For a split second, the cloak fell open slightly to allow me one last view of the world. Another picture of all the soldiers patrolling the familiar cobblestone roads. My heart fell into my stomach when I saw one of many wanted posters plastered to the wall above our heads.
On the left was Frederick, the crown prince who had “disappeared”. On the right was a sketch of my own face, “The Traitor”, but it was out of sight before I could see what it was for.
When Luke and James allowed me out of the cloak, my eyes had to adjust to the new surroundings. It was a basement. The curvature of the ground and the one high window was evidence enough of that. There were candles dangling all across the ceiling, which was wood. It made me wonder what we were underneath. There was a big table in the middle, and off on one wall there was a cot laden with a sleeping form. Rachel came forward to greet me out of the corner and threw her arms around me, thrilled that I was all right.
Apparently, it was Frederick on the cot, and there was another one in the same part of the room that Rachel began to herd me toward. “You need your rest, Lina, you let out a lot of magical energy last night. You have to build it back up before you can start your training.” She grinned happily, ear to ear.
Luke and James escorted Sam to the door to my dismay, and I reached after him with my eyes until I could see him no longer. I wanted him to stay.
Rachel made me lie down and pulled the blanket up to my chin like any mother would. My mind felt like it was spinning in circles trying to keep up. What was a Kidek? How did Sam know about Rhydin? What would my magic feel like when I had it under my control? I was only able to verbalize the first one before Rachel called mandatory bedtime.
Rachel looked at me as if she hadn’t expected to hear that question. Her red eyebrows rose and shadows formed under her blue eyes. “Well, long story short, the Kidek is the leader of the Rounans. I’ll tell you more later if you would like.”
I could barely nod or process any shock before my eyes unwillingly closed.
Chapter Eight
M y eyelids creaked when they opened, feeling heavier than they’d ever been before. As they began to recognize light, I realized that the wall was wrong. I lay on my side, staring at it, with a huge weight in my chest, a lump like a sand bag sitting on my heart. My arm ached, although not too badly now.
I did not see the rough edges of the wood that lined my home. Nowhere could I see those beautiful shades of brown etched into the lines that once could tell a tree’s age. I did not see the little notch in the wall where I accidentally fell as a child and nearly broke my arm or the little burlap bag that held some of my most dear possessions – my mother’s favorite children’s book that I learned how to read from, an old sock of my father’s that he had taught me how to darn, Rosetta’s doll she had made me when we were extremely little, and a grass whistle Sam had given me shortly after we became friends – which sat in the corner underneath my straw tick where no one could see.
I saw, instead, a hard, earthen wall that was dug out hastily, perhaps in secret. A small, thin root twined its way through the crumbling dirt, straggly and black. It was most likely killed many years ago by the coal-sodden soil of this mining town.
As the realization sank in that I was not at home, and that I was, indeed, in the basement of Luke Owens’ livery, I felt my heart beat increase. We were nearly killed last night. I should have died, but I didn’t. My magic saved my life…
It was at this moment that I realized that my back was against something hard. I moved slightly, but not too much considering the weight in my chest, and became confused as to how I could be facing a wall and yet have my back against another one. This wall wasn’t just hard; it had curves.
I leaned forward barely far enough to look over my shoulder, and to my surprise, I saw Rachel. She was parallel to me, her shoulder blades against the small of my back because she was so tall. Her red hair seemed messier than usual, pulled tightly away from her face into a little blob on the back of her head, but she was awake, staring into the corner of the little earthen room, the candles dimly lit above. When I finally found my voice, I just had to say, “Rachel? What in the world are you doing?”
Rachel snapped out of her thoughts, her pristine blue eyes finding mine as she rolled over toward me the tiniest of bits, careful to keep her back firmly against mine. “Good morning, Lina! How do you feel? Oh, this? Sorry, we’re still working on hiding your presence from Rhydin. Until your charm is finished, the only way to keep him from sensing you is by keeping core contact with me. Good thing we’re friends, right?” She grinned from ear to ear like this was the most normal thing in the world. “Frederick has to do it, too! See?”
She motioned just a few feet away in the same little alcove to Prince Frederick’s cot. He was sitting up, barely awake, his pretty white suitcoat wrinkled and smudged with burn marks. Sitting to his back was young, long-haired James working away with his hands on some sort of multicolored leather object. It was a strange sight to see two people with their backs to each other, but at least if I had to do it, they did too.
Frederick groaned and rubbed his eyes, stretching the skin of his temples into strange contortions as if that would make his head stop hurting. Afterward, his back straightened, like the noble prince he was, and his eyes found mine. “Lina, I am so sorry. I would come kneel and apologize further, but my protector is preoccupied.”
I couldn’t help the smile coming to my face as James gave him an irked-teenager look, the lump in my chest becoming a little lighter. “You don’t have anything to apologize for. Besides, that would just be wrong to have the crown prince at my feet. Not to mention unsettling.”
Frederick chuckled, possibly the first time I had seen him smile. It was nice. His wiry build extended to his face, the cords in his cheeks tightening to create quite the set of dimples. His voice was resolute as he said, “Either way, please accept my apology. I have put both our lives into irrevocable danger because of a hasty, rash decision that cannot be undone.”
