Sworn To Transfer (20 page)

“The death of that
cardiara
means more than you’re saying.”

“Much more.”

“I—”

“There are things that I don’t have the time or the inclination to explain right now,” Maree Amber replied. “There is much that I need to do over the next few days. Please stay out of trouble and obey Alexandra’s wishes.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Ciardis turned to go to her room.

“One more thing, Ciardis,” Maree Amber said with a tired look. “This is not to be discussed with anyone else in the guild. It is a private matter, and you will leave in the morning under the cloak of darkness.”

“Very well.” With that, Ciardis departed for a short night’s sleep.

As Ciardis departed Maree Amber stayed behind in her office. Hours passed and she worked long into the night writing correspondence, scrying far across the empire and worrying about the possibility of the empire hosting a war on two fronts. But as she went to sleep, her last thought was not of conflict.
We really need to find a better way to weed out our candidates for the Shadow Council before they become the insipid twits the Companions’ Guild so loves to foster.

*****

A
s Ciardis left Maree Amber’s office she didn’t head to her rooms. She hurried to the baths, seeing no other way to contact Prince Sebastian from so far away and without the Aether Realm bracelet. Moving through the portal and into the Imperial nursery, she followed the directions he’d given her to get to his quarters undetected. As she slipped into the sitting room, surprised that there were no guards or servants around, she tiptoed to his bedroom door.

Easing it open, she called out to the dark bed that took up a large portion the room, “Sebastian”.

A confused voice echoed out, “Ciardis?”

“No, it’s the maid with your midnight sandwich. Yes, it’s me! Now get up. We need to talk, and quickly.”

As they went into the sitting room she launched into a detailed recall of the night’s events without leaving anything out. By the time she was done, he looked as if he was holding back a yawn. Straightening from a relaxed pose he said, “She volunteered you? That doesn’t sound good.”

“I know. I’ll be away from the courts for far too long. What if someone attacks you, or...”

“It’s not me I’m worried about it. The forest is a dangerous place, and it’d be easy for an accident to occur. One sponsored by your court enemies.”

That hadn’t occurred to Ciardis, and now she wondered who was really behind her exile from the Imperial Courts.

“What can I do?” she implored.

“You have to go. Stay as close to Vana and Meres as you can once you meet up with them. I’ll follow as soon as I’m able to convince my father that the Imperial delegation should be a priority.”

Ciardis nodded and swallowed.

“Well, I guess this is goodbye.”

“For now.”

Before she could stand, he reached forward and pulled her into a deep hug. Still encased in his arms, she heard him whisper into her ear, “Stay safe. For me, okay? I need you around.”

With an awkward laugh, he continued, “Without you, court is just going to be boring.”

She smiled and stood quickly. With a nod, she left without a word. She made it out of his sitting room doors just as the first tear fell down her cheek.

*****

T
he next morning came quickly for Ciardis. She barely had four hours of sleep before Maree Amber’s personal valet stood over her bed saying the lady had sent her to wake Ciardis immediately. Ciardis hurriedly dressed and rushed down to meet Alexandra.

Alexandra sat in a carriage outside, cloaked and confident. A few minutes later, Ciardis was looking out the carriage window, taking in the sleepy city of Sandrin as it passed by. Early morning mist twisted around the cobblestones, a chill laced the air, and a few early morning sellers were preparing the shops to open. The bakery’s fires had already begun for that morning’s bread, and the farrier was already shoeing a gleaming chestnut in front of his stable.

The horse’s owner caught Ciardis’s eye as the carriage momentarily stopped to allow a herd of large oxen pass in front of them. He was tall, easily six feet, with the bulging muscles of a man not unaccustomed to hard work. He wore fine linens and his hair was tied back and braided in a design that she’d only seen among the soldiers of Sandrin. He turned briefly from the farrier’s work as she peered curiously from the cabin.

Hurriedly, she sat back in the carriage, embarrassed at being caught staring.

“You’re a very curious young woman,” Alexandra said, leaning casually forward to rest her arms on her knees as they exited the city gates. Turning to her, Ciardis couldn’t help but be fascinated by the pointed edges of her ears that peeked out from the long strands of blonde hair.

