treat you like anyone else now.”

  In response, feeling betrayed that all the effort he had put into reviving the girl had only led to such an unnecessary confrontation, Alec turned his back to Andi and headed towards the door. “I’m not going to take you because I need to spend time with Salem. She’s a woman I respect,” he said, making the most cutting comment he could fabricate on the spot.

  Andi gave a howl and leapt at him, tackling him with a hard tackle. “That was just mean-spirited!” she said, sitting atop him and looking down.

  Alec looked up at the girl and grinned. She was a pretty girl, he saw again, with the flash of emotion bringing her eyes to life. He wasn’t sure how they had come to such a confrontational pass so suddenly, but he needed to put it to an end. A sudden gust of air lifted Andi off of him and raised her from the floor, then kept lifting her higher, until her back was pressed against the ceiling of the room. He stood up casually, waved to her, then headed towards the door.

  “You’re just going to walk away? You cheat when I’m winning the fight, and then you walk away?” her shrill words were in his ears as he left the room and he continued to feel her anger as he walked from the house to the stables. Salem and Jasel were waiting at the stables when he arrived there.

  “Would you like to go into town this morning to check on the state of the palace?” Alec asked Salem. “I thought that you would be best able to recognize and question people there so that we can understand what’s happening and decide what to do next.”

  “If you think that would be best, my lord,” she acceded.

  “And you just need to keep an eye on our horses while we’re inside the palace,” he told Jasel, who looked crestfallen at such a minor role.

  As they rode into town, there was little conversation. Once inside the city confines, they returned to the alley where Alec had gone previously to enter the palace, and Alec decided to use the same route to carry Salem up to the roof of the adjoining building.

  Alec told Salem that she needed to return to her former appearance so that the people they approached in the palace would know and trust her. She sat silently in her saddle as he placed his hand upon her and carried out the restoration, taking liberties with her appearance to smooth her skin so that she appeared younger and without stress compared to her looks that Alec had known before. It would help the members of the palace staff to see someone who appeared relaxed and refreshed in the midst of the trauma he suspected they were suffering during Trayma’s breakdown.

  She was stiff in his arms when he carried her to the roof, and Alec knew that seeing he and Andi during their momentary kiss had upset her. He felt sadness at the distance that now separated them because of that moment; he had admired the woman’s strength of character, as well as her grace and beauty, yet he knew that he was going to leave the city as quickly as possible and should not provoke any relationship to blossom between them.

  “We will become invisible, and we will fly to the palace and enter its upper floors,” he told her. “I would think that we should seek out the officers of the guard, to find if we can count on them as allies to aid your restoration.”

  “Shouldn’t we simply fly to their armory at the palace and seek them out there?” Salem asked. “I can think of two officers who were always prudent leaders my husband approved of. If they are still in the service, they would be best for us to approach.”

  “Tell me where the armory is,” Alec replied. “I like the idea.”

  Moments later they embraced again, as Alec created the cushion of air that lifted them and carried them into the rear of the palace grounds, where a long, large stone building ran the length of one wall of the palace’s inner enclosure. The invisible couple walked up to an open door and found themselves observing the large, open practice space the guard members used to hone their swordsmanship skills, as a few pairs of men clashed wooden practice blades with one another.

  “Let us be visible to them when we walk in,” Salem told Alec. “We should show these men that we have no fear.”

  “As you command. My lady,” Alec responded, concluding that the suggestion was bold, but prudent. He dropped his Light powers, and adopted his Warrior energies, then fell a step behind Salem as she led the way into the armory.

  Salem walked into the armory, then turned left, and began to walk towards an office door. As they progressed, the room grew quieter, the wooden blades ceasing to clack and whack against each other, the practicing guards turning their attention to the surprising presence in the building.

  “My lady,” a voice spoke, stopping her. She and Alec turned to see the men around them walking slowly towards them. The small nagging feeling of discomfort that Alec had remotely sensed for some time nagged at him with increasing forc
e, adding to the apprehension he felt about the approaching semi-circle of a dozen men, only one of which appeared to be an officer.

  “It gives me joy to see you alive and looking so well, my lady,” the man who Alec thought might be an officer said. He dropped to a knee, and the other men around him dropped as well, their heads bowed.

