Defiance: The Umbra Chronicles Book 2 Page 5

  Chapter Five

  We woke up hours later, after a good sleep that we’d never expected to enjoy. Honestly, how often do you think I actually get to sleep on what is nearly as good as a bed? I’m no Princess, despite what recent events would have had me believe. I’m grateful for what I get. What I didn’t expect to get was a third party, sitting on a stretcher, a little way apart from us, reading a book.

  He didn’t realise that I was awake at first, so I had a few moments to study him. I’d recognised him nearly at once, once I’d got over his likeness to Caradoc. I remembered him well, even though I’d only known him for a few minutes. Someone who plays a big part in your life, as he did in mine, stays printed on your memory.

  And it was because I recognised him, that I didn’t scream.

  ‘Why are you here?’ I asked. I felt like I was in a dream and the things you say in your dream – everyone knows they don’t have consequences.

  ‘I’m waiting for you to wake up.’ His grin fit him but didn’t fit our surroundings. I smiled back. In that odd, in-between state of dreaming and waking, it seemed perfectly natural that he should be waiting for me.

  ‘I would have woken with a kiss,’ I suggested. I realised I was completely awake and in the real world when I saw the look of horror on his face. I sat up. ‘I’m sorry the idea is so distasteful to you,’ I muttered, crossing my legs and casting a glance at Lynnevet who, thankfully, hadn’t witnessed my humiliation.

  The horrified look on his face turned to one stern determination. ‘As an adult, not to mention as a royal guard,’ he said, ‘it’s my responsibility to look after a minor who is in trouble. You must be ten years younger than me!’

  ‘You know that you sound pompous?’ I asked brightly. ‘I don’t see a problem, except that I’d rather some pompous old man didn’t kiss me.’

  He leaned forward. ‘Keep thinking that.’

  ‘What are you doing here then?’

  ‘I’m a guard. I’m guarding you. We can be really good friends, up until the moment you try to escape and after that we probably won’t be friends at all.’

  ‘I’ll have to remember that.’

  ‘We’ve met before, do you remember, Emer?’ he asked. I’d forgotten for a moment that I’d had the same name that year. I cast a glance at Lynnevet. His gaze followed mine. ‘I met your sister, Lynnevet, but I was sure at the time that you and she were either twins or very close in age.’ He looked from one to the other. We were clearly not the same age now and I fought the urge to laugh.

  ‘This is Lynnevet,’ I said. ‘And yes, I remember.’ I wondered how I looked to him. I’d had what could only be described as a wide variety of experiences while I was in Rheged. I’d starved when I was a featherskin and I’d been stuffed with food when I’d been a princess. I hadn’t been a princess long enough for the stuffing to take the hollows out of my cheeks. My hair had fallen again, cascading over one shoulder.

  Ronan sighed. ‘What possessed you to do it, Emer?’ he asked. ‘And above all, what possessed you to do it so publicly? You must have known what the result would be!’

  ‘Maybe I’m suicidal,’ I suggested lightly. Lynnevet wasn’t asleep. She turned to look at me but didn’t say anything.

  ‘You should have thought of your sister,’ Ronan snapped. He slapped the book shut and stood up. He looked just like Caradoc, tall and broad and imposing, when he stood over me like that. Still, he didn’t have Caradoc’s wildness ‒ for all his bulk, Ronan was far more civilised than Caradoc would ever be. If I’d never felt physically threatened by Caradoc, then I certainly wasn’t going to be threatened by his son.

  I stood up too.

  ‘I’ve always thought of my sister,’ I snapped. ‘Why do you think I’m here? What do you think I’ve ever done, except look out for others? I’m sick of having to be responsible for the whole damned world!’

  ‘There was no need for you to draw attention to yourself!’ he shouted back. ‘He hasn’t been your Guardian for, what, at least five years? You had a new life! Why did you have to go back and drag up old grudges?’

  ‘Old grudges?’ I wanted so much to give him a shove and wondered if he felt the same. ‘Old grudges? Just this last Winter Solstice we were given to him again!’

  ‘Then you should have gone to the guards again!’

  ‘Why?’ I demanded. ‘It only got us one night of freedom. It didn’t do us any good, why do it again?’

