‘Sucker.’ I tied the elastic around the end of my braid and stood up. ‘Got to tell you though, if that’s what it takes to get fed around here, I’m ready to beg.’ My stomach growled as if to highlight my words.
‘Right,’ Turos said. ‘Breakfast. Come on.’ He gave Scruffy one more shake of his head and then turned and led me from the room.
‘You want to come boy?’ I asked.
‘He ate his body weight in lamb about three hours ago,’ Turos said.
Scruffy looked towards the door and then turned and jumped back up onto the bed, turning around a few times before snuggling into the cover.
It took us far too long to get down to the dining hall but only a few minutes more till I was ploughing my way through bacon and eggs on top of a pile of pancakes covered in some sort of sweet sauce.
‘I don’t know how you can eat your savoury with your sweet,’ Turos said. He had opted for just the bacon and eggs.
‘Don’t knock it till you try it. Here.’ I held my fork out to him. It held the perfect proportion of pancake, egg, bacon and sauce.
He screwed up his face as he took it from me and popped it into his mouth. I watched in amusement as his expression changed from disgust to delight. He swallowed and said, ‘Why does that taste so good?’
‘It’s the whole sweet, savoury thing. You know, like salted caramel.’
He reached his fork towards my plate and hooked half a pancake off it. ‘Salted caramel?’
‘You guys haven’t invented salted caramel yet? Oh boy. I’m going to have to talk to your head chef.’
‘We haven’t even invented this caramel thing yet.’
‘You don’t have caramel?’ I could feel my eyebrows riding high on my brow.
‘What’s in it?’
‘Butter, brown sugar and cream. I think. Mum does the cooking in our house.’
‘We don’t have sugar here,’ he said. ‘We use the leaf of another plant that we brought through with us. It thrives on the east side of the island.’
‘Well.’ I placed another bite of pancake into my mouth, chewing and swallowing before I finished the sentence. ‘When we get home I’ll get Mum to make you some.’
He stiffened, his fun face immediately shifting to his serious one.
I groaned and put my fork down. ‘Are we going to fight about this?’
‘We can’t let you go.’ He pushed some egg around his plate with his fork.
‘Who says?’
‘Father.’
‘Yes, well your father also locked me up and threw away the key a couple of days ago.’
A wry smile touched his lips.
‘Look.’ I put my cutlery down and leaned across the table toward him. ‘I am needed. The goblins are mustering an army.’
He shrugged one shoulder and leaned back in his chair, but he didn’t meet my eyes. ‘We left those sorts of problems behind us a long time ago.’
‘Yes, well, now you have your own enemies, but you don’t see me writing them off.’
He shifted in his seat and had the grace to look uncomfortable. ‘We dealt with them.’
‘And if it wasn’t for me you’d be down half your army.’ It was a tiny bit of an exaggeration.
‘It’s not up to me. If it was, I’d go with you.’ He looked up, his eyes finally meeting mine. ‘I’d follow you anywhere. You should know that.’
My breath caught in my throat at the intensity of his words. His eyes held mine captive as I drowned in the ice-blue waters within.
‘Well then.’ I cleared my throat. ‘That’s always good to know.’ If I hadn’t spent the night with Aethan, my response might have been different. ‘Should we go see your father now?’ I pushed my seat out from the long table and stood.
He also stood and I followed him out, trying not to notice how all other conversation stopped as we passed, how heads bent and hands reached towards me.
‘I wish they wouldn’t,’ I mumbled under my breath.
‘They love you,’ Turos said.
‘They don’t even know me.’
‘Well, when they do get to know you, they’ll love you even more.’
I looked at him sideways but his expression was calm as he held the door open for me. I walked through and turned back to face him, waiting as he held the door for another man to exit the hall.
The man saw me standing there, and I held my hand up as he moved as if to bow. His attack was so unexpected that even if he hadn’t been moving with the swiftness of one of the trained Millenia warriors I would have had trouble defending myself.