Before I had time to respond, Rachel chimed in with her musical voice. “Well, it’s not the perfect situation, but we must make the best of it. You two are going to be getting a lot of one on one time living down here, and it’s the perfect set up to begin magic training!”
“Magic training?” I could feel my jaw fall and the fear settle into my throat.
“Of course!” Rachel replied cheerily, “You remember that message I left you in that bottle, don’t you? It said ‘meet us the day after the festival’, and here we are! The objective was always to begin teaching you magic, but now it’s awakened so even better! Although that means we really need to get started so you’ll be ready for Rhydin. You did get that message, right? I winked at you. I thought that would help.”
“Whoa, whoa wait, slow down!” I forgot for a moment and tried to scoot away from Rachel to better situate myself to look at her, as most human beings do.
She gave me a dark look and moved with me to keep her back against mine. “Lina, never do that again until the feathers are ready! Even just a few seconds could allow Rhydin to find you and kill you before you know one spell!”
I swallowed hard, starting to feel claustrophobic.
Frederick sighed. “Rachel is right. Rhydin no doubt knows that your magic has awakened, and so whatever he has in plan for us will soon be made known. I will teach you magic the best I can. Our powers are far different, but it will be as close as we can get. Don’t be afraid of it. It’s saved your life once now, and it will do so again countless times.”
I nodded, beginning to feel slightly better about the whole magic situation. A few thoughts were swirling around my mind though. “Your Highness, I-…”
“Don’t call me that.” The prince was quiet, his eyes staring right through me. “I would prefer if you called me by my given name. So few people in my life do, and I would like you to do so as well.”
“Okay… Frederick.” The name felt strange on my tongue with no title. I
was getting used to hearing it by Rachel and her brothers, but it felt strange to say it myself out loud. “I have a question already, if that’s okay?” He nodded. I took a deep breath, trying to decide how I should word it. It was still so foreign to me. “How do Rhydin’s Followers have magic if they are not Royals? Does this mean they are Rounans?
Frederick tried to stand but remembered James and stopped. Instead, he gripped his knees a little harder as he spoke, “Lina, you really must work on forgetting that notion ever existed. It is totally incorrect. You have magic, and you are not a Royal or a Rounan. Royals tend to have magic much more often than most people because of their pure bloodlines. The Royal families typically only marry within each other, and so we have a very strong Gornish bloodline straight from Emperor Caden himself. Common people have mixed blood, which may contain Gornish, Rounan, or any sort of mixture that never had magic in the first place. Rhydin’s magic is created magic, as the Allyen magic is. His is so great, in fact, he can metaphorically break off pieces and hand them to other people to use in his stead. This is how his Followers have power. There is much more complication and technicality to it, but it is far too impossible to understand at your current level.”
He was right. My head was already spinning. Parts of it made sense, yet it seemed impossible to unlink the connection between Rounans being the only common people who had magic. We had grown up our entire lives being taught to stay away from Rounans because they were dangerous, and if you were convicted of being one, whether rightly or falsely, you were immediately hanged. I remembered one of the public hangings I saw as a child. My mother hadn’t realized it was occurring and had taken me to town with her. Normally, she kept our family clear away from them, but she had made a rare mistake. She kept her hand over my eyes, but I remembered the screams.
And now, I knew a Rounan personally. Someone I never dreamed would be a Rounan, much less the leader of the entire people. Sam was the Kidek. I was an Allyen. In the span of less than a week, our friendship that had been a constant for ten full years had changed forever, equally complicated by both new titles.
What would happen to us now? I hadn’t told him about my magic, and now he knew I lied. But he had lied to me as well… He never told me about this role, or that his bandana, which I always figured was some weird preference or obsession, was actually a way of signifying him as leader. Kidek of the Rounans. It was mind boggling, and it was scary to think I might lose my childhood friend. It bothered me a lot more than I thought it would, too.
“Frederick? Is Sam really the Kidek?” My lips trembled.
The blond-haired man looked at me with a quirk to his eyebrow. “Yes, he is. Leader of the Rounans. It is an inherited position, always passed down to the firstborn son just like kingship is. Therefore, he inherited magic that is unlike any other. Rounan magic does not take any sort of form, such as water or fire. Or even wind, like my own. I’ll get to that in our lessons.” Frederick smiled slightly.
At that moment, there was a sound outside the little door. They were light footsteps, but the old stairs betrayed the noise with loud creaking. The door opened to reveal Luke, Rachel’s brother, with bags under his eyes and clad in simple clothing with an apron covered in straw. He smelled of horses, having already worked a few this morning.
James seemed overjoyed to see him, as if he’d been quite bored. “Luke! Are the feathers ready yet? I am so ready to be one person again!”
Rachel let out a chuckle, but Luke was much more adept at hiding his emotions. He cleared his throat as he crossed the room to another wall where shelves had been dug out. “Yes, James. They had to crystallize overnight, but they should be finished. You will be free soon enough. All of you will.”
