Mark of the Princess (20 page)

She felt infuriated at his ego and at the same time sheepish for having reacted the way she did. Was she really behaving like a brat? She thought of her life and how sheltered she really was. How Kaleb and Tristan knew so much more than her and Evyette. She thought of her actions back home. That girl is gone now, now sits a girl here who has managed to escape a castle prison, has been shot with an arrow and then have that arrow removed and is now having her powers come in. Maybe she had been naïve. But now she was something different, she had to be.

She turned and laid her head on a smooth stone that was on the floor and without looking at him responded. “Oh, and you’re not
that
great.” She knew it was a lie as soon as it left her lips. Of course he was great. He knew spells that could do things she never thought possible, he’s been trained by the best. He was great, but she wasn’t about to tell him.

Brennus laughed to himself.

He waited outside surveying the area until he felt it was safe enough to go to sleep, although he had put up some protection wards, he wasn’t one to take chances. Brennus walked back to the cave and sat next to the princess who he thought was asleep. Her hair lay on the floor between them and he looked at the mark on her back again. He sat trying to recall every ancient marking he had read about. He knew this was no ordinary power or skill marking. This was more. Without thinking he reached over and touched it with his finger tracing the mysterious symbol.

Her body reacted instantly giving her goose bumps and he quickly drew his hand back. She made no indication that she was awake although she was. She felt him touch her and although she was thinking of the touch she wondered about his intrigue toward her Mark.

He turned with his back to her so that he could face the opening of the cave, with his mind on the symbol, he fell asleep.

The dreams were random. Some of his childhood, most of his training. After all, that is what most of his childhood consisted of. Training. Having been born with the most Marks and gifts than any other warrior faerie in a century it was only natural to have him work on each and every one of those skills. No matter how much it took from him being with the other children.

Brennus envisioned the classes, the trips, the books. Suddenly as if by magic a book was in front of him. It was an old book. ‘There are only three copies of this book in the world.’ He was told. It has the most powerful and ancient symbols and spells inside. He thumbed through it and saw each and every one of his Markings as they were when he was born. Of course now they looked different as they all had expanded and spread since he had first begun his training. The more he trained the bigger they became, symbols of his knowledge and power. But then he came to another page. A symbol that he had seen once before. He couldn’t remember in the dream where he had seen it. He tried to read the information below it, but only grasped some words. Omnipotens, infestus, mille annus. He awoke quickly thinking of his dream. ‘Most powerful, dangerous, thousand years’ he repeated to himself. He turned to look at Alannah who this time
was
asleep. He glared at her Mark once again, and as if being hit by a wall of information, he remembered.

The day dredged on as the one before. This time though they had come across a pond and a berry bush by noon time so they were not as famished as the day before. Brennus had not told her about the dreams or about what he had remembered. He had simply told her that controlling her emotions would be the first step in channeling her powers. Despite her worry of getting them wrong, she practiced a few of her spells during the day. When she passed a hole in the ground she turned and said “Aquacio” and suddenly the hole was filled with water. She smiled at herself and kept walking. She knew that certain spells took a lot of energy and could leave her drained so she used the ones she knew would not deplete her. As she walked by a tree she touched a flower and in a low voice said “Fieri-caecus”, and as she drew her hand back the flower became invisible.

Her arm burned around her bicep. She grabbed at it, but the burning was gone in a moment. When she looked, her spell casting mark had spread. She continued to recite spells in her head but didn’t perform any of them for fear of draining her energy.

At night they stopped at a clearing to rest. They heard some noises nearby but decided that they were probably coming from animals now that they were getting closer and closer to the forest edge.

* * *

Kaleb and Tristan had already doused the fire and put some protective wards around the area they were to be sleeping in. Evyette who had been quiet most of the day seemed drained. Tristan looked at her and saw just how tired she was. She was paler than usual, there were dark circles under eyes, and he wondered how much sleep she had actually gotten the night before.

Tristan had, as usual, propped himself up against a tree. Evyette came over next to him and without a word she leaned against him and put her head on his chest and her arm around his waist. She didn’t know if he could protect her like he said but she sure felt safe being this close to him. He lifted the arm that was around her back and pulled back her hair which had fallen to cover half of her face and then put his hand on her arm and fell asleep.

The sound of the snapping twig awoke them. Kaleb quickly looked at Tristan. Tristan was trying to carefully slip out of Evyette’s hold without waking her. He stood himself and walked over to Kaleb.

“Do you think someone is here?” his hand on the hilt of his sword.

Kaleb put his hand in front of him with this palm up. “Levis” suddenly a small ball of light appeared , floating above his palm. They both looked over to see if they had woken Evyette, but she was still sound asleep. They knew that with all the wards that they had placed she would be safer in here than following them.

Kaleb lifted his hand in front of him, “Pendere” the light lifted from his hand and hovered in front of him. He unsheathed his sword and walked in the direction of the sounds that he kept hearing.