  It was Andi! Alec realized that the discomfort he felt was Andi’s discomfort; in some fashion the strange bond between them delivered sympathetic feelings from her to him even at this distance. He had left her pressed against the ceiling of the room when he had left the country estate, and she remained there even now – with a full bladder, he realized with a grin.

  “You think our acknowledgement of the lady is funny?” the officer was rising to his feet, looking at Alec and misunderstanding the cause of his smile.

  “No sir,” Alec said quickly. He closed his eyes and focused on carefully reducing the air current he had left in place, lowering Andi back to the ground.

  “Is this a friend, my lady?” the officer asked Salem.

  “He is, major. He is a staunch and strong ally,” Salem vouched quickly for Alec, placing her hand trustingly on his arm. “I would not be here, would not even be alive, were it not for this man.”

  “We are pleased to see you. All the members of the palace guards would cheer if they knew you stood within the palace grounds, Lady Salem. Rumor placed you far away, on the road in the wilderness,” the man said. “Are you here to see General Filpon? Has he invited you to come back to serve us?”

  “No,” Salem answered without faltering. “I chose to come back on my own, to find out what the state of the palace is at the moment.” Alec was proud and impressed by the surety in her voice and the confidence she displayed in her poise; she had no idea of what was occurring around them, but she was speaking as if she were the ruler of the palace.

  “What is the status here in the city?” she asked. “I understand Quisel is dead. What is happening with Bened?”

  “Well, you obviously know that there is a virtual civil war going on within the palace grounds,” the officer said, to a few murmured sounds of agreement. “Trayma has gone crazy, talking about ghosts and betrayal – as if he is one to talk. He had Quisel executed, and then he tried to do the same to Bened, but the general got wind of it, and has gathered forces around himself. Trayma has gathered forces around himself.

  “Many of us are at a loss to know which is the lesser of the two evils. But if General Filpon is ready to back your restoration,” he let his words tail off hopefully.

  “Major Bray, I would like to see General Filpon to talk with him,” Salem answered. Alec felt Andi’s relief and anger, and he grinned again.

  “Is this man a fighter or a clown? All he does is gape like a mindless idiot,” Bray said, looking at and misunderstanding Alec’s smile once again.

  Alec took a deep breath, and waited for Salem to answer.

  “I cannot tell you enough about the power and the wisdom of Alec,” Salem answered. “Do not ever underestimate him. Now, please take me to see General Filpon.”

  “I will take you, but we have a guard around the General to protect him in these circumstances,” Bray answered. “Your friend must wait out here.”

  “Go on,” Alec answered immediately. He held out his hand to rest in on Salem’s arm. Do you trust this man? I will accompany you if you want my protection.

  Salem’s eyes locked with Alec’s. These are my people, and I know these are the men I can trust; I must show that trust to them now, if I am going to ask them to support me.

  Well said, Alec acknowledged. “I’ll wait here and perhaps spar with some of the guards if they’ll honor me with the opportunity,” he said aloud, withdrawing his touch from Salem. He felt as though he was seeing her become a different person, a stronger woman who was a natural leader rising to the need of her city.

  “We’ll gladly cross blades with your champion,” Bray agreed. “Give the man equipment and be good hosts while the Marchioness goes to talk to the General,” he directed the soldiers around them, then promptly led Salem away into a different part of the armory structure.

  Alec and the guards looked at each other, smirking. The smiles of the guards soon turned to serious expressions as they found themselves straining to withstand Alec’s ability to manipulate his blade. After three bouts, they sheepishly agreed to accept his terms of fighting two at once, and it was during one such match, all parties sweating profusely from their exercise, that Lady Salem, Major Bray, and General Filpon re-entered the practice space, putting an end to the fencing.

  “He seems pretty serious for a ‘grinning idiot’,” General Filpon said to Bray.

  “He handles a weapon well,” Bray agreed, a wooden expression on his face.

  “His work with a sword is the least of his weapons,” Salem said. “Did you hear about the fight on Jeweler Lane?”

  “The slaughter of the thugs? None of the survivors will tell what really happened, but there were a lot of bodies hauled out of there. The crime rate will be cut in half in the city,” Filpon commented. “Are you saying that your champion had something to do with that?” he asked, as Alec approached, rubbing a towel across his sweaty scalp.

