by Edun, Terah
“I assure you, I’m not here to mock you,” Sebastian said, lifting his hands in a placating gesture. “You’re quite worthy, believe me.” He looked a bit flustered. “And…and you’re quite…well, beaut…valuable. In fact, the power you loaned me in the Aether is probably only a fraction of your abilities. You saved my life today.”
Ciardis wasn’t yet ready to give in and believe him, but she had been there in the Aether with him, had stood against his foes, and knew that they, at least, believed he was the Prince Imperial. She came back to the couch he stood next to, plopped down, and grabbed a biscuit from the tea service. “Let’s say I decide to believe you, Sebastian Athanos Algardis,” she said, pronouncing each syllable carefully. “How could I possibly help the Prince Imperial? What can I do that your fabled Gardis cannot?”
He sat down beside her as he answered her question with one of his own. “Do you know the history of the kingdom’s formation? Did they teach you of the tie between the first emperor and the land?”
Stiffly, she replied, “I’ve heard of the breaking, yes. The first emperor came from Sahelia, across the seas. He was a powerful protector of his people and loved his land. As emperor he made a pact. Out of this pact rose the Guardians, known as Al-Gardis, and a binding contract to keep the land of Algardis whole and thriving through blood and sweat for as long as his family ruled.”
Sebastian nodded, impressed at her knowledge. “Yes,” he said. “Most are familiar with the Gardis because they are the pact personified—direct descendants of the unions between the first five Emperors and their ladies in the Imperial Halls. They train their entire lives, from birth to death, to protect the land from evil and the people from tyranny.
“But there’s another side to the pact, one drawn in blood,” he continued. “In the first decade of the kingdom’s founding, the emperor faced challenges from all sides. The enemy in the North wanted to wipe out Algardis. The emperor’s dragonkin of Sahelia saw him and his subjects as human chattel to be broken and enslaved, and the kith—natives of the lands that became the kingdom—fought back at every turn, as they were displaced by homesteaders. With his army of just a few thousand soldiers, the first emperor knew that he could not hold back the invaders on all fronts.
“So he made a pact with the spirit of the land, the Land Wight, an elemental of immense power. The Land Wight agreed to create a powerful physical barrier around Algardis for the first one hundred years of its existence, and to protect it from invasions from land, sea, and air. In return, the first emperor agreed to tie his line to the land for its future protection.”
Ciardis wasn’t quite convinced. “So you’re saying that every single emperor since the first emperor Athanos has been tied to the land?”
“Every emperor and Imperial child,” Sebastian clarified.
“And what does that tie mean for the Imperial children?” she questioned.
“Each child,” he said, “is tied to a portion of Algardis that they are connected to from birth. As long as that child is alive and the bond is strong, the land will thrive, crops will flourish, and disease will be abated.”
Ciardis knew plague still pulsed through the land in waves, and people still died, so how could these Imperial children be so powerful if the land lay fallow? Dozens of young ones back home had died last winter, the coldest Vaneis had seen in decades, and she had heard of worse in the far northern reaches of the Kingdom.
“As Imperial heir and the firstborn child of my father,” Sebastian said, tiredly wiping his eyes, “I should be able to protect the whole of Algardis. By birth and by blood, the entire kingdom is and forever will be under my protection. Historically, the more powerful the heir, the better off the land will be, and, by extension, the more powerful the Imperial court will be.”
“What does the nobility have to do with this?” she asked.
He sighed and explained, “Over time, the Imperial line has married into multiple noble families, so they, too, enjoy some of the heritage of the blood ties. In essence, every person with Imperial blood has become a mortal Land Wight, to one extent or another,” he said. “But that heritage and their access to it is tied into the power of the Emperor.”
“I see. But by your logic, they wouldn’t hate the Imperial heir. They need you. You’re their link to power and privilege.” Tilting her head Ciardis said, “Unless you messed that up somehow. What’d you do?”
