by T J Trapp
Alec, you must listen to me, Erin thought earnestly. Feel with me, and start directing the energy to where I tell you it feels right. Alec nodded weakly. He tried to shape the flow of energy as she directed, and slowly the two started to have a little success. The energy started to feel right.
✽✽✽
By morning when the sun rose, Alec was alive and conscious. He had beaten the poison but was very weak.
“You did it, Erin,” he said. “You saved me.”
“No, we did it,” she said, fingering his hand and his rings. “It took us both, but you are alive.”
They sat together for a long while. Finally, a figure entered the morgue. Erin looked up; Alec was still too weak to move much.
“Mother!” said Erin, surprised to see the Queen at this dismal place. “I sense that things are not right with you.”
“Everything is wrong,” the Queen said sadly. “Brun sent me here to fetch you. He said that you had all night to mourn your Consort, and that was more than enough time.”
“Mother!”
“Six of Brun’s henchmen are waiting outside to take us back – you must come with me, or things won’t go well for either of us, I fear. He sent Ferd off on some task, so my royal guard wasn’t around this morning to protect me. I asked for a few moments alone with you and your Consort before we leave his dead body here.”
“They only got one thing wrong,” said Alec.
The Queen jumped, startled, and looked at her son-in-law.
“You live!” she exclaimed.
“It seems that way,” Alec rejoined, with a faint grin.
“Quiet!” whispered the Queen. “If Brun’s men know you are still alive they will finish you off!”
“Mother, what is going on? How did Brun know Alec had been poisoned? Or was it he who …”
The Queen nodded, and cut her off with a wave of her hand.
“Yes, of course, it was Brun. I wonder now if this whole ‘War Council’ was just a charade to get us away from Theland. Brun has some sort of arrangement with the ruling Gott nobles.” The Queen rubbed her neck, shaking her head.
“Brun gloated over your ‘death,’” the Queen said to Alec. “He insisted in telling me all about it, and how clever he was. But he said he was disappointed in the assassin. He said he thought he had paid for the best, and the fool botched the job.
“I wonder how much he paid? And did it come from my royal coffers?”
“Assassin,” moaned Erin. “I should have known.”
“The assassination was supposed to happen later last night in a quiet moment, away from the crowds, so that people would think you were drunk and died in a fall or something. But that’s not what the cur did – I guess he got excited at the prospect of killing you in a big moment, so he jumped you during the height of the festivities. But, Brun said it didn’t really matter that it happened where everyone could see, because now all would know you were dead. And, he said, no one ever survives blue thorn poison.” She looked at Alec fondly. “Except you, apparently.”
“What do we do now?” asked Erin, shaking her head. The Queen arched her eyebrows and reached for her daughter.
“We must go with them,” she said. “And quickly. If they think I have taken too long, and come in here and find Alec alive, he will be killed outright. I sense malice and treachery in Brun, but not murderous intentions toward you, my daughter.”
“I will need your help, my love,” said Erin to Alec, kissing his forehead. “Try to recover as much strength as you can.”
“Okay,” said Alec. “Will do.” Then as an afterthought, “Can you get them to bring my staff here?” Coffee would be nice, too.
“Yes,” said the Queen, thinking quickly. “I can tell the mortician on the way out that Erin’s request is to have your staff laid beside your dead body. He will do that.”
Queen Therin and Erin walked out of the morgue to the waiting thugs.
Alec lay on the cold hard morgue slab drawing as much healing dark energy as he could. He could no longer feel the rightness that Erin could sense, but he could flood himself with energy in his own way.
✽✽✽
The Queen and Erin were escorted by Brun’s men to a small building some distance away from the palace. Brun waited inside. The guardsmen brought the Queen and Erin to him, roughly shoving them through the door of Brun’s chamber.
“Take her away,” he said to his men, pointing at his Queen. “You know the plan.” Two of the men took the Queen by the arms and half drug, half pulled, her across the floor and out the door.
Mother! Erin mentally cried in anguish, as the Queen was taken away.