  ‘What do you mean it didn’t do you any good? I was at the court. You were put with a new family. I saw it happen.’

  I looked down. It didn’t seem right to be shouting these things. They were too important to shout. ‘We spent one night with the fosterwoman,’ I said quietly, like I wasn’t talking about the most damaging day of my life. ‘Then she took us back to Maldwyn and nothing had changed, except maybe it was worse.’

  ‘What?’ He looked horrified, shattered. ‘But it was a court appointed guardian, they’re not allowed to just hand you over-’

  ‘I’m not sure what they are and are not allowed to do is a big point of concern for a child molester. Maybe the fosterwoman was part of the Order. We never knew. We only cared what made a difference in our everyday lives, and the only thing that made a difference was that at the next Winter Solstice they took us back to Caillen and we got new Guardians and new names again.’ I couldn’t say anything about the baby. That was my secret, and only Sparrow and the monster who’d fathered him knew he existed.

  ‘Emer, I swear to God, I never knew.’

  ‘Swearing about it won’t help,’ I said dully.

  Lynnevet looked up at me as if to say she knew what would help, but Ronan would never understand that drive for vengeance.

  Ronan stared at me. ‘Believe me, Emer, I never knew.’

  ‘I believe you.’ I gave him a very direct look. ‘How you feel about it changes nothing. It was simply something I had to endure. Now I’m older and that monster has no control over me. I’m not sorry for what I am. If that means that I have to face the consequences, then so be it. But I should never have allowed this judgement to fall on Lynnevet.’

  He stepped forward again suddenly, until we were so close that if I took a deep breath, I would have felt him against me. His hand fell heavily on my shoulder. I needed it to steady me because I was shaking. I drew in a shuddering breath.

  ‘I will never allow it,’ he swore, then turned and left the cell.

  ‘Do you trust him?’ Lynnevet asked after he left. ‘It was hard to be sure, the way you were speaking.’

  ‘I trust him,’ I said, ‘as much as I trust anyone. I met him years ago. He tried to take me out of a bad place.’

  ‘He didn’t get you out in the end?’

  ‘Not in the end, no. But he tried, and that’s more than most people did.’

  Lynnevet didn’t reply.

  ‘Why don’t you get some more sleep?’ My stomach rumbled at that moment. The very mention of food was enough to set it going. ‘I’ll wake you when it’s time to eat.’

  Lynnevet was already curled up. She just closed her eyes again. I did the same but couldn’t sleep. Another guard came in to watch over us.

  The next morning a nice, kind guard led us out to our trial. I’d seen many trials like it from a distance, with the accused standing up before the judge and trying to deny what was always the overwhelming evidence from witnesses. I’d used my magic very publicly. Every single person who’d been on the Prom would have been a witness. What struck me, though, was that I was pretty sure I’d seen many of these witnesses at other trials

  The first two witnesses spoke about how I’d stood up on a crate and uttered words of power. That was confusing, since there is no such thing, although the word ‘No’ can be pretty powerful. The six witnesses after the first two, though, were the ones who really captivated the attention of the crowd. There were certainly creative, anyway, and they didn’t suffer from an inability to express emotion.

  I hated children, they said. It wa
sn’t exactly untrue. I hated most people; I just didn’t make an exception for small people. I made their children sick, they said, I made their children have bad dreams, I made their children behave badly. The crowd lapped it up, and by the end of it even I nearly believed it. No one even mentioned David and I wondered for a moment if I was maybe attending the wrong trial.

  And then Lynnevet hung me out to dry. She took a step away from me and pointed an accusing finger. ‘She was the one who used magic!’ she cried. ‘I’m just a little girl! I had nothing to do with it!’

  The judge faced her impassively. I wondered how many times he had sent children to the flames. When we were thirteen, Lynnevet’s age now, the creepyguardians still had a strict curb on our activities. I doubted that Lynnevet had ever seen a child executed.

  I tried not to blame her for distancing herself from me, but I did. I’d faced every kind of horror for her, and I expected her to reciprocate.

  ‘Take them away,’ the judge said, ignoring Lynnevet’s last, desperate attempt to save her life. ‘The community has declared them guilty. They will be executed at sunrise tomorrow.’