  “Alec, this is General Filpon,” Salem introduced. “How should I identify you? I don’t think I know a word that describes all that you are.”

  “I am an ingenaire,” Alec said with a smile. “General it is an honor to meet you.”

  “Are you part of the group that came through the city three days ago? Why did they leave you behind?” Bray stiffened slightly at the title Alec claimed for himself.

  “You’ve heard the title?” Alec asked with great interest. “I am actually chasing a group of ingenairii, a group that I am not part of.”

  The name is an ancient one used in tales to frighten children, or that’s what we used to think,” Filpon answered. He held out a hand and shook with Alec, a firm grip providing a statement that the man was as strong and tough as his ramrod straight posture suggested.

  “There were strangers who came through the city just a few days ago. They went to a house, slew a young man, and took his wife. When the constables tried to intervene, they were slaughtered – not as efficiently as the thieves in Jewelry Lane were exterminated perhaps, but they were left dead. And then the ingenairii – they called themselves that – left, took another girl, and taunted the police to follow them to Exbury, Erechta, and Yangchoo,” Filpon explained.

  “Are those cities nearby? Could I catch up with them, once this situation is settled and Lady Salem rules the city?” Alec asked.

  “You think the lady will be back on the throne of the city just like that, as a convenience to you?” Bray asked in astonishment.

  Alec felt a sense of uneasiness. “I do think she can retake the throne quickly, but I did not mean to imply anything,” Alec tried to iron out whatever problem his words may have created.

  Salem held up a hand. “I understand. Our ingenaire is truly traveling on his own mission, but he has stopped here to help my family in its quest. We should be thankful for the help he has given, and acknowledge that he has other purposes in life beyond Woven’s future.”

  “I intend to stay to help the Lady regain the authority she deserves,” Alec said to Bray and Filpon, “please don’t misunderstand me. But I have pledged to avenge another injustice as well, and I mean to keep my promise.” He felt a swelling sense of determination, as though he were even then setting out on a mission.

  “Tell me what you need – Trayma to go crazier?, Bened to surrender himself to you? – I’ll find a way to make it happen,” Alec promised.

  “Before you dismiss him, let me tell you that I know he can do such things,” Salem spoke loudly and hastily.

  Both Filpon and Bray cocked their heads as they appraised Alec.

  “We need them both dead, for all the world to see, and so that everyone knows that the Marchioness is responsible for their deaths,” Bray said abrupt
ly.

  “That would be crude, but effective,” Filpon agreed.

  “General, may I see you and Lady Salem together, privately?” Alec asked. He gave Salem a meaningful look.

  Together the three of them left the practice room again, a room that had grown more crowded as more guards came in, responding to the rumors that Salem had returned to the palace.

  When they were in an office, Alec closed the door. “If the Lady Salem were seen to personally wield a sword and slay these men, would that be sufficient?” Alec asked Filpon.

  “If she were an Amazon warrior who could do that, yes,” Filpon answered. “And maybe where you come from women are raised as warriors, but in Woven, that is not the case. We will support the Marchioness for her wisdom and rightful claim to the throne, not for her valor at arms.”

  “But if Bened’s men see Salem fight him and win, they will have no choice but to follow her, will they?” Alec pressed.

  “More likely they’ll flee the city. There will be no home for them in Woven; we wouldn’t tolerate traitors returning to the palace, and they know it,” Filpon said.

  Alec looked closely at Salem, studying her features intently.

  “What is it Alec?” she asked.

  Alec closed his eyes, and focused his Healer energies upon his own body. He forced his hair to lengthen, and his face to grow narrow. His facial stubble gently fell from his cheeks and chin, as his chest swelled outward. He opened his eyes to look at Salem’s, startled to notice for the first time how blue they were, then he made his own eyes lighten and change.

  Filpon staggered back from Alec, until his back was against the wall. “By the temples, what are you?” he whispered.

  “I am the Lady Salem,” Alec replied. “How close is the appearance?”

  Filpon’s eyes flew back and forth and back and forth, “Your chin is too large, and your throat apple is too prominent,” he said at last.

  Alec stroked his fingers along his chin and throat. “Better?” he asked.

  “I don’t know what to say,” Filpon answered.