The Consort, Chapter 14
two nights later…
DG was dreaming of Finaqua.
Her subconscious seemed to have a special connection to the summery palace; she dreamt of it often, even though she’d only been there once since becoming Queen. Cain had taken her there for a week’s holiday about two months before when he’d decided she needed some time off. He hadn’t been wrong, but she didn’t like saying so for herself.
But now, in her dreams, she was there again. She walked the halls, which melted into the fields and the streams and the lakes. Endlessly she walked, searching for something. Then she saw Cain, off in the distance, standing on the lakeshore with his back to her. He was wearing his old Tin Man clothes, which she hadn’t seen him in for years.
She called out to him and he turned. I have to tell him. I have to do it now before it’s too late. She ran, but her limbs were slow and stupid, held back by that dreamforce that dragged at her and wouldn’t let her run fast enough. He waved and smiled, a sad smile, then turned and began walking away. She tried and tried to run but the moment she got to where she thought he was, he vanished. Finally she saw him on the edge of the forest and called for him to wait, wait for her, please wait.
He just turned and disappeared into the forest, as if he’d never been there at all.
She jerked awake, holding herself very still and quiet. Something had woken her.
Every sense on high alert, she glanced at her bedside clock. Almost five a.m.
Something’s happened to Cain. And something’s happening here. Now.
The thought was unbidden but unshakeable. She’d come to trust the occasional flashes of intuition she exhibited. Her still-emerging magical abilities didn’t come with telepathy, or precognition, but there was a mental element. An unpredictable, annoying one, but an element all the same…especially regarding things and people that were the most important to her.
The fact was that her concern for Cain’s safety could no longer be called mere worry. Intense, agonizing terror was a more accurate description. They’d had no word since Saturday, the day they’d exchanged dispatches by stealth hound, and it was now about to be Tuesday. Saturday evening, Raw had sensed Cain relieved and with Jeb. If they’d left immediately, they would surely be back by now. Even if they’d left Sunday morning, they ought to have been back. If they had chosen to stay, for whatever reason, Cain would surely have notified her. She had a hard time believing he’d choose to stay any longer than he absolutely had to, when it was so clear that they had some things to talk about.
The only conclusion was that something had happened. It had been decided the previous evening that if there’d been no word by this morning, a squad would be sent after them.
Cain. Oh God, I know we don’t talk, I don’t know if you even exist here in the O.Z. but if you’re there please don’t let anything happen to him.
But she couldn’t think about him right now, alone in the woods with a few dozen soldiers and possibly in trouble. He was far away and she couldn’t help him, but something was going on here. Something had woken her, and her magic was snapping all around her body like one of those summertime mosquito-zapping lights people used to hang on their porches back home. With effort, she pushed thoughts of Cain to the back of her mind and slipped out of bed, grabbing for her trousers and a t-shirt.
She stood stock-still in the center of her room, listening, waiting. She heard nothing.
Then, a figure dropped past her window.
DG cocked her head, blinking, too startled to react at first. Did that just happen?
She darted over to the wall next to the window, keeping herself out of sight, soundless on her bare feet. She peeked around the windowframe and saw a rope dangling outside. She craned her neck upwards but couldn’t see what it was dangling from.
Holy shit. He was rappelling.
We’re under attack.
No sooner had the thought passed through her mind than the alarm sounded.
She heard the guards burst into the sitting room and quickly stepped into her sneakers before emerging. “Your Majesty, we need to get you to the bunker,” Dillon said.
She thought about arguing. It wasn’t in her nature to run and hide. But she didn’t know from where the attack was coming, or how many there were, or what their objective was, although she could guess. It wouldn’t be smart to charge right in before assessing the situation. So she went with them, a small huddle of four guards surrounding her.
“Where’s my sister?”
“They’re fetching her now, ma’am.”
“We’re waiting.”
“We can’t wait, Your Majesty.”
“I said we’re waiting!” That shut the guards up, even though DG knew they were probably right, but she wasn’t willing to go to the bunker without Azkadellia beside her.
They didn’t have to wait long; within ten seconds another huddle of guards appeared with Az in a bathrobe in the middle of them. “DG, what’s going on?” she asked, hurrying to clasp her hand.
“We’re under attack. Come on, we’re going downstairs until we figure out what’s the deal.” They boarded the elevator, squished in with the eight guards, and started down. “Wait…where’s Father? Az, have you seen…” DG trailed off.
