The Fourteenth Key (The Chronicles of Terah Book 3) (45 page)

“Don’t worry. You are.”

~ ~ ~ ~

After he finished the interviews he’d set up for right after lunch, Darrell met with six of his best archers and explained what they were going to do. “We’re going to shoot arrows at Marcus so he can practice defensive magic. Don’t aim directly at him. Aim a little off to the side or a little high. Make it close enough to be realistic, but, for the love of Camden, don’t hit him.”

Brandon, his best archer, asked, “Won’t he be insulted if we don’t aim at him?”

“After yesterday he’d probably rather you didn’t aim right at him. Besides, he knows this is a training exercise.”

“What happens if he does get hurt?” Yanel asked. “Will we be charged?”

Darrell shook his head. “No, but since no one here is going to hurt him, it’s a moot point.”

Meech frowned. “Moot?”

“It means it doesn’t matter since it’s not going to happen,” Darrell explained. “Look, make the arrows come close enough to be threatening, but you’re all good enough to miss. If you weren’t, you wouldn’t be here. Now, head out to the sparring field so I can get your positions marked off before Marcus gets there.”

When his men nodded, Darrel said, “I’ll meet you in a few minutes. I’m going to let Myron know we’re ready.”

While his men made their way out of the castle, Darrell stepped into Kevin’s office and asked Chris if Marcus was ready.

“About as ready as he’s going to be. He’s a little apprehensive about having your men shoot at him.”

“He’ll be fine. Kevin’ll be there.”

“I know, but Marcus has never seen Kevin spar. We have. Makes a difference.”

“Maybe I should put Kevin in the center first and let Marcus see how he does it. Think that might make him feel better?”

“It probably would, but your men would have heart attacks.”

Darrell laughed. “I’d have a mutiny on my hands. No, I don’t guess I can order the guards to shoot at the Master Sorcerer, but I’m sure I can get you, Karl, Joan, and Steve to do it. A little demonstration of what we want them to do might help my men as well as Marcus. I should have thought of that earlier. Can we round everyone up?”

Chris stood up. “I don’t know. We can try, but what about bows and arrows? My bow’s upstairs, but I have no idea where my quiver ended up. And I bet Joan and Karl have their stuff at their house in Milhaven.”

“No problem. We’ll borrow what we need from the guards.”

“Ariel, see if you can find Steve and ask him to meet us …,” Chris paused and looked at Darrell.

“In the meadow below the barracks.”

Ariel nodded and left the office.

“We’ll stop by Karl’s office on the way,” Chris said as he walked over towards Kevin’s office. He knocked once and opened the door. “Okay you two,” he said to Kevin and Marcus, “time to get this show on the road.”

Marcus frowned at Chris.

“He means it’s time to go out to the meadow,” Kevin explained.

Darrell stuck his head in the door and looked at Marcus. “Has he explained what we’re going to do?”

“From what I understand, your guards are going to shoot arrows at me and I’m going to use magic to stop them.”

Darrell nodded. “That’s the general idea. See you out at the field.”

~ ~ ~ ~

Fifteen minutes later everyone was assembled at the meadow. Laryn was with Steve when Ariel found him, so she came with him.

Darrell glanced around the group. “We decided to run a practice drill with Myron in the center to show you what we want.”

“Excuse me?” Brandon’s eyes were big as saucers. “You want us to shoot at Myron? I’m sorry, sir, but no, I’m not doing that.”

Darrell grinned. “Chris said you might object so some of us who’ve done this before are going to shoot at him, but since we just decided to do it we don’t have our bows with us. If we could borrow yours, we’ll get started.”

Brandon handed his equipment to Darrell and stepped back several paces.

“Don’t worry, Brandon,” Kevin said. “It’s going to be all right. You have my word.”

Brandon nodded, but he stayed where he was.

“Let me get this straight,” Laryn said, looking at Darrell. “You five are going to stand in a circle and shoot arrows at my nephew.”

“We’ve done this before, Laryn, dozens of times. He won’t get hurt,” Darrell answered.

“I should hope not,” Laryn said. “What kind of Master Sorcerer would he be if he couldn’t handle a few arrows?” She glanced around as the guards handed over their bows and quivers. “If I’ve counted correctly, there’s an extra bow. Do you mind if I play?”