Alexandra reached down and grabbed a short blade from inside her high boots. The edges gleamed as she turned it around in her hand. Ciardis leaned back into the plush seat cushions. The woman looked at her with knowing eyes.

“Have you ever traveled by road before?” she asked, still twirling the knife.

“Of course,” Ciardis said proudly.

“From?”

“Vaneis to Sandrin.”

“Those roads are paved. The path is even. There are no holes, large or small, to mar its way. It does not wind in and around obstacles, and it certainly does not buckle under pressure. That is the emperor’s road.”

“This,” she said, gesturing outside to a road heading east, “is the
kith
road. And your journey will not be so easy.”

Out the moving carriage window, Ciardis could see both roads. One laid and paved with orderly bricks, the other a flat path of brown dirt cleared of vegetation. In her opinion, neither one of them looked very hard.

As if reading her mind, Alexandra sat back and smiled. “You will see.”

When the city had disappeared, the ride went from smooth to extraordinarily rough, and Ciardis began to see what she meant. The ruts in the road meant that the carriage was constantly jumping and banging, the occupants in fear of being thrown every which way if they didn’t keep their hands on the handles inside.

It was misery after two hours. Her back hurt, her head throbbed, and her arms felt sore from being jerked around.

“How long did you say this journey would take?”

“Three days.”

Ciardis closed her eyes in horror.

“Let’s do something about this, shall we?” said Alexandra with a mischievous glint in her eyes.

“Something?”

“Something magical, of course.”

“I can’t. Maree Amber was very clear that I’m not supposed to—”

“As the person in charge of your care and your instructor over the next three days...”

“Instructor?” Ciardis said.

“Maree instructed you to obey my wishes, did she not?” the woman said authoritatively.

“Yes, but—”

“My wishes include a thorough instruction on the use of stabilization tactics through my air magic.” She hesitated and added, “Of course, this is a subject I wouldn’t force. What do you say?”

At that moment they hit a particularly bad rut in the road and were thrown to the left side of the carriage. When she impacted the wall, Ciardis felt her sheathed knife jab her cruelly in her stomach and her head banged against the wall. Shifting back into her seat while cradling her abdomen, she didn’t hesitate.

“Let’s do it.”

“Very good.”

Ciardis didn’t have anything against using her magic, and Maree Amber’s commands had been quite explicit. If this woman wanted to make their ride more comfortable while teaching her something, she wasn’t going to say no.

“Has Maree taught you to look for another’s power?”

“Yes, through mage sight.”

Alexandra looked out of the window for moment. “This is how we’ll do it then: I will call upon the air to form a light stream underneath the carriage. The carriage will then move forward on the air. Then we will use your power to create a stabilized feed. This road will go on for another five hours using that technique. But I warn you: the air must be constant underneath the carriage or we will go tumbling. I’m going to teach you not just to enhance a gift, but to steady it, and allow it to run on a power base far below normal output. Because the task we’re doing is simple, we can redirect the wind’s natural predilection to follow the currents and push it to follow the carriage.”

Ciardis was a little hesitant. “Isn’t that going against the natural order?”

“It is,” Alexandra said, “but this will also get us to the forest at a rate five times as fast. You cannot use the pegasi to fly to the Ameles Forest or gate in by portalway. It must be by this road, and time is of the essence.”

Weighing the pros took less than a second. “Let’s start on that lesson then.”

“In order to stabilize anyone’s power feed, you first need to know how much power they’re capable of pulling in to a task. What can they give over a long amount of time to feed the stabilization link? How much is too much power to take? And what is too little?”

Ciardis nodded. “How will I know?”

“Stabilization feeds are uncomplicated but need a dedicated source. They are usually done with teams of mages, but for this output only one mage is needed. I can do it, and because you’re unversed in this I will put a limit on how much magic can be drawn from my core.”

“Like a reserve?”

