The Swarm Trilogy (14 page)

“I’d like to see the queen,” I said, keeping my voice strong and steady. I didn’t want him to question me.

“You were already here once today, weren’t you? You don’t exactly go unnoticed in this town.” His teeth gleamed as his lips parted. Was it a smile or a threat? I couldn’t tell.

“I was, but, I forgot something,” I said.

He looked behind me and side-to-side, his eyes squinting. “Okay, I don’t see anybody. If you can be in and out really quick, I’ll let you in. I always had a soft spot in my heart for the queen and I don’t think she deserves this. If it gives her any peace to see you again tonight, then I’ll allow it.”

I fought the urge to hug the big brute and instead smiled back at him. “Thank you so, so much.”

“But be quick. If you aren’t out in a few minutes, before my shift is over, I won’t be here to explain anything to the next guard on duty.”

I nodded and slipped in the doorway, which he opened slightly for me. I ran down the dirty hallway, searching for Mags’ cell. Fifth door on the right, I remembered from my earlier visit. I was glad I paid attention.

“Mags,” I whispered through the tiny window with bars. The straw crunched and I hoped she heard me. “Mags,” I whispered a little louder this time.

“Lianne? Is that you?” A yawn enfolded her words. She’d been sleeping, but I didn’t care. I needed to talk to her now.

“I only have a couple minutes and I need to ask you something. It’s really important. Come closer to the door.”

The straw crackled again, popping faster as she scurried toward me.

“What is it?” she asked.

“I need to know who Trevin’s father is,” I whispered. “If there is any chance he’ll help us tomorrow, you have to tell me. He may be the only person who can rescue Trevin while I rescue you.”

“Lianne,” she said, sighing. “I can’t tell you.”

“You have to,” I insisted. “He may be our only ally. You have to tell me.”

Mags silence overwhelmed me. It was a simple question with a simple answer. She needed to share with me quickly or I’d be caught.

“It’s Aric.”

“Aric?” I gasped. “Kellan’s father? But he’s so old.”

Mags’ laugh, so strange in its juxtaposition to the dungeon, rang out in the hallway.

“Don’t forget I’m a few years older than you and he took in Kellan when he was a young man himself. Yes, he’s older than me, but he’s the kindest man I’ve ever met.”

I had to concede that. Aric never hesitated to help me. The more I thought about it, I wondered why I hadn’t considered it before. He’d been interested in why Mags was imprisoned, a little too interested.

“I know he’ll help us,” I said. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning, okay? Try not to worry. I have everything under control.”

“I trust you Lianne,” Mags said. She stuck her fingers between the bars, a ribbon hanging from them. “Take this to Aric. He’ll know I told you the truth.”

I touched my fingertips to hers and slid the ribbon into my palm.

“Get some sleep,” I said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” I turned and ran back down the dark hallway. After a quick knock on the door, I heard the hinges groan as the guard opened the door.

“Thank you,” I told him again.

“I hope you got what you needed,” he said.

I nodded before turning and running off into the town.

I hurried through the spreading darkness to Aric and Kellan’s home, my head still spinning with the news that Aric was Trevin’s mystery father. He was older than her by a good fifteen years, but because of his position he was very fit. I could see why Mags would feel an attraction to him and he’d been alone since his first wife died at a young age. I wondered how their love developed so quickly. I chuckled. Who was I to question the speed after my new feelings for Bryden?

The dirt kicked up from my scurrying feet. I stopped running, knowing it would draw too much attention, but I walked as quickly as I could. I hoped to get to Aric before Kellan was home from cleaning up after practice. I’d promised Bryden I’d talk to Kellan, and I meant to keep that promise, but I had to talk to Aric first, and alone. If Kellan couldn’t be trusted, then Aric needed to know that too.

I slipped behind the house and through the window into Kellan’s room. The bed I’d lain in for the last few weeks didn’t call to me like it used to. I didn’t even want to touch it, knowing what I could have done with Kellan. I couldn’t imagine it now. All I could see was Bryden when I closed my eyes.