Erin was left with Brun and his remaining henchmen. Erin thought about trying to fight them, even though she was still wearing her blood-stained gown and had no weapons with her.
It would be close, she thought, but they will be ready and expecting me to try something. Unarmed, I probably can’t take four of them. They are also probably better trained in unarmed fighting than me. I wish I had worked harder to master unarmed combat.
Brun interrupted her thought. “We are at war, Little Princess, so your mourning time is over,” he sneered. “Time for action. First, we need to get your fate settled.
“Understand that if you don’t do exactly what I command, your mother, Queen Therin, and your brother, the esteemed Colin, will be dead. However, if you behave, and do as I tell you to do, then I will let them live.”
Erin could sense the truth of his statement.
“I have two choices,” Brun said, stroking his beard. “When you returned to Theland last year when you were supposed to be dead, you messed up my plans. And you coming up with your ‘Wizard’ Consort didn’t help, either. But, now that your Consort is dead, things are a little easier.” He stepped forward and put one hand under her chin, tilting her face towards his.
“Choice Number One, I can kill your mother, the Queen, and then consort with you. I don’t really like that choice because it means I would have to ride you enough times to have a handful of whelps and then wait for them to grow up.” He took his hand from her face, seemingly bemused by her dismay at this first choice.
“But, I don’t like hard skinny girls like you, although it would be the ultimate insult to your father to ride you a few times.” He snickered.
“You killed my father, didn’t you?” Erin shot back, her dark eyes blazing.
“Of course.” Brun smiled. “A good slow-acting poison works wonders! I would have done the same with your mother if your Consort hadn’t shown up and saved her. A few more days and my little Amelia would have been Queen, and things would have been fine.”
“You killed Leonder, also, didn’t you,” Erin accused, remembering the questionable circumstances surrounding the death of her lost love.
“No,” Brun replied, returning to his chair. “That was totally Brunder’s dumb idea. I had better plans, but my son Brunder, he always did stupid things.” He looked at Erin, clearly enjoying recounting her former lover’s fate. “Brunder told me that he and some of his friends ‘borrowed’ your little plaything one afternoon and took him out into the woods. They dropped him into a pit with a wild boar. Then they goaded the boar with their spears until it was angry enough to attack your sweet boyfriend and gore him.” Brun smiled. “Brunder said the first time around, the boar only injured Leonder, so they had to poke the boar a few more times to make him mad enough to go after your little friend and finish him off.” Brun pressed his fingertips together, eyeing Erin, looking for her reaction. She remained stone-faced.
“But that was Brunder’s way. Brash. Stupid. That is not my style. I would have been much more clever. Much. My spies knew of you and your mother’s plans, and the sneaky way you were going to announce your intent to consort with Leonder while Brunder was away. Since you wouldn’t play fair about consorting, it made it harder to get you consorted to Brunder,” Brun continued, eager to show how clever he would have been.
“I would have ta
ken Brunder on our hunt. Then you would have announced your asinine consort decision. Brunder and I would have made an unexpected return to town the next day, in time to challenge your proposed consort arrangement. When Brunder won the challenge against your little weakling, you would have been legally consorted to Brunder. Then, I would have worked with you until you were obeying my directions. If you turned out to be too stubborn, after you had your girl-pup, I would have poisoned you off.” He stood up.
“But enough about your foolishness in the past. Back to business. Time is wasting.” He strode towards Erin.
“Choice Number Two. Let me remind you that your mother’s life is at stake, depending on how you answer. Your second choice is to abdicate to my daughter Amelia.” Erin struggled to show no emotion. “We will write your abdication note here, today, now,” said Brun.
“And if I choose neither option?”
Brun shrugged.
“Then your mother – our dear Queen – is dead. Simple.” He crossed his arms and glared at Erin.
“You have only a few moments to decide, because I told them to take your mother to the woods and poison her if they didn’t hear from me by the time the tower’s shadow crosses the front path. It is already half-way there. We will blame your mother’s poisoning on the same rogue assassins who poisoned your Consort.”
