Ferus : Book 6 of the Heku Series (33 page)

Zohn frowned, “I still
want to know what Laythan is up to… what caused all of
this?”

“He really wanted to go dancing?” Dustin
suggested.

The Cavalry matched
Emily’s speed as they walked to their barracks. No one was in a
very happy mood after the accusations by Laythan.

“Where’s his area?” Emily
asked, stepping into the Cavalry’s barracks.

“Over here… but we can get
it, Em,” Silas said, and sat down at a chair to start gathering
Laythan’s clothes into a bag.

“I’m already here…
besides, I read it was the Commander’s responsibility,” she said,
and smiled. She sat down on the floor and started packing up his
books.

“You ok then? After that?”

She nodded, “Irritated I guess.”

“No one agrees with him,”
Jaron said, and hauled out the mattress. Emily looked over at the
bed frame and saw a wooden box sitting under the bed. She pulled it
out and flipped it over.

“What’s this?” she asked,
running her hand over the rune etched into the top. It looked to
her like an arrow with two of the feathers pointing toward the
arrow-head instead of away from it.

Silas glanced over, “That’s the Nordic rune
for love.”

Emily grinned, “Laythan
has a girlfriend?”

“Not that I know of,”
Kralen said, and started going through Laythan’s
dresser.

“Well… I’m just nosey
enough to open this,” she said, and pulled at the lock. “Anyone
have a screw driver?”

Jaron reached over and pulled the lock off
easily with his fingers.

“Thanks,” Emily told him,
and opened the lid. Her face fell as she saw the top picture. It
was an 8x10 black and white photo of her on horseback. She flipped
it aside and the picture beneath was a smaller color photo of her
swimming alone in the pool.

“So is his girlfriend
cute?” Kralen asked, grinning. He turned to look at Emily, and she
was quickly going through the photographs, frowning. “What’s
wrong?”

“It’s…” she managed to
say, and quickly read a hand-written note she’d once left for
Sam.

“What?” Kralen asked, and
sat down. He picked a handful of pictures from the pile and gasped,
“Mark…”

“What now?” Mark asked, turning around.
Kralen handed the pictures up to Mark as Emily continued to look
through them.

“Oh my God!” she yelled as
she held a picture in her shaking hand. The black and white picture
showed her asleep in bed, Dain as a newborn was curled up next to
her.

“Get the Elders and clear
out the barracks,” Mark said, motioning for Silas and Kralen to
stay as Jaron blurred to the council chambers.

“What’s this?” Emily
asked, and held a picture up to Mark. This one was a full color
photograph of her from the chest up, and someone had drawn puncture
marks on her neck with red pen.

“Fantasy, I’m guessing,”
Mark said, and took the picture from her.

“This one’s a note I wrote to Chev a long
time ago… told him I went to get my hair cut. Why would he have
this?”

“Is there a problem?” Zohn
asked when the Elders arrived.

Emily kept looking through
the odd assortment of items in the box while Mark filled the Elders
in. She picked up a leather glove, one that she’d lost a few months
earlier, and set it down on the growing pile beside her.

“Let me see,” Chevalier
said, and picked up the stack of pictures.

“Where is he?” Quinn asked.

“He left immediately, didn’t even come back
here,” Mark said. “He has to know we’d find this stuff.”

“He might have assumed we’d ship it to him
and not go through it.”

“Well… I wouldn’t have gone through it…
but…”

Quinn nodded, “But Emily found it.”

“Track him down… I want
him,” Chevalier said. Silas and Kralen disappeared to gather the
Cavalry to search for Laythan.

Emily finally dropped the pictures in her
hand and stood up. She glanced once more at the stack of personal
items and headed for the door.

“Em?” Chevalier called. “Where are you
going?”

“To sleep,” she told him,
and walked out of the barracks.

“For now,” Mark said, irritated. “That’s one
huge personal violation.”

***

Emily woke up and glanced over at the clock,
it was 1pm and she still felt tired from being up all night. She
quickly looked around the room and saw that she was alone. The
window was open and a cool breeze was coming in through it.

