Читать книгу The Chronicles of Articia; Children of the Dead - K.D. Enos - Страница 6

Alec grasped the wooden sword tightly despite the renewed pain that shot up his side and his arms. The red welts on his body were the cause of his discomfort, but he still lifted the sword to block his sister's attack in his attempt to receive no more bruises. Alec preferred competing with his sister at archery, or horseback riding, in which he was particularly talented. Nevertheless, here he was again, in the training yard taking another beating from his sister Ava. Alec had become an excellent swordsman, mostly thanks to Bryn's training and his dislike of the injuries he received from training with his sister. They learned early from the many sparring contests that Bryn arranged; the only people in the castle that could best him with a sword were his brothers Tristan and Dominic, the king himself, his sister Ava, and of course Bryn. In fact, Alec cannot remember anyone who even caused Bryn to break a sweat in competition.

Ava swung to his left, her sword making a loud thwack against his sword. His fingers instantly went numb. How is Ava using magic to do that again! He thought. The wooden swords they used for practice did not make the same satisfactory clang as the swords that clashed in battle, but they could still cause pain. Grunting with effort, he ducked again and aimed low for her legs. As agile as ever, she jumped the sword and came crashing back on the attack.

His feet skated across the gravelly dirt as his breath came quickly. Feinting to the left, he tried to trick Ava by coming under her swing. She pretended that his action fooled her until the last second when she backed up and quickly came up under his sword. It was one of Ava's signature moves, and he felt stupid for falling for it every time despite his knowledge of the tactic. His sister used the same strategy when she played chess, sacrificing her queen just to make the final checkmate with a pawn.

Ava stepped into his swing and was about to disarm him but Bryn intervened. "I almost forgot; you two need to get ready for the banquet your parents are holding for your brother's coming-of-age ceremony. Go now, or you'll be late."

Ava groaned, irritated that the spar ended just before her victory. Alec grinned, silently thanking the gods for his escape from additional bruises on his hammered body.

They hurried up to their bedchambers. The castle had a secret passage from the training ground to the sitting area of their rooms. The twins had discovered the dank and long-forgotten passage many years ago. It became important for the twins to use this route to the training grounds so that Ava could avoid being discovered running about in trousers. Her regular antics had already caused a stir among the royal staff. Seeing Ava in nontraditional attire for a princess of the realm would have sent the castle inhabitants into pandemonium. The servants tolerated much from the young twins, but they were traditionalists and would not be able to tolerate the princess walking the halls of the castle in her brother's trousers without a specific decree from King Henry.

The passage ended in the main room in the twins' bedchambers. Their father had tried to put them in separate lodgings years ago but had given up when they had both refused to eat, sleep, or do anything until the abomination ended. Instead, a door was constructed, at Ava request, between the two connected rooms so they could still be together. It allowed each of the siblings to have private space.

Aleczander washed from the basin and donned a royal blue tunic with ruffled sleeve ends; he always loved the light swoosh the fabric made as it slipped over his head. Most of Alec's clothing, including the tunic, is imported from the markets in Cyrus. The merchants of the eastern shore sold fabrics that folklore said to be sewn from the silk of remarkable worms raised by the elves of the Vale. His trousers and cape were fine-looking ivy green. He pulled on his favorite black boots. Looking in the mirror, he had to admit he looked good. Look out ladies, here I come, Alec thought as he attempted to pull a comb through his black curls.

He swore under his breath as his comb was stuck in his mass of hair. Alec stopped fussing as Ava took the comb from his hands and gently teased the curls out. "Patience is a virtue, little brother."

Alec smiled at his younger sister. He was her elder by only a few minutes, and he thought, Even though you can still pummel me with that sword of yours, I can now out lift, out climb, out ride, and outrun you.

Ava had washed her hair and brushed it out by the fireplace to dry it. It was still quite cold in Articia despite winter's waning. Once the season made it uncomfortable to set a fire, it would be more difficult to dry her hair; she would have to allow much more time to ready herself for castle events.

When her hair was clean and dry, it naturally curled and waved beautifully past her shoulder blades and down her back. Her midnight blue gown and deep green cloak were identical in color to his garments, so they matched. Ava looked in the mirror quickly. She never spent much time admiring herself in the reflecting glass; it was a functional device. Like her clothing, her brush, her comb, it served a purpose-to ensure that she would be presentable in court. Otherwise, she never really concerned herself with her looks. Though she did make the mistake once of asking Alec about her appearance. He completely misinterpreted her request; she had only wanted to know if she was presentable, but he had pulled out one particularly embarrassing love letter from a baron's son and read it aloud to her. It reminded her why she was not particularly fond of the note or its author.

