When Forces Rise

by Meagan Hurst

  Before Z could speak again Midestol interrupted them both. “Does your offer still stand?”

  Z met his eyes and shrugged. “If you want it to.”

  “I find I do not, but rather than have your offer fall through for no reason…” Midestol spun and impaled Rameilas with his sword. The woman let out a cry of pain and stared at him in horror as her legs buckled.

  Z caught herself before she moved, but inside she felt both dismay … and relief. Dismay because she was tired of death and having to explain this to Veilantras would probably end badly, and relief because she hadn’t been responsible for Rameilas’s death, Midestol had killed her. It also meant her plan had been successful. She watched without reaction as Midestol kicked the woman off his sword and held the blood covered blade until it was clean once more. Only then did he slide the blade back into its sheath and turn to face her.

  “I expect you at dinner tonight,” he informed her as if nothing had changed. “I likewise expect you to be dressed appropriately. If you do not have anything in your packs that meets my approval, I will have clothing sent up.”

  He moved past her to grab the tray before heading for the door, stepping on Rameilas’s body on the way out. As the door swung open he paused and turned back to her. “I meant what I said, Zimliya,” he told her without meeting her gaze. “I am not trying to beguile you with false words in the hope of weakening you on the field of battle. If I had wanted your life as I once did—just to end it—you would already have perished.” Clearing his throat and in a much louder voice he glanced at the two bodies in her room. “I will send someone to clean those up,” he added. “The castle appears to be only hungry for blood. It is to be expected, I have more than enough captives at the moment to satisfy it.”

  “I am glad to hear your latest skirmishes have yielded such wonderful results,” she told him sarcastically as he offered her a raised brow before leaving her alone in her room. Once he was gone, Z knelt beside Rameilas. The woman’s eyes were open, but there was no sign of life within them. Despite a part of her wishing she could have saved the woman, Z sighed in relief. Standing, she moved to go through her clothing. She would, she decided, never understand Midestol. He was far too fond of her. She, on the other hand, had become too trusting of that fondness.

  Unpacking her clothing, she tensed as something internally pulled the wrong way. Wishing she knew exactly where it was, Z lifted her shirt to find she was bleeding, but she still had no idea if that was connected to the tear of a muscle or if she had been bleeding for some time. Cursing her inability to feel pain, she reminded herself that once she hadn’t been able to notice the subtle signs she could now. Mindful of her promise to Nivaradros, Z mentally made a note to visit a healer upon her return.

  I appreciate that line of thought. You are badly wounded. Nivaradros’s tone was frosty, but she could tell he was less frantic than her had been before. How are things going?

  Um…Midestol’s decided not to kill me, she offered—inwardly cursing the fact Nivaradros could bypass all her barriers on the amulet when he chose to. But Rameilas’s rescue is not going to happen.

  She felt Nivaradros’s pry for information and let some of her walls down. His shock surprised her, but once he withdrew, his emotions settled. That was a very, very risky play, he chided. If you ever do anything that stupid again I am going to kill you myself. Midestol should have killed you. A minute later his touch returned to the memories of the meeting she would offer him. After lingering over the words Midestol had spoken before Rameilas had arrived, the Dragon’s concern vanished. Never mind. Well played indeed. I would have made the same gamble. What do you plan to do?

  I intend to play along with his game. I am to attend dinner for some unknown reason.

  Ah, and your clothing?

  He doesn’t approve.

  Of course not. When left to your own devices you choose clothing that doesn’t leave you half naked. That is far too much clothing for him. Nivaradros’s anger faded into amusement. He was still furious at her for what she had offered Midestol, but since she was alive and Midestol had explained he was not killing her off the battlefield, his anger wasn’t what she expected. She could, however, sense he was holding back his words for when she was safe and in a location where the Dragon could lecture her without be overheard.

  How are things going there? She asked in a vain hope of distracting him. Nivaradros snorted, but she could feel him pull away from her thoughts so he could gather his own.