He gave her a wry grin. “You catch on quickly. My father is getting older, and it’s assumed that I will ascend to the throne within ten years. But I haven’t been able to manifest a connection to the land since I was about five. I have no idea why. Essentially, they believe that I’m blocking their power.”
Ciardis wracked her brain for the history of the last five Emperors as she took a demure sip of tea. “The nobility are right to be worried, I think,” she said. “May the Heavens protect the Emperor. Sadly the past five rulers have rarely lived past fifty years. There’s only one that I can remember, and he died at sixty-two.”
Sebastian nodded. “My grandfather, Cymus. The connection to the land takes a toll on all those who bear it. The nobles are afraid—not without cause, as you say—that I’ll ascend to the throne and, as a consequence, they will lose their power, their connection to their own domains, and will be unable to use those ties to the land to stop the Northern hordes from pouring across the border.”
“They don’t seem too far off the mark.”
“Tell me something I don’t know.” Sebastian grimaced. “I understand their fears, and I’m afraid, too. But I also know something they don’t.” Ciardis looked at him silently, inviting him to continue. “Despite what they think, I’m not completely ignorant of the land; I can feel every vibration, every forest, every mountain, every vale, every swamp. It’s only my ability to manipulate that connection that has dwindled.”
He slumped forward with a hangdog look in his eyes. “I can sense the land, but my ability is out of focus.” Looking at her with a pleading expression—though Ciardis wasn’t sure if he was pleading with her, or some invisible god to answer his prayers—he continued, “The land is there for me, but it’s too powerful for me to grab by myself. If I were still a child, the Land Wight would help me as I slowly regained my heritage, piece by piece. But now, as a man, I must do it without its help.”
Ciardis felt like muttering some choice words about a boy who had yet to shave calling himself a man, but held back. Some clans marked the thirteenth year as the beginning of manhood, and apparently Clan Algardis was one of them. Ciardis looked Sebastian in the eyes and said, “Fine. Let’s say I believe everything—the Land Wight, the heritage, the threat. Why didn’t Lady Serena recognize you for who you really are? She’s been to court plenty of times. You wear no glamour.”
Sebastian shifted uncomfortably as he wrung his hands, much as Serena herself had done earlier. “Actually, I do. It’s not one which effects the actual physical perception, but rather the mind’s understanding of that visual.”
Pulling back a sleeve, he exposed his wrist. A thin bracelet encircled it, similar in make to Ciardis’s moonstone and sapphire anklet. The gemstones were a bit different, but just barely. In fact, it was so similar that Ciardis reached down to pull up her skirt to compare the ornament on her ankle to the one he wore. “I used it to interrupt the connection between what Serena’s eyes saw and what her mind perceived,” Sebastian said. “Rather than change my physical appearance, the Mindas bracelet that I wear on my wrist replaced it.”
“I see. So if you’re the mystery patron who gave me this bracelet, why didn’t you believe me in the Aether Realm?” she said with an angry gesture at the twin piece of jewelry that encircled her ankle.
“Wouldn’t you have doubts about some woman who’d shown up in a forest with no way to verify her claims? Even one who was wearing the correct bracelet? I had no idea what you
looked like.”
Ciardis nearly rolled her eyes as she thought, Great minds think alike, eh?
“Now that I know you are indeed the Weathervane who has all of high society rubbing their hands with glee we can move forward.”
“Move forward?” Ciardis murmured smoothly, taking another sip of tea. “And what, pray tell, would we move forward with?”
“As a prospective patron, I intend to court you and win the contract,” he said with the full arrogance of youth.
“And if I have no intention of being shackled to a fifteen-year-old boy?” she shot back.
“I’ll be sixteen in a month,” he said. Sebastian seemed honestly taken aback by her implied refusal. Most companions would consider it a credit to the Companions Guild to be so hotly pursued, or at the very least suitably impressed to be courted by one of noble—let alone Imperial—blood. “I assure you,” he said curtly, “I can make it worth your while.”
