Flash Fiction # 641 -- Trust

 You may not believe this, but a person can spend their entire life in the castle and in close service to the royal family and still go unnoticed.

Granted, I was only seventeen, so the 'entire life' part was limited. Even so, you would think one of them would make note of the young man who ran messages through the castle and into town. It was a position of trust.

My trust was never tested until Princess Dela began writing notes to the pirate's son. The king had Captain Vic as a guest that week.  The pirate captain had been a powerful local lord until barbarians overran his lands. So, the possibility of an alliance with the pirate, gaining the man's help in protecting our coast, and probably gaining some gold and jewels, as well. It looked promising.

We wouldn't be the first country to make such a deal.

When Dela handed me the perfumed and sealed note and told me who exactly to give it to, I knew we were in trouble.  I should have gone straight to the King.

I went to the Queen instead.

Queen Woda lives mostly in seclusion in the North Tower.  It is not punishment.  She just doesn't much care for people.

She also had more than a touch of 'sight,' which made her very powerful and dangerous when she was mad.

Queen Woda was not in the best mood when I climbed in the window, my usual way of not being seen.

"I warned him!" she shouted, shaking a dead plant at me.  I sneezed.  "Let me have it."

I didn't have to explain anything to her.  That helped.  She took the note and glared at it momentarily before handing it back to me.

"At least her grammar has improved."

Then she shook the dead plant, and I sneezed again.  I waited patiently as she made several circuits of the tower's interior.  

She shook the plant every time she passed me, and I sneezed.  I was starting to take it personally.

Then she stopped and stared at me.  "Never become a parent."

I nodded vigorously in agreement. This was the point where you agreed to anything.

"If Dela finds out I know about her affection for this boy, she'll be embarrassed and mistrusting for years.  You are going to have to deliver this note and then find a way to stop her from meeting the boy."

"How do I --"

"Out, out, out." She shoved the plant at me and then the note.  "Go do your work."

"This is not --" I began. Her gray eyes narrowed.  The plant rose over my head. "Not the window I should go out."

I scrambled out one -- I didn't care which -- and scurried down the outer wall.  The king and his guards were waiting for me.

"Note from your daughter to the pirate's son," I explained.

"Excellent. That should give his father something more to consider.  Why were you visiting my wife?"

"Because no one let me in on the plan." I dusted my hands and held out the paper. "Do I deliver this or not?"

"What does she want?" He asked with a kick at the tower.

"As far as I can tell, a good marriage for her daughter and pirate loot."

"Amazing. For the first time in our entire marriage we actually agree. What do you think of the pirate's son?"

I had not expected that question but I had a quick answer. "He seems quiet and polite, but I get the feeling there's more of his father in him than he shows."

"Good."

"It might help if we knew his name," I suggested.

"Yes, get right on that one."

He went away.  I took the note to the young man, who handed it back without opening it.

"Don't make this any harder." I shoved the note back into his hand.  "Open it, read it, and agree because that is exactly what I am going to tell the King, Queen, and Princess you did.  Then, when you don't show up, they'll all think you are a coward."

"I should care?"

"Why do you think your father brought you along?"

He snarled, but I had made my point.

"What am I supposed to do now?" he demanded.

"Answer the note.  Have a nice walk in the garden tonight, but keep in mind that there is a guard behind every tree trunk, and the queen will be watching from her tower. What is your name?"

"Wintonweorth."

"What is your nickname?"

"Dan."

"Okay, Dan.  This is how it is going to work."


At least I had a plan to share.

I spent hours sitting by my window but not looking into the garden.  I heard movement and quiet words.  Some laughter. Movement, talk, laughter: repeated again and again until I thought I would go mad.  It was not what I expected to hear.

I fell asleep in my chair and didn't wake up until dawn. Nothing sounded out of place.  I grabbed something to eat and headed into the garden.

I found Dan and Dela on my favorite bench with the snake in a basket between them.  I watched as they took turns offering it delicate morsels of food.

So, they bonded over the snake, just not in the way I had imagined.

"What did you expect?" Dela demanded as she looked at me. "That I would faint into his arms?"

"Actually, I had hoped for the opposite. No matter. It worked, right?"

"Mother was already here discussing wedding plans.  I do wish she would stop jumping ahead in the timeline."

It turned out that Dan collected flora and fauna from everywhere he went.  His father was more than happy to settle him and his collection on land.

And now all I had to worry about was Princess Nina and finding her the right husband. I just had to wait for the right message.