Chris grinned as he handed Laryn the sixth bow and quiver.

After the five Tellurians and Laryn spread out in a big circle and armed their bows, Darrell called out instructions for the benefit of Marcus and the guards. “On the first few rounds, we’ll fire individually. As soon as Myron blocks one arrow, the next one is fired. I’ll start and we’ll go around the circle counterclockwise.”

Darrell fired the first arrow, which bounced off Kevin’s shield and landed about halfway between them. Before that arrow hit the ground, Chris fired the next one. And so it went, one arrow after another for the next five minutes. Then Darrell called a halt so everyone could pick up their arrows.

After all the archers were back in place with full quivers, Darrell said, “This time Myron will catch the arrows and stack them in a pile.”

Five minutes later, Darrell called a halt. “Those are the two drills we’ll work on today. Later we’ll move on to this one.” Darrell turned around and notched an arrow. “Fire at will!”

For the next few minutes, arrows were flying at Kevin from all directions. At first he let them bounce off shields, but after about a minute of that, he began catching them. Within minutes, the archers were out of ammunition.

When Darrell called a halt that time, he motioned for his guards to come over and collect their weapons.

Kevin joined Marcus at the sidelines while the others collected the arrows and returned the bows. “Take it one step at a time. Don’t worry about that last drill. Like with all magic, start small, master that, and move on. Today, one arrow at a time, and don’t worry about missing it. If you do, I won’t.”

Marcus nodded, but he didn’t look very confident.

As Marcus made his way to the center of the circle, Chris stepped beside Kevin and whispered, “Are you sure you can do this?”

Kevin took a deep breath. “I hope so.”

Steve and Laryn were the first to leave, followed by Joan and Karl. Right before Joan left, Chris told her he was going to watch the drill and asked her to let Ariel know where he was in case something came up. Then he settled down to watch with Kevin.

An hour later, Darrell ended the session. Marcus had spent half the time using his shield to deflect the arrows and the other half trying to catch them. Kevin didn’t have to intervene even once when he used his shields, but if Kevin hadn’t been there to back him up when he was trying to catch the arrows, he’d have been a human pincushion. Kevin didn’t know who was more wiped out, Marcus or him.

As they made their way back to the castle, Marcus apologized for missing so many arrows. Kevin laughed. “You should have been there the first time I tried to do it. It’s harder than it looks, but once you get the hang of it, it’ll be a lot easier. At least you didn’t miss any with your shield. I did. If it hadn’t been for Glendymere, I’d have been dead a dozen times over.” Marcus didn’t say anything, so Kevin added, “Look, you’ve got to be drained, physically as well as magically. Why don’t you take some time off, restock your energy supply, and go relax for a while. There’s nothing pressing this afternoon, is there?”

Marcus shook his head no. “I don’t have anything lined up. If you don’t mind, I think I’ll go lie down for a bit.”

When they reached the castle, Marcus went on his way while Kevin and Chris went back to Kevin’s office.

“I’m ready for something to drink,” Chris said. “What about you?”

“Something cold,” Kevin answered as he sat down at his desk. “Maybe some scog.”

“Do you want to go down to the dining room, or shall I send someone?”

“All I want to do is sit down and not think for a few minutes.”

Chris stepped back out into the reception area to ask one of the pages to go get them some scog. When he returned, he shut the door. “I have a question.”

Kevin nodded.

“What you said to Marcus on the way back,” Chris said. “I don’t remember you having that much trouble with the arrows.”

“I didn’t,” Kevin said. “But I thought it might make him feel better if he thought I had.”

“How do you think he did today?”

“Okay, not great, but okay. He’ll get better with practice. I have no doubt about that, but I’m not sure his first reaction to an attack will ever involve magic. If he stops and thinks, yes, but his reflexes are geared toward physical defense. I’m not sure we can change that.”

“Practice did it for you,” Chris pointed out. “When Gaynor attacked, you reacted without thinking, and your reaction was magical.”

“True, but I’m not a physical person. He is.” Kevin shrugged. “All we can do is try. Let’s see how he does after a few more sessions. Maybe the drills will work and the shields will become instinctive. Unfortunately we won’t know unless he gets attacked again, and I hope that doesn’t happen.”

