“I’ll be here tomorrow,” Alec promised the men who waited for him to restore their natural color as he ceased his efforts for the night. “I will treat every one of you tomorrow, I promise, in the name of the Princess Esmere.”
Alec sat back and closed his eyes to rest, until Chandler nudged him sometime later. “The taverns are going to close their kitchens soon. If you want some dinner, we better go.”
“Thanks. I need to eat some food after all the healing. Do you know a place you recommend?” Alec asked, leaning forward in his seat.
“There’s a place at the end of town that serves good beef, and the serving girls are always pretty,” Chandler said with a wistful sigh. Alec and Ephraim followed him out the door and down the main street to a large tavern with a single large common room and several small private rooms scattered around the periphery. They sat at a table, served by a girl as pretty as Chandler had promised, and waited for their food to arrive.
Instead, as Chandler’s wine and the juice for Alec and Ephraim arrived, the waitress handed a note to Alec. “I can’t read your language,” he confessed to Chandler, handing the paper to the older man. “What does it say?”
“You’re invited to have a drink in Room 6,” Chandler said with a stifled guffaw.
“What’s so funny?” Alec asked.
“You’ll find out,” Chandler said. “Nothing to worry about.”
Curious, Alec left the table and approached the door for Room 6. A man who reminded Alec of a bouncer silently opened the door and ushered Alec in. A woman sat alone in the room sipping a drink and looking out at the dining room through a large window. She looked up at Alec appraisingly as he entered, and she pointed a finger in a business-like manner at the chair across the table from her.
“How old are you, twenty two, twenty three?” she asked. “It doesn’t matter. You’re a good looking fellow. You really don’t even need to be a Jag to work; we have a clientele that likes regular skin too, you know. Does that interest you?”
Alec looked at her without comprehension. “I’m sorry. What do you mean?” he asked as he tried to decode her comments, but was unable to make any sense out of them.
“And an exotic accent even! Is that real, or are you just playing to the market?” she asked. “I’m Easton, the buyer for houses in Dana and Raysing. I saw you out there with your friends and thought I’d make a business proposition. Is it a real accent? Ever since the Princess had her misfortune it’s been a very desirable feature for a number of women.”
“It’s a real accent,” Alec replied, realization dawning on his face. “You think I’m here to become a Jag?” he asked, and then smiled.
“Tell me about the Princess,” he said.
“what’s that got to do with anything?” the Easton woman responded.
“Maybe nothing, but humor me anyway,” Alec replied.
“She’s being cheated by the men. The Conglomerate cheated her by overthrowing her; her foreign lover cheated her by running away; and now her own allies are going to cheat her by taking her crown from her,” the procuress said.
“Would it help if her, lover, came back to defend her?” Alec asked.
“Men don’t come back,” she replied cynically. “Besides, what can one man do now?” the woman asked. “Enough politics; tell me what you’re interested in.”
He focused his energies, and turned himself blue, watching the face of the woman grow pale. She raised her glass to her lips and gulped down its contents without realization.
Alec turned his skin back to its normal shade, and she poured another glass without realization. “I’m interested in helping the Princess,” he said softly. “I’m not interested in being a Jag for hire. If I change my mind, I’ll let you know.
“So tell me, do you think that having her lover return to her, even if he is a foreigner, will help her to win this trial?” Alec asked.
“I think this trial is guaranteed to put someone from Valeriane on the throne, because that is what the Valerians wants,” Easton said.
“There’s always someone who wants the throne,” Alec agreed. “Now, I’ll return to my friends, and you can return to your recruiting. I’m flattered you called me in,” Alec said as he stood, and left the room to return to the table where Chandler and Ephraim were ravenously eating their food, as Alec’s plate sat on the table.
“You knew what that was about,” Alec accused Chandler in a mild tone as he sat down.
“That’s what those rooms are for,” the trail guide said. “You’re the envy of everyone in here for getting called in. It’s a guarantee of success.”
Alec grinned as he started to tear into his beef and noodles, and after their meal they returned to their boarding house for the night. The next morning Alec awoke to find a large group of men waiting for him to cleanse their bodies of the colloidal silver that made their skin blue. The three travelers spent the day in Jagine as Alec treated his patients all day long, and the next day they left at last, moving out of the boarding house with the rising sun, eager to make up for the time they lost in the village.
Chandler and Ephraim were curious about Alec’s healing ability, and they spent much of the next two days talking about healing and cures. They talked less on the third day, as they started to attain extremely high altitudes where oxygen was less abundant in the thinner air. The trails Chandler followed were narrow, requiring more concentration now as they climbed higher and higher.
Alec touched Ephraim several times to relieve him of mild altitude sickness, mainly headaches and fatigue. There were other travelers on the trail headed in both directions, though not many. “Are there many bandits on this trail?” Alec asked his guide.
“I’ve heard stories of some, but I’ve never met any. Nothing really valuable comes this way; it’s not a regular trading path,” Chandler replied. “Tomorrow we’ll go through the highest pass, and you’ll understand that it doesn’t invite much traffic.”
