Slave Line (The Young Ancients) (14 page)

After that everyone that wasn't in on the meeting left, all as one group. Huddled together almost, as if expecting a sudden attack or something. It kind of made sense, but he'd been honest enough about what his plans were. No one really loved spies overly, but it was just a job, wasn't it? Tor waved to the Royal guard that he hoped was in charge.

"Would you hand those shields out? Make sure your own people have them too, if they don't yet."

Tor had weapons that would go through his own shields, but almost no one else did. If they were attacked though, they'd be pretty safe. Even if one of the spies used a nano weapon.

"I... disagree with that sir. It's enough to protect them physically, that's the duty you were set. What if they steal one of them and take it back to Austra with them? Our secrets might be exposed."

That... Tor shook his head, smiling.

"Well, the government and their Ancient won't be doing much with it. I agree though, it might be tempting for them to steal one of those. Please tell them that they can keep them, as long as they let us know first, before getting off the boat. I hate it when people just take my things. So far no one in Austra can even figure out how to make basic fields though. They already have devices to study though. Let them. If they can figure it out, more power to them. I'm surprised they didn't send someone in for schooling it in, to tell the truth." It was a real point, their current way of doing things was so wasteful that it kind of mad Tor sad to think about. It was bad enough that it almost had to be a treaty violation.

The man moved to go get the amulets, at least Tor figured that was the case, but he stopped him, touching his arm gently.

"I'm sorry, I don't know your name. Are you in charge of the Royal guard for this mission?"

"Carver sir. I won't be in charge one the mission itself, since we'll have protected individuals on board. That will be handled by their primary watchers." He bowed and left before anything else could be said.

Wracking his brain led to nothing though. The Royal guard protected the royal family and the high ranked nobles... Oh. Burks. He was a Count, as well as the Ancient of Noram. That made sense at least. He looked at the man down the way and waved to him a bit.

"Shall we get to plotting then? I don't really know how to do this kind of thing, but maybe if we seal the room to keep spies out? I take it no one here is in the employ of Carol Coltress directly? If so, let me know and I'll pay you double not to mention any of this to her." He tried to make it sound light and playful, but half the room stiffened. They didn't glare at him though, in fact the Baron himself started to nod.

"I see. You mean to have her killed then? I understand, given the threats she made toward you. Thank you for not taking this to war. I... can't really say I blame you. I wish it could be done in some other way however." There was real diplomacy in the man's voice, especially considering he thought that Tor wanted to kill his wife.

"What?" OK, he sounded shocked, which got everyone to stare a bit.

"I'm not plotting her death. Sure, she made some threats, but she was just worked up. I can't really blame her for it given everything, it was a horrible situation. I stole part of her vengeance from her. I understand I'll probably have to pay for that someday. This isn't about that. This is about something different altogether. I don't know exactly what to do about it, but I recommend we look to something other than death. Mainly because I've had enough of that for the time being."

People just kept watching him, so he explained, his eyes looking at each of the people involved in turn.

"Alright. So, Burks here is getting married to Bonita. That was set up the other day and as far as I know is still planned?" He looked at the two in question, who both smiled. Bonita took the Ancients hand, which sent a pang of jealousy down Tor's spine. He really liked her after all. It was why he set them up in the first place. He probably would have married her himself if he hadn't been needed to see to Ali first.

The thought made his blood run cold for a second though. She was his wife, and a good one. Dwelling on what might have been wouldn't help anyone. They'd never even been engaged for goodness sake, Nita and himself.

"So, I noticed that Carol was being a little reticent the other day, trying to stop that from happening, because, at least she said, that she feared Bonita was being played with again. That this was some kind of trick to break her heart, like had been done before." He stood then, and leaned forward for affect. It hurt but was worth it.

"Except when I risked reading her field I could tell she knew for a fact that wasn't the case, because she hadn't hired it done, like she had all those other times." He hadn't meant to growl the words, but he did anyway. Nita was his friend and it burned through him how badly mistreated she'd been.

No one said anything, but Nita turned a beet red color. It wasn't shame either. Tor had just never seen her actually get angry before he realized. The Baron was holding his breath and Collette actually pulled a weapon and put it on the table. One of the new multi-weapons too. Not one he'd made either, though from the style it was clearly a copy. It was about ten inches long and made of brown focus stone, looking glassy and sleek. It had the same glowing sigils on it, so someone good had made it. Most of the kids didn't bother with that at all, since it was extra work, nearly as hard as making the field itself in some cases. Tilting his head Tor got the idea. It wasn't made by the kids. Burks had done it. The third and fifth designs were green. The Ancients favorite color. On Tor's they were purple, for the same reason. It translated when the work had been done. If Lyn made it they probably would have been red.

He didn't shrug, but did nod toward it.

"Put that away Collette. You won't need it, I don't think. We need to... Simply instruct the Baroness that doing such things to her own family isn't allowed or proper. Any idea as to how that would best work?" He sat then, hoping he hadn't just stared a war. After a few seconds he realized they might not believe him. He'd have wanted it confirmed if someone had said that about his own mother or another family member.

He hit his truth amulet with a single tap on the front of his black shirt, causing a cream colored aura with two horizontal golden rod stripes to appear, making everyone but Burks and Weasel jump.

"I affirm that what I said is true and correct to the best of my ability to understand such things." The field didn't change, of course, because he was telling the truth. If he tried to lie, it would have turned black. He wasn't in a position to fake it either right now, since he couldn't build anything to save his life at the moment.