Ava, your face was beautiful to gaze upon,

your cheekbones high and flushed with color

and seen with spotless complexion.

You full red lips curved in a smile,

straight nose curved only slightly,

not pudgy but not overly long.

Your chin is delicate but strong,

almost like iron-filled glass.

Your eyebrows are, like your hair,

jet black, but not too thick.

Your eyes, a stormy gray

were always hinting a smile.

Ava knew she was stunning and held herself like someone who knew it. However, that was the absolute worst poem she had ever gotten from any of the noble courtiers. "Alec! Where did you get that?" Why did I keep it? "Give it to me now!"

"Sure," Alec replied, handing her the parchment. "I made many copies." Aleczander smiled to himself as he took his sister's arm and led her down the hall. Though told by many that he was handsome, compared to Ava, he felt rather plain.

Despite their rush, the two walked into the grand hall a little late.

"I told you we should have skipped practice today," Alec hissed through his teeth as everyone in the room cheered for a prince and princess of their kingdom. While Dominic would be high king one day, and the only one who could not marry into another kingdom, Tristan and Aleczander would be kings, and Ava a queen with many freedoms that their oldest brother would not realize. The position of high queen would be reserved for Dominic's wife, whenever he got around to choosing one; but there was no rush while King Henry was still on the throne.

"It's called being fashionably late; it's something normal princes and princesses do," she whispered as she smiled and waved to a particularly attractive noble's son.

Alec winced at his father's glare as he and Ava took seats on each side of their mother, as they always did during formal occasions. She nodded to them, smiling as if to greet them. However, her motherly demeanor did not fool the twins.

"The point of this affair is for your brothers to be cheered, not their younger siblings." Her voice was icy and meant to be harsh. Having dealt with this their whole lives, they knew what to do.

"I'm sure they will, mother," Alec started, "because the attire that you acquired in Cyrus for our brothers…"

"… is sure to leave all of the nobles in the hall in jealous admiration," Ava finished, not even bothering to look at her mom.

Alec and Ava had been finishing each other's sentences for years. This canny ability is one of the unusual traits that the goddess gave to the Artician twins. The queen found this trait charming in her youngest children and the pair used it to soften her mood whenever they found themselves in a tough spot, and the twins frequently found themselves in a tough spot.

Their mother sighed. Queen Angelica of Articia looked more like a mother than a queen as she straightened her son's cloak and pushed a lock of Ava's hair behind her ear. She smiled as she turned back to their father.

"Nice job on Alec's hair, Ava." The queen commented as the corners of Ava's mouth turned up slightly and Aleczander's face turned a slight shade of red.

Before Ava had a chance to tease him, the front doors flew open with a bang, and in walked Tristan and Dominic, clad in the magnificent gold and silver of the royal family. The only ones allowed to wear such brilliant colors on that day were Dominic, Tristan, and their mother and father. Ava and Aleczander would not normally include such extravagance in their wardrobes until they came of age at sixteen.

Dominic took a seat next to Ava and Tristan sat next to Alec. All of her children surrounded Queen Angelica. The king sat alone at a solitary table, according to a tradition that had begun a millennium ago when Articia consisted of mostly nomadic tribes and the leader of the tribe sat alone above the rest of the tribe. Later in the evening, Dominic would leave his mother's side at the table and sit at the right hand of the king. This would be the symbol of succession for the royal family. The King and his heir sit alone at their own table at all royal functions. Dom now sat at the table with the king as a symbol of the royal succession.

Of course, the funniest thing about the formal occasions was that they did not match the preferred life of the royals. The family usually took their meals at a table in the kitchens, a most informal setting. It was especially cozy in the winter when the cook fires warmed the area, making it the warmest and most comfortable location in Castle Articia. Though it was unusual for any royal family to eat in a kitchen, the king treated the entire castles workforce as part of his extended family. There is no one in his employ whose name and story he does not know. It is because of this that so many ordinary folk are devoted to the king. It is why they all take up arms to defend the king and country so readily whenever needed. He is noble and distant when he is required to be, but openly friendly to his subjects when not involved in matters of the state.

It was unusual that there was only a high king in Articia. It has always been a tradition and necessity to have large royal families to manage the significant amount of territory in the kingdom. A plague had afflicted Articia when King Henry was a young man and all of his siblings and his mother succumbed to its deadly effect. As a result, for a relatively brief time in Articia's long history, Articia had only one king. When Henry suddenly became king, his advisors quickly worked with him to return stability to the kingdom. The council set up baronies and a subordinate noble system to manage the growing needs of the plague-devastated kingdom of Articia. Most of the current barons in Articia are not directly related to the royal family. Now, the system was engrained and the current nobles wanted to maintain and even increase their power in the management of their territories and over the people who resided on their lands.