  We made it on the ship. There was a minor difficulty, but everyone is still alive.

  Z covered her eyes. How minor? She demanded to know.

  Apparently the Council was aware you left violently. We were attacked soon after, but since Dyenrits Caris was already coming ashore at the time, our magic combined with theirs ensured that none of us was seriously wounded, although another five Dragons perished. They may whole a grudge against us for a while. The Mithane has also decided to put an embargo on trade between the Alantaions and the Dragons for a minimum of a year due to the second attack. I don’t think the Dragons were pleased, but he pointed out that had he perished, you probably would have destroyed the Isle. Considering this, he advised them to consider taking the embargo in silence. Oh, and Veilantras showed up to apologize to you, but as you are missing-in-action as the mortals term it, she apologized to me.

  How’d that go? Z wasn’t in a very trusting mood of Veilantras; not since she had once again been unhelpfully silent during the meeting to decide Nivaradros’s fate.

  It went well enough, other than the fact it was soon after we were attacked. I have no idea if it happened to go that way or if she tipped them off that you were gone. His irritation was strong enough to feel through the amulet, and Z wondered if the Rangers could overhear all of this. They cannot. I may have broken through your defenses, but I didn’t leave channels open for everyone to follow.

  That is surprisingly comforting. Closing her eyes, Z sighed. Things are going well?

  Things are going fine. The Mithane and the Captain appear to be old friends despite the fact the ship doesn’t sail for anyone but itself. They have therefore been keeping everyone in line, and we should dock in Alantaion kingdom within a few weeks, unless something goes horribly wrong. In the meantime, the Mithane has borrowed some sort of communication device—

  It’s called a lev’air.

  As you say. Anyway, he has been in touch with his army. They will be waiting for us when we reach the shore. Likewise Zyrhis—though he insisted this is your job—gathered his army to meet us with the Alantaions. The Islierre is currently in discussion with his small detachments. They are unwilling to battle underneath a Dragon regardless of who it is.

  And the Nialtians?

  Sabaias is slightly peeved at you for leaving. He is therefore unwilling to speak to his father personally. I believe I will have to go to their lands myself in order to get a true answer one way or the other. It is an irritation, but there is not much else I can do. I believe contacting him over the lev’air would do nothing but sour an already tense relationship.

  I doubt Misteki will follow his son in this. I have a feeling Sabaias is still struggling with Kitra’s death, and since I am missing, he doesn’t know anyone else well enough to trust them, especially not you.

  And the heirs?

  He’s always been rather standoffish around them. He’ll fight with them, he trusts them to a point, and he and Shalion could be brothers, but they are not, as he puts it, me. Just because they will agree to something doesn’t mean he will. He often compares them to mortals.

  There was a very long and cold pause. You need more female friends. Almost all of the heirs are males, and most of the rulers are as well. The wives or consorts of each ruler were too easy of a target. Most mortal ones exist, but very few immortal ones do. It’s limited your female interactions, and while it doesn’t seem to have a negative impact on you, it certainly makes it difficult for the rest of us.

  Thanks, Z
replied stiffly. I had no idea I was to be judged by the sex of my acquaintances.

  Nivaradros’s chuckle was soothing. We judge you on everything, he teased. But we are all recovering from the last battle with the Dragons and have little in the way of spare energy. I worry about you, though. Midestol seems…dangerous at the moment. Try not to antagonize him while you’re there. Mortals struggle when they are trying to be something they are not. He does love you, but your unwillingness to be his granddaughter in the manner he believes you should be is probably more than a sore spot with him. There was a sudden pause and the Dragon sighed. I have to go. Do whatever you must to return to us in one piece.

  He was gone before she could reply. Hoping he had left because he was a Dragon and the courtesy of waiting for her to say goodbye still escaped him, she returned to trying to find something to wear for her meal with Midestol that evening. It was a fool’s hope. She had expected to fight and none of her clothing was formal nor would it qualify as leaving her half naked. Irritated with herself for not considering this, she debated changing the clothing she did have to meet his expectations.

