The Destroyer Book 3 (37 page)

"Isslata should come. I wanted her at the last meeting." I couldn't rule out any of the possibilities. Not asking her to come could be seen as me backing out of my agreement with Isslata. If the empress knew of it she might not believe that I could be trusted to deliver her to the Radicle. I'd figure out another way to leverage Nadea if needed.

"Good. I will speak to the empress about your request." Vernine nodded and looked pleased. Was I playing into their hands? I suddenly wished for my armor, shield, mace, horse, and two armies divided by a line of skirmish. Battles were so much easier than this intrigue.

I stepped out of the tent and into the red rays of the setting sun. Twilight was an hour away, but the avenue was as active as at dawn. I had amused myself every few hours by listening to the comings and goings in the camp. My eavesdropping gave me little information beyond what I had already guessed. The army had not set hooks into the city yet because they were still investigating the strange explosion that had decimated one side of the castle. They didn't want to risk any of their kind, especially the empress, until the researchers were sure of what caused the incident.

Vernine touched my arm lightly and we began to walk down the packed dirt road toward the center of the colored grid of tents. Most of the Elvens we passed paid no attention to my entourage, a few gave us a puzzled look. I assumed the Elven soldiers did not realize that I was an O'Baarni. I certainly did not look like one. I had put on some weight since being awoken, but I was nowhere near as bulky and stout as a typical heavily muscled O’Baarni. There were other humans walking through the paths in Nia soldier uniforms, so aside from my clothes and escort, I was not particularly conspicuous.

The organization of the camp had felt familiar when I first observed it. Now that I knew the empress divided her army in the same way I had, with the same number of generals, the structure of the massive camp was clear. I felt confident I could make my own way to her pavilion and even find her generals’ tents without assistance.

"Have you finished moving all of your kind to this world?" I inquired.

"I am not party to such plans." I nodded at Vernine even though I felt like she was lying.

"Me neither. That was why I asked." I smiled at her and she only returned a slight frown.

It had been cold yesterday and the night brought an angry rain storm, but this day was significantly warmer than any in the previous week. I had not yet experienced spring on this world but it seemed like it might begin any day now. My mind drifted away for a bit and wondered about how the Radicle had been created. Who designed it? How did it know of the other worlds? Did all the worlds have the same four seasons? What caused the seasons? Was it the power of the Earth on the world? The oceans? The sun? The moon? I recalled the intricate map I saw in the ruins beneath Castle Nia. It looked like an impossibly huge spider web that glowed with the magic of the Ovule I placed in the Radicle. Had my people finally figured out how to use the device and left my birth world, or had humans always inhabited these worlds?

"You look pensive, O'Baarni," Vernine commented at my side as my thoughts began to give me a headache.

"I'm thinking of friends long gone." I shrugged my shoulders and gestured to the surrounding camp. "They wouldn't believe this." My tent sat in an area surrounded by Alatorict's colored tents, but when I finished my sentence we had reached sandy-colored tents. They flew brown and red flags above them and I assumed they were the green-haired general Dissonti’s colors from the outfit she had worn the last time we met.

"Tell me more. I do not understand what you mean." Vernine’s eyes opened slightly and she licked her lips like a snake.

"They would be surprised that I am a prisoner in an Elven camp. They would be amazed at how calm I am now." I laughed and tried to hold back the flood of memories. Thayer, Malek, Shlara, Alexia, Gorbanni, and I had spent countless hours over some thirty years creating a war machine capable of freeing our people from generations of slavery. In that time we had become closer than family.

Maybe it was fitting that I was here. I had betrayed the one person who loved me more than I loved myself. If Jessmei was correct, and our family and friends took on a spirit form to watch over us when they died, then Shlara and my other generals would probably be enjoying the poetic justice of my end coming at the hands of this empress.

I couldn't worry about my past anymore. I was needed too much in the present.

"You said they were long gone. What do you mean?" We entered an area of white tents and black flags. We had only another few minutes to walk.

"Dead. At least I hope so," I said as half a dozen Elven men and women clad in ebony, with hair of various metallic colors tied back in elaborate braids mixed with black or white beads walked past us. It was the first group to eye me with surprise and then anger. It seemed that some of the troops did know who I was.

"Human friends? On this world?" Vernine turned her attention toward ten red uniformed warriors walking past us. I sensed tension between my guards and Yillomar’s troops, but none of them looked at me as they passed.

"They don't seem to like you." I changed the subject.

"Most don't like the empress's Elite," Vernine replied.

"What does that mean? You all have to color your eyes red and put gray paint in your hair?" Vernine smiled at me and a few of her guards gave me a sidelong glance.

"We are the empress's chosen soldiers. The best warriors, tacticians, and Element users." Vernine's voice filled with rare pride.

"I can recall Isslata telling me that she is the best Elven warrior alive. She said it several times actually." I chuckled and Vernine laughed a little with me.

"My friend is very boastful. But she is not entirely incorrect. Isslata is quite notorious amongst our people. Perhaps there is none in our army that is her better. But she rarely engages in the type of combat that would pit her skills against our other warriors." This was interesting to me. I never saw Isslata do more than behead Nanos's guard. She had been fast, but her opponent had practically been defenseless. "But the empress chooses us because of potential only she can see. Then we are entrusted to her for training and tutelage. We serve her because of the love she shows us." Vernine's tone reminded me of Isslata when she spoke of Telaxthe. They both seemed to have complete adoration for their leader.

"So the empress has an army, but an additional private army within? Seems redundant." We approached the green tents.

"Do you recall our empress telling you how she studied the Destroyer?" Vernine looked at me with a pewter eyebrow raised above her ruby eyes and I nodded back. "Perhaps he would have lived a few years longer if there had been a more loyal force between him and the rest of his army?"