  I was so brave – because that’s what’s important when you’re going to be murdered: that the judge and the crowd howling for your blood don’t think you’re a coward. Lynnevet burst into noisy tears – that wasn’t going to make a difference either.

  We were escorted back to the cell. I held Lynnevet on my lap and stroked her hair, despite what she’d done to me. I looked at all those empty stretchers and wondered how many people had gone from here to the stake.

  The guard changed an hour before sunset. It was Ronan again, his face set and grim. I’d seen Caradoc look like that many times. Suddenly, Ronan didn’t look so civilised. His hair was too short to braid into the traditional Camiri style, but he’d added a blue bead to one of the short locks. He came over to us where I sat on a stretcher, Lynnevet lying across me with her head in my lap. He knelt down in front of me.

  ‘We have to go now,’ he said quietly. ‘I’ve disabled the guards, but we’ll have to hurry.’

  I stared at him and irrational anger rose in me. ‘We are not your responsibility,’ I snapped back. ‘We don’t need you. Believe me, I am quite capable of defending the pair of us.’

  On my lap, giving up her pretence of sleep, Lynnevet snorted. ‘And I can teach you manners, too, Sparrow. Snorting is to be avoided. General rule.’ I turned back to Ronan. A glint of humour was in his eyes ‒ despite himself, I guessed.

  ‘Let me help you, Emer,’ he said. ‘I owe you a debt. I cannot leave it unpaid.’

  A debt. Fantastic. Still, as much as it galled me to admit it, I needed help to get out of this situation. Being proud wouldn’t do me much good when I was dead.

  I should never have gotten Lynnevet into this situation. I had to get her out of there, then I could go back and try and kill Maldwyn. Once that was done, I might try to kill Aoife, which wouldn’t be easy given the level of security around the average Queen. Then, well, there would always be a bridge somewhere, a river, a knife, and I need concern myself with the real world no longer. But now I had Lynnevet to consider, and my promise. I couldn’t break a promise to her.

  ‘Fine,’ I snapped. I stood up and dusted myself off. ‘Let’s pay off your debt, shall we?’

  #

  He opened the door cautiously. I’m not sure why he was so cautious, since both the guards who had been stationed at the door were face down and unconscious.

  ‘Quickly,’ he whispered.

  Lynnevet and I followed him.

  It was late in the evening. We didn’t see anyone as we hurried through the narrow corridors, through the little used back rooms of the Palace of Justice. We slipped out a small door onto the Prom. At this hour, it was deserted. The three of us ran across the Prom, towards the securely fastened gates that covered the entrance to the hive.

  Ronan led us up a small flight of stairs that led to the sally port used by the guards when they had to pass through the gates after sunset. He fumbled for a key at his belt and I saw the blood on his knuckles I hadn’t noticed before. His hands didn’t shake. I looked up at him with new respect. He was throwing his whole life away and he was completely calm.

  ‘Who goes there?’ a man shouted.

  Ronan stopped so quickly it was obvious he was doing something subversive. The three of us looked around. The man at the foot of the stairs was the size of a mountain. Ronan drew his sword and gave a low growl, but I had a sudden idea. I thrust my arm out in front of Ronan to stop him and ran down to the man with one hand extended. ‘Stop!’ I cried in a shouted whisper. ‘Stop! Stop!’

  I think he was so shocked at my audacity that he actually did stop.

  ‘You swore an oath to me!’ I cried. I looked him straight in the face, so that he would look back at me and know me. ‘Twenty years ago, you served the Empress and you swore an oath to serve me when I returned from the dead! You swore to serve me. Every guard in Rheged swore to serve me and I remember your face. For your sake and the sake of every person in Rheged, Meistri or Camiri, I fought the dragon Darragh and I destroyed him. Like Umbra, I swore to return, to save you when you needed saving, and I am here now. You must let me pass, for the sake of every person in the Thousand Counties.’

  We stared at one another. The light near the gates was dim, so I asked Umbra to kindle her light for me. She shone like a star in my brow. My hair fell from its knot and I let him look at me. He was enormous. If he took a swipe at me, I was dead, Umbra or no Umbra.

  His mouth dropped open and he fell to one knee. ‘Bach Chwaer,’ he whispered, looking up at me.

