Sworn To Secrecy: Courtlight #4 (7 page)

“Who has that power?” said Ciardis.

“The person who hired him,” answered Vana.

Gripping Thomas’s shoulders, Thanar shouted in his face, “Which Weathervane? The mother? The one accused of the empress’s death?”

Foam began to appear as Thomas mouth and dripped from its corners as he bit his tongue. Haltingly, he said, “N-not the mother. Ciardis. The girl. They want her weakened. W-want mother d-dead”

Ciardis said. “Thanar, stop this. If he continues to fight the bond like this, it will kill him.”

Thanar tightened his hands on Thomas, and a moment later he withdrew his magic. The darkness of Thanar’s power flowed out of the corners of Thomas’s eyes like a dark cloud. As the black receded he looked more normal. Moments later he slumped forward into Thanar’s grip, unconscious.

Breathing harshly, Ciardis reached forward to feel for Thomas’s pulse at his throat.

Unease settled over them all. Meanwhile, Ciardis was helping the revived Thomas to sit back. “What?” he said, looking around slowly and blanching at the sight of Thanar kneeling so close in front of him. “What happened?”

“You don’t remember?” Ciardis said.

Thomas shook his head in confusion. “No. Remember what? The last thing I remember is seeing you come toward me in the ballroom.”

Then he shook his head like a dog getting rid of water. “What happened to my stutter?”

They all exchanged dark looks.

“It’s gone,” said Thomas as he brought his hand up to touch his mouth in astonishment.

He looked around. “Where are we?”

Then he spotted the streaks of blood on Ciardis’s gown. “Did something happen?”

A
side from the rather unfortunate ruin of her new gown, not one of them looked the least bit sane. Vana had her knives out. Kane’s side was blood-splattered. And Thanar looked severely disgruntled at the interruption of his magic. Ciardis tentatively put her hand out to touch Thomas, but yanked it back as he skittered away violently. Unfortunately that only brought him closer to Thanar behind him. Thomas seemed to realize that as he scurried to the side.

“What about your powers? Why did you try to hurt Inga?” said Thanar as non-threateningly as possible. Which meant a thin, teeth-filled smile and a less moody glare. It didn’t really work.

“What? Who’s Inga?” said Thomas.

Vana swore. “This is getting us nowhere. He needs time to remember and we need to get out of here.
Now.
”

Thomas swallowed. His Adam’s apple bobbed conspicuously as he said, “I hurt her? And him?” The pain on his face made Ciardis wish she could say no, that it was someone else.

“He’s in no condition to be left alone. We have to take him with us,” Ciardis said firmly.

Kane said, “Then let’s go.”

When Ciardis’s eyes lingered too long on the scar on his open chest where Inga’s sharp blade had torn into him, Kane flashed a wan grin at her. “Nothing but a cut.”

She gave him a wobbly smile. “Of course, right. But you’ve forgotten that I saw that cut before it was healed. If Inga doesn’t tear herself apart for nearly killing you, she’ll tear
you
apart for not getting out of the way fast enough.”

Kane looked uneasy. “She just might. She’s always on me about being on the defensive.”

“Even with her,” said Caemon. Ciardis had to admit Inga often pushed Kane to be on the defensive, particularly while they trained.

“All right,” said Vana. “I’ll get some guards to carry Inga. Everyone else, you can make your own way.”

Ciardis swallowed. “How? In case you forgotten, we’re surrounded by courtiers, my mother’s missing, and I doubt the imperial guardsmen are going to let us go just like that. At the very least we’ll have to answer for the profuse amount of blood littering their marble, and they’ll want to know who practiced such dark magic that would make a frost giantess go crazy.”

“Are you so sure?” Vana said with raised eyebrows.

“Well, they’ll want to know who practiced such dark magic without their approval,” amended Ciardis. The guards probably wouldn’t care about a potentially insane
kith
.

Darkly, Caemon said, “Are we so sure it wasn’t approved?”

What was left unsaid was that only the emperor could approve of such a messy kill in the middle of his ball.

Ciardis looked around her at the grave faces encircling Thomas. “My, you are a cheerful lot today.”

They all looked back at her with frowns, none of them amused.

“Fine,” she said. “Is there a way for the group of us to get out of here together without drawing attention?”

Vana looked thoughtful for a moment. “I believe there is.”

