“I’ve had training. I can shoot a bow,” the princess protested.
“Give that woman a bow,” Kestrel said, standing and leaning on his staff. “And arrows,” he added.
Minutes later, the four of them left the house and started to make cautious progress along the route, slowing down to the pace of Kestrel’s painful limp.
“The princess tells us that you screamed at her to shut up,” Alicia spoke after a silent pause.
Kestrel thought back, trying to remember.
“It was when we were on those steps at the end, when the monsters and the rebels and the sprites were all coming at once, and you were invisible,” the princess explained hastily. “And I’m not mad or complaining; I’m sure I was loud. I was hysterical by then, and with good reason, I think,” she added.
“If he ever told me to shut up, he’d have to sleep with one eye open,” Lucretia said.
“Why is that? Do you have access to his bed?” Alicia asked innocently.
“Pshaw!” Lucretia exclaimed. “He’s too much of a pretty boy for me now,” a brief grin slipped across her face.
“He is attractive, isn’t he?” the princess asked blithely, as though Kestrel weren’t present. “The courtiers at the palace would be so jealous of him if they saw him.”
“Well, the difference is that he’s useful at times, not like those courtiers,” Alicia added. “He’s high maintenance though,” she added.
“There’s someone up ahead,” Kestrel interrupted the banter, pointing towards an apparent checkpoint at a crossroads. “They don’t have red robes on.”
“Let’s be careful anyway,” Lucretia urged.
“Halt right there! Who are you?” one of the guards asked as they approached, both men pointing bows at them when they were still fifty feet away.
“My name is Lucretia, and I live in the house by the paintshop,” she explained. “My friends and I were attacked by men in red robes a few hours ago, and we’ve decided to come see what’s happening on the base.”
“I’ve heard of you; you’re the one who got away from the humans,” one guard said. “Who are the others?”
“I’m Kestrel, returned from duty out west, and this is my doctor, while this is our friend from the palace,” he remained deliberately vague.
“Where are you heading?” the other guard asked.
“Anywhere there’s someone in command,” Kestrel answered.
“There isn’t anyone; no one higher than a lieutenant, anyway. Most of the officers were gone from the base, or at the palace, or killed by the rebels,” the first guard answered.
“Go to the command center. You’ll be safe there. As far as we can tell, the rebels on the base have all been wiped out now and we’re in control. There were a couple of big battles around the command center as a matter of fact,” he continued, and he waved them on by as the two guards lowered their weapons, and resumed searching for other potential problems, unaware that they had let a former prisoner and the princess of the realm walk past them.
At the command center they found a work crew laboring to stack the bodies of dead rebels in a cart, the bodies to be carried off and disposed of.
“Hey,” a voice called authoritatively. “You, walking with the staff, stop,” a voice said.
Kestrel and his companions turned to see four men in uniform walking purposefully towards them, as a lieutenant led three rank and file guard members, two carrying torches.
“You’re the archer who broke the siege of the command center! I recognize you,” one of the guards spoke up. Kestrel peered through the evening gloom and recognized the elf as one of the two who had joined him in firing at the rebels earlier in the day.
“We feared you had died. These men had great things to say about you,” the lieutenant spoke. “Where did you get injured?”
“After the battle here I went to the palace,” Kestrel said matter- offactly. “I found the princess, and brought her back here,” he motioned to Elwean, who stood behind him.
“Your majesty?” the lieutenant recognized her face, focusing on her for the first time instead of simply seeing another uniform. He bowed, as did his squad, stunned to discover a royal refugee upon their ordinary military base.
“You’re safe here now; we’ll take care of you until we find out how safe the palace is,” he said as he rose.
“Is my father safe?” the princess asked.
“The king is rumored to be safe, protected by a number of palace guards. You were rumored to have been taken hostage by a large number of rebels and removed from the palace,” the lieutenant said. “There are guards out combing the city trying to find you.”
“Oh gracious! I need to get back to the palace to let father know I’m safe. Can you arrange an immediate escort?” the princess asked politely, but used an authoritative tone that brooked no refusal.
And so, minutes later, as Lucretia returned to her own home with a squad to remove her dead assailants, the princess, accompanied by Kestrel and Alicia and a dozen other guards, strode along the streets of the city. They travelled at Kestrel’s slow pace. Alicia retrieved the last remaining skin of healing water from her office, secured as they passed the building, and saved it to dose Kestrel once they reached the palace and determined it was secure.
