A Simple Darkness (The Young Ancients: Tiera) (22 page)

After thinking it through, out loud, she just shrugged.

"That means that, one way or the other, one of us has to die today, doesn't it?"

The only person in the room that even nodded was the Princess, who had short hair that was about halfway to her collar, in about the same red color that the Prince and his father had. Tiera looked back at her, still feeling the rage of all the insults, but trying not to take it out on the royal family. After all it wasn't their fault. Alphonse had even tried to salve the whole thing over, but Count Morris wouldn't let him.

"Can you win this Tiera? You shouldn't throw away your life over it. He was a bore, but that isn't worth death." The Princess sounded reasonable then. Calm and collected as if she were just asking questions and not trying to lead her to a specific conclusion.

The thing there was that Karen Derring answered for her.

"She's stronger than she looks and not just a little. Stronger than Baron Havar, I think. Fast too. So much so that I honestly don't think the Count will survive if she really goes for him. She isn't a great fighter yet, but she's aggressive and doesn't quit. If Morris were a real fighter? Then maybe not. But he holds no extreme skill in that area that I've ever heard about." She shuddered then. It seemed like something real too. "This isn't about
that
. This shouldn't be happening at all. If the Count... What the heck he was thinking I don't understand."

Count Lairdgren looked at them and then focused on his granddaughter, his face blank and relaxed. "He probably thought that Tiera was one of the regular transport pilots. Most of their original number were indeed prostitutes, and a few of them still maintain both professions. It might explain the reaction of his man as well, if his own Count had been referring to such women in that manner. Then, when she became angry, they couldn't allow themselves to see it as justified, since who listens to whores?"

It made sense when put that way, not the man's actions, but how it might have arrived at them to begin with. Now he couldn't back away from what he'd said, or he'd lose face. Tiera gestured at Karen to go, adding the word please to the movement as an afterthought.

"After all, he has an appointment, doesn't he?"

Just after she left, Tiera felt herself at loose ends for a moment. There were things to do though, like walk the area they were fighting in, so that she'd understand what obstacles might be in her way.

"I need some heavy sticks." That was muttered as she wandered from the room, no one following her. It took a while to trace her steps back to the front door, but when she turned it was clear someone had indeed followed her. George the Royal Guard.

She smiled at him, feeling a little sad.

"Some days it's not even worth getting out of bed. Have you ever noticed that?"

The man was silent for a moment, then nodded, his face stern and slightly disapproving.

"On
several
occasions, to tell the truth. My job generally requires it of me anyway however, and we can never know what the day will hold, good or bad. My fellows are seeking those staves you asked for. Where will you be holding your duel? There's a nice flat area a way past the pond garden. Flat and covered with grass, so it will distress people less later, if one of you dies there. Off to the side where no one goes most days." He gestured toward the left side of the building with a bow, and walked with her to the place. It would do, she decided. It was very flat, but as she walked it she noticed a very slight dip in the turf. It wasn't enough to help her fight, she didn't think, not that she was an expert in the subject.

Her whole plan was to rush the Count before he knew what was happening and flail his knees to take him down, then beat him in the head until he stopped moving. Not sophisticated at all, but it might work. Or she'd die herself. That was a real danger, she knew. No one offered her pointers or anything, but there probably weren't a lot of things that would help at that point.

She spent nearly two hours trying to work out exactly how to approach the whole thing, and practiced it at a walk, covering everything she could think of, including an ambush, both before
and
after she took her shield off. If the man had no honor, sending in a military hit first would make sense. There would be less danger to him that way. She wasn't an expert on duels, but that seemed about right. You normally wouldn't do it, cheat like that, but he was the jerk that had started it all, so who knew what might make sense to him?

Timon's Fast Craft settled on the far side of the palace, and he floated around the building using his Tor-shoes about five minutes later, his face holding a wry smile and shaking his head as he tapped the back of his right hand, dropping the four inches to the ground.

"Well, I heard. Sorry about sending you into that mess. Can you tell me exactly what happened? Start from the moment you left this morning."

It took a while for her to get through it all, since he asked a bunch of questions about things that had happened that she'd barely noticed. A lot of his attention went to what Countess Morris had done and said and how she'd sounded when she did it. That seemed pretty important to him, but she couldn't see why. It was the Count that she had to fight.

Then, not being very helpful at all, her little brother walked off, into the King's palace like he owned the place, and was just letting that pesky group of tall people squat there for the time being. It would have been funny, if the situation wasn't so tense.

She was just so mad. Anger coursed through her each time she thought of the man, calling her names, as if he knew her? As if she became a whore, just because he proclaimed it, in his blindness and stupidity? She didn't touch the weapons when they came out, since that was against the rules, but she looked at them carefully. They were identical, except for color. There was a very slight difference that way, one being almost imperceptibly darker than the other. They weren't perfect in length, being about an inch over three feet, but that had to be close enough. Other than that they looked like very straight and undecorated table legs. There was a little bench that they were set on, made of highly polished wood, with a nice white seat cushion across the whole thing.

It was nerve racking, having to wait, but at least it wasn't days or something insane like that. Most duels were like that she knew, but that was just to ensure travel was possible. Karen was taking care of that, so it wasn't an issue. She thought that was the case at least, it might have been so that people could get their affairs in order first. If so the man was out of luck, and, as it turned out, time as well. The plain silver craft settled about ten minutes after it was due, meaning that the Count already looked pretty bad. Showing up late like that was an insult after all.

Another
one.