Bonita got what it meant, she'd seen the trick before. In fact she probably had her own Truth amulet. Tor hadn't remembered giving her one, but Trice liked her and made sure that the important people got one of everything, didn't she? His friend was squeezing Burks hand so tightly it turned white, her own fingers red from the pressure in places.

"It makes sense. She's always hated me. I... Kind of suspected it was her for a long time, but I never had any proof. Well. I'll just call her out and have this done then. No need for anything fancy Tor. I'll handle it." She stood, as if to storm off and challenge the women, her own step-mother, to a duel to the death right then, but Green wisely pulled her back down, shaking his head.

"Calm love." His voice was almost bored sounding it was so relaxed.

"Tor already asked that we don't spill blood over this. Besides, we can hold that in reserve, in case we feel she's too great a nuisance later. I'd rather you not have to kill anyone, if possible."

Nita made an angry sound and Collette stood, weapon still out, because she was nearly as upset as her sister was. Tor didn't blame her of course, but seriously, this wasn't where he'd thought they'd all go with it.

"Right.
I'll
challenge her and then Bonita won't have to bother with it. That evil... vile woman. Do you have any idea how much harm she's done to my sister over the years? Hiring people, actors mainly no doubt, to court her, then mock her over it, cruelly, to a point I was almost certain Bonita was going to end her own life more than once." She gasped then, looking at her sister and trying to apologize, but she didn't need to it seemed.

"It was close. More than once." It was a dark admission. The kind of thing most people wouldn't have made at all in front of people they didn't know.

Tor was surprised when his younger sister Tiera started talking, nearly as angry sounding as Collette, once she heard everything. As far as Tor knew she'd never met Bonita before. That didn't seem to matter to her however.

"OK. So... We should punish her by taking away her most prized possession then. Anyone know what it is? I mean, just to start with. Then we should take away all her friends and move outward from there. Destroy her good name with the public and all that. Have some plays written that show her in a bad light?"

Tor blinked.

"You know, Tiera, you sound evil when you talk like that." She did too. Scary even. He nodded, trying to make sure he never wronged her to the level she had to come after him. She was immortal too, so she might just be around for a long time. It paid to be careful around people that could back up a threat hundreds of years in the future.

His sister laughed, a dark thing that didn't make her words seem better at all.

"Well, you don't hurt my family or friends, do you? Not ever. So what's her main focus in life? Her children? Horses? Um... books?" Tiera was obviously floundering now, but the Baron shook his head.

"No, she only prizes her own beauty and appeal toward others. She's lovely and knows it and uses it as a weapon. I should have never married her. If it wasn't for the fact that her father would have gone to war with mine I'd have stayed married to Glaren. We should have just fought the war." He sounded miserable, but probably didn't mean it. No one sane wanted battles fought and lives lost.

Tor's mother, Laurie shook her head too.

"That's in the past now. We can only deal with today. So, we set up an attack and have her face cut up? That sounds like an act worthy of war itself if not done carefully. Safer to just challenge her to that duel."

Everyone agreed to that, but didn't have any better ideas. Tor just sat quietly, thinking. If it were up to him, he'd just create a field to change her looks. They already had disguise amulets that could do it, the trick would be making her wear it somehow. One preset to look how they wanted.

Burks looked at him and nodded, as if having an identical thought. That was probably likely, wasn't it?

"We could lock the field to a very tiny ceramic sliver, one so small that she wouldn't even realize that it had stuck into her skin. We fix the field to make her look the way we want and then lock it so no one else can change it. We need to do that, else her own will would eventually do it, no doubt, being a narcissist as she is."

Tor nodded.

"We can get that done tonight I think, if you can get the needle ready? I can't do the transfer or the new work on it myself, but the basic field already exists and you're The Green man, so I'm willing to bet you can figure something out. Then we just have Collette or the Baron deliver the jab with a pat on the back or something..."

Burks stood and bowed to Bonita.

"I'll have that before we leave in the morning. Off to work then. I need to collect some things first, then I'll come back here, if that's permitted Tor?" He looked at the younger version of himself as if he'd say no for some reason.

"Of course it is. I wasn't mad at you really, just the foolishly complex and annoying rules of the Ancients as a whole. They need to overhaul their system, but given everything that would probably take decades to work out, wouldn't it?" He was joking, but sounded pretty dry about the whole thing. Like it was just so likely even his voice wouldn't let him try to say otherwise.

"About like that." Burks waved and walked out, turning to smile at his fiancé.

"This will work much better than simply killing the woman. It might even get her to eventually learn something."

After he left everyone turned to stare at Tor, waiting. It took a while but he eventually got it, they wanted to know what the plan was. Burks and he hadn't actually explained had they? It just seemed like it to Tor, who thought in a very similar fashion.

"We're going to put a tiny disguise amulet in her skin, one so small she won't know it's there. One preset to make her look the way we want. Then we can work on the rest of the plan. I kind of like the idea Tiera had, with the play. You know... we should get that Gala girl to write it. Heather? No... Meryl. I'll have to check on that. She did a great job writing the one where I'm a troll that had to be begged to save Galasia. I mean it was a kids play, but it worked pretty well, didn't it? Half the people in Noram think I'm a mean little man with warts on my nose." Thankfully he didn't even sound bitter about the idea. Suddenly it seemed almost... cute. The girl had tried to make him out to be a magical creature, probably because she didn't think a mere person could do what he had.

It could have been taken as an insult, sure, but he thought he understood it all now. She'd been horribly afraid of all the death that had happened when the plague had hit her city and needed something that was more than what she knew to cling to... So she invented a magic troll that could be bargained with, if with difficulty. An imaginary protector that could be bought, even if a person didn't have a lot of gold. She'd also kind of made Sara Debris into an almost mythic protector...