David Wells - Linkershim

The man in the robe smiled with such pure, innocent joy that Lacy felt a little flutter in her stomach. “I am Phane Reishi. Welcome, Princess Lacy. You are safe. Zuhl and his brutes can’t hurt you anymore.”

Lacy looked around, a bit bewildered. “Thank you, Prince Phane …”

“Ah, please call me Phane. It would be so refreshing to dispose of titles and formalities. May I call you Lacy?”

She blinked, looking around at the formality of her welcome and feeling even more unsure of herself. “Of course. I’m grateful for your hospitality, but I’ve been entrusted with a task by my father and this journey has brought me very far off course.”

“Lacy, please,” Phane interrupted, “there will be plenty of time to discuss such matters. Let’s get you settled in first.”

“But,” she started to say, emphasizing her frustration with both hands and wincing in pain before she could finish her protest.

“Oh, Lacy, what’s happened to your hand? You must be in such agony.”

“That’s what I’m trying to tell you,” Lacy said. “There’s something very dark pursuing me. You and your people aren’t safe with me here.”

Phane smiled like the sunrise, extending his open hand to the wall behind her. “I assure you, there are few who could breach these walls. We are all quite safe here.”

Lacy turned and saw the wall for the first time, a hundred feet tall and as sheer as a cliff. From the light at the other end of the tunnel, she could only guess that it was a hundred feet thick as well. She turned completely away from the greeting committee and stared in wonder at the massive fortification. Phane silently stepped up beside her, smiling in feigned wonder.

“How?”

“In truth, I don’t really know,” Phane said. “These walls were built long ago, though I suspect magic played a role.”

“If we’d had walls like these, my people would have survived Zuhl’s barbarity.”

“Lacy, let me take a look at your hand.”

She frowned, hesitating for only a moment before holding up her broken hand for him to examine.

He was gentle, cringing when his probing caused her the slightest twinge of pain. After a moment, he nodded to himself, waving his hand at the open air beside them. A door opened with a soft pop.

Lacy gasped in surprise. She’d seen magic since her ordeal had begun but nothing like this. Phane smiled, stepping into his Wizard’s Den and motioning for her to wait where she was. After a few moments of rummaging around, he returned, the door vanishing a moment later.

“Drink this,” he said, holding out a vial of pale liquid. “It will numb the pain so I can heal your hand.”

She looked at her broken, deformed hand, then back at him, hope shining in her eyes. “You can do that?”

“I can indeed, but it will be a very unpleasant experience without this,” Phane said, holding out the vial.

Lacy nodded, drinking the contents quickly, then turning her nose up at the bitter taste.

“I know it tastes bad, but I assure you it will ease the pain. Come, sit with me,” he said, motioning to the steps of the gazebo. When they were comfortably seated, he held up a white bandage and started to unwind it. “This is a very special bandage,” he said. “It will straighten the broken bones in your hand and then mend them correctly. By tomorrow morning, your hand should be fully healed.”

“Really?” Lacy asked, feeling a slight dizziness come over her.

“Indeed. Now, give me your hand.”

The rest of Lacy’s day was a blur. After Phane wrapped the bandage around her broken hand, he guided her back to the carriage before bidding her goodbye and entrusting her to Captain Erato. Drogan was gone, but his absence seemed like more of a curiosity than anything else.

Rolling down the street in the back of the carriage, she could feel the bones in her hand begin to move. Somewhere very far away, she knew she should be in pain, but she wasn’t, or more precisely, she didn’t seem to care.

Erato drove the carriage into the courtyard of a beautiful house and escorted her inside. A staff of ten met her in the foyer. They treated her like a queen, bowing and averting their eyes as if she might bite. She would have giggled except nothing seemed real.

One of the servants led her to a lavishly decorated room with a bed even bigger and softer than the one she’d left behind in Fellenden. The last thing she remembered was the servant helping her take off her boots. Then she woke to the light of dawn.

At first she didn’t even notice. Then it hit her; her hand was healed. It didn’t hurt anymore-not even a little bit. A weight lifted and sudden relief washed over her. She had tried to come to terms with her injury, but all she’d really done was deny the crippling nature of it, until now. Now that her hand was healed, the fear of lifelong suffering she might have endured faded away, leaving only gratitude.

She opened the door leading from her bedroom with a smile and found a young woman waiting for her there.

“Would you like a hot bath, My Lady?”

Lacy closed her eyes, trying not to cry. It had been so long since she’d felt safe, let alone clean. She nodded enthusiastically.

***

“My dear Princess, you are a vision of loveliness,” Phane said with a wide smile and a deep bow.

She had spent the day surrounded by dozens of servants as they fussed over her new dress. In her former life, Lacy would have thoroughly enjoyed the attention, but now, after all that had happened, it seemed so unnecessary, so frivolous.

People were dying and she was being pampered like a princess. She had tried to just accept the first dress offered, but the seamstress would have none of it. After several hours of trying on dozens of dresses, Lacy found herself caught up in the process like her old self, only to have reality return with a jolt of guilt.

She was a princess. And that had taken on a whole new meaning. In the past, her title had meant that everything she wanted was offered, that everything she needed was provided, that she needn’t lift a finger in her own service. Now she understood. Her station was not a privilege but a sacred burden, a duty to preserve and protect her people no matter the cost to herself.

While Captain Erato drove the carriage to Prince Phane’s banquet hall, Lacy reminded herself to be cautious. All evidence to the contrary, she couldn’t help feeling that events were out of her control, that there was some larger game being played and that she didn’t understand the rules.

The banquet hall was magnificent. Crystal chandeliers filled the long, high room with light, and minstrels filled the air with music over the murmur of the crowd. At a glance, most of the men in the room appeared to be Regency officers and the women, their wives.

The evening started with a receiving line, Phane leading her past each and every officer in attendance. By the time they were seated, Lacy’s head was swirling with new names and faces. The officers were mostly dour and serious men, many wearing battle scars like badges of honor. Their wives were another matter. Lacy was ashamed to realize that she saw much of her former self in them. None of them seemed the least bit interested in the historic events unfolding across the Seven Isles, focusing instead on clothes and jewelry, gossip, and their husband’s place in the pecking order.

The meal was elaborate and long, each course an attempt to showcase the wealth of her host, though she had to admit, some of the food was quite good. Mostly, Lacy endured the evening, biding her time until she could speak with Phane alone and make her case for transport to Ithilian.

Her time came late in the evening after all of the courses had been served and the guests were mingling. Phane drew her aside and offered her a glass of warm liqueur that smelled of cinnamon. They sat in a pair of comfortable chairs in an alcove off to the side of the banquet hall.