The city showed few signs of damage from the battles with the rebels, and once the princess’s squad reached the palace, they learned that the whole palace was secure, and that in all of the city, only the military base and the palace had been targeted for the attack. Once Princess Elwean was delivered to and recognized in the palace, she was rushed off to a reunion with her father, while those who had escorted her to the palace were left waiting in a sitting room, with guards outside the door.
Minutes after the princess was returned, a messenger arrived to speak with the squad that had escorted her, and dismissed them all to return to their base, except for Alicia and Kestrel, who were invited to spend the night at the palace, in a luxurious room with two beds.
Kestrel insisted on pushing a bureau in front of the door for the evening as a precaution, then went and lay on his bed at Alicia’s insistence, as she tended his wounded leg once again.
“You don’t appear to have damaged the leg any more by walking all the way over here. This healing water is so miraculous,” she told him as she gently swabbed his leg with a cloth that was damp with water from the spring. “What do you think they’re going to do with us? Will they put me back in prison?” she asked, looking up at him.
“I don’t think so,” Kestrel guessed. “They would have done that already if they intended to, instead of putting you in a luxurious room in the palace.”
“It’s not as nice as your room in Estone,” she smiled at him. “Just think about all that I would have missed if I had stayed up there!”
“Is that good or bad?” Kestrel asked with a laugh.
They went to sleep in their separate beds, and each slept soundly, until they were abruptly awoken in the morning by the sound of a servant unsuccessfully trying to enter their room, unable to budge the furniture that blocked the door from opening inward.
“Just a moment,” Kestrel called, and he hopped out of bed, able to move with relative ease on his rapidly healing leg. He moved the furniture as Alicia sat up sleepily and watched, and then they were both astonished to see a tray of breakfast food wheeled into their room.
“Compliments of his highness, and he hopes that you will join him and his cabinet for a discussion in an hour’s time,” the serving man said calmly as he delivered the meal to them, then left the room.
An hour later, well-fed and cleaned up, Alicia and Kestrel followed a member of the palace guard to a room on the upper floor of the palace, lit by a skylight, where Kestrel recognized the princess and Elder Miskel and the king, but knew none of the other seven men who sat around the table.
To the surprise of all, the king stood when Kestrel entered the room, and everyone one else hurriedly stood as well, their eyes me
eting one another’s in astonishment at the alteration of protocol.
“You are most welcome to join us today, Lord Kestrel,” King Standoll spoke. “My daughter has described your extraordinary abilities and efforts that you used to rescue her from death yesterday, and Elder Miskel has also indicated that you tried to raise the alarm about the nature of the enemy we faced before all the trouble erupted yesterday.”
“Thank you, your highness,” Kestrel said in relief, glad to know that Elder Miskel had spoken up on his behalf.
“Your highness,” one of the men spoke up in a puzzled tone, “what estate does Lord Kestrel hold domain over, to hold his title?”
“As of this morning, all those lands that formerly were the estates of Sir Chandel are now the property of Lord Kestrel,” the king replied, “those lands that border along the Swampy Morass and the River Criess and the manor in Oaktown.”
Alicia’s hand grabbed Kestrel’s shoulder, and squeezed tightly.
“Your majesty is very kind,” Kestrel replied. “I don’t know what to say,” he admitted, speechless at the thought of being a lord. He would be the neighbor to Jonson’s people in the Morass, he thought first of all, a concept that made him smile.
“We’re glad to see you can smile at your newly-granted boon,” Miskel said. “His majesty gave just rewards to someone who has done great works on behalf of our nation, though perhaps no one knew of your work at the time.
“Just yesterday, only minutes before the attack on the palace began, Kestrel,” Miskel paused, “Lord Kestrel,” he corrected himself, “was warning us of the forces of Uniontown, with their monster lizards and their evil new gods. We saw that danger come to near fruition, and we suffered many losses and much damage from the Uniontown efforts to overthrow our nation’s rulers.
“We have to be aware of this, and be prepared to fight this terrible new enemy in ways that are not traditional, I expect. Is that true, my lord?” he asked Kestrel.