“No, you can’t,” said Ciardis flatly. “I may be inexperienced, but I’m not stupid. Your own courtiers are trying to kill you, and your social standing is next to nil. Any of my other prospective Patrons would be a much more suitable pick, in particular because they want me for me. You need me, but for how long?”
Sebastian opened and closed his mouth. He bit his lip, thinking, apparently trying to come up with something that would convince her to accept his proposal. Then, hesitantly, he said, “You’re right—I’m not offering you a marriage, a family, or a warm hearth to crochet by. I’m offering you an adventure, and a chance to save your Kingdom. Everyone needs something to inspire them, an you really say that managing household accounts will do that for you?”
Ciardis swallowed hard and looked away. His little speech had hit close to home; that was exactly what she had to look forward to if she accepted Barnaren’s proposal, and no doubt many of the other proposals. Household accounts, birthing baby after baby, and decorating. Homemaker and broodmare. Her face twitched slightly as she thought with guilt, Is this any different from what would have awaited me as the wife of Fervis Miller?
Snapping out of her reverie, Ciardis grabbed Sebastian’s wrist, and turned the Mindas bracelet back and forth to look at it, “So you have enough wealth to buy a fancy trinket. What makes you think this will save you?”
Sebastian said stiffly, “These aren’t trinkets. They’re Royal Armory treasures imbued with Residual Magic. You can’t just saunter down to the Fifth Street market and ask for five at a time. With all the spells woven into them, it takes dozens of mages to create either one. It did, in fact.”
“I’m tired of this game,” he announced. Reaching over his shoulders to grab the button flap tying his jacket at his neck he took the cloth from his left shoulder, under his right arm and over his left shoulder revealing bare skin. He turned his back and bared his right shoulder to her. “If I can’t convince you to help me out of loyalty to king and country, perhaps you’ll take legtimacy.”
On his shoulder, Sebastian bore the sigil of the Imperial Courts: a lion rampant before a stone wall. But this sigil was more than it seemed, for in the lion’s mouth was a giant ruby. As he turned back to her, she almost squirmed. Sebastian said, “Before my mother died, she had my father sign an agreement in blood that stated that I could choose and marry whomever I desired. The blood-red marriage stone symbolizes that. If you really want marriage, I can give that to you.”
Ciardis was touched, but her voice was wary as she said, “As sweet as that sounds, we’re going to have to think of something else. Given your age, some would say that I…influenced you unduly as an older woman. Nevertheless, I swear to you, Prince Sebastian Athanos Algardis, that I will help you in your quest to vanquish your enemies.”
He refastened his waist jacket, looking pleased, as Ciardis said, “If I’m to help you, Your Highness, I’ll need to know exactly what you desire of me. Surely a beautiful woman on your arm is not enough to ward off assassins.”
“As you remember from our time in the Aether Realm, it certainly isn’t. What I need from you is not your beauty or grace, but your talent. As the only Weathervane born in nearly four decades, you are my only hope to harness the Land Wight’s gift and restore my power.”
“My talent is to raise another person’s power, Your Grace. You said that you have none.”
“’Your Grace’ is what you call a duke,” he corrected her. “At the very least, you must call me ‘Your Highness,’ or better yet, ‘Your Imperial Majesty.’” Her eyes flashed, and he quickly said, “Joking—just joking. Okay? And as much as it pains me to say so, you’re wrong about my power. I didn’t say I had none, I said I can’t access it. I know it’s there, and bountiful. If anything, the jump to my palace apartment from the Aether Realm proved that. You enhanced what I thought had been permanently locked away. Otherwise, we would have never gotten out of the Aether Realm alive. After all, the bracelet you wear is keyed only to you, not to myself. And before you ask, no, Weathervanes cannot enhance the power that already resides in residual magical objects – whatever level of power it has been imbued with is the one it will stay with.”
She got up and began to pace again. “So are you offering Patronage or asking for a one-time boost?”