I slipped through the doorway and into the kitchen. Aric sat at the table, nursing a mug. From the smell, it was mead. I wasn’t sure if inebriation was a good or bad idea for this conversation.

“Aric,” I said, catching my breath and sitting down at the table across from him. “There’s something I have to tell you.”

He looked up at me, tears in his eyes. He slid his hand across the table, grasping mine tightly.

“I’ll listen to anything you need to tell me, but at the moment my heart is aching. I’m a warrior, I have been my whole life, and I’ve learned to control my emotions. But there are times when I need to let go. I’m losing someone important to me and even though I lost her once before, I don’t know if I can do it again.”

“Mags still loves you too,” I blurted out. His eyes popped open and the tears that had been hovering on the corners of his eyelids fell in a steady stream. “But there’s more you need to know. I plan to rescue Mags tomorrow before she’s executed.”

“It’s not possible,” he said. “I’ve spent the week in a fog plotting ways to save her and carry her away to safety, but I can’t do it. I can’t fight the whole army. I trained them and I know that alone I’m no match for them.”

“You don’t have to. Bryden and I have a plan to save Mags.”

Aric broke out in a peal of laughter. “I’m sorry, sweetie. You’re a great fighter, but you’re no more a match for the army than I am. And Bryden? The boy is crippled! What can he do?”

I squeezed his hand, still holding mine across the table.

“You have to trust me that we have a plan. We will succeed. I won’t let my best friend die for something she didn’t do.”

Aric raised an eyebrow at me.

“Okay, she did do it, but she’s not a traitor to the kingdom. Her love for you did nothing to harm the king.” I fished around in my pocket for the ribbon she wanted me to give to Aric. “This is for you.”

I placed the ribbon in his callused hand. It lay limp, its delicateness in stark contrast to the bulging muscles and tendons.

“I gave this to her,” he said. “We once met accidently on the turret stairs. We didn’t dare to embrace, but instead I laid my forehead on her outstretched arms and put this ribbon in her other hand. We wanted so much to be together, but we couldn’t. It was after, after the one time. It was the last time we showed any affection for each other.”

“Because then she found out she was pregnant with Trevin,” I prompted.

“Yes,” he said, with venom in his voice. “The king’s son. The boy he got on her, ending our affair. She wouldn’t see me again after that. I can understand. Why should she want me when she had the king’s third son inside her?”

His fist closed on the ribbon, his skin turning red as he squeezed harder. I put my other hand on his fist and tilted his chin up toward me. “Trevin isn’t the king’s son.”

I felt his hand stiffen, and then relax. The ribbon slithered out of his hand to the table, resting between us. “It isn’t true,” he said.

I nodded my head.

“But if I had known, I would have come forward. I would have claimed him as my own.”

“Which is exactly what Mags feared,” I said. “She didn’t want you to lose your position. She couldn’t bear the thought of you ending up on the executioner’s block when she could keep everyone alive by keeping her silence. She sacrificed everything because of her love for you.”

“It wasn’t her decision to make alone,” he growled, pounding his fist on the wooden table. His mug shook and mead spilled on the ribbon. He scrambled for it, lifting the ribbon up and shaking the mead off. He pulled it through two fingers squeezing the rest off. A tiny circle remained behind, turning the spot from red to a dark maroon.

“If you can rescue Trevin from Albree, we can all escape,” I said. “You and Mags can finally be together.”

Aric wound the ribbon around his index finger. “All of us?”

“You, Mags, Trevin, Bryden and me,” I answered.

“Kellan?” he asked. “What about my other son?”

I sucked in my breath. What was wrong with me? Kellan was Aric’s adopted son, how could I just assume Aric would go along with our plans that didn’t include Kellan?

“Aren’t you two together?” he asked. “You've been here every night for the past few weeks, sleeping in the same bed.”