Erin could feel the sincerity in his statement. She glared at Brun, then sighed deeply. She knew she was defeated.
I can’t let Mother die.
“All right,” she said, tossing her head back. “You win. I will write the abdication note.”
She wrote in her hand what he dictated:
“‘After the death of my Consort, I will no longer rule. I thereby renounce all rights to be Queen of Theland, and abdicate from all other positions of responsibility.’”
“Is that all?” she asked.
“No, a little more. I don’t want you hanging around the Residence in Theland.” Brun smiled at her, or leered.
“‘I will remain in Gott for some time with my True Love. Signed: Erin, Princess of Theland.’ Got that?”
Erin nodded.
“Good. You have one minute to spare.” He handed the signed note to one of his men. “Get the scribes to make a copy for me, and then take the Queen away as we planned.”
“Take her away? You said you would let her go free!” Erin exclaimed.
“Free? No, I said I wouldn’t kill her – just now, anyway.” Brun laughed.
“Now what? What are you going to do with me?” Erin asked. “You know you can’t get away with this.”
Her step-father chuckled.
“I’m going to make sure you are happy for the rest of a nice long life, my dear Princess. I have just the thing arranged for you, while you are still of breeding age.” Her leaned in, close to her face. “And no, I don’t want to kill you. The Queen would discover the truth. If I have you safely stashed away where only I can find you, then I can use you as a hostage to ensure the Queen’s good behavior.” He stepped back. “Besides, your premature death might place in question the legitimacy of Amelia’s rule, at least in the minds of any of your mother’s loyalists who still remain in Theland.”
Erin clenched her fists, keeping her arms by her side.
“Take her away,” Brun said to two of the men, wheeling away from Erin. Brun’s guardsmen grabbed Erin by her arms and forced her down the hall and into a dingy room; they shoved her into the dark space, slammed the door behind her, and locked it with a loud ‘click!’ She sat on a small stool, in the half-light of the cell, and cradled her head in her arms, her sleeves still stained with Alec’s blood.
20 – Lord Rawl
Oh, my darling Alec. Maybe he was close enough to sense her thoughts. She fingered her diamond band that Alec called her ‘wedding ring.’ Things keep getting worse, Erin thought.
She sat in the room for most of the day. A lone ray of sunlight from the sole high window filtered through the dust and cobwebs. A man came once and slid some food in; she was hungry, so she ate even though the food was cold and stale. I hope I’m not eating poison, she thought dully. She slept fitfully off and on. Late in the afternoon two guardsmen came to get her. They grabbed her by the arms, slashed the bloody sleeves off her dress, attached one set of manacles to her wrists, and a second set to her ankles. Then they escorted her across an open commons towards a different building.
“Where are we going? What is happening?” Erin said, grimacing from their rough hold on her arms.
“We are just following orders,” one said. “They said to take you over there. We don’t know why.”
“Now be quiet,” said the other thug, shaking her.
They stopped in front of a small building with arched doorways and old tapestries hanging in its entry foyer. For a moment, Erin thought she caught a glimpse of someone leaning on a staff in the archway shadows, but it might merely have been a statue or a carved column, she realized.
“Good afternoon, Princess,” Brun said to her with a carefully posed gesture of goodwill and a toothy smile. An older man stood near him, dressed in the robes and floppy hat of a Gott noble. At Brun’s command, Erin was pulled into the small room, with Brun and the nobleman following. The two guardsmen shoved Erin to the front of the room, and turned her to face the nobleman, continuing to hold her. Brun awkwardly arranged Erin’s dress, pulling it more tightly across her torso and hiding the soiled spots in the folds of her skirt. He looked back at the older man, smiling.
What a phony, thought Erin, sneering at him.
“This? This is what you are offering me?” the older gentleman said, looking Erin up and down.