The next day they did continue to climb up into a treeless region, then above the snow line, where the sky itself seemed short of breath, remaining a dark blue hue as their horses traipsed against the strong wind in the pass, stinging snow blowing against them in the wicked breezes that were a continual feature. Alec treated himself for altitude sickness as well as Ephraim, and longed to begin the downward trek.
Throughout the day they remained above or at the snow line, and that night they huddled in a crude travelers shelter without a fire or warmth beyond that which Alec could supply to their bodies. At noon the following day they paused after cresting a ridge, and Chandler pointed to the distant horizon. “We’re going to start to descend now,” he gladdened Alec’s heart by saying. “Those peaks over there are the last ones we’ll go through before we sink down towards Dana. We’re making the fastest passage I’ve ever been on from Jagine to Dana; another two days after today and we should arrive at the city.”
Alec was heartened, and he shared the news with Caitlen through their mental link, speaking to her in the evening as he had done every evening of his journey, when they shared news and feelings. Alec had amused Caitlen greatly with his story of Easton’s proposition to him, making him glad that he could lift her spirits with his tale. He sensed her great loneliness and the stress she felt, and he realized the regret that permeated her thoughts.
Three days later, the three travelers rode their weary horses into town, and rented rooms at an inn. Dana was a mid-sized town, not nearly as large as Vincennes or Valeriane or Krimshelm. It was ruled from a stronghold castle perched on a hill that watched over a large bend in the river below it. The stronghold dominated all the landscape of the town between the castle and the river, a town that spread up and down along the river banks.
I’m in Dana now. I will see you soon, Alec told Caitlen, his mental voice jubilant.
How will you get here? What are you going to do? I will be so happy to see you again! Caitlen replied.
Alec put on a simple white smock, a bandolier of knives
and his sword, then left Chandler and Ephraim at the inn. “You are free to go any time you want,” he had told them. “Or you can stay; the rooms are paid for five days rental. I don’t know when I’ll be back. You have been good companions; travel safely, take it slowly ascending the mountains, and don’t drink the water in Jagine!” he slapped Ephraim’s shoulder playfully, then walked away, headed to the vicinity of the castle where Caitlen had told him she was held.
During his journey Alec had spent a considerable amount of time contemplating what he would do to set Caitlen free. Without his ability to trans-locate he had to either use brutal force or cunning, and he preferred to use cunning. Caitlen had told him that she was allowed to keep a small retinue of her own body guards with her, and she had chosen Bethany and Rahm along with two others, none of whom could escort the princess without a Valeriane escort as well. But they were allowed to leave the castle on their own, and Alec had developed a plan to take advantage of their freedom.
He waited outside the castle entrance. What time did you tell me Rahm would come on duty? He asked Caitlen.
Just a half hour more, she replied, puzzled by the question, but Alec said no more, as he stood and watched the gate.
Bethany! Rahm! He sent a mental message to them as he saw them walking down the street. I’m in the alley across from the castle entrance.
He watched both their heads jerk up, then look at each other, before they looked in his direction. They altered their path and their stride lengthened as they rapidly approached him.
“You are right here in front of them!” Rahm laughed at Alec’s impudence, while Bethany simply hugged him tightly, her eyes moist.
“Come in here and trade clothes with me,” Alec told Rahm.
Five minutes later Bethany stared gap-jawed as two Rahms walked back out. “What is happening here?” she asked.
“You and I are going to walk into the palace to see the Princess,” said Alec’s voice and accent, emerging from the Rahm dressed in an imperial uniform, while the other stood sheepishly silent. “This uniform is tight,” he complained. “I can change my face features, but I can’t make my body smaller!” Alec was slightly taller and slightly heavier than Rahm, and his body remained the same size, even after the transformation Alec had wrought on his face.
“Go back to my inn on Canal Street and wait for me,” Alec told the other Rahm. “I’m not sure how long this will take.” Then together Alec and Bethany entered the castle.
“I’m so glad you came back,” Bethany told Alec as they entered the courtyard of the castle. “Have you been okay? What have you been doing?”
Alec began to recount his adventures for her, beginning with the campaign in Krimshelm, but had only told a small portion of the story before they entered a hallway, where Bethany interrupted him. “That’s Princess Esmere’s room,” she pointed to a room guarded by four guards wearing Valeriane uniforms. “We can go in with her, but if we take her anywhere, they will go with us.”
“You look bigger today,” one of them said casually to Alec, believing he was Rahm. Alec smiled and shrugged, but kept his accented voice silent as he and Bethany were admitted to the suite. Inside Caitlen was pacing restlessly around a spacious room, and Alec stood still to restore his appearance, and to take in the sight of his dearly beloved pregnant princess, who he had not seen in so long.
Caitlen glanced up at their entrance, then continued her pacing, unaware at first that Alec was in the room. Bethany watched Alec transform his visage, and then watched with amusement as Caitlen continued to restlessly stride in front of the large windows that looked out over the garden below her rooms.