He was on me within a millisecond, and if he’d had a knife, I would have been dead for sure. Instead, he threw me up against the wall, grabbing my hair and smacking my head back against the hard stone.
‘Witch,’ he snarled as he pulled my head forward and started to ram it backwards again.
It took me all of that time, just to get my hands up between us. I could see Turos, charging the man from behind. He would get there before the man had a chance to break my skull open, but I didn’t need his help.
‘Get back,’ I screamed. And then I unleashed a lightning bolt straight into the man’s chest. He flew backwards across the hall, smacking into the far wall and sliding down to lie in a crumpled heap. A black hole was charred deep into his chest and all of his fingers had the tips blown off. An acrid smell hung in the air. Burned flesh.
‘See.’ I looked over at Turos. He was staring at the man with his mouth wide open. ‘Not everybody loves me.’
‘I think,’ he stared down at the body, ‘that those who don’t, will put up a much better pretence from now on.’
People had started to crowd into the doorway. They all stared at the man with horror on their faces.
‘Thor.’ Turos pointed at one of them. ‘Go tell Braydon there’s been an assassination attempt. And organise to get this cleaned up.’ He grasped my arm and started to pull me down the hall.
‘Where are we going?’
‘To see father.’
‘Oh.’ I don’t know why I thought our destination would have changed.
A few minutes later we reached the start of a curving staircase. A single guard stood at the entrance. He clasped a fist to his chest when he saw Turos, but his eyes widened when he saw me and he bowed his head. I kept my distance, just in case. Let it not be said that I do not learn from my experiences.
I may have climbed the winding staircase more slowly than was strictly necessary. I wasn’t at all looking forward to talking to King Bladimir.
There was a guard at the top of the stairwell as well. He clamped his fist to his heart and opened the door. ‘Sire,’ he said, ‘the Prince is here.’
‘Has he brought the witch with him?’
I elbowed Turos. ‘Witch?’
‘Well, technically, you are a witch.’ He gave me a broad grin.
‘I’m more faery than witch.’ Huh. At some point during the last year I had actually begun to believe that. I mean I know it was true, but for the first almost eighteen years of my life I had believed I was pure witch. Isla was obviously rubbing off on me.
King Bladimir was at his desk, staring out a wide window into the valley. Dragons soared like gliders below us, weaving around each other as they swooped and dived. The faint hollers of their riders echoed up to us.
He turned and then stood as we entered, brushing his hands down the front of his ruby-red robes as if to smooth them.
‘Son.’ He clasped Turos’s hand before turning to me. ‘Young lady,’ he said, ‘it seems I must apologise for my hasty treatment of you the other day. You have my heartfelt thanks for the service you did my people yesterday.’
Turos let out a chuckle which I assume was due to the look on my face. The whole way there I had been readying myself for a tongue lashing.
‘Urrrr,’ I stammered, ‘that’s okay. Anyone would have done the same.’
He shook his head and clasped his hands behind his back. ‘That’s where you are wrong I fea
r.’ He rocked back-and-forth on the balls of his feet.
‘So, ummm, you’re not going to punish me for using magic?’ I wasn’t sure if I was pushing it or not, but it would be good to know where I stood.
‘As long as you only use your power for good, I don’t see why not.’
‘Oh boy.’ I sat down on one of the seats lined up against the wall. ‘Do you want to tell him or should I?’ I crossed an ankle up over my other knee.
‘What is she talking about?’ The hard-arse was back in the King’s voice.
‘There was an attempt on my life,’ Turos said. ‘A few minutes ago.’
‘Attempt on your….’ The look Turos shot over his shoulder at me shut me up.
‘We were attacked on our way here. Izzy used her power to save my life.’
‘I see.’ The King started rocking on his feet again. ‘And you feel that if she had not intervened that you would not have survived the attack?’
‘I may have,’ Turos said. ‘I mean I’m pretty good.’ He let out a quick laugh. ‘But you never can be sure in these situations.’