Their fear of losing their lands, authority, and status grew as the king's family grew. The animosity now heightened on Dominic's ascension; when a royal child reached such a rite of passage as the First Excursion, there would be talk of awarding him a territory and anointing him a king thereof. Speculation arose as to which pieces of whose territory might be reclaimed for this purpose.

Alec watched as Ava affectionately pushed a blonde curl back from Dominic's eyes. Alec and Ava had always been an oddity when it came to appearance. Their parents had blonde and light brown hair. The family was known for their deep blue eyes as well. But Alec and Ava had coal black hair and stormy gray eyes.

"How long do you think you will be gone, Dom?" Ava inquired.

Alec realized she was already worrying about the year in which princes who came of age traveled the kingdom to prove themselves worthy of the throne. Dom would not leave for a week at least; the feast was not even over yet and she was already worrying about him. Alec shook his head. Even as a toddler, Ava had fawned over her older brothers.

"I will be gone only for about six turns of the moon, Ava," Dom replied. "I couldn't stay away from my favorite sister for a full year."

"You mean your only sister," she said as she beamed at him.

The first course of the meal was collard greens, neither liked, nor consumed, by the royal children. Unfortunately, this lack of interest in the current course of sustenance usually left the royal children open to other activities. Tristan and Ava were using their inherent magic to annoy the royal chamberlain across the table with minor pyrotechnics.

The exasperated sigh from the chamberlain caught the attention of King Henry, who glared at the pair of siblings. The chamberlain suffered frequently from the antics of Tristan and Ava. Alec just smiled, knowing that Ava and Tristan's were just too mischievous to restrain themselves and their actions would be replayed many times tonight.

Alec often wondered about the blessing of magical capabilities. It seemed that the goddess bestowed the gift of cerebral arts completely randomly. The goddess had also bestowed a gift on his father and mother. Tris wondered why he and Dominic did not share their gift of sorcery. Though he sometimes thought he might enjoy the use of magical powers, he did not envy the free time his sister and brother lost to learning magical control.

As Alec was absentmindedly monitoring his sister, he looked across the room to admire Princess Kaitlin, who had traveled from the neighboring kingdom of Cyrus to participate in the annual Artician festival. When his glance swung back to Ava, Alec saw his sister's eyes turn from their normal gray to a light blue. "Ava, your eyes," he whispered.

She stopped and sighed as the color in her eyes slowly changed back. Ava was unique in both her appearance and her skills. Shortly after she had started to exhibit signs that she had magical talent; it became obvious that she had more power than most. Ava had other unique abilities that none who practiced the arts in the past had ever revealed. Most remarkable, and unique, was the change in the color of her eyes.

When Ava started her magical discipline training, they discovered that her eyes would change colors as she progressed through various difficulties of the arts she performed. When she executed rather simple acts of sorcery, her eyes would change from gray to light blue. The magical scholars tested every extreme of her magical capabilities and discovered that there was a progression, from light blue to light violet, light violet to green, green to light brown, light brown to dark violet, and dark violet to a blazing gold.

When Ava had reached the golden stage, all hell broke loose. She lost complete control and wild magic erupted from her body. Fortunately, the magical scholars were the ones to discover this about Ava and were able to contain her power; otherwise, she may have destroyed the entire castle and everyone in it. At that point, King Henry had put her into a strict magical training program so that she would learn to control her magical capabilities.

Despite a considerable amount of examination, the magical scholars could not determine what caused the change in Ava's eyes. It was clear only that it coincided with her use of her magical abilities.

As the guests in the hall finished the collard greens, the stewards removed the empty plates and started the next course, a breaded onion soup. This meal was one of the local favorites. The queen sighed relief, knowing that this was one of her children's favorites as well. She was confident that things would now settle down at the table.

Alec spooned his soup into his mouth and turned his attention back to Princess Kaitlin. Her brown hair waved down her back, with some of the strands tied and braided at the top. Her dress was a crimson color, though her cloak was green like his cape. However, the thing that caught Alec's attention the most was her eyes. They were a remarkable chocolate brown; to Alec, they were very warm and welcoming.

The third course of the meal was a cured beef that was a favorite of the royal family. The meal was specifically selected for this event because it was one of Dominic's preferred meals. Aleczander was beginning to grow bored after he had finished his serving. Then his father announced a break in the dining for a bit of dancing. Alec smiled as Ava slid down in her seat.

Several of the younger boys were so eager to ask her to dance that they had crashed into each other on the way to the table. This was causing a major problem for the other young nobles trying to reach Ava. Still, one lucky boy, at least three years younger, had managed to reach her.

"May I have this dance?" he squeaked.