“What?” Azkadellia said.
DG blinked. What was I saying? “Nothing. Lost my train of thought.”
The bunker elevator went directly from the residence floor to the bunker, five stories below ground, without any other points of entry. It was a slower ride because the car and cable were reinforced and heavier than the regular cars, and the suspense of their slow sink was agonizing.
Suspense which came to a screeching halt when the car did. “That isn’t supposed to happen,” Az said. The guards were looking around for something to do, someone to fight, but saw only the closed walls of the lift car.
Well, if this is their plan, it sucks, DG thought…just before a loud boom shook the car and rattled everyone’s bones. They could do nothing but stare as the lift doors were pried open through a gaping hole in the shaft and they found themselves staring into the eyes of a dozen Longcoats with shotguns.
“Hello, Your Majesty,” one of them said. He had more shiny bits on his coat than the others, DG figured that meant he was the leader. “My name is Nejo. Please, join us.” He held out a hand.
Great. A smarmy, overly polite bad guy. Do they all read from some kind of handbook? The shtick is pretty tired. DG ignored the man’s proferred hand and stepped out of the lift into the main corridor of the twentieth floor. She was rarely here; this floor was part of the archives. She was only sure what floor it was because of the room numbers nearby. She kept a tight hold on Azkadellia’s hand as their guards were hauled out of the lift and disarmed. “Whatever you think you’re going to do, it won’t work,” she said.
“It has already worked. This palace was designed to repel attack from the ground. The bulk of your guards are stationed below. It was ridiculously easy to come in from above and secure this floor so none of them can help you.”
“You must have had help.”
“From more than one person, yes.”
DG scanned the group. She counted about thirty Longcoats. If they’d come in as he’d said, it wasn’t too likely they were spread out. This was probably most of them. Keep him talking. The question of whether or not Cain’s group near the border had also been attacked was physically battling her to be voiced and she kept forcing it back down again. “What are you gonna do with us?”
“Oh, that’ll be up to the new King.”
“The O.Z. can’t have a King. Matrilineal, remember? It’s the law.”
“Well, they say change is good.” He beckoned someone forward, and a Longcoat approached dragging a bound prisoner. DG saw with growing horror that it was Gerald Umbrey. He was staring at her with a baleful expression. “Meet the new King of the O.Z.”
“Lord Umbrey,” she said, through gritted teeth. Good thing I didn’t divorce Cain and marry this yutz, like certain people wanted me to.
He was shaking his head. “I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, Your Majesty.”
“What did you do?” she demanded.
“They killed my father, months ago,” Umbrey said, miserably. “And said they’d do the same to me, and my sister, unless I helped them. They wanted me to try and…see if I could marry you, but you married the General before I could even meet you.”
“So you decided a coup was the next best thing?”
“No! I never wanted this!” he cried. DG watched his face. She was inclined to believe him. The fact that the Longcoats were keeping him restrained was telling. “I tried to charm you away, thought maybe…maybe you’d leave him and marry me and that would satisfy them.” Slow tears were leaking down his face. “I didn’t think I’d like you as much as I did.”
“Oh, good lord,” Nejo said, rolling his eyes. “Spare us your flagellations, Umbrey. I’ve been listening to you whine for months.”
DG still had a hold of Azkadellia’s hand, hoping Nejo wouldn’t notice her silence. She didn’t dare look at her sister, who was seeing or hearing nothing at the moment.How much time do you need, Az?
Few more minutes.
I can stall him for that long.
You have to stay calm. Don’t disrupt the flow.
I won’t let go.
I know you won’t.
“I won’t help you kill her, no matter what you threaten me with!” Umbrey was yelling.
“Oh, I don’t think that’ll be necessary. You can just marry her now. Might help ease the transition with the people, too, if the former Queen seems to be okay with this…development.”
“I already have a husband,” DG said, unable to help the snarl creeping into her voice.
Nejo stepped closer, a look of fake sympathy on his face. “Oh, I’m afraid you don’t.”
Don’t listen to him. He lies.
He pulled out a long, deadly-looking sword. It was bloodstained. “Cain’s blood,” he said, calm as if he were demonstrating a new dance step.
No. You don’t have to believe him.
“You’ll be happy to know that he died bravely.” A tight smirk curled his lip. “The last word he spoke was your name. Isn’t that romantic?”