I began to watch Luke carefully as he withdrew a package wrapped in animal hide, curious as to what these feathers really were. More questions came forth from my teeming mind. I sputtered, “Rachel, you said a charm would hide Frederick and I’s presences from Rhydin. Is it a feather? How can just a bird feather be so special? What is a presence anyway?”
Rachel sighed, trying to look at me while remaining back to back. “Yes, the charm I mentioned takes the form of a feather, but it’s not a bird feather, Lina. It’s far more important than that.”
Luke and James were both eyeing her as she spoke this.
“These feathers come from our people, the ones that have devoted their lives to protecting the Allyen. They are very powerful, and they will hide you from even Rhydin. A presence…well… It’s more like when you have magic, you are able to tell when other magical people are around, or even where they are if close enough. That’s what it means to sense a presence. Rhydin’s power is so great that even if he were on the far end of Mineraltir, he could sense you from here in Soläna because you have magic. This feather will make your presence invisible, you and Frederick both.”
“Oh.” I nodded, that concept somewhat making sense although seemed halfway stalker-ish. “Do normal people have presences? What about Rounans?”
“Again with the Rounans…” Luke grumbled from across the hall.
“I’m just curious!” I crossed my arms angrily.
Frederick responded this time. “You can sense normal people if you’re looking straight at them. If you cannot see a person without magic, you cannot sense them as they have no power to sense. Rounans have a slightly different case, seeing as they aren’t Gornish in descent. They feel different when you sense them, again only when you’re looking right at them. You can sense them, but most of the time you have to check their arm to make sure.”
“Arm? Why the arm? That doesn’t make sense. What’s so special about an arm?” I was flabbergasted at this point and totally lost.
Frederick chuckled, “No one really knows this. In fact, I didn’t either until I met a real Rounan, but they have marks on their arms. A long angular one from their wrist to their elbow that tells you how much magic they have. It’s a mark every true Rounan has, but nobody knows, which leads to all the tragic hangings of innocent people that were just a little strange. You could ask Sam to see his.”
I had to let that absorb for a while. That’s why they were so many terrible hangings? Because people were so prejudiced that they didn’t bother to check the facts? How many lives could have been saved? Why were Rounans persecuted so terribly? I wondered if I should wait and ask Sam that last one.
Luke approached the two cots with what looked like two shards in his hands. One was a brilliant purple, more like amethyst, and the other was the most beautiful shade of grass green. They both shone with reflected light, looking like pieces stolen from a stained-glass window or something. They were each strung on a leather cord, a few beads on either side of purple, orange, or green.
James took the green one and tied it around Frederick’s neck. As soon as it was knotted tightly, James shot up and took a few leaps around the small room, stretching his thin limbs. “Freedom!” He celebrated.
Rachel took the purple shard into her hands carefully, and then worked on tying it securely around my neck. I touched it as it came to rest a little lower than my locket would if I was still wearing it. It was not there, and I remembered that it was tucked safely into my sash because I had yet to find something to replace the shoelace Birdie had broken.
This so-called feather looked so much like glass, but it didn’t feel like one in any way! It seemed hard and sharp, but when I held it in my hand, it was light and soft, as if I held nothing but air. Barely, within the purple shine, I could make out a vein, such as a leaf or bird feather would have. It really was a feather, but it looked like a piece of stained glass. What kind of creature did these feathers come from?
“Now, you must never take these off!” Rachel warned as she stood, stretching herself although not quite as animated as James was.
Frederick was looking at his own feather, marveling at its qualities just as I had been, before tucking it safely inside his vest. I turned just in time to see Luke handing Rachel and James a piec
e of paper from his pocket and whispering, “You’ll never believe what they’re doing…”
In a matter of seconds, Rachel and James both busted out laughing, holding the paper tightly. James was howling while Rachel cried she was trying so hard to control herself. Frederick and I glanced at each other, confused as to what could make the Owenses laugh so hard. They had senses of humor, that’s for sure, but it was a rare occurrence to see them crack up like this.
Frederick caved before I did. “What is it?”
Rachel pursed her lips, attempting to keep from laughing as she handed him the paper, which I could now see was a flyer. “So, how’s the happy couple?”
I could see the color drain from Frederick’s face as Rachel and James died of laughter. When I asked what it was, he couldn’t even speak to me, much less look at me, as he passed the flyer over. It was the same poster I had seen yesterday, Frederick’s face on one side and some sort of rendition of mine on the other. They made my eyes too big. I saw the word “Traitor”, as I had yesterday, but the text at the bottom was a completely different story. The official news straight from the castle was that Frederick and I had eloped!
I felt my heart sink and my mouth go dry instantly. I could barely feel my hands holding the paper anymore, and there were no words for what I was feeling. Horrified came the closest. I dared a glance at Frederick, who was being elbowed by James until he finally gave a little laugh. He was getting over it. Probably thinking it was silly. I wanted to die.
“Yep, you two are definitely going to have to stay down in this basement until this craziness comes to an end.” Rachel laughed, “The entire kingdom is scouring the town for you two newlyweds, and once the kingdom finds you, Rhydin will. Feathers or no feathers.”
I glared at Rachel with one of the darkest glares of my lifetime.
The Allyen (The Story of the First Archimage Book 1) Page 10