Before Ava could answer, Tristan took his sister's arm. "I'm afraid you're going to have to wait, good sir, because I'm claiming my right as a prince of Articia for the first dance of the night with my sister." Tristan looked over his shoulder at the disappointed boy as he led Ava on to the dance floor.

Aleczander turned to look for his preferred partner for the night and caught her gazing at him. She looked down immediately, her cheeks growing pink and making her even more beautiful. Aleczander strode confidently, or at least hopefully, towards the princess from Cyrus.

"May I have this dance, Princess Kaitlin?" He bowed to her and kissed the tips of her fingers, very formally, even for him.

She smiled sweetly. "I will dance with you on one condition, Prince Aleczander." Her big brown eyes twinkled with mischief.

Realizing he was about to play into her hand, Alec straightened from his bow and gave her his arm as he spoke in a very silly and low voice, "I will do anything for such a fair princess."

Kaitlin raised her eyebrows and giggled, then said very seriously, "Please tell your sister and brother to stop shooting sparks across the table; their aim is horrific and I'm terrified they'll hit me." She grinned shyly.

Alec was a little surprised. So, she had caught that, he thought. Not only was she beautiful, but she had an eye for magical energies, even the more subtle magics that his brother and sister were performing tonight. It took a certain amount of talent or familiarity to see the magical activity. Alec was impressed.

As he took her arm, he replied, "Gladly. For you, Princess, it would be my pleasure. But do not expect them to listen to me."

She pretended to be puzzled. "Not even your twin? I would not know for sure, but I thought there was a special blood bond from being someone's double born."

Alec smiled a little as he thought of trying to control his sister. It would be going against the blood bond to suggest a change in behavior. Alec chuckled. "Regardless, I'd like to see anyone try telling my sister what to do. She can be quite stubborn, especially where I am involved."

Alec escorted Kaitlin onto the dance floor and twirled her around so he was facing the deep brown pools that were her eyes. They were happy, delighted even, intelligent, understanding, and welcoming; but underneath all that, they were somewhat sad, almost yearning. Before his eyes could inquire deeper into hers, she giggled, which brought him out of his daze. Alec stepped back and looked at her with confusion. She giggled again. "It's our third dance and almost every girl here is throwing daggers at me with her eyes."

He furrowed his brows as he turned to look. Sure enough, a group of the nobles' young daughters had caught him looking their way and hurriedly turned their eyes to the floor and the ceiling. They had clearly been glaring at Kaitlin.

Alec had not realized how long he had been gazing at her while they danced. When the song ended, he bowed to Kaitlin. "I'm afraid I must decline on the next dance, Princess." He kissed her hand, and as he made his way towards his sister, he whispered in Kaitlin's ear, "One more dance would have started more than just rumors; we'd have a brawl-you versus the rest of the over-enthusiastic young ladies in this hall." She giggled again, and then smiled as a much younger noble's son asked her to dance.

Alec shook his head and walked towards his sister, his curls bouncing. Ava was attempting to escape a young noble trying to ask her for a second dance. Alec smoothly intervened with an "I'm sorry," correctly interpreting the look of the young man he thought might be Cyran, one of Kaitlin's younger brothers. "But I must borrow my sister for a few dances." He whisked his sister away before the young man could protest.

"Thank you," she whispered.

Alec rolled his eyes. "Is it so bad just to dance with them?"

Ava glared at him. "All they want to talk about is themselves and the great things they have accomplished," Ava said with irritation. "Half of the remarkable deeds I am positive never happened at all. Most were remarkably outlandish and the remaining stories were highly questionable." Ava sighed as they crossed the dance floor. "Then there are those who find that all they want to talk about is me, which is far worse since they know nothing about me but think they do!"

Alec laughed at Ava's disgust as she continued her tirade, saying, "The worst was the one you chased away. I thought it was going to be all right to chat with him until he recited a poem he wrote for me."

Alec stopped dancing and had to laugh,

"Stop it! The poem was terrible, worse than the one you found." She paused. "All he talked about was his older brother anyway, who he seems to admire quite a bit."

"Sounds interesting," Alec, stated with a wink.

"At least the stories he told about his brother were believable,"

Ava responded. "I am most intrigued about him. But he is the only young gentleman in this room who hasn't tried to ask me to dance yet."

Alec chuckled silently at his sister's subdued but passionate outburst. "Where is this disgrace of a man who has not even asked you to dance yet?"

Ava rolled her eyes and pointed him out. "His young brother gestured to him so many times, he couldn't possibly have missed that we were talking about him. I think his face is burnt into my memory."

Alec examined the face of the young man for which Ava had inclined her head. "Hmm, I thought I knew every noble gentleman in court, but I do not recognize him."