“I’m sure the exercise is good for you,” Alec said at last, observing her re-enter the room from another part of the suite.
“Alec?” Caitlen looked at him, as the expression on her face transformed to a radiant smile, and she bustled over to hug him. “You probably can’t even get your arms around me any longer, can you?” she said as they embraced, and she burst into tears.
“Hush, my love,” Alec whispered gently in her ear. He glanced at Bethany, and spoke. “You can leave us. I’ll stay with her,” he said, and the door gently closed a moment later.
“What do we do now?” Caitlen asked Alec after a long silence.
“I will do whatever you think is best for you,” he told her. “I will take you out of here if you want to escape; I will stay with you if you want to stay here,” he said. “I will never leave you again, unless it is to serve you.
“And I want to marry you Caitlen, if you are allowed to marry a foreigner and a commoner like me,” he knelt before her. “I know you told me the decision is yours, but…”
“Oh Alec,” she broke into tears again. “Alec no, not now, not like this – not for this reason,” she protested.
“Caitlen, I’m asking for one simple reason – I love you, and I want to be with you for as long as we can have together,” Alec said. “I went back to my own land, and when everything happened, when I learned all that I went to learn and everything was said, I had a choice. My powers to trans-locate were taken away, and I had to pick where I would live, back there, or over here with you.
“I chose to come back to you – I didn’t come back to this land; I didn’t come back to this war. I came back to you, and I can never go back to the Dominion again,” he told her, both of his hands wrapped around hers. “You are my life, and being married to you is what I imagine my life will be.
“Until I learned the rest of the story of my life, I shouldn’t have asked, but now I know that I am free to marry you, if a foreigner like me is allowed to marry the ruling monarch,” he told her.
“How do I marry you? Do I ask someone for permission? Do we go to a temple?” Alec asked.
“Assuming I ask you,” Caitlen corrected him with a grin, “we could! We could ask to go to a temple to be married, and they couldn’t refuse us the request!” Caitlen said excitedly, her beaming face looking down at Alec. “My answer is yes, of course Alec! No one can prevent me from marrying you!
“I may have mentioned once before that here in our nation it is the prerogative of the woman to ask for marriage, not the man,” Caitlin said. “It might be construed as presumptuous of you to take advantage of the circumstances. When the time is right, you need to let me ask you to marry me,” she said, and Alec shook his head gently as she grinned at his confusion.
“Could we pick any temple we wanted for the wedding?” Alec asked. “Where I come from, we had only one God to worship, one temple that we went to.”
“For royalty, it must be a temple to the sun, the source of light and energy,” Caitlen explained, “or it can be the palace.”
“Oh Alec, I love you!” she impulsively said.
“Caitlen, you know I love you too. You are my motivation. From the time when I didn’t know anything about myself to now, you’ve been the reason I’ve kept going. I’ve followed you, fought for you, come back to you. Now most of all, I want to marry you. Even if it means you eventually have to hide me in the basement of the palace to keep my nasty foreign accent hidden from the court, I want to be your husband,” he told her.
He rose from his knee. “What do we do now?”
“You need to take me to the assembly of nobles and let me announce my plans to marry you,” Caitlen answered.
“And what do we do if they say no? It seems likely that they’ll refuse the request,” Alec answered.
“I can offer to let you challenge them to battle,” Caitlen.
“That sounds easier,” Alec replied with a smile. “How many of them are there?”
“Twelve,” Caitlen told him, a serious expression on her face.
“So we need to force out way into a Council meeting, then I fight them all. Once we’ve beaten them all, won’t we have won the war?” Alec asked. “Can we just go back to Vincennes and get married there?”
“The other claimants to the throne aren’t all united. This Council is under the control of
two of them, but there are others down south, including in Birming. That’s the stronger group of pretenders to the throne. They are the dangerous ones, the ones who want to allow slavery in the empire. They are the ones the rumors credit with controlling strange, unstoppable monsters,” Caitlen answered.
“If you can defeat this Council for me, then we can go back to Vincennes to gather our forces for a march on Birming, and after you win that battle, we’ll just need to go back to Valeriane to make sure there’s no opposition left there,” Caitlen said, then shook her head ruefully and laughed. “Maybe you’d like to go find a less challenging honeymoon?”
“So how long will it be until we’re married?” Alec asked, exasperated. “Two years?”
“We can get married as soon as you defeat this Council,” Caitlen smiled. “Once we have freedom in the city, we’ll be free to be married!”
“Will we be able to have a ceremony of our own, one that makes me feel my God knows?” Alec asked.
“Of course, Alec,” Caitlen said.
“Shall we go right now?” he asked.
“Go? Where?” Caitlen asked. “To the Council?”
“That’s where we have to start, isn’t it?” Alec asked.
“I don’t even know if they’re meeting right now,” Caitlen replied. “I haven’t spoken to them in two weeks. I don’t go out of the suite very often now that my pregnancy is showing so much.”
Ajacii and Demons: The Ingenairii Series Page 12