  ‘That’s right,’ I said, hearing Ronan gasp behind me. ‘Now is the time to fulfil your oath. Open the door, soldier.’

  The guard stood as quickly as he was able and opened the door with hands that trembled. As I passed, he knelt down again and put his hand out towards me but didn’t quite touch me. ‘Bach Chwaer,’ he said, ‘please?’

  ‘Please, what?’ I was doing my best impression of Aoife, as I always did when I wanted to look haughty, but it was hard to look down at him while keeping my nose in the air.

  ‘Bless me before you go, and I will pass on your blessing to my wife and my children.’

  It’s a terrible moment when you realise that your enemies have wives and children, but it’s worse when someone asks for your blessing and you know that you don’t have any blessings to give. But I had to do something. I suddenly felt sorry for him; for him and for all the people who were waiting for the mythical Bach Chwaer to return from the past to liberate them from their sorrows. I put my hand gently on his head.

  ‘May you be blessed for your service here tonight,’ I murmured. ‘May your family live in safety and happiness and peace.’

  He watched me until we were out of sight, running over the irregular stones outside the hive. As soon as we were far enough away that we couldn’t be seen, Ronan caught my arm.

  ‘He thought you were the Bach Chwaer!’

  ‘You don’t say.’

  ‘Why did he think that? I mean, he just let us walk right out of there!’

  I pulled my arm away from him. ‘I am the Bach Chwaer,’ I said. ‘I never asked for it, but the title was thrust upon me by the Empress. I couldn’t let all those people die when Darragh was going to destroy Rheged. I’m not the nice one, but I’m not the kind of person who could allow that to happen and not intervene.’

  ‘But the Bach Chwaer was in Rheged twenty years ago! You’re not old enough!’

  ‘He knew my face, didn’t he?’ I started walking again. ‘How do you think I’m nearly twenty and Lynnevet is still thirteen. Even though it was five years ago, Lynnevet is still thirteen. I went back to the past and I killed a few dragons. I was given the title of Bach Chwaer. Aoife stole my throne and let the whole of the Thousand Counties burn, let the war rage on for two decades. But I was the Bach Chwaer. I am the Bach Chwaer.’

  ‘That was you?’ He’d stopped w
alking and I felt him staring at my back. I refused to stop, so he had to jog to catch up to me. I was well aware of Lynnevet’s keen interest beside me.

  ‘Yes, that was me,’ I snapped, wishing he’d stop looking at me like I was some kind of hero.

  ‘I was there,’ Ronan said.

  ‘That’s not specific enough for it to make any sense, do you know that?’

  ‘I was there ‒ in the Halls of the Young, that night that the Bach Chwaer and the great Caradoc liberated the Camiri youth. I saw you. You spoke to me!’

  ‘What? You couldn’t possibly have been there. You’re Meistri, not Camiri.’ And yet, that flaming red hair was the exact same colour as Caradoc’s. It had been a big night, when Caradoc and I had gone to the aid of the children imprisoned in burning buildings when the dragon who was Darragh’s son had attacked the Halls of Youth. I knew I didn’t remember everything from that night, but I remembered a boy with red hair. It had struck me as like Caradoc’s, and it had caught my eye because I was in love with Caradoc even then.

  ‘I was just a young boy. You gave me your insignia. This insignia.’

  That made me stop stalking over the road in the dark, which can only be described as a good thing. I asked Umbra to light up for me again and she glowed from my brow, just enough for me to watch Ronan reach into his tunic and pull out a ring that he wore on a chain around his neck. He lifted it over his head and showed it to me. I took it. I’d barely worn it for more than a day. The Empress had given me this ring when she announced I was her Bach Chwaer.

  I resisted the desire to look at Lynnevet because she was too young to understand. The Empress had once seemed a distant figure to me, an old woman, reportedly three hundred years old and kept alive by her magic. I’d encountered people there who had gone through the Portal before me, people who claimed that they would meet me in my future ‒ a thought which suddenly gave me hope that I would survive long enough to meet them! It wasn’t until only hours before the Empress’s death at Aoife’s hands that I realised that the Empress was Elisabeth, drawn into the Portal for so long that she emerged three hundred years before we could meet. She had raised Aine and Aoife as her adopted daughters, loved them all their lives, until Aoife betrayed her.