The young man was maybe fourteen of average height. He looked lean but strong. He shifted in his seat and in the twist of cloth; Alec saw a glimpse of muscular arms. His chin was strong and sharp, his face angled. His hair was brownish-blonde and curled around his ears. It flipped up at the edges where it cut off at his forehead.

"He is quite handsome, Ava. Maybe you should ask him to dance," Alec quipped as he caught sight of the young man's brooding amber eyes. "He looks so … bored."

I suppose this young man is sweet on the eyes to the young women in the hall, Alec thought, but he knew his sister rarely saw the world quite the same as any normal girl. Not only did she know how to use weapons, but she also dabbled in musical performance, not to mention the use of scholarly magic, something very few people could achieve. It put quite a twist on her character, making it difficult for her to relate to the other young women of Articia. No, she would have no interest in most of the boys here this evening. Somehow, this young noble was different. There was something about him.

"He seems all right to me, Ava. Not self-absorbed at least, Handsome, if you like pretty boys." The last part was just more of Alec's teasing, and she knew it, but did not rise to the bait. Instead, she made a curious noise and turned to the door.

"What is it, Ava?" Alec asked, concerned.

Looking up at him, she responded, "A messenger is about to come through that door, but I'm not sure what he's going to say."

She occasionally had these visions; he remembered overhearing a conversation between Brendan, the royal mage and Ava's tutor, and his father about his sister's ability to foresee things. They said that it was common for powerful practitioners of the magical arts. The fact that she could do it still made him uneasy.

They danced right into the next ballad as he waited in uneasy suspense. Sure enough, a few minutes later, the door flew open and outside in the courtyard a messenger dismounted his horse and ran through the door. After bowing to the king and delivering a roll of parchment, the messenger left as quickly as he had arrived. King Henry read the message quietly and then looked around the room.

The king seemed troubled as he addressed the guests. "I'm afraid I must postpone the rest of this lovely evening to deal with a matter that has come to my attention and that I must not ignore, so I must bid you all goodnight." The queen took the king by the arm as he turned for the door. "I hope you enjoyed the celebration and especially the collard greens."

Alec immediately looked up to his father. "Collard greens" was the prearranged code word for possible danger. Alec had always thought it was strange that before each public event, they would discuss a set of codes for different situations. Alec and his siblings were always amused that the word chosen was something that the royal children truly disliked, like collard greens or religious studies. He had not believed that they would ever use the code words.

Ava gave him a worried look and noticed that Dominic and Tristan were already moving toward the large tapestry along the back wall of the hall as the king and the queen left the chamber by the main doors. Alec and Ava did not wait for additional confirmation and walked casually towards the tapestry. Behind, it hid a door to the back corridor. When they entered, Dominic and Tristan were waiting with swords drawn. Dom looked to Alec and Ava and said, "We are not alone; I saw movement down the hall." His eldest brother was pointing to a bend in the passage that led to the family quarters.

Ava sighed, and without breaking stride, she reached under the folds of her dress and drew a hidden dagger. It had always been the tradition of the royal family to carry their weapons to any formal occasion. Henry's children had never heard of a need to use them before tonight. The four siblings continued down the hall cautiously with Dominic leading and Tristan providing a rear guard. It was not long before shadows started to close in on them.

"Dark magic," Dominic shouted, "Ava . . . !"

Before he could complete his sentence, a wave of power emitted from Ava's palm as her gray eyes progressed quickly to a light brown. This happened every time Ava was gathering her power. Alec braced himself for the explosion of magic that those light brown eyes indicated. Like the wave of a powerful hand, the force of Ava's magic felled the foreign men in the hallway and the sounds of their grunts and metal banging into walls filled the air. Alec drew his sword, Shadow Fang, and moved up beside Ava to wait for what was coming down the hall.

"Alec, cover the rear!" Tristan shouted as he moved past Alec to stand next to Dominic. With Shadow Fang in his raised arm, Alec stepped behind Ava and scanned the darkness behind his position.

"Ava, a little light please," Dominic requested. Ava made a motion with her hand and flames of light flew out in front of them; she turned and repeated it behind.

"How did they get behind us?" Ava shouted as she saw the threat past Alec. He watched as two armed men approached them cautiously from behind. Tristan smiled at his brother Dominic as the stunned men in front of them stood back up and collected their senses.

Dominic needed no prodding as they moved in quickly to engage the intruders before they could recover their weapons from the ground. Tristan was approaching his first target when he called out, "Tartarus inferi" and his sword glowed in a blue flame as he struck at the first man. Dominic moved in on a second. Alec waited for the two men who were behind them to engage before he struck, while Ava took the opportunity to pull a second dagger from a fold in her cloak.