She rolled onto her back and watched the sun
shine patterns onto the ceiling above her. She wondered what to do
about the pictures. Both Chevalier and Mark were furious, actually
madder than she was about it. It suddenly occurred to her to let
them deal with it, to let them do what they were inherently born to
do.

Emily crawled out of bed
and threw on a t-shirt and shorts, opting to not wear any shoes.
She called down for some pizza, and then grabbed a bucket of tennis
balls she kept in the closet.

“She’s out of bed,” Quinn said, stating the
obvious.

“This is it then. She’ll
run,” Zohn said, and glanced over at Chevalier.

“Derrick, call her in,” Chevalier called
out.

The Council braced
themselves for the angry lashing they were about to get from Emily.
The pent-up fury at Laythan that was about to be released on the
Council caused them to tense. She came in a few minutes later with
both the Labrador and the Malamute with her. The Council was
shocked at how large the Malamute was, and how Emily was dwarfed as
she stood beside the giant wolf mix. She had a piece of pizza in
one hand and a bucket in the other as she walked up to stand in the
trial area.

The Malamute sat, facing
her, then howled slightly and wagged his tail.

“No,” she told him and
took a bite. “You called?”

“How are you?” Quinn asked, watching as the
Labrador stood perfectly still and stared at the bucket in Emily’s
hand.

“Fine, why?” she asked,
and then gasped. The Malamute jumped suddenly and put his front
paws on her shoulders as he reached to bite her pizza, which she
had at arm’s length above her. “Get down!”

The dog answered her with a cross between a
growl and a howl, his tail wagging happily behind him.

“Do you require
assistance?” the Chief Interrogator asked, somewhat
amused.

Emily finally managed to push the dog off of
her shoulders, “No.”

She walked up and put her
pizza on the desk in front of Zohn, and then turned to the dog,
“Valle, sit down!”

The Malamute stomped his
feet and lowered his chest to the floor playfully, while the
Labrador kept a close eye on the bucket of balls.

“Sit!” she yelled at him,
and he stood up fully. Emily walked around to his hind end and
pushed on his rump above his tail, “I said sit.”

Valle turned suddenly and
put his paws on Emily’s back, sending her to the floor. He licked
her face as she struggled to get away from him. When she fell, the
bucket of balls spilled across the trial room floor and the
Labrador picked one up, excited, and ran up to the Council’s chairs
and dropped the ball at Quinn’s feet.

“Umm…” Quinn said, and
looked down at the ball.

When the Council turned
back to the trial area, Emily was rolled into a ball on her knees
and the Malamute was standing over her, licking the back of her
neck as she screamed at him to get off.

Zohn’s hand flew up to
cover his mouth as he started to laugh and Kyle appeared beside
them and pulled the dog off of her.

The impatient Labrador growled slightly at
Quinn and stomped his feet, looking quickly from the heku to the
ball.

“He wants to play fetch,” the Chief
Investigator told Quinn.

“Oh, right,” Quinn said,
and tossed the ball back to the trial area.

Emily finally got to her feet and called for
Jaron, who appeared almost instantly with 3 other guards. They saw
the fray and immediately hauled the dogs out.

Emily walked over and
picked up her pizza from the desk, “Ok… where were we?”

Kyle blurred around the room and picked up
the balls, then handed the bucket back to Emily and returned to his
seat.

“Em…” Chevalier said, and
then started to laugh.

“They’ll learn, I swear… they’re just
puppies,” she said, knowing already what he was laughing at.

“That puppy is close to
130 pounds already,” Dustin said. “He may be too big for you to
handle.”

Emily glared at him and Kyle spoke quickly,
“He didn’t mean that.”

“They’re just excited
because they haven’t been out to play today,” she told them, and
took another bite while Chevalier calmed down.

“Did you get hurt?” he
asked finally.

“No”

“Fine then… we are
wondering if you were planning on leaving the palace,” Zohn said,
suddenly serious.

Emily frowned, “Why would I leave?”