He rubbed his head tiredly. “Gods, I don’t know. I need to search the royal libraries again. I don’t think you’ll be able to enhance my powers permanently without a constant link, but I’m not sure. Do you know if a link is needed?”
“I will have to ask around,” she said.
At that moment, the clock tolled the half-hour, and Lady Serena came back into the room, true to her word. Beaming, she said, “I do hope you two had a productive conversation.”
Ciardis nodded primly. Sebastian bowed and said, “Yes, very. I’m eager to see Ms. Vane again during the Hunt.”
“Very well, Viscount Marce,” said Lady Serena. “Shall I escort you out?”
He nodded in agreement and took Ciardis’s hand, kissing it lightly. She couldn’t help but wrinkle her nose as he left. Prince Imperial or not, Sebastian’s hand-kissing technique, a bit too much saliva was involved, left a lot to be desired.
Chapter 11
The next morning Ciardis decided to take advantage of the seasonal opening of the Imperial gardens. Once every four months the Emperor decreed the court gardens were open to all who desired entrance. Ciardis scribbled a note to Serena and Damias to inform them of where she’d gone and that she’d be back in time for this afternoon’s lessons in the gardens.
Taking the tuk-tuk she came to the garden’s gate. Seeing the sign that asked for a bit of coin to offset the cost of repairs after public displays, she gave the garden assistant a few shillings as she passed through the entrance. Deciding she wanted the freedom to wander alone with her thoughts she avoided the group of newcomers heading for a servant who would guide them around.
Soon she was walking on a path that was empty except for the rustle of winds and the beautiful plants that adorned it. An hour into her wandering, she noticed that she was in an older part of the gardens with huge sycamore trees that had roots that arced from the ground. Ducking under a root the height of a human, she found an old palace gate on the other side - rusted over but unlocked.
Deciding to take a peak Ciardis walked through the hallways occasionally touching a marble bust with cobwebs caked over it and fabric draped from the windows which had long ago begun rotting.
I must be in the old Imperial Palace.
Just before she turned a corner she heard voices up ahead. Deciding now was not the time to make her unsanctioned presence known she ducked back around the corner and into an unused nook behind a very large suit of dragon armor.
The voices came closer.
“Milady, the time is almost near,” said a man, “Soon the boy will be fully discredited. You will take your rightful place.”
“With you by my side – I assume Martieaus,” said a woman’s calculating voice.
“I live only to serve, milady,” he said.
“Yes, do remember who you truly serve here. It is not my fool brother and certainly not that brat of a nephew.”
As they passed her Ciardis only saw their backs. They reached the far end of the corridor from where Ciardis hid and parted ways.
Ciardis waited quietly for a long time before she emerged from her spot behind the armor. Rushing back she ran out of the gate and under the sycamore’s roots. Her dress was ruined with the trailing cobwebs and dust but she didn’t even consider that.
As she slowed her fast pace down upon reaching the normal gardens she tried to recall exactly what she had heard. She really wasn’t sure. Who was that woman? A feeling of fear crept up Ciardis spine until she almost screamed aloud when she felt a hand grip her wrist.
She did startle and whirl around though.
“Easy lass,” said a man who stood in front of her, “I mean you no harm.”
He held his hands out to show how harmless he was. It didn’t help – he was a man with towering stature. But her training kicked in.
“Of course milord,” Ciardis, “It is I who should be apologizing. I was merely startled.”
He gave her a grin and bow, “Lord Aaron, at your service my dear.”
Ciardis couldn’t have been more mortified. Here she stood with cobwebs on her dress and dirt in her hair – before quite a handsome man. Once just ONCE why can’t I be like Prima? Perfectly presentable every minute of every day.
Gathering her pride and displaying a sunny smile took a lot of courage but Ciardis managed it. “It’s a pleasure to meet your acquaintance milord. I am Ciardis Weathervane and I do believe you’ve caught me on a bad day.”