Believing that he faced an inexperienced youth, the first attacker made a fatal mistake; as he raised his sword to strike, Alec drove in fast with Shadow Fang and his sword bit deep into the unfortunate warrior's flesh. The battle was on!

Ava saw her brother take down a man to her right, and immediately more men jumped out of the shadows. She tensed as she heard Tristan strike and kill another man-of-arms with his sword Silver Bane. Dom had already sunk his royal sword Ghost Touch into many a foe. He pressed forward to engage another. How she wished to have the familiar handle of her sword, Last Kiss! Despite the fact that women were not allowed to train in the martial arts. Well she trained harder than most men train, and wished that she could defy tradition and had worn her sword as her brothers did. Without Last Kiss, she had to make do with her daggers and her magic.

Ava's training became a significant advantage for her in this skirmish with the first enemy she encountered. The ferociousness of her attack surprised the thug, who was not expecting a woman to be skilled in battle. Ava gripped her daggers and twirled quickly around her attacker, sinking one dagger into the stomach of that unfortunate soul. Blood now soaked his shirt as the man-at-arms started falling backwards.

Ava had to parry the thrust of another warrior because she tarried too long trying to retrieve her first dagger from the body of the unfortunate opponent. She grabbed the dying man's sword from his weakened hand and swung it under her arm to stop the progress of a man approaching from behind her. Her gown severely restricted her freedom of movement, a gown now covered with the blood of her unknown assailants.

They fought their way down the hall, "There are a lot of them!" Dominic called as he led them all into Ava and Aleczander's chambers. Tristan closed and locked the door and stood by while Alec and Dominic searched the room.

The sounds of the palace guard fighting the men-of-arms filled the hallways. After what seemed like an eternity, the noise subsided. The four children of Henry waited in the room for the all-clear signal so they could reunite with their mother and father. Dominic stood guard at the door while Tristan stood at the window that was open to the yard.

Dom heard the call of the captain of the guard at the door, who relayed the prearranged code. Dominic looked back at his siblings and nodded before he opened the door. Many men lay wounded or dead in the upper atrium as the guard addressed him.

"Sire, is all well with you, your brothers, and your sister?" the captain inquired.

"Yes, captain, we fared well. Is the enemy still in the castle?" Dominic asked as he stepped out the door into the atrium.

"Yes, but we have driven them to the concourse. Your father has joined the fight and sent me to see to you, your brothers, and sister," he replied.

"Tristan, it looks like things have settled down here. Let us go and help father clean up what remains." Dominic looked toward Alec, "Alec, lock the doors behind us and wait for our return. I believe this will be over soon."

Dominic and Tristan darted out of the room and turned down the hall toward the sounds of battle. Alec closed and locked the door and turned to Ava. "What the heck is going on here? We never actually had to fight before, though we have had plenty of drills. I never expected to have to use my skills for real!" Alec was clearly upset.

"Keep your voice down, Alec. We're alive, and together, and that's what matters." She turned and looked at the door. She knew that behind it was blood. There was lots of blood. She thought about the recent events and realized that it was not the actual blood or the battle that bothered her, but what the result of her actions meant, the real meaning. She thought about the loss and the lives that she and her siblings had extinguished. The men would have no second chance to change who they were and what they had done. They were condemned to the abyss, to the darkness. There would be no chance for redemption.

"The time will come when we will draw our first drink of blood, and that will be the day of sorrows."

Ava recalled the words of Last Kiss and now understood their meaning. Her innocence was now lost, forever.

She had not realized how much it would bother her to take a life, but it was necessary in some situations, and this had been one of them. Dom and Tris would tease her and call her weak. To care for the lives of the enemy you took was not something you are supposed to allow yourself to feel.

As Alec looked at his sister, trying to understand her sudden silence, Ava jumped to her feet and grabbed Last Kiss. Sensing the danger from behind the tapestry on the wall, Alec jumped up with Shadow Fang and stood beside her.

Faster than they thought possible, a dark figure moved out from behind the tapestry and angled toward the pair. Ava, mostly on instinct, parried the lightning thrust, clearly aimed at her heart.

"An assassin, he came in through our training yard passage!" Ava yelled to Alec.

Alec was kicking himself mentally for not checking the passage when he and his brothers checked the room. He closed the distance with the assassin to help keep his sister safe. This guy is good, Alec thought, not your standard man-at-arms. How is he managing to keep both of us from scoring a hit? A dance of blades continued for what seemed an eternity before Alec allowed himself to become distracted. The assassin took quick advantage of this critical mistake and came in under Alec's thrust to score a vicious slash to his arm.

"Arrrrgh." The blow forced Alec to withdraw a few steps, clearly out of the fight for the moment.

