Terah Edun - Sworn To Transfer

Stephanie gave her look bordering on crazy. Ciardis could physically see the struggle cross Stephanie face on whether she wanted to be clean or take out the dirtiness on Ciardis. Apparently her desire to be clean overrode the desire to hurt Ciardis for forcing her out into the woods in the first place. And so they began walking, Ciardis in the lead until they heard the sound of a babbling brook. Stephanie didn’t even wait until Christian and Ciardis were on the other side of the running water to start discarding her clothes. She took a bar of soap out of knapsack and dumped the tunic and pants in the water.

Before Ciardis disappeared on the other side of the shrubs into the open glade, she noted a curious tattoo on Stephanie’s lower back. Before she could investigate further, she was pulled into the clearing by Christian, who chided, “You really should ask to look at a girl’s goods first.”

Ciardis gave him a droll look and rolled her eyes.

Walking into the center and trying to forget the attack by the Shadow Mage, she asked him, “So what’s the tattoo?”

Christian looked up at her in surprise. “How would I know?”

“I thought you were lovers,” Ciardis said with a furious blush as she dipped her head.

He laughed. “No, we’d bicker night and day if we were. Kill each other in a week at most.”

She looked at him curiously.

“Don’t get me wrong,” he assured. “We get along fine. In semi-small doses. We’re good at watching each other’s backs and under orders.”

“Orders from whom?”

“Now that you’d have to ask Stephanie.”

“Ask me what?” came the question from behind them. Stephanie stood there redressed in a clean tunic and pants. She must have had a spare in her knapsack.

“Whom do you take your orders from?”

“Whom do you think?”

Ciardis fought not to get angry; it didn’t really serve any purpose.

With a sigh, she said, “The Shadow Council?”

Stephanie smirked at her and started brushing her wet hair. “But who runs the Shadow Council?”

Deciding that she could play this game Ciardis walked over to Stephanie, “You said you told the council about me and what happened with the Duchess of Carne. So they have to be in the city?”

She said it as a question and was delighted when she saw a surprise of confirmation flash on Stephanie’s face.

Ciardis grinned and held up two fingers. “Secondly, they have to be well connected. Enough to have a torturer on their payroll and spies in the courts.”

Stephanie didn’t say anything, but she stopped brushing her hair.

“And three, they have to be mages,” Ciardis ventured as she looked over at Christian, “because the two of you are. If they have runners with this much power, then the head person needs to surpass you.”

Christian crossed his arms and smiled. “Very good, little mage. Now who would you guess?”

“Christian,” Stephanie hissed.

“No,” said her partner as he waved his hand, contemplating the girl in front of him. “You started this. Let her finish.”

But they didn’t get the chance. The ground began to rumble and they stumbled backwards as it continued to shake. Ciardis, Stephanie, and Christian hurried to get closer together and figure out what was going on. In front of them the earth began to bulge until a large mound had formed. With one last rumble the mound, at least three feet high, cracked, and out of it poured shadows. Individuals and groups, shapes and objects, dozens came forth out of the darkness. In the center of the moving pit of shadows, a large one began to rise. It smoothed into a human shadow and then a line appeared down the front.

Out of the center stepped a man: the Shadow Mage.

And behind out of the shadows came another man—the one she seen one sunny day in Jovelin’s bookshop. The man with the golden Weathervane eyes.

“Hello, Sister,” he said politely.

If Stephanie and Christian were startled, they didn’t show it.

This didn’t look good.

“Who are you?” she demanded.

“I’ll be doing the talking for now,” said the Shadow Mage with an unpleasant smile.

“You see, my friend here is a Weathervane. One of only two in existence,” he said congenially. “By the looks on your friends’ faces, they have known about it. By the look on yours, my dear, you didn’t.”

“Is that why you tried to kill me the other day?” Ciardis asked softly. “So your friend would be the only one?”

The Shadow Mage laughed. “Well, no. That was merely a side bonus.” The forest around them and even the brook was silent as the world fell away and all Ciardis could look at was the male Weathervane standing in front of her.

How could there be another? And why is he helping this evil man?

The Shadow Mage glanced between the two and said somewhat sympathetically, as if he had read her very thoughts, “Oh, but you see he has no choice. Show her the bracelet.”

The Weathervane stood silent and lifted his arm to pull back his sleeve to reveal the bracelet. His arm trembled with the effort, as if he hadn’t wanted to but was forced to reveal the cuff on his arm.

It was a wide silver band. Plain in nature, circling his wrist in a perfect sheet of metal. It was molded to his skin and didn’t look like it would come off over his wrist. Not easily.

“That bracelet controls his movements and his powers. It has done so for his entire life.”

And then he smiled. “And whoever controls the bracelet controls him .”

Pain and anger crossed the male Weathervane’s face, but he didn’t argue with any of the facts.

“If there were another Weathervane I would have known,” protested Ciardis. “And they’d never be chained, like you’re saying.”

The Shadow Mage looked at her with something akin to pity, “I believe you believe that. And that is what’s so sad, little Weathervane. Do you know who ordered this?”

“Enough,” Christian hissed as he stepped forward. “If you want to kill us, kill us then. No need for this torture.”

“This will be through when I say it’s through,” the Shadow Mage said calmly while looking at Ciardis’s shaken face.

Christian interrupted again and suddenly there was a shadow creature behind him that forced him to his knees with its blade at his throat. Stephanie moved to help him and shadows quickly sprouted out of the ground, this time in the form of vines. They pulled her feet out from under her and bound her arms behind her back with thick, dark ropes.

At the Shadow Mage’s imperceptible nod, the creatures put thick black layers of shadow over both Christian and Stephanie’s mouths.

“Now, little Weathervane, where were we?”

“Ah, yes,” he continued in giddy excitement. “The shackle on his wrist, pretty though it is, was ordered by your emperor. But don’t think your precious prince didn’t know about it. Oh, he knows, and it serves him well.”

Ciardis wanted to shout and scream and deny it all.

“You’re wrong,” she said fiercely.

The Shadow Mage motioned for the gag to be removed from Christian’s face.

“Ask your friend over there. Am I wrong?”

Tears running down her face, Ciardis looked Christian in the face. Hoping for a denial. But he said not a word. Just stared at the Shadow Mage with hatred.

“Why?” Ciardis said. But she wasn’t directing the question at the Shadow Mage. She was looking at Christian, who was bowed on his knees.

Reluctantly, he turned his eyes to her. “Ciardis,” he pleaded, “this is neither the time nor the place.”

“Why?” she shouted in his face, tears running down her cheeks as she fell to her knees, “Why have you all been lying to me this whole time? Why is he shackled like a dog by the very man I serve?”