Kestrel was flustered and unprepared. “I didn’t anticipate that we’d walk into such a deep and important discussion this morning, sir, and I don’t know that I can really put the things I know and feel into words very well.
“I have seen these red robes of Uniontown in many nations, and I know they bring evil intentions everywhere they arrive,” he began. “And they apparently infiltrated dangerously high into our own nation’s leadership. Who was responsible for removing Colonel Silvan from office?”
“Chandel, Strab, Graebe, and Treeso were the ones who demanded he be sent into exile,” one of the men spoke up.
“I know Chanel and Strab are dead,” Kestrel responded. “If the others aren’t, they should be.
“Bring Colonel Silvan back to Center Trunk, and trust him to run the operations against Uniontown,” Kestrel said. “And kill all of the monster lizards that you see. They’re in the rivers here – the red robes were going to throw the princess to them.
“And let me go back among the humans, and try to find friends for us there. The humans are just as divided by the traitors of Uniontown as we nearly were. I can talk with humans who would be our allies against Uniontown,” he argued passionately.
“You want us to be allies with humans? With nations like Hydrotaz?” one of the ministers asked facetiously.
“Yes!” Kestrel cried. “I know the new princess who may already be on the throne, taking over control of that nation right now. She is fighting the Uniontown occupation of her country by Graylee. I think she would welcome help from us in a fight against Graylee.”
“So you would have us send our guard members out to fight on the open plains? Didn’t Miskel say that you opposed that idea?” another figure at the table asked.
“There are mountains and cities and woods where our men can fight in better terrain,” Kestrel said. “Perhaps we could even fight alongside some of the Hydrotaz soldiers. And there are many different battles that we all are going to face; this is going to be a campaign, not just a battle.”
“If Kestrel believes this is worth exploring, and if he found Hydrotaz willing to accept our support, I would ask for volunteers, provided he serves with them, leads them, and translates for them, to venture onto human territory,” Miskel spoke up in support, drawing looks of surprise from the others around the table.
“Father,” princess Elwean leaned towards her father and spoke urgently in a soft voice that was nonetheless intelligible to everyone in the room, “I trust him. He suffered injury to save me from a terrible situation where no one else could have succeeded. I’ve seen and listened to him with his friends, like the lady Alicia here, and he is a man with a good heart, as well as extraordinary weapons. He is favored by the gods! We have to trust him.”
Everyone in the room was silent, waiting as the king sat and considered the questions before him. “Lord Kestrel, go to your home in Oaktown, and make yourself known to your new subjects. Then return here, with Colonel Silvan, so that he may resume his duties,” the king said. “We will proceed to cleanse away the traitors and the monsters in the meantime. Elder Miskel, I’ll leave that in your hands. Come back to see me tomorrow with your plans for how we begin.
“Everyone is dismissed for now,” the king finished the meeting abruptly.
Alicia tugged on Kestrel’s shoulder, and whispered in his ear.
“Your majesty,” Kestrel spoke up, attracting everyone’s attention. “I would ask for two favors – would you grant clemency to Alicia, and remove the death sentence that awaits her?”
“It shall be done,” the king said, “as a favor to you. What else would you ask?”
“Rather than head straight to Oaktown, Alicia and I would like to take our friend Lucretia to her hometown of Karbeen, even though it may delay our arrival at Oaktown. We will travel as quickly as possible, I promise.”
“Will you take that human creature, your horse, as a means of travel?” Standoll asked.
“We will,” Kestrel answered.
“Don’t scare too many of our subjects with that monster,” the king grinned. “Travel safely, travel quickly, and come back soon with Colonel Silvan.”
Kestrel and Alicia bowed along with everyone else as the king and princess left the room. Elder Miskel immediately crossed the room to meet Kestrel. “Bring Silvan back as quickly as you can. If there’s anything we can do to help speed your trip along, let me know.”
“It’s only midday,” Kestrel answered. “Maybe we can begin our journey over the roads yet today.”
“Safe travels then, Kestrel,” Miskel said. “I think you’ve got a very long journey ahead of you, much farther than just to Oaktown and back. And I know we need to see you succeed, if the elven nation is going to survive intact.”
Coming in 2013
“Road of Shadows”
The Inner Seas Kingdom Series Volume 3
The Inner Seas Kingdoms: 02 - The Yellow Palace Page 38