Flash Fiction #640 -- Spirit Animal

 Becoming the spirit animal for a human was supposed to be a reward, not a new trial to overcome. Yes, I made some mistakes off the start, but it wasn't my fault.  

According to my assignment info, which included a picture, Aren was a Captain in the King's Guard, a war hero at barely twenty years old, and a scholar.  That sounded like an exciting pairing and I accepted.

For a Spirit Animal manifestation to work, there are a couple steps to follow.  First, the aura of someone worthy of our help, touches upon our realm.  Extensive study is made of past deeds and potential actions.  

The fae get more spirit animals than humans.  They're easier to read and predict actions.  Humans have too many mental options and gray areas.  It isn't unusual for there to be only one in a million with a spirit animal to help them along.

Aren looked almost as pure as a fae.  After an eon of desk work, I jumped at the chance to go back into the field.  I wondered what his subconscious would make of me.  Lion?  Bear?  Dared I hope for a dragon?

If someone had told me that there were twins involved, I would not have bonded with the wrong one.

Maybe I was too anxious.

He took note of me, a vague shape at the edge of a plot of flowers.  I could already sense his thoughts, although they seemed odd ...

What is that? Oh, it must be a bunny!

Goddess, no! Don't let me --

I was a bunny. An enraged bunny, in fact. I gave a battle cry of power (I'll leave you to imagine that one) and charged straight at Aren.

Someone scoped me up and I found myself staring into ... Aren's face. Only Aren still sat on the bench with his book in hand.

"Is this yours, Aten?" he said with a slight sneer and held me by the back of my neck.  I was not impressed.  I also had the feeling I was in danger.

Aren, Aten.  Two of them and I had bonded with the wrong one.  Or maybe I had gotten lucky.  Aren tossed me at his brother who leaped to his feet and caught me before I landed in the thorny rose bushes.  He cradled me in his arm and patted my head.

"You are useless," Aren declared, spun on his heel, and headed back the way he had arrived.  I had the distinct impression that he couldn't remember why he was heading this way.

"That was a close one," Aten mumbled.  He gathered up the book he'd been reading.  I noted it was very old and worked with magical signs.   Well.  That might change things.

We headed into the castle via the kitchen garden and door.  Several workers looked up, nodded, and went back to work.  I had the feeling Aren wouldn't have won such a good reaction.

"He's rude to everyone," Aten said aloud.  "The only time he's happy is when he's at war or making someone's life miserable."

You can hear me.

"Mother's fault," he mumbled and fell silent as they started up a staircase. Once he was certain no one was around, he continued.  "Mother knows enough magic to be dangerous.  She wanted a super powered prince.  She didn't realize there were two of us."

Seems to be a lot of that going around.

"Aren got decisive warrior prince.  I got sensitive magical prince.  I think she read too many fairy tales growing up."

He fell silent as we made our way down a busy hallway. Harried servants nodded and smiled at Aten as we passed.  Of course, we ended up in the castle's archive and library. Aten closed the door with a sigh of relief.

Life went about the same for the next twenty days.  I transitioned from spirit animal to familiar, meaning I had a far closer relationship to Aten and could tap is magic.  I could even run a few errands, like checking up on Aren.

It didn't take long to realize that he was planning to start a war.

"Of course, he is," I said and nibbled on a carrot top that Cook Mysen had saved for me. "His only purpose in life is to win battles and rule people."

"Mother is holding him back from the second.  How do we stop a war?" Aten asked.

"I think I have a plan."

The set up took seventeen days.  Aden had to get used to seeing me out in the cage set up in the garden.  More than once he made mention of dinner and rabbit stew.  If I had been a real rabbit, I wouldn't have understood a word he said. What pleasure did he get out of it?

Aren's Raiders -- the ones no one was supposed to know were his -- kicked up enough trouble at the border to be one step from a war.  So, as he was going down the stairs for breakfast, I used a quick spell to teleport myself behind him, braced my legs and leaped, hitting him mid-back with all the force I could manage.

He screamed before he fell and broke his arm and leg.  For months he claimed his brother's rabbit had tried to kill him.  Aren didn't care that his mother said she'd been in the garden with me at the time of the accident.

His obsession with murderous bunnies lost him the support of the army. I probably didn't help by waking him in the middle of the night for conversations, and disappearing before anyone could come at his yells.

It would take some time to rebuild that trust.  They would be less likely to follow him on some odd quest, too.

Even better, in his long convalescence, Aren learned that if you are nice to servants, they'll be nice to you.  He came out of it a much better person.