“Same here,” Chris said as the door opened and Ariel stepped inside with two mugs of scog. After handing one to each of them, he left, pulling the door to behind him.

Kevin leaned back in his chair and sipped his scog. After a couple of minutes, he sighed, sat up, and said, “Okay. What’s next?”

Chapter 41

Caitlyn's Story

After Joan left the sparring field, she went to the playground and watched the children for a few minutes. When she caught Serra’s eye, she tilted her head towards a bench Darrell had set under the tree, and headed in that direction.

“How are things going?” Joan asked when Serra joined her.

“Fine, at least out here.” Serra frowned as she sat down beside Joan. “You look like you’ve got something on your mind though.”

Joan watched Caitlyn play in the sandbox with a couple of the other children. “I need to borrow Caitlyn for a little while. I have to ask her some questions about what happened the night her father was killed, and I’m not sure how she’ll react. She may not be back this afternoon.”

“Haven’t they already questioned the children? Corey said he talked to Gen. Crandal while he was at the chapel.”

“He did. She didn’t.” Joan sighed. “But it seems they should have talked to her, too. She told Hayley a couple of things they didn’t know.”

“Why did Hayley wait so long to mention it?”

“She thought they’d already talked to Caitlyn. It was a comment she made to Marcus that brought it all out.” Joan shook her head. “From what I understand, when Gen. Crandal and Myron were talking about interviewing the children, they said they were going to talk to Corey, but Caitlyn was too young to have noticed much. Hayley told them Caitlyn might know more than they thought. She thought they’d taken the hint and questioned Caitlyn. They didn’t, so now I get to.”

“I don’t envy you,” Serra said.

“I’m going to try to get the answers they need without stirring up all the trauma, but I’m not sure that’s even possible.” Joan stood up. “I really hate this.”

“Good luck.”

A few minutes later, Joan and Caitlyn headed over towards the pasture where the horses were grazing. Joan whistled and her horse trotted over to the fence. She picked Caitlyn up and let her sit on the top rail and stroke the horse’s nose. While Caitlyn was distracted, Joan said, “You never did tell me about your adventure.”

“What venture?” Caitlyn asked.

“You know, when you and Corey hid out in the woods.”

“Oh,” Caitlyn said as the horse stepped in close enough for Caitlyn to scratch his ears. “That was scary.”

“I bet it was. What did you do?”

“I held onto Corey’s hand most of the time. And don’t tell him, but a lot of the time I had my eyes shut. I didn’t want to see.”

“What were you afraid you’d see?”

“The bad men, the men who were yelling.”

The horse was ready to go back to grazing, so Joan picked Caitlyn up and set her back on the ground.

Once Caitlyn was on her feet, she said, “They scared me.”

“I bet they did.” Joan took the child’s hand and started towards the castle. “They’d have scared me, too.”

“It made me feel a lot better when they got on that boat.”

“Did you see them on the boat?”

“Uh-huh, and it was out in the river, not at our dock. My stomach felt better then.”

“Do you remember how many you saw?”

Caitlyn shook her head. “I know it was more than four. And one man kept coming and going.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, he was there, then he wasn’t, then he was. Coming and going.”

“Like he might have gone down a ladder and then climbed back up?”

Caitlyn shook her head quickly. “No, no, no. No ladder. That’s what Corey said when I told him about it. He didn’t go up and down. He was there, then he wasn’t, and then he was there again. In the same spot.”

“I got it,” Joan said as she stopped and turned towards Caitlyn. “Like if you’re looking at me, then you close your eyes,” and she covered her eyes with her hands, “then open them again,” she said as she jerked her hands away. “Right?”

Caitlyn laughed. “No, not like that. They were out in the river. I wasn’t scared anymore. My eyes were open. He was there, with another man, then they weren’t. I kept watching. I wondered where they went, but then he was back. Poof!”

“What about the other man?”

Caitlyn shook her head. “He didn’t come back. Just the man. And I still don’t know where he went.”

“Do you still want to know?”

Caitlyn nodded. “I’ve never seen anyone leave like that before. I want to know how he did it.”

“I do, too.” Joan took Caitlyn’s hand again and headed back towards the playground. “Let me see if I can figure it out. I’ll let you know.”