“Sort of, but more like a withdrawal with no option to increase the flow. It will be more than enough to serve our needs. All right, watch me.” Ciardis turned her mage sight on Alexandra. Ciardis watched while Alexandra drew power from her core and set the power aside in a neat ball that became visible without mage sight. It glowed like a small sun in the confines of their carriage. Inside the golden sun was a much smaller silver core.

“That small silver core is the last of the magic in this withdrawal. Once reached it will either have to be replenished or we’ll be riding on dirt again. I set it to silver to give us warning.”

“Not bad,” Ciardis admitted.

“I’m glad you approve,” Alexandra said with a smile.

“Now for the stabilization feed. See how I’m drawing power from the core sitting beside me?”

Ciardis nodded as a thin but fluctuating stream of power began to flow from the core through the floor and out to the underside of the carriage.

“I’m sending it into the air below to form a wind pathway for us, but it’s not stable. The power flow is fluctuating and becoming too big or too small depending on the air flow. It is responding to magic’s natural tendency to be fluid. I can stabilize it myself. But having a second mage on hand will help. I don’t deplete my resources as much and you can learn how to control power flow.”

“Now, Ciardis, I want you to tap into the stream of power. Not into me or my core. Reach out with your magic. Concentrate.”

Ciardis had never done anything like that before. She reached and reached...but there was nothing to grab the stream with. She could see the stream, she knew where it was, but using her magic to manipulate it was another thing altogether. It felt like she was missing a key step in the process.

“Here,” said Alexandra as she reached for Ciardis’s hand. She noticed momentarily that her hands were as cold as ice, but she focused on Alexandra’s instructions instead.

“Feel the pulse of my magic throbbing through my hands. Yes, like that. Now look through your mage sight and follow the path. The magic is flowing directly from my core—it pulses with the beat of my heart. Do you feel the withdrawal core beating with same intensity?”

“Yes.”

“Good, reach for it.”

Ciardis felt for it, but there was a barrier around the core. She couldn’t touch it.

“Keep going. If you can’t touch the core, see if you can hook into the stream.”

“Got it.”

“Keep hold and relax. Now you can feel the thrum of the power going through the stream. It’s pulsing erratically, with bits of magic large and small flowing through it. I want you to smooth it out, restrain it from taking too much magic at one time. Stabilize it.”

Ciardis blew her breath out slowly. The stream felt slippery, like a live snake in her grasp. She was beginning to sweat in the confines of the carriage and her curls felt heavy.

“Can you open a window?”

Alexandra opened the window and watched Ciardis while she sought out the coiled knots of too much magic flowing through the thread and the empty pockets of too little magic flowing out. Alexandra had put a barrier over her withdrawal core to make sure the girl couldn’t access or tamper with it. What Ciardis would deal with was the stream. She needed to learn to control her power, and, in doing so, learn to control her use of another’s.

Slowly, little by little, she used her magic like a rolling pin. Ciardis evened out the bumps and pockets in the stream, redistributing the flow of magic inside. When that was done, she said to Alexandra quietly, “Now how do I make it stay like this?”

“Think of your magic hold as a bottleneck; as long as you have a grip on the stream of power flowing into the underside of the carriage, you can control how much magic is released. Do you feel the magic flowing inside the stream?”

“Yes.”

“Keep monitoring it. Smoothing it out consistently. Restrain it when necessary. Soon it will become second nature and you won’t have to focus on it continuously.”

Ciardis didn’t take her eyes off the stream. Smoothing the flow took some finesse at first, but now it was mostly monitoring and hitting occasionally abnormalities when she saw it. After fifteen minutes, she sat back with a tired sigh. Her eyes still took in the stream, but she knew that the stream was flowing regularly.

“The trick,” Alexandra said, “is not to fall asleep while monitoring.”

Ciardis laughed. “Right.”

Then she noticed how smooth the carriage ride had become. With surprise, she looked out the window. They were floating a few inches above the ground and speeding along. This was so much faster. Comfortably monitoring the stream’s flow with just her magic, she watched the scenery go by. Now that the road was smooth, the carriage had picked up speed. They had long ago passed outside even the large towns on the outskirts of the city of Sandrin. The hamlets they passed through now reminded her of Vaneis.