Aten and I spent our time in the archives planning on how to take over the world...

Flash Fiction #639 -- True Sight

 

If I hadn't happened to be sitting on the bench that late at night, trying to sort out my runes, I wouldn't have been able to change history.

It happened this way:

Princess Santia sent to the temple for me.  It was already past sunset, but that happened sometimes. Whenever she felt uneasy in the world, she sent for her favorite diviner.

It helped that I had a true gift.

I knew her betrothed would arrive tomorrow and they would marry on the anniversary of her father's army defeating his father's troops in battle.  

I had tried to hint that it was an inauspicious choice of date for the wedding celebration. For King Telthe, Santia's father, it was a day of jubilation.  For King Cosin -- well, he had no say, having lost the battle. He didn't have to be happy about it.

The joining of the two families and the promise of joint rule of both countries was the best future any of  us could hope to see.

A shame the reading for that night didn't promise anything good.

As a member of the Sisterhood of True Seers, I dared not even whisper how bad the event would go. No one wanted to listen to me.  However, in tonight's reading, I had seen nobles on both sides taking affront at references to the battle.

Weapons drawn. Blood spilled.

The war would restart.  I saw devastation everywhere, and Santia's prince never returning to her.

By the Rules of the Temple, any of us with true powers were forbidden from giving more than hints about what we read in the runes.  The more serious the reading, the less we could say. I understood.  We could change the world by urging people into actions to counter a bad reading. That often didn't mean a better future.

I left the palace in a hurry when Santia was called away by servants.  I shoved the rune stones into their silk bag and gathered my shawl.  I didn't stop until I sat on the bench outside the temple gate.

I needed to wrap each of the runes in their own small cloth and pack them away properly. Taking unprotected runes into the temple could be dangerous.  I paused, though. It was a warm night with a slight breeze, a haze of high clouds, and a full moon.  Such an atmosphere would help clear the runes of troubling energy that had built up tonight, both from the reading and from my hasty retreat. I laid them out on the bench beside me, troubled when a couple slid into different spots.

I kept up the battle with the runes for several heartbeats until I realized they were creating a reading, and I wondered if it was meant for me.

I drew my hands back, and the runes kept moving, and I had the impression that I must ask a favor.  I had no idea of what favor I needed or whom I needed to ask.

And then Lapril walked up to the bench.

I had neither seen nor heard him nearby. That's not unusual. His work as the King's Assassin required a level of stealth that touched on magic. I had no idea what he was doing outside the temple this late at night.

"You called me?" he asked, his voice soft.

"No, I didn't," I protested. Then I looked down at the runes that still jumped and slid across the bench.  "Or maybe I did."

"They seem more active than usual."

I suppressed a hysterical laugh. "It is not a good sign. I am sorry they called --"

Ask for a favor.

"They want me to do a favor?" he said, surprising me.

"You can read the runes?"

"I can hear them."

I found that fascinating.  I wanted to ask more, but he shifted slightly, and I realized that the two of us might draw unwanted attention.  That's when I realized the favor I needed.

"Because I belong to the Temple, I abide by their rules.  I cannot tell you why I want this done. I can only ask that you trust me.  I would not do this for a minor reason."

Lapril looked at me and then at the runes I was trying to catch and put away.

"I trust you."

"First, I do not want you to kill anyone."

Lapril gave a sigh of relief.  I told him the basics of what I needed and let him work out the details.  There wasn't much time.

By evening the next day, I knew Lapril had succeeded.

King Cosin and his party had stopped for the night at the last caravansary before the city.  They would have arrived midday, but instead, a messenger delivered the tale of a goat on the roof and the area over the king's table collapsing onto his group.

There were no serious injuries.  Even the goat survived, although there was still some question of how it got up there.

King Cosin broke his leg and couldn't travel for at least ten days and probably more.  King Telthe sent supplies and gifts, and made certain they wanted for nothing.  He even went to visit.  
 
By the time they arrived,  the kings were fast friends.  The wedding took place ten days later with as much pomp and festivities as could be managed. I even danced with Lapril, much to the delight of Santia and her mother.  Lapril seemed to enjoy it as well.

At the end of the dance, I quietly thanked him for his help.  Lapril had a nice smile.

At midnight, I gave Santia a reading and could promise her everything bright and beautiful I had hoped to see in the previous reading.  This time there was no doubt.

Well, there was the problem with their future children, but I had time enough to figure that one out.  I trusted it would not require an assassin this time.