“Princess, this is Lord Rawl,” Brun said, still smiling through his clenched teeth. “He lives in the far reaches of Gott, and needs a young consort. He is a man of wealth and high status. I have offered you to him to ensure your safety and comfort. We are working a deal. You will be pleased.”
“I will never agree,” said Erin, her eyes flashing. In the nick of time, she stopped herself from spitting at his feet.
“Ah, my Little Princess, but you don’t have to,” Brun said, menacingly. “In the fair land of Gott, the maiden’s father can agree to the consort arrangement. As your step-father I have that right. And, I may say, duty.” He stepped back, regaining his false smile, and gestured around the room, with its elaborate carvings, statues, and tapestries. “This is a consorting temple. Nice idea; we don’t have anything like this in Theland. Potential consorts come here, look each other over, and then agree to the arrangement.” He stepped back towards Erin and took her arm with a paternal stroke. “All we will need, my dear ‘daughter,’ is a drop of your blood, my blood, and the Lord’s blood on the final seal, and then everything will be legal.” He smiled triumphantly.
Lord Rawl looked her over, appraising this piece of merchandise.
“This is what you are giving me?” he said in a rasping, squeaky voice. “I was expecting more.” He ran his hand up the back of her leg under her dress, grabbed her rear, and squeezed. Erin flinched but the two guards held her steady.
“She is taller than me. Too tall.” He felt her hair, her arms, her back. “She is so skinny and hard.” He sniffed. “I was expecting something shorter and softer, more curves. Prettier.”
“She is a Princess,” Brun said, impatiently, “and I am paying you a fortune to take her.”
Lord Rawl walked around to Erin’s face, grabbed her jaw, forced her mouth open, and peered at her teeth. Erin tried to kick the older man, but Brun stepped on her leg manacles, preventing her leg from moving. If the Lord noticed her disrespect, he made no notice of it.
“Good teeth at least.”
Lord Rawl ran his hand over her breasts and squeezed each roughly.
“She is so flat!” He stepped back for Erin and turned to Brun. “You aren’t paying enough for me to take her. I need more!”
“All right – how about another ten pieces of gold?” said Brun.
“I need a
t least another thirty,” said the Lord. The two men continued to dicker for a few minutes.
“What do you think I am – a prize cow?” said Erin in disgust.
“You think of yourself too highly if you think you rate with his prize cows,” Brun growled. She could see Lord Rawl nodding in agreement.
“She is too impertinent. I fear she will try to run away,” said Lord Rawl. “What happens if she runs home to you?”
“If you discipline her properly she will not run,” Brun said. “But if she does, we will follow Gott laws since she is your consort and consorted in Gott. Here, runaway consorts are supposed to be returned,” he said for Erin’s benefit. “I promise that I will return her if she runs away to us. However, I might try her a few times before I send her back,” Brun added, leering at Erin.
“I might have to just hobble her up front, you know – but that will cost me more money,” the Lord whined.
Brun looked at Erin.
“My ‘daughter,’ you might not know the customs in Gott. Here, they know how to make their women behave.
“Women consorts are the man’s property, of course. A man has the right to use reasonable force to make you women behave. In the countryside, where you will be living with Lord Rawl, they follow local customs. If a woman tries to run away she can be hobbled – usually by cutting the Achilles’ tendon in the rear of one leg, right above the heel. Some women wear a leather boot to hobble around, after they heal, but they can’t go very far. I know that you are fleet of foot. I’m sure that you wouldn’t want that to happen to you.” Brun took her hand. “Just so you know, if a woman tries to fight her man, all her fingers will be crushed. I’m sure that would hurt.” He looked directly into her eyes. “And of course, Gott women do not carry weapons.
“If you behave well, and do as Lord Rawl tells you, then you will have a good life. A little songbird in a golden cage, as it were.” Brun dropped her hand. “But if you don’t … if you disobey him, I’m sure that Lord Rawl will do what it takes to make you behave. His interest in you is for breeding, not your charming personality. He is buying the fact that the pups you spit out for him will have a royal bloodline.”