“Really?” Ciardis said.

Vana raised an eyebrow. “You have no faith, my young friend. Or did you
want
to stick around for the fireworks and crumpets?”

Ciardis’s pleasure at being referred to as Vana’s friend was rapidly displaced by the sarcasm dripping from her words.

Ciardis flushed. “No, but how do you expect to get a man covered in blood, an unconscious frost giant, and a mentally ill mage—whom we didn’t arrive with, by the way—through the crowds, outside to the carriage, and home without a fuss?”

Vana smiled. “I have my ways.”

Ciardis groaned inwardly. It wasn’t often that she liked Vana’s ways. They often ended with Ciardis in stitches with cuts, bruises, pains, and aches.

Vana turned to Thanar. “When I give the word, drop the sight and sound shield. Caemon—be ready.”

Caemon looked over at Vana with a slightly frustrated look on his face. “Ready for what?”

“To do what you do best,” she replied.

Vana sheathed her knives and raised her hands in the air. Purple mist began to gather in her palms. Excitement began to gather in Ciardis’s stomach. As much as she wanted to deny it, this was
much
more interesting than dancing her way through a dreary ball.

“What exactly are you going to do?” she asked.

“Call in the cavalry,” Vana said. “Caemon, if you’d please assist me. I’ll need a boost.”

He narrowed his eyes at her. Ciardis watched the unhappiness on his face as he raised a hand and placed it on Vana’s shoulder. Suddenly Vana’s magic flared, the purple mist burst from her palms in a thick and visible cloud and arced up to the top of the dome, encasing them all. It spread out like sulfur and smelled worse. As they all hunched over, coughing into the thick mist that was making their eyes tear up, their noses run, and their throats sore, Ciardis had a minute to regret everything that had come to pass in her life. Who else would manage to acquire a perfect new ball gown only to have it returned bloodstained with a need to be fumigated in the same night?

“Now,” shouted Vana from inside the cloud.

Thanar dropped the shields. The mist poured outward to encase the entire ballroom in a thick cloud. Confusion reigned. Guests began shrieking and coughing. Some began to run away from the alcove towards the larger ballroom. To Ciardis’s consternation she heard footsteps running toward their group. Booted footsteps. Lots of them. The mist began to lighten where they stood as Vana forced it outward, effectively corralling the curious guests away from their area. When her teary eyes cleared and she could stand up to attend to the snot running down her face, Ciardis paled at what she saw. They stood surrounded by a semi-circle of...
servants
. Armed servants. They all carried knives and swords. These weren’t the servants that attended the meals. No, only the children from the noble families attended the service as pages to refill goblets of wine, juice, and water for the very people they sought to emulate as adults and who often served as their guardians. Even the butlers and the maids were highly trained individuals who had served their entire careers either in the palace or highborn houses. But these people, they were from the lower classes—washwomen, stablemen and kitchen help. One man still had a bloodstained apron on and a towel thrown over his shoulder from his work as a butcher. All that was missing was the giant cleaver and the wrack of meat in front of him.

“Vana?” asked Caemon with some awe.

“Meet my team,” Vana said proudly. “Now let’s get out here.”

“We can’t leave my mother,” argued Ciardis.

Vana nodded at something in the distance. Ciardis turned to see Lillian being led forward by the hand of a determined waif of a girl who was covered in flour from head to toe. Lillian looked down at her captor with some amusement as well as distaste as she was led forward—or rather dragged where the waif wanted her to go—that is, until she saw what waited her near the alcove. The smiled quickly slipped from her face.

“What happened?” she spluttered.

They all exchanged glances and pointed at the confused boy sitting in the corner with Thanar looming over him.

The young waif dropped her hand.

She strode up to Vana proudly, disregarded the profusion of knives on her person, and demanded, “Fifteen shillings. You told me to get the one in the dark blue dress with feathers in her hair—I got her.”

Vana raised an eyebrow but handed the pouch over without comment. The waif smiled, sniffed, and disappeared through a servant corridor in the blink of an eye.

Told her when
? wondered Ciardis.

“I suppose you want us to follow her?” Kane said with sarcasm.

“Oh no,” said Vana with a smirk. “We’re going straight through the ballroom.”

“We are?” echoed five surprised voices.