“It seems a violation, what the guard
did.”

“Oh, that… I figured I’d let Mark and
Chevalier handle that.”

“Wait… do what?” Chevalier asked,
shocked.

“I have 2 dogs to train, a
horse that needs broken in, one heku that can’t stay on his horse,
and a group of new recruits starting… I don’t have time to seek
revenge on the little git… so I leave that to you.”

“Wow,” Quinn said, glancing at Zohn.

“That’s new,” Zohn said,
impressed.

“Now I’m off to play
fetch,” she said, and started for the door. She turned and looked
at Dustin, “Or did you want to join us?”

Dustin glared at her and she smiled and
walked out of the trial area.

Chevalier’s eyes narrowed, “Not sure I trust
that.”

“It is odd,” Kyle said, frowning. “She’s
never let us handle things like that before.”

“So does that mean she’s already gone?” Zohn
asked.

Quinn whispered and then shrugged, “Nope,
she’s out with the dogs.”

“I still don’t trust her,”
Chevalier said, and blurred from the room.

“Let’s go to Morse Coven then,” Zohn said to
Kyle. “We’ll see if Laythan is there and leave instructions if he’s
not.”

“Why not call?” Dustin asked.

“To scare them,” Kyle
said, and he and Zohn left.

Chevalier walked out and
pulled on some sunglasses, it was mid-summer and already up to
almost 100 degrees. He heard Emily on the south lawn and walked
over. Silas was tossing a ball for the Labrador, far enough it took
the dog several minutes to return with it. Kralen was crouched
down, pulling on a leash attached to the Malamute’s harness while
Emily called the dog to her. The dog was pulling frantically
against the heku, his tail wagging as he struggled to get to Emily.
Mark and Jaron were off to the sides, scanning the area.

“Seems just a little mean,” Chevalier said,
walking up to Emily.

“He loves to pull, this
works better than tying him to a horse,” she explained, and held
out a treat.

“What are you up to?”

Emily looked up at him, “I’m playing with
the dogs.”

“You know what I mean.”

“No, actually, I don’t…
Pull harder, Kralen,” she said when the dog inched forward a
step.

Emily looked at Chevalier and saw his lips
move quickly and with a flash of blurring around her, they were
alone on the grass.

“Hey, why’d you do that?” she asked,
standing up.

“Come here,” he told her,
and led her to the empty out-building. They stepped into the
swimming pool room and he sat down and patted the chair beside
him.

Emily ignored the chair and sat on his lap,
straddling his legs so she could face him, “What?”

“Tell me what you’re up
to.”

“I’m not up to anything,”
she said, and started to unbutton his shirt.

He took her hands in his, “Stop distracting
me… I want to know why you said we could handle Laythan.”

“I told you, I’m busy and
you always want to handle things, so I’m letting you.”

“Then what?”

“Why do you assume that’s not the end of
it?”

“Because I know you.”

“You can have him, no
strings attached,” she told him, and then leaned forward to run her
lips along his neck.

He let go of her hands and lifted her face
to look at him, “Stop it… I don’t trust you and I want to know what
you have planned.”

Emily’s eyes narrowed, “Nothing.”

“Promise me.”

“I swear, Chev, I’m not
going after him, ok? I like it here… I’m comfortable here and my
friends are here. Yes I miss the island, but it’s nice to see you
every day and I’m not going to risk getting hurt by running after
someone with a crush.”

Chevalier sighed, “Thank you.”

Emily crawled out of his lap and stepped out
into the hallway.

“Wait… I’m not done,”
Chevalier said, and appeared at her side.

“I’m done.”

He grinned, “I’m not talking about the
talking part.”

“Oh, I know,” she said,
and stepped out of the out-building. “Moment’s passed, you lost
your chance.”

“I did?”

“Yes, you did… once and
for all you need to learn who’s in charge here,” she said, and took
off running for the palace. She only made it a few steps before
Chevalier grabbed her arm and spun her into an embrace. He lifted
her up and kissed her passionately.