Ava, seeing her brother's distress, stepped in front of her brother to keep the assassin from finishing the job. She could not contain the rage building inside her as she directed the power of her magic at the assassin.

Alec was holding his wound to staunch the bleeding. "Ava, no!" he shouted, as he watched his sister lose control. Her eyes were changing colors rapidly now.

As the assassin stepped in to what he thought was going to be an easy strike, the man looked into her blazing golden eyes. The assassin's eyes widened as a burst of wild energy exploded from her body. The burst of lightning and power blew him into the wall. Her magic immediately extinguished the life of assassin; Ava's power was too immense for him to survive the attack.

"Ava, regain control! You must regain control!" Alec yelled. Ava did not hear him as the energy continued to flow from her body, igniting the tapestry on the wall. Seeing the tapestry burst into flames and realizing his sister was lost in the power, Alec yelled a prayer, "Adara, help us!"

Alec covered his head, expecting the castle to collapse under the assault of Ava's uncontrolled magical power. As a soft light filled the room, Alec heard a whisper in his head just before he passed out, all will be well, my son.

…

Alec opened his eyes as he heard Ava speaking through the door: "Who wishes to speak to the willow?" Willow was actually one of Ava's chosen names; all of the royal family members had code names that described trees in the royal garden. The royal family never shared these names outside the family.

"Birch wishes it to be so." Ava smiled and opened the door for their father. The queen followed the king into the room and turned toward Alec with a look of concern. He now realized that he was lying in a pool of his own blood. Some of the elite guards were behind the pair and turned back to guard the door to the siblings' chambers.

Alec's mother saw the severity of the gash on his arm and started an incantation as she held her hand over the wound, "Lumen sano!" Alec's pain began to lessen. As she finished saying the phrase, the wound stopped bleeding and closed up.

"Well, Alec, it looks like you managed to get your first battle scar," Dominic said as he and Tristan entered the chamber.

The king and his aide moved across the room to examine the assassin. The aide reached down and pulled a brooch out of what remained of the assassin's cloak. He looked up toward the king and said, "Sire, this man was from the assassin's guild of the Mildanar tribes to the north."

"You are correct," Henry responded, "I recognize his affiliation from what remains of his garb." King Henry looked over at his wife and Alec, "Will our youngest son survive?" the king said sardonically for he knew that wound Alec received was not fatal.

"Of course, his wound was not so bad" Queen Angelica replied calmly. The queen stood up from tending Alec and walked toward the king. "It looks like we may have to commit more attention to our holdings in the northern territories."

The king nodded to his wife. She was always the politician and well aware of the pending danger a large royal family represents to the many duchies in the kingdom. "Well, gentleman, looks like you got your first taste of what we will face ahead. I would express how well you did protecting your sister but it appears that she managed to handle these things well enough on her own."

The king reached down to pick up Last Kiss. As he lifted the curved blade from the floor, sparks flew from it. King Henry quickly handed it to Ava. As he rubbed his hand, he commented, "It seems that your sword is not pleased that I handled it, Ava."

The royal swords had individual personalities and always selected their wielders; such was the way of the weapons' magic. Last Kiss was no exception. The soul of the sword would not allow a male to take hold of the blade.

In order for a sword to have power, it had to have a kind of intelligence, and generations of use by the royal family had added personality to each sword. When members of the royal family turned twelve, the royal family held a ceremony in to the chamber of the swords so each royal could be "selected."

Each sword has its own history and selects its new wielder based on that history. Alec's sword, Shadow Fang, one of the oldest of the royal swords, had been a gift to the eighth king of Articia, Heldar the Great, who aided the Silver Mountain dwarves in their war with the barbarian tribes of the east. Heldar united the tribes of the lower valley into what is Greater Articia today.

Tristan's sword, created in a time of strife and war, glimmered with flame against its silver blade. The dwarves of northern tribes had united with a group of outcast Silver Mountain dwarves in a revolt against the dwarven King Th'grem. It was the first time in history that the dwarves had fought each other. King Eric the Gold, of Articia, agreed to help the Silver Mountain dwarves defeat the dwarves of the northern tribes, and the weapon masters of Silver Mountain forged a sword for the great king that commemorated that occasion. It was the first sword the dwarves had ever created to kill another dwarf, thus its name of Silver Bane.

Ghost Touch, Dominic's sword, had an unusual history. It was the first dwarven sword given to a royal family member not forged specifically for royal use. One of the dwarven weapon masters named Garn had forged the sword as a way to commune with the dead. He had lost his beloved daughter in an accident in the silver mines and was so distraught that he neglected all else to forge the sword so he could speak to her again. He did not succeed in getting the magic to commune but managed to forge a sword that drew energy out of those it struck and transferred that energy back into the wielder, making him stronger. In his despair for his failure to forge a sword to commune with the dead, Garn neglected his other children. Because of this, his remaining children had to fend for themselves.