Her right hand tightened into a fist, but she waited, nearly ten more minutes, for a whole group of people to come around the edge of the palace. It was the whole Royal family, Count Lairdgren, half a dozen other tall people that she vaguely recognized and about sixty that she just didn't. Her eyes went directly to Count Morris though. He looked...
embarrassed
. He also tried very hard not to make eye contact with her. It was a mistake of course, since it meant he wouldn't see her coming.

"You're late. I thought for a few minutes that you were going to try and not show up. Good to see you have a
little
bit of honor left. Maybe it will get you through the next minutes." The rage was so clear in her voice that people glared at her, or at least reacted. Most just looked, she realized. They weren't actually angry, but baffled. As if they didn't understand the whole thing.

She saw that Sandra had come, and stood by her father, not looking happy at all. Tiera bowed to her, a choppy motion that showed just how much hatred was in her body at the moment. She forced a wicked sneer to her face though, making direct eye contact with the girl.

"Countess Morris.
So
sorry to hear about the loss of your father." It was a pissy thing to say, since it was basically announcing to everyone that she fully intended to kill the man. There really was no other option however, was there? She walked to the center of the grass then, and looked around, wondering what the next step would be.

I turned out that Timon stepped in then, getting in the way.

 "A moment please?" He had a bland tone and character to his voice. Everyone looked at him anyway, as if he weren't just a little boy. "I have a few questions before we begin. Count Morris, why were you trying to avoid coming to the Council of Counts? It's my understanding that without special dispensation from the King, it's required of you, an unavoidable duty. I know that at least one of your fellows had to come from his sick bed for it. I lent him a healing amulet, so that won't be a problem, but he came, out of duty, even though he lay near dying at the time. You on the other hand seemed to be ducking out." He didn't explain it all, but he did hold up a Truth amulet and try to hand it to the man, who took it, but seemed to not really understand what it was, not at first.

"Preposterous, I
wasn't
trying to avoid it!" The glowing white and gold field shifted to black, a streak shooting across it in a way that meant the man wasn't just lying, but that it was a major thing. Timon didn't call him on it, but the King did.

Her brother just shook his head.

"Are you loyal to the King and kingdom, Count Morris? To the heir and Royal family?"

"Naturally? What kind of question is that?"

The response there was interesting. There was a bit of a black streak, but not when he spoke about loyalty, only when he pretended he didn't know why the question would be asked.

Tiera shook her head, but didn't interrupt. She did want to know why the man had done it. Insulted her like he had.

It took about two minutes for the man to realize that Timon wasn't just asking questions, but taking information from every breath Morris took. It was an amazing thing to see, but the man's words didn't help a lot. After he took the device back her brother looked at the King and then the Queen, giving each a small bow.

"Count Morris is loyal, but thinks that there is danger here and doesn't wish to be caught in the middle. He purposefully went after Tiera, knowing who she was the full time, even ordering his man to try and drive her away, so that he could have an excuse to miss the Council. He clearly didn't realize that Tor wasn't the only dangerous person in my family." Timon looked sad then and shook his head. "That was an error, Count Morris. I suggest you grovel now. I don't know that it will save your life, but you laid your conspiracy too well, and in the wrong place. This road will not end well, otherwise."

The man bristled, but didn't deny it at all, instead he turned his nose up.

"Do you really think I fear a little girl? Her head doesn't even come to my middle. I'll thrash her easily and then make her beg for me to stop. This is a ridiculous thing. I don't know the game that you're all playing at, but this should end now." He sounded a little less sure of himself at least.

Tiera nodded once.

"Let's get it done then. We'll see who begs, shall we?" She gestured, holding out her right hand. "Weapons please."

A man dressed in a nice green outfit jogged over to the table, a man in red doing the same. The other man went first, but the one in green brought her the stout piece of wood quickly enough. He looked hard and stern faced.

"Should I call anything out , miss? Or... call for a champion?"

She shook her head, but then reconsidered. "Tell him to get ready, there will be no more warnings."

The man didn't hesitate. "Prepare for battle! No further word will be given!"

Then she ran as fast as she could across the distance between them. The Count was bigger than she was, but slow and, as she'd guessed, not much of a fighter. He held the stick correctly and tried to block with it, but he missed since she was aiming so low. The crack was deafening. It got a nice bellow from the man as well.

Then she did it again, several times before he could fall and managed a nice strike to the back of his right hand, causing his stick to go flying. Since she had time, after that, she hit him in the groin with her foot and then started to break his jaw, but stopped for a second and hit him in the stomach instead. He couldn't beg very well if his mouth didn't work, could he? Not that he had a lot of time to get to it. Her next blow just missed the left temple. He was down already and not likely to get up on his own now. She moved to make the next blow really spread his brains across the yard when someone hit her from behind. Hard.

She couldn't really roll with the stick in her hand, so she landed on her face as a cry went up. She rallied pretty quickly, in time to see that it was Sandra Morris, and that she had a Force Lance out. She hit Tiera with it again, picking her up and throwing her backward bodily. It was cheating, but not totally unexpected. The stick fell from her hand, but that didn't stop her from doing
anything
.

Tiera had already worked out what would be needed after all. She didn't have a shield on, but her Fast Craft essentially was one. She set it up and hid behind it, letting it take the pummeling for her. Then she crawled in, making a small door for it, and, instead of running away, slowly moved toward Sandra and knocked her down, turning the earth under the dark skinned girl as she did it. Then, just as slowly, she set the thing down on top of her and climbed out.