He walked carefully into the large group of trees, and looked around but found no-one or nothing. Suddenly out of the corner of his eye he saw a beam of light heading toward him. He turned to face it and used the sword to ward off the spell. “Impetius.” he said as he flung his hand in the direction that the attack came from. Suddenly as if out of the shadows a sword came up into the air and slashed down at him. He brought his sword up and blocked it, knocking the other sword to the ground.

“Coma!” Suddenly the small illumination shot out rays of light all around the group of trees, exposing his adversary. A Rogue Faerie came at him attacking with his sword and several other spells. “Incendum!” The rogue faerie yelled. “Aquacio!” Kaleb yelled back as a stream of water shot out from his hand and doused the stream of fire that was beaming at him. The water splashed hitting them both. Suddenly the Rogue Faerie ran at him with his sword at the ready.

The clash of swords was loud. Kaleb studied his opponent. The rogue faerie stood a mere couple of inches taller than him. His wings were battered and had been cut. He was thin and looked starved but was still muscular and strong. He had marks like his. His eyes were dark though, they seemed almost completely black.

Suddenly the pain was hard and sharp. The rogue faerie had kicked up his leg when Kaleb was blocking his sword, kicking Kaleb in the stomach. Kaleb stumbled back and bent over a moment but remained on his feet. Unexpectedly another faerie came from the other side of the trees. He was taller than the two of them and covered in Marks. His fighting style was un-relentless. He attacked the rogue faerie and knocked him down several times. Once Kaleb caught his breath he ran back to the battle. He swung his sword at the rogue faerie and almost hit the larger faerie. The larger faerie was about to attack Kaleb when Kaleb shot him a glance that showed he had not meant to do that. The large faerie brought up his sword and ripped through the air in the direction of Kaleb but blocking the sword of the rogue faerie. Kaleb then turned and using all the power he could muster, shot a burst of power in the direction of the rogue faerie. The hit knocked him off of his feet and into the tree behind him. The larger faerie ran faster than Kaleb had ever seen any faerie run and suddenly by the time the rogue faerie stood he was pinned to the tree by the silver blade. The blood running from the faerie onto the sword traced markings on the sword that Kaleb was unable to interpret.

The larger faerie quickly disengaged his sword from the tree and the rogue faerie and pointed it at Kaleb, the Rogue faerie falling to the ground.

“I don’t know what your business was with this faerie but it is done. You should leave and take your trouble with you.” He said, standing over Kaleb.

Kaleb, keeping his sword at the ready responded. “I had no trouble with that faerie. I was attacked while investigating some noise. I do not live in these mountains.”

Suddenly from the edge of the trees Alannah came running in with her sword at the ready. “Brennus?”

“Alannah!” Kaleb exclaimed before putting his sword down, a stunned expression on his face.

Thinking that this might have been another hired hand of Maligo the larger faerie shot a spell at Kaleb and knocked him down. For the moment Kaleb had forgotten that the princess was there and stood quickly and retaliated. He shot a burst to Brennus but he had moved out of the way. It struck a tree and pieces of bark and leaves filled the air.

Brennus ran at Kaleb with his sword in the air, ready to crash down. Kaleb lifted his sword but did not expect the might behind the other sword. He blocked it but barely kept his own sword from hitting him.

She looked back at Brennus who had stepped back but still had his sword at the ready. “It’s ok, Brennus. He’s here to rescue me.” A smile of relief creeping across her lips.

“No, Tristan and Evyette are here. Come.” He grabbed her hand and led her to the clearing where Tristan and Evyette stood waiting.

He smiled and tilted his head to her. “She was actually very brave, and did not need too much help.” He looked up at Alannah and winked.

Kaleb saw it and looked at Tristan who he knew had seen it too.

For the next few moments Kaleb, Tristan and Evyette stood talking to Alannah about what she had been through and about what they had been through as well. Alannah told them the story about the previous night when her powers had begun to come in.

Alannah looked over at Brennus and waved for him to come over.

“Brennus, I’d like to formally introduce you. This is my sister Evyette.” He tilted his head toward her. She motioned toward Tristan. “This is Tristan. He is Kaleb’s best friend. And well, you have already met Kaleb.” She finished as Kaleb put his arm around her.

“Well, it’s truly a pleasure meeting you all but now that we are all up and it is almost sunrise I think it would be best to get going.”

“Oh. Right” Alannah and the others had been so caught up in the morning’s events that they hadn’t noticed that the sun was about to rise “I’m sure tonight’s commotion might have called some attention to our location.” Alannah said turning back to Kaleb.

“Yes, but before we go anywhere we need to contact your parents and let them know that you are alive and well.”

“That would be great but how?” Kaleb reached into the bag that he had taken off of his back and put at his feet and pulled out the mirror.

He recanted the spell that opened the communication between them and Alannah’s parents.

~
Chapter
19~