One early summer day one of those children, Grenden, encountered danger while returning from foraging in the forest. A mountain bear attacked this child of Garn and as he tried to flee the beast, he became trapped in a gorge. High Prince Hilgar, son of Eric the Gold, was out hunting and came upon the distressed dwarf. The prince fought the mountain bear off with his sword, rescued the son of Garn, and escorted the boy to his home. When Grenden returned, Garn was so troubled over the possibility of losing another child that he snapped out of his grief and recommitted himself to taking care of the remaining members of his family. To show gratitude, he gave Hilgar Ghost Touch as a gift.

Last Kiss was a special sword because it was the only sword forged for and specifically wielded by a warrior queen. In the northern reaches, beyond the kingdom of Mildanar was a band of nomads. They lived a hard life. In the nomadic society, women as well as men fought and trained out of necessity. Arianna was one of the strongest willed of the women of her tribe. In the winter of her fifteenth year, she had a vision dream from the goddess Adara that she was to journey east to the land of the dwarves to receive a gift. On this journey, she met and fell in love with Prince E'ward, son of King Telnard of the Articia territories. The two continued to the dwarven lands only to find the dwarves in battle with the goblins of Coal Mountain. Arianna could not resist participating in the battle and Prince E'ward joined the fray, not willing to let the remarkable warrior woman, of whom he had grown fond, fight alone.

In gratitude to this remarkable pair, the dwarves forged two swords. Last Kiss, the first sword forged specifically for a woman, and First Touch, the sword that King Henry now wields. When the pair returned to the territory of Articia, they raised quite the stir. Young girls and women came out of their dwellings to witness the sword-bearing warrior woman whose reputation had preceded her into the kingdom. Prince E'ward and Arianna were married soon after and none in court or in the entire kingdom dared to question her breaking the tradition against women carrying weapons. To this day, they do not know if the gift the goddess spoke to Arianna was the sword or Prince E'ward.

King Henry rubbed his hands, which were now a little numb from handling Last Kiss, and turned to his youngest children. Alec and Ava looked at each other with trepidation. "Um, I have been training with Alec for a couple of years now" Ava stated.

Dominic and Tristan broke into laughter as they saw the look on the faces of their younger brother and sister. The queen smiled at both of them and turned to the King "I will be heading down to the infirmary now to see if I can help the healers comfort and heal some of our brave warriors who were wounded in the fray."

The king nodded to his aide, who stood and called out to the elite guard to provide an escort for the queen. He then looked over at his younger children. "Why do you two look surprised? Did you really think anything would happen in my castle that I did not know about?"

Ava looked at her brother and started to smile. "So you are not mad that I broke tradition and that I am training in the martial arts?"

The king looked at her and said, "Since you were two years old, we all knew you would have it no other way. With your stubbornness and your athleticism, many of the court commented on how much you resembled your ancestor, Queen Arianna, in both spirit and attitude. But I knew you were destined to be a warrior princess when you, as a toddler, sneaked behind me into the sword chamber and Last Kiss lit up like faerie fire."

The king then turned to his aide. "We have to get back to our duty and secure the castle. We still have many frightened guests in the hall below that we need to attend. Arrange for escorts so they may all return to the safety of their quarters." As he headed to the door of Ava and Alec's rooms, the king stated, "I think under the current circumstances we should arrange for the nobles to return to their respective estates until we finish investigating the culprit of tonight's action."

The aide called out to the hallway to members of the elite guard, "Leave a small contingent to guard the royal quarters. The rest of you come with me to secure the rest of the castle and grounds."

The king turned back to the twins, "Later we will have a discussion about the carnage in this room." The king moved swiftly down the hall with his elite guard to the lower sections of the castle, as two stewards came in to remove the body of the assassin. Once the body was removed, the royal chambermaids arrived to clean the "carnage" that the twins had wrought in their residence.

"Ava, let's retire to our own rooms while this area is cleaned. Mother has ordered me to rest and recover from my wound. By the way, I really liked that tapestry you destroyed. I hope you plan to get me a new one on our birthday." He smiled back to her as he walked toward his room.

Ava entered her private bedroom and sat on her bed. She again reflected on the skirmish that had just occurred. She had not realized how much it would bother her to take a life, even though it was necessary in some situations, and this was one of them. The words of Last Kiss entered her thoughts again.

"The time will come when we will draw our first drink of

blood, and that will be the day of sorrows."

Ava thought of the men she had sent to the abyss.