  A knock on her door caused her to draw a dagger, but it was only a slave who had come to collect the bodies that still lay on her floor. She ignored him and he ignored her, although he did a poor job of it. His eyes kept darting to her and narrowing. It was clear he wasn’t used to seeing a female clothed and without the telltale signs of beatings. Since she would have had the same reaction if she had been in his position, she managed not to comment, but as he discovered Rameilas weighed more than he expected, Z’s determination to be silent began to fray at the edges.

  “Let me help,” she said as she moved to pick up Rameilas’s legs while he struggled with the shoulders.

  The slave nearly dropped his half in his surprise. “It is not,” he told her in a very accented voice, “your duty to perform.”

  Not recognizing the accent, Z waited until her knowledge of languages kicked in—if she didn’t hear the language itself, it sometimes took a minute to arrive—and then she greeted him in his own language. His eyes widened in amazement and Z smiled before switching back to the mortal language all rulers and most of their people spoke. “Where are you from?” she inquired as she resumed her half of the task.

  “Another world,” the man answered—his distrust showing in his hazel eyes. He was entirely human, but that wasn’t a surprise. Humans had somehow managed to make it to the majority of the worlds Z had visited, and she assumed they were also on many others. Humans, sadly, were like that.

  “I suspected as much. You can speak with me. I am not one of Midestol’s, and I speak your language. Have you been here so long that you don’t trust anyone?”

  “My wife was taken by one of the soldiers until she displeased him and he slaughtered her; my two daughters have likewise been claimed. One of them may still live. My sons—the youngest were slain as we were captured and my oldest is being trained to be like the men here. Why should I trust you?”

  “I didn’t say you should trust me,” Z said as they got the body to the door. His solution to avoid carrying it down the stairs was to throw it, which caused Z to wince as she listened to it fall all the way down.

  “Did you know her?” the man wanted to know as he watched her.

  “No, but it’s just the whole…Oh never mind, it’s not like I wouldn’t do the same thing.” She regarded him curiously. “How many of you are there?”

  “Of my family? Of my people? Or of slaves in general?”

  Z wanted to hit her head against the wall. Now was not the time to get involved, and yet it was also the perfect time to get involved. After all the deaths she had caused, she wanted to save someone instead. “All three.”

  “There may be four of my family remaining here—three for certain. There are about a hundred of my people scattered throughout this place.” He hesitated for a moment and then shrugged. “And several thousand slaves. I know there are auctions going on hourly.”

  Several thousand. Z inwardly groaned at the thought of trying to rescue several thousand slaves with no immediate help. It was possible, but she would probably get herself killed, which would only anger Nivaradros. “What is your name?” she asked the man as they moved back upstairs to grab the second body.

  “Tylaris,” was the cautious reply.

  Nodding to show she had heard him, Z helped him carry the body of the woman Z had accidently killed over to the door. Once more, they threw it down the stairs. “Where are you housed?” Z ventured. Tylaris’s eyes narrowed as he watched her, and he once again looked her over.

  “You’re not human are you? You just look human.”

  Z tensed—feeling as if she had been slapped—and stared at him in dismay. “I’m human. Entirely human,” she added crossly. “I am, however, also immortal. The immortality is new.” Turning away from him, she sighed. “You are dismissed.”

  Only when she was certain he was gone did she return to the clothing dilemma. Unfortunately, it proved to be something she couldn’t focus on. Her mind kept returning to Tylaris and the rest of the slaves. It had been years since she had attempted to get any of Midestol’s slaves out, and today it was weighing on her. Forming a plan of attack would take time, so while she continued to decide which strategy would be best for the dinner tonight, she also ran through the inventory of tunnels, secret passages, and lesser used routes to and from the dungeons as well as to and from the kingdom.