Vana snapped her fingers and directed four of her servants to the incapacitated frost giant.

“Even with four of them, that’s not going to be easy,” said Lillian.

“The butcher’s a lightweight,” pointed out Vana.

“Wouldn’t that make it worse?” asked Ciardis.

“Not that kind of lightweight,” said Kane. “He has the power to displace the weight of an object with magic. A good skill on a construction site or in the ship docking business. And usually very hard to come by. In fact, the last one I heard of was traveling with a crew of mercenaries on the emperor’s road.”

Vana smiled a toothy grin. “I might have convinced him to leave a life of crime.”

“For the morality of your cause?” asked Kane.

“For double his yearly take.”

“Damn, I’m in the wrong line of work,” muttered Kane.

“All right, lads and ladies,” said Vana. “My core will carry Inga, Thanar’s got the boy, Ciardis stick with your mother, and Caemon—you’re with me.”

Everyone took their places. When Vana gave her marching orders in that tone of voice, it was best to just go along with it. Her other ideas tended to end in massive bloodshed and slit throats. This idea actually seemed reasonably safe.

T
hey made it back to Lord Steadfast’s mansion in one piece and gathered in the downstairs parlor. Vana set Thomas down firmly in a hard-backed chair and lashed him to the seat with the rope from a nearby window valance.

“Close the curtains on all the windows,” ordered Lillian.

With barely a shrug, Ciardis and Caemon went to the six floor-length windows in the parlor and pulled their dark curtains closed. When a portly female servant with ruddy cheeks knocked on the door politely and eased it open with a, “Good evening, masters and mistresses, I’ve brought tea. With the weather being as cold as it is and all.” Vana frowned and stepped forward. Lillian held up a halting hand and spoke as if she was the lady of the manor. “Set it in the corner and leave. We’ll be needing no more service tonight. Instruct the maids and footmen to retire to bed.”

The servant quickly nodded as she glanced askance over at the bound boy in the chair before Thanar stepped in front of Thomas, his darkening gaze fastened on the woman. Her cheeks quickly paled under the splotches of red that marred her face and she exited back out the door.

As she left, Thomas began to awake. His eyes fluttered open and he struggled to sit up before he realized he was bound to the chair with rope. As everyone turned to stare at him, confusion and trepidation flashed across his face. Their brooding looks didn’t help. He began to hyperventilate again while trying to speak, but was overcome with anxiety.

Muttering, Caemon came forward. “This isn’t working.”

He hiked up his dress pants as he knelt down in front of the seated mage. He reached forward with both hands to grip the trembling boy’s balled fists but halted in mid-reach when at least three voices shouted at him, “Don’t touch him!”

Calmly, Lillian explained, “If he has the ability to cloud actions and change perceptions, he could change you without you even knowing it.”

Caemon frowned over his shoulder but slowly lowered his hands to his sides.

Softly, as if they were the only two figures in the room, he spoke to Thomas. “Calm down. Deep breaths, lad. We’re not here to hurt you.”

Thomas looked up with his eyes partially hidden by bangs as he shook his head slightly.

“What?” asked Caemon in light surprise, speaking to him as if they were alone in the room, two friends playing a game. “You think we’d hurt such a fine lad like yourself?”

Thomas stayed silent.

Ciardis bit her lip and walked forward until she stood at Caemon’s side. She put a hand on her twin’s right shoulder and smiled at Thomas. “You were quite chatty at the ball, Thomas.”

He looked up at her and his lip twitched. In a grimace or a smile, she’d couldn’t quite say.

Looking from one twin to the other, he hesitantly opened his mouth and spoke. Well, he tried to speak. What came out was more of a croak than intelligible conversation.

“Could we have some water please, Mother?” Ciardis said over her shoulder. She would be nice as pie to Thomas if that would get him to calm down and cure Inga of her ailment.

“Of course,” Lillian said as she quickly went over the teacart and poured from the crystal pitcher.

“Thanar, could you untie him?” asked Caemon calmly. The daemoni came over without a word and cut the thick curtain ropes.

Walking over to her son and daughter, Lillian smoothly held out the glass to the boy. This presented a conundrum. Thomas was still trembling so harshly that grabbing the glass seemed impossible. But being faced with the simple choice actually seemed to calm him. He stopped shuddering and reached out a tentative hand for the glass.