‘That is true.’ King Bladimir nodded his head. ‘Very well then. We will not speak of the matter again. But,’ his eyebrows lowered and his eyes took on a stormy look, ‘do not let me hear of you using your powers in such a way to harm an innocent, or things will be very different.’
‘Of course not Sire.’ I stood and bowed as I backed towards the door, knowing a dismissal when I heard one.
‘Well,’ Turos said as we walked back down the stairwell. ‘That went better than expected.’
I was about to make a snarky reply when Emerald’s voice sounded in my head.
Come quick. Come quick.
I grabbed Turos’s arm. ‘Emerald needs us.’ It hadn’t been outright panic in her voice but after yesterday, I wasn’t taking any chances.
Turos’s eyes focused on nothing for a second, then he grabbed my hand as we ran down the stairs. I tried not to notice how nice it felt with his large hand wrapped around mine. I failed miserably and for a second I had an urge to force him up against the stone of the stairwell and take his mouth with mine. Instead, I concentrated on the urgency that had been in Emerald’s voice. There was no time for making out. Not now, anyway.
‘This way.’ Turos dragged me through a side door and onto a broad balcony. He held my hand tight as he ran straight at the edge. We hurdled the top of the balustrading together, and I let out a whoop as we plunged into the ravine below us.
Then Lance was there, levelling out underneath us. Turos grasped my waist with his hands and positioned me in front of him for the landing onto Lance’s neck.
He placed both arms around me and onto the piece of leather that hung from Lance’s scaly throat. ‘Sorry,’ he murmured into my ear. ‘I need to hang on to something.’ I shivered and resisted the urge to turn around as his lips brushed my earlobe.
I didn’t want to confuse the situation any more than it already was. I mean yes, I wanted to make out with him. Yes, I craved the feel of his lips on mine. But I didn’t know what it meant beyond that. I knew that the lust that was in his eyes was probably mirrored in my own. But if you took the lust away, it you removed my crazy teenage hormones from the equation, what would be left?
With Aethan I had had it all. The rip your clothes off, smash your mouths together, can’t get enough of each other, lust. But beyond that was an enduring love, a trust, and a friendship. I didn’t have those with Turos, and that only made me yearn for Aethan more.
I pushed all of it from my head and concentrated on keeping my seat as Lance negotiated the tight bends into the breeding cavern. I kept an eye out for trouble as we soared through the cavern. Everything seemed as it should.
Lance fluttered to a standstill and landed next to Emerald.
‘What’s going on?’ I said to Isla.
‘Look. Look.’ She pointed at Arthur.
The fat, little dragon leant forwards and then ran towards us, fluttering his wings as he did. He lifted a couple of inches into the air before crashing back down.
Emerald let out a huff of pleasure and wrapped her tail around Lance’s.
‘Yay.’ Isla ran towards him with her hand held high in the air.
His tongue lolled out of the corner of his mouth as he reached down with the tip of his wing and tapped it against her hand. Then he let out a gurgly laugh and collapsed onto his back. Isla jumped up on top of his belly and scratched his arm pits. His laugh became a shriek as he waved his legs. She jiggled up-and-down with his motion before finally sliding back off him.
‘He can fly,’ she exclaimed running towards me. ‘None of the other hatchlings can fly yet.’
I tickled the bottom of one of his feet and he let out another shriek. ‘Yes, but we’ve already ascertained that he’s far more advanced than any of his peers.’
‘He’s special.’ Isla nodded.
I looked at him lying there, giggling and squirming with his tongue still hanging out of his mouth. ‘He certainly is that.’
‘Stop it.’ She punched me on the shoulder.
Arthur stopped giggling and sat back up. He pushed himself up onto his feet and then started his sprint. His wings fluttered and flapped and then suddenly he rose into the air. He sailed for a hundred metres while Isla, Turos and I chased him, cheering and whooping.
‘Now that,’ I said, ‘was flying.’
He reached his head down and pushed his snout to Isla’s cheek.
She reached up and patted his neck. ‘I know boy,’ she said. ‘It won’t be long till we’re flying together.’
‘How long?’ I said to Turos.