  Two hours later she had a two minute warning before Midestol strolled into her room without knocking. He carried fabric over his arms, and Z decided not to bite his head off over the lack of courtesy. She still hadn’t found an outfit and while enraging Midestol had its benefits, she also didn’t want to end up wearing nothing to dinner. It was a possibility; she’d done it before. His eyes ran critically over her as he placed the clothing—dresses from the looks of it—on her bed.

  “Are you feeling well?” he demanded to know. “You look rather…peaked.”

  Lying to him wasn’t hard but lying to him while he was pretending to be civil was, and since he had been more than willing to spare her life lately she figured she owed him. “The backlash did significant damage. I am trying to ignore it.”

  “By carrying bodies?”

  He knew. Inwardly flinching, she kept her expression smooth and raised a brow. “I take it you’ve decided to make sure I had something to wear to dinner?”

  He inclined his head as a small smile emerged before he began to go through the clothing without much attention to detail. It let her know which dresses he didn’t approve of her wearing, but he would tolerate if she picked them. The last dress however he lingered over. “This one would suit you,” he remarked.

  Of course it would. It barely covered anything. If Z had ever wished—and she had—that Midestol would allow her to dress slightly more conservatively because of their linked blood, he had disabused her of that notion. In fact, she had a feeling it was worse since he had discovered she was his granddaughter. Now he really wanted to flaunt her. Knowing better than to start a fight, Z pretended to be interested in the dress he had preferred.

  “Well done by the way,” Midestol said rather suddenly as she began to change in front of him.

  Pausing with the dress halfway on, Z waited for him to continue until it became apparent he wasn’t planning on it. Working on the zipper in silence she watched him for a second before sighing and turning so he could finish zipping the dress up. “Well done on what?” she growled.

  “You managed to eliminate Rameilas without personally harming her. Had I been paying closer attention I would have perceived your game before I had killed her but, alas, I did not. Granted, as she wasn’t what I had hoped, her death was a minor inconvenience. I am sure Veilantras has another weakness, and if not then one of the other Dragons will. You may find your Isle allies hard to contact soon.”

  “Well there may be a shortage of Dragons that come off the Isle for a while anyway,” Z adm
itted to him with a crooked smile. “They’ve had a bad week.”

  Midestol’s curiosity didn’t show, but she could sense it. “What did you do?” he asked when it became clear she wasn’t going to continue her conversation.

  “They summoned Nivaradros to an assassination; I went with him. Let’s just say I didn’t take too kindly to their refusal to grant him any kind of leniency. A small battle ensued and the Dragons have lost a small number of their kind as a result.”

  Midestol’s eyes danced. “You assassinated Dragons on their Isle and you are still breathing?”

  “They started it,” she muttered as she made the mistake of glancing at herself in the mirror. Pushing the image out of her mind, she turned to face Midestol. “And they deserved it. I am not asking for them to give Nivaradros a place on their council—though he should have one. I am not even asking them to tolerate his presence on the Isle. I am asking them to allow him to be considered exempt from rules he has never followed and to be considered outside his race. He belongs to me.”

  Her grandfather was staring at a spot just over her shoulder—apparently lost in thought. “It appears Nicklyn’s death was good for you,” he commented. “I thought you would be on your own for the duration of your life. Yet while I believe you were attracted to him, there wasn’t enough there to keep things going. At a certain point things would have ended up as they did; with one of you killed by the other. Nicklyn had promise, but I will admit I am pleased he lost in the end.”

  “He would have been your best warrior,” she pointed out.

  “Indeed, and I would have ruled the world. But the upcoming battle will be something, Zimliya—I am certain you can sense it as much as I can—and that is worth far more to me than the loyalty of one short-lived warrior. You have been the first actual threat to me on the field, and I have a feeling when the battle begins, it will be apparent to all that the true battle will be won by a single being; not by a collection of armies or one large army. If you win, what will you do with my people and lands?”