"The empress fears one of her generals will try to overthrow her?" I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

"No. Of course not. But I'm sure that the Destroyer did not have those fears either. She won't make the same mistakes he did. Wait here, O'Baarni." We reached the clearing before the empress's tent. I nodded to Vernine and thought about what she had said while she walked across the clearing and down into the large white pavilion. I hadn't needed a personal army loyal to me because I had five generals who were my best friends. I trusted my life to them too many times to count. They would never have betrayed me.

I had betrayed them.

If I had known I was capable of killing Shlara, would I have raised my own army to protect myself? My stomach turned at the idea of planning to murder my best friend and then using loyal soldiers to protect myself afterward. Soldiers who trusted me. Soldiers who believed I was the best hope for our entire race. I had made a mistake in the midst of fear and passion. As much as I hated myself for what I had done, I knew I would have never been able to plot such an act of betrayal and treason. I would have sooner killed myself than allow it to happen, if I had known.

Vernine's green armored guards certainly didn't seem like an elite force. They were as skittish around me as a wild stallion about to be neutered. They exchanged too many sideways glances with each other and tensed up whenever I shifted my weight slightly. Alatorict's soldiers had acted the same way. It was true that they were not as strong as me, or as fast, but the six of them could easily defeat me if they wanted. I wondered for a few minutes if the empress gave some directive that I was to be unharmed and her guards were nervous that they might have to disobey her and kill me if I became aggressive.

I had not figured out why she always sent women to guard me. Did they believe I would not kill one of their females? I almost laughed at the idea. In Nia I had killed both the male and female assassins who ambushed me. In my army, men and women had trained and fought and died as equals. The same was true of the Elvens. Nia seemed to have some cultural differences between how men and women were treated. Nadea was expected to wear dresses and pursue gentler interests than a man, though these mores had not seemed to influence or stop her from doing what she wanted. Yet even in Nia women were regular members of their army and did not seem to be held to different standards. Perhaps Telaxthe trusted her female soldiers more, or they just happened to be the most capable.

Ten minutes passed, then another. Finally, the sun sunk behind the distant slope in the west that hid the ocean from the city. The sky turned from amber to a blood red that splashed the horizon like a spilled glass of wine. The slide into evening brought a light, chilly wind that reminded me of the last night’s storm. The breeze carried the scent of water, clovers and rosemary.

Vernine emerged from the tent a few minutes after the sun set. She beckoned to me and my circle of guards took me across the clearing to the mouth of the pavilion. Telaxthe’s sentries roughly patted my tunic and pants in search of weapons. When they were satisfied, Vernine nodded her head to me and walked down the small series of wood steps into the belly of Telaxthe's dwelling.

The pavilion had not changed since the last time I was here. The empress and her generals were sitting in the same places as our previous meeting, wearing the colors of their individual banners. The main difference was that the wide area was now bathed in soft lantern light from ten silver wrought lamps that hung from the support beams of the pavilion. The lanterns were etched with entwined vines, delicate leaves, and exquisite images of the sun and moon. Each shade was made of a thin pink silk that seemed to deaden the harshness of the flame behind it while at the same time enhancing the fire's presence.

The other change to the room was Isslata. She sat at her general's right hand, on the outskirts of the circle. She wore a form fitting pair of gold wool leggings and a matching tunic instead of the leather and chain armor she usually wore. The blouse had blue stars embroidered below where the collar of the shirt parted to reveal the peach tinted skin of her cleavage. Her sword sat sheathed on the ground between her and Alatorict. The cold stare she gave made me wonder if she was intent on drawing the blade.

"The O'Baarni," Vernine announced with a flatness that came with stating the obvious.

"Please sit down, Kaiyer." The empress gestured to the small pillow positioned forty feet in front of her. The seat was closer than it had been three days before and I wondered if this was a way of showing that they were beginning to trust me. I could close the gap from sitting to ripping the beautiful head off of her shoulders in less than a second.

"Thank you." I nodded and forced a smile to my face while I kneeled on the pillow. Vernine took her position a few feet behind Telaxthe and she licked her lips slightly while she glanced around the tent at the other half dozen guards. I took a deep breath of the pine, lavender, and sage scents that filled the pavilion. Then I studied the woman who looked too much like Nadea.

The empress wore a cream-colored robe made of reflective satin fabric. It seemed to glow in the warm light of the hanging lamps. Across the surface of the robe spun green and gold-colored embroidery of tree roots. They twisted and turned across the empress's clothes like they were alive. I imagined that the back of the garment probably displayed the full trunk and branches of the tree. I almost asked her to turn around so I might see the full beauty of the design. She wore her hair down loose, except for a braided section that ran threaded through half a dozen small golden bells. I was lucky that she didn't have her hair tied back as Nadea always did. The similarities between the two women would have been likely to cloud my judgment. I was not worried about her using my sense of smell to control me again, but that didn't mean that the empress had no other powers at her disposal.

"I would like to apologize for the long wait between our meetings. I am sure you can guess at the demands my role places upon me. It is no excuse, of course, but I would like to make it up to you tonight." She smiled coyly and Alatorict's mouth curled up into a matching grin. All of her other generals and Isslata stared at me intently, save for the red clothed Yillomar. The large Elven looked terribly bored.

"Good. I've been pretty horny since you played that little trick on me. I guessed it would only be a matter of time before I got to fuck you."

A hiss went through the room as if a thousand snakes were lit on fire. My heart skipped a beat as the faces of the gathered generals and guards turned into one of absolute malice. Like rabid dogs they crouched forward, hands on weapons, faces turned toward me with long teeth exposed and snarling. The change was so sudden and swift it was as if they acted as one animal, one life form, and only one Elven in the tent maintained her composure.