‘Well normally,’ he said, ‘hatchlings don’t start flying till they’re at least six months old. And they can’t support the weight of their riders till they’re at least a year. With Arthur?’ he shrugged his shoulders. ‘Who knows?’
‘Again,’ Isla squealed.
Arthur turned and sprinted back towards Emerald and Lance. He took off, gliding higher into the air than he had before.
My little genius, Emerald murmured into my mind.
You could carry him couldn’t you? If we had to leave? He might be a genius but I doubt he’d be able to fly far enough in the next couple of weeks for what we needed to do.
What’s going on? She shifted her body and stared at me with huge unblinking eyes.
Santanas has begun to muster an army.
A small puff of smoke rolled out of her nostrils but she didn’t respond.
I wanted to tell her that she didn’t belong here, that we had to go home. But the problem was that I could see that she did. She may have been in my world for the majority of her life, but she had never belonged.
And now I was going to ask her to leave this all behind and take me back, for what? So we could defeat the man that had initially tricked her into leaving.
I suddenly didn’t know if that was going to be enough.
8
A Choice of Two Worlds
‘Behind you.’ Aethan spun toward me, releasing an arrow over my head as I ducked.
I jumped into the air, turning head over heels to land behind the goblins that had just ambushed us.
‘That’s ten,’ Aethan yelled.
I twirled a sword in each hand, sweeping the tips down through the Achilles tendons of two goblins. They screeched and fell backwards and I plunged a sword into each of their chests. I spun and conjured up a crossbow, releasing a bolt into another goblin. ‘Hah. Twelve,’ I called out, sighting another goblin down my next shaft.
Before I could release it, Aethan plunged a spear through the warrior’s back. The goblin fell to his knees, clutching the tip of the spear with both hands as blood ran out of his mouth. Aethan put his foot on the warrior’s back and wrenched the spear out. I had time to admire his form as he hurled it into the air. I followed its flight with my eyes, groaning as it lodged into a goblin still hiding in the trees.
‘Thirteen.’ Aethan dusted his hands together.
‘This isn’t working.’
‘You’re right. You’re never going to beat me.’
I gave his shoulder a shove. ‘That’s not what I’m talking about.’
He gave me his cheekiest grin and said, ‘Well what else do you suggest we do?’
‘We need to shift as soon as she does. We’re giving her too much of a head start.’ Too much time to set up traps for us.
‘It’ll be dangerous while we’re being attacked.’
‘You’ll have to cover for us. I’ll just grab you as soon as I feel her go.’
He nodded. ‘It could work.’
‘It could mean that it’s just us against her if we do it fast enough.’
I had begun using Isla’s blood to mark my pulse points the way Wolfgang had showed me. It meant Galanta could no longer feel me through our blood bond.
‘Ready?’ I laid a hand on his arm and, when he nodded, moved us to where I could feel Galanta.
As soon as we landed we dived apart. I rolled back to my feet and shot an arrow off into the nearest goblin. Galanta stood in the middle of a circle of warriors. They had been facing out, ready for us, and now they attacked.
Galanta’s lips pulled back to reveal her pointed teeth in a cross between a snarl and a smile. And then she disappeared.
I dived through the legs of a goblin, batted another’s sword out of the way with my own, and then leapt high into the air, sweeping over the head of the next one. I came down in a crouch behind Aethan and grabbed onto his ankle as he thrust a sword through the chest of a warrior.
The forest clearing disappeared from view and Galanta appeared before us. A look of shock flashed across her face and then she was gone. I let her blood drag me as I followed, still holding onto Aethan’s ankle.
We were on a beach, then back in the forest, then on a mountain top, then in the middle of a herd of fire-breathing buffos. Galanta kept shifting. As soon as she landed she was gone again. We were just as fast, but it soon became apparent that this tactic wasn’t working any better than the last one had.
I stopped, let go of Aethan’s ankle, and stood up.
He looked at me with unfocused eyes, wobbling as he shook his head. ‘I feel a little unbalanced.’
Faery Revenge Page 13