DG clamped everything down. Tight, so tight that nothing could get through, nothing but her connection to Azkadellia, nothing but that flow from sister to sister. He lies. He lies. He lies.
“I can see you don’t believe me. Frankly, I don’t care whether you do or not. I only care that…”
Now, DG.
DG quickly shut her eyes and threw up as much of a shield around herself as she could before Azkadellia let go with a cry, a pressure wave bursting from her and blasting through the Longcoats, toppling them like bowling pins and stunning them into a daze. Even DG wasn’t completely safe; the impact rocked her on her feet and sent her head spinning. Az sagged to the floor in a half-faint.
DG let go of her and sprinted towards the door to the stairs that led down, where the palace guard would be waiting, or at least where she hoped they’d be waiting. She was halfway there when someone grabbed her leg and she flew headfirst onto the floor.
She spun and saw Nejo, pale-faced and manic, grabbing at her lower legs. She kicked him away and got to her feet again. She had to reach the door before the Longcoats recovered from Azkadellia’s Stunning. Nejo seemed just as determined to stop her. He staggered up and lunged for her. She sidestepped him, spun and landed a hard kick right into his stomach, glad she’d kept up with her martial-arts lessons and wishing Glitch could see her put them to use. Nejo was much larger than she was, and her kick didn’t have nearly the effect on him she’d been hoping for. She ducked his arm as he swung it around to hit her and punched him in the jaw as hard as she could, which seemed to hurt her more than it did him.
I don’t have time for this. I have to get to the door.
Cain’s dead.
No, he isn’t. Nejo was just trying to throw you off balance. He’s probably fine and rushing home as fast as he can.
She grabbed Nejo and thrust her knee right into his crotch hard enough that she felt the ligaments in her leg pull and twist. That was going to hurt tomorrow. But the damned guy kept coming.
Suddenly Nejo was grabbed from behind and thrown off her. “Go!” Umbrey shouted at her, giving her a push for good measure.
DG stumbled and regained her footing, then ran for the door again. She unbolted it and threw it open, and blessed Haven, the stairway was crammed to bursting with palace guard, who poured in, wild-eyed with frustration and ready to kick Longcoat ass. DG sagged against the wall, sliding to the floor, and sat there until she felt herself borne up by two pair of arms. She looked up and saw Glitch and Raw lifting her to her feet. “Are you all right?” Glitch asked.
She nodded. “Uh-huh. Might be a little bruised.”
“Well, you just single-handedly repelled a Longcoat military takeover, so I’ll take ‘bruised.’”
“Not single-handedly. Azkadellia really did it.” She broke away from them and hurried to Az’s side. The guards were lifting her off the floor. Her head lolled. “Az?” she said, taking her hand. “Can you hear me?”
“Unh,” Az groaned. “Did it work?”
“You bet it did,” DG said, smiling. “You knocked ‘em dead.”
“Mmm. Good.” She seemed to shake it off a little, more awareness coming into her eyes. “I’m okay.”
“You’re not okay, you should go lie down.”
“I’m staying here with you,” she said, her voice sharper now.
“You two should go back to the residence,” Ambrose said. “This is going to take some sorting-out. Take your own guards and stay there until the guard has secured the whole palace.”
DG nodded. “Gerald Umbrey was part of this, Ambrose.”
“So it seems,” he said, tightly.
“But in the end he helped me. I think he was coerced.”
“We’ll have him Viewed. Don’t worry.”
DG opened her mouth to tell them what Nejo had said about Cain, but she couldn’t get the words out. If I don’t tell anybody else, it isn’t true. A childish forestall, but all she had. “C’mon, Az. Let’s go upstairs.”
Azkadellia was so tired that lifting her hand to her mouth to drink her tea felt like a heroic effort. She was sitting on the couch in the family drawing room watching her sister pace.
She shook her head. “They had more information about the palace than Gerald Umbrey could have given them. They knew where the bunker elevator shaft was, they knew which floor to use to best access it. They must have had another source, not necessarily a willing one.”
Az sat up. “DG, I know what you’re thinking, but…it might not be. There are other ways.”
DG looked at her, and Az saw her desperation to believe that. She wished that she really believed it herself.
The door opened and Ambrose entered. “DG, you’ d better…”
That was as far as he got before Jeb Cain pushed his way past, bloody and bruised and looking very much the worse for wear. He saw DG, went straight to her and hugged her. Az blinked in surprise. DG and Jeb weren’t that close, to her knowledge.