I hesitated, knowing I needed to tread this line carefully. We needed Aric’s help and with his anger over Mags’ secret I didn’t know if one more surprise would crush his spirit. He was already drunk. I needed him sober and ready to do anything I asked.

“Bryden and I aren’t together,” I lied. “He’s helping me. We’re both Dalagans; we have to stick together. I couldn’t leave him behind. And of course I meant Kellan. I just assumed you’d know that.”

I smiled, hoping it was enough to convince a drunken man. My heart wasn’t in it. I couldn’t force the lie for much longer.

“Of course.” He took a swig of his mead and swallowed quickly. “I know you’d never leave Kellan out. He’s a good son. He’s loyal and a great fighter. You’re using him in the plan, right?”

I nodded. Kellan knew the basics. He knew I was going to save Mags. Even if Aric said something, Kellan wouldn’t know the difference.

“Good. I won’t leave without my son.” Aric looked me in the eyes. “Neither of them. Now tell me how to rescue Trevin.”

Aric and I sat for the next twenty minutes as I filled him in on where to find Albree and Trevin and excuses he could give her to make her leave Trevin in his care. I told him where to find the horses Bryden was readying for all of us.

“Exactly where are we riding these horses to? No one in the kingdom will harbor the head arms master, the queen, and her bastard child.”

I took a deep breath. Time for the most difficult part of the plan, the most dangerous with unknown consequences.

“Dalagan.”

Aric dropped his mug on the floor. It clattered and broke into a million ceramic pieces on the floor.

“It’s the only place we can think of that will be safe.” I turned around when the door behind us banged shut. Kellan came in and I hadn’t noticed. I’d been so busy explaining to Aric that I’d forgotten to watch for any sign of him.

“Where’s that?” he asked.

I turned around, ignoring Aric and his broken mug.

“Dalagan. It’s where we’re headed after we save Mags and Trevin.”

Kellan looked at Aric, scrambling around on the floor picking up shards from his destroyed mug.

“Why are you telling him?” he asked, not too kindly. I had to think, and fast, to keep Kellan from exploding. To keep him from finding out that Aric was Trevin’s father.

“I didn’t want to leave him alone without knowing where you went, Kellan. He’s your father. He loves you, no matter what you may have been feeling lately, Aric’s love for you hasn’t changed,” I whispered. It was probably unnecessary. Aric was already singing a battle song under his breath. I hoped he wasn’t so drunk he wouldn’t remember all the instructions I gave him.
“And what’s this about us leaving after freeing Mags? I thought she was going to leave alone. Why are we going with her?”

My brain scrambled, looking for the right answers. I didn’t want him to know the whole plan, especially about Bryden’s involvement, but he’d already heard too much.

“I can’t stay here after killing the king, can I? I thought you’d want to come with us. Maybe I was wrong.”

I hoped he’d agree, tell me I was wrong, that he wanted nothing to do with me. It wasn’t the way Bryden would want me to break things off with Kellan, but a break up was a break up. Either way I’d be rid of him.

Kellan reached over and pulled me to him. I stumbled into his arms as his lips landed on mine in a passionate kiss. I felt nothing, none of the chills Bryden gave me when we kissed.

He pulled away from me as quickly as he’d grabbed me and whispered, “We will be together always. Forever. I’ll never let you leave me.”

His words sent chills down my spine and the fire in my belly ignited, the first time since I’d calmed it in Bryden’s presence. Instead of feeling loved like I did before with Kellan, I now felt raw fear. If I left him, he might come after Bryden and me. I could defend myself, but Bryden couldn’t. He had his magic, but if he used it in public before tomorrow morning our whole plan could be ruined.

Kellan forced me to look at him. “Promise me, Lianne. Tell me you’ll never leave me behind. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

I gasped. Was it possible he really did love me and wasn’t using me as a pawn? My heart twisted in knots, wondering if I’d be hurting him worse than I thought. I’d been ready to break it off with Kellan, believing it wouldn’t mean anything to him. I wondered if he did love me. Then why was he still setting me up to take a fall?