“The Longcoats brought him,” Ambrose explained. “He’s the only one, though. He said he had to see you.”
“Jeb, are you all right?” DG was saying, patting his back. She drew away. “What happened? Where’s Cain?”
He stepped away, tears streaking his dirty face. Az’s heart was growing heavier by the moment. Oh, no. Oh God, no. “He’s dead.”
Az watched DG’s face close down. “We can’t be sure about that,” she said.
“I can! I saw it happen!” Jeb cried. “They killed him, DG! Right in front of me!”
“Tell me what happened. Exactly what happened.”
Jeb visibly pulled himself together. When he spoke, his voice shook. “My squad and I were captured, but we’d escaped by the time Dad and his unit found us at another basecamp. He got suspicious that we were all able to escape, and thought they might be tracking us. We’d just found the transmitter in my coat, when…they were there. They were just everywhere. They had us surrounded and just started mowing everyone down. I hit the deck and I didn’t see where Dad was right away. Then one of them ran in and grabbed me and hauled me out of the basecamp. The fighting went on but they kept me out of it. When it was over…everyone was dead. But they dragged me to the front and they had Dad down on the ground, on his knees. Then that guy…Nejo…he looks at me and says ‘We’ll take this to the Queen,’ and he stabbed Dad right through the heart.” Jeb’s face was a mask of misery as he related this story, his words broken up and choked.
Az put her hands to her mouth. She wished she could shut her eyes but she couldn’t stop watching DG’s face. It had gone beyond blank. It was so blank now that it looked like no expression had ever touched it before and never would again. Jeb’s face was warring with itself, one second crumpling, the next second clenched.
“They Viewed me, DG,” Jeb said, hoarse. “They got stuff about the palace out of my head.”
DG didn’t seem to have heard him. “I need to see it.”
Az stood up. “DG, no. Don’t make him re-live it.”
“I have to see. Raw?”
Raw walked forward from where he’d been hunkered down near the door. “DG not want to see this,” he said, in that quietly emphatic way he had.
“No. I don’t want to. I need to.”
“Not make Jeb see again.”
DG looked at Jeb, but hardly seemed to be seeing him. “I’m sorry, Jeb, but I have to see it.”
He nodded, holding up a hand when Raw started to object again. “It’s okay. I’d need to see it, too.” He walked over to the mirror over the mantelpiece. Raw hesitated, but then joined him there. DG stood back, watching the glass; Az tried to take her hand but found it cold and unresponsive.
Raw put one hand on the glass and one hand on Jeb’s head. The young man jerked a little, then bit his lip and shut his eyes as the image came into the glass.
Az wished she could look away. It was just as Jeb had described. Cain on his knees, held down by two Longcoats, his face stoic, not even looking at Nejo as he loomed over him. They heard Nejo speak, then he drew the sword. Just before the blow, Cain shut his eyes. Az saw his mouth move. You couldn’t hear him, but it looked like he was saying her sister’s name.
He gave the barest jerk as the sword passed through him. Blood poured from the wound. He fell to the ground, and the Longcoats left him there.
Raw released Jeb and stepped to DG. He watched her frozen face for a moment, then put both one hand over her heart, lowering his head in concentration. She sucked in a breath while he…what was he doing? Az couldn’t tell. Whatever it was, it was an effort.
“Raw cannot feel Cain,” he finally said. “Cannot see. Cain is…is lost.” He pulled back, shaking his head, his hands going to his face before he sank to a crouch by the fireplace. Jeb stumbled to a chair and collapsed into it, his head in his hands.
DG stood there for a long moment. Az exchanged a glance with Ambrose, who looked stricken. “Excuse me,” DG finally said, quiet and calm. She turned and left the room, walking with even, measured steps.
Azkadellia followed her out at a discreet distance, Ambrose right behind her. They watched DG walk down the hall towards her room. She was about to follow her there when DG suddenly stopped in the middle of the corridor. Az put out a hand to stop Ambrose, who was about to go to her. “Just a second,” she whispered.
DG was just standing there, as if she’d forgotten not only why she was walking or where she was going, but even what the point of walking was in the first place.
She turned slowly around to face them, but she wasn’t seeing them. As Azkadellia watched, her heart breaking for her sister’s loss, DG’s knees slowly buckled beneath her and she slumped with tragic, inexorable grace to the floor until she was sitting there, legs folded and back straight, her head still held high and her blank eyes staring into space.