Chapter Six
The king beckoned them forward, and Winifred found herself bathing in the presence of the elaborately dressed royal couple. Both wore gold and white robes, though they didn't opt for the usual crown that royals were supposed to wear, like the ones in Golubria. Aside from the glimmering gold, they appeared remarkably under-dressed.
Winifred didn't want to look into the eyes of royalty. She felt smaller and smaller, surrounded by people far above her station.
I'm not supposed to be here. This isn't me.
But here she was. And now they expected her to explain everything, since Mordred only had the condensed account, and likely didn't comprehend the full size of the threat.
With her friends watching her, Winifred sought to explain. She explained everything, including the fact that she was originally recruited into the palace as a spy. Best not to leave out anything. She did add that they wanted her to spy for them—and when she went to warn Ian, who was trying to sniff around for any hint of the assassination attempt, they were chased and accosted.
She finished off with, “And that's how we ended up running for our lives against the living dead, all to warn you.”
There was an electrifying silence, broken by the older Fjordan sister. “You're a traitor,” Bethany said, stating the rather obvious fact at this point, but giving the words out for everyone else as well.
“There's tombs under the palace?” Vasha said, eyes wide, apparently not bothered by the traitor statement. “I never knew that. And I live here. Also, you didn't explain how the mask on Ian came off.”
“Bitches,” Kiara added, “is no one remotely interested in the walking dead at all? Because that's the most shocking information I've heard. Also, the coolest.”
Bethany shook her head, eyes narrowed into slits. “You realize your crime will likely be punished. You have contributed directly to the very plot that you now warn us of.”
“Yes, I know,” Winifred said, exasperated. They'd probably lock her up, and it was the least she deserved. “I don't have an eternity. Fact has already been established. But right now, I'm warning you because...” Winifred glanced at Kiara, and trailed into miserable silence. Kiara. The one she would have hurt the most with this back-stab. The Fjordan princess did look a little shaken, but she didn't wear the loathing Winifred anticipated.
“What did Ian mean,” Kiara said, “that you picked the right side? I heard him. He chose to believe in you. Why?”
I don't know, Winifred wanted to say. I don't understand why he said those words. “I...” she began, then hesitated. “I think it was when I realized I'd rather save Kiara than my own mother. And that thought... it terrifies me so much that I didn't want to linger on it.” Instantly, Winifred fought to not cry.
There.
She'd said it. The thought she'd been avoiding, tucking away in the back of her mind. Even when it was presented to her, face to face, Winifred still didn't want to register it.
That she had picked a side. She just never wanted to say those words out loud.
The king's lips were pinched, but he nodded, before saying in his calm, measured voice, “We'll go to the military section. We can talk with the officers better and decide what needs to be done. Thank you for the warning.”
They all strode out behind the king and queen in relative silence. The military quarters were located one floor down, close to the throne room for easy access. Winifred wondered if the werewolf at the entrance had already dealt with the First Wolf corpse, or whether said corpse was now roaming around the palace, seeking more to kill. She had no idea just how deadly the corpses were, and certainly didn't want to try, in case it ended up with their untimely deaths.
She kept glancing nervously behind her the whole time, hoping against hope that nothing would show up.
“We're here,” the king said, before pushing open a smaller door which lead into a room with a large, circular table. Lights danced around the room, and the walls were lit with braziers. A huge window helped them to overlook the outside of the palace, the gardens, and the entrance to the palace over the gated bridge. The lights in the room matched the same color as the torches, giving an orange glow to the things inside it. Ian was in here, gesticulating, and people were springing to attention at his orders.
“About time,” Ian said, looking at them, not sparing a smile for anyone. “We're already securing most of the palace, and have sent at least ten werewolves to deal with the... problem we were running away from. Okay, assigning roles.”
The king didn't appear to be particularly upset that Ian was barking the orders. Perhaps that proved a part of Ian's special role within Kanthus. Not only did he do detective work, but when push came to shove, he took command as well. Winifred wanted him to look at her, to reassure her that he hadn't changed his mind and had started hating her.
She knew the thought to be silly, but it invaded her nonetheless.
“All of you are lightweavers, right?” Ian said, indicating their little group.
“Not me,” Vasha said, her thick lips pouting as if upset about this fact. “I never quite had that blessing.”
“You're Highborn. Still useful. Go with non-Highborn groups. Your senses will be needed.” His confirmation that Vasha could help the cause made her lips split into a smile of relief.
“Do I get to be useful?” Kiara asked, eager for action.
“You're staying with the king,” Ian said, causing her to stand rigid to attention. Such an important duty. “Your shield in particular will be needed. You too, Bethany. If the enemy breaks through, draining the light might be what we need to get the king and queen to safety. And maybe you can find another use for your ability. Oh, and question, Kiara. Can you do a full-body shield now?”
“Only with myself. I can provide a general shield to cover someone else, though.”
“Good.” He nodded, satisfied. Winifred allowed herself to smile proudly. Kiara had come a long way since that initial disaster of a lightweaver she'd been faced with. “Now, Winifred. Your light can help reveal the enemy better than any other sources. You can track their bodies, and your lights can seek out things, yes?”
Winifred nodded, heart thumping painfully in her chest. “Yes. I'll do it.”
“Thank you, Winifred. I appreciate this. I understand if you... you don't want to get involved.”
His eyes locked with hers, shining in genuine thanks. How strange. She'd done nothing to be thanked for. She didn't deserve to have him smile at her, yet she enjoyed seeing it at the same time.
“I don't understand how you think you can trust me. I wouldn't trust me.” She tore her gaze away from him, ashamed.
“Guess you can say I have hope for you.” He walked over to clasp her on the shoulder, whilst Kiara nodded in a knowing way.
“I wish things were different,” Winifred said. “I wish we could have met in better circumstances.”
“We can't have everything, can we?”
The truth did have a way of hurting. “I wish as well that my mother made it easier to hate her.”
“It's normal to love your mother.” Ian's jaw tightened. Remembering something from his past?
“Unless you didn't know them,” Bethany said.
“Oh, I hated mine,” Vasha said with a contemptuous roll of her eyes.
“Doesn't mean it's normal. You're not normal.”
“That's very rude of you to say,” Vasha said, pretending to be offended.
Winifred clasped her hands together, trying to hold her emotions in one place. She'd been given a task. She hoped to the skies she wouldn't fail.
“Sir!” a soldier barked from the window. A Highborn man, without the ability to change into a werewolf. “Enemy approaching!”
Ian sighed. “I have no idea if we can cope with this.” He approached the window, followed by Winifred, Bethany, Mordred, and Kiara. The king and queen remained still, talking to one of their generals. The military room swarmed with dozens of others, some ranked as high as generals, others as Highborn soldiers, preparing for the wave of invaders now stumbling towards the palace.
Through the greenish gloom of the cemetery, hundreds of shambling corpses could now be seen heading towards the palace. A small line of werewolves was already moving out to defend them against the first wave, and other soldiers with bows and arrows stood twenty paces behind them.
“Tell the archers,” Winifred said, “to use flaming arrows.” The Golubrian suspicion for burning the dead had to come from somewhere. Why not something like this? “I have a bad feeling ordinary arrows won't work on something that's already dead.”
“Write the note, toss it down,” Ian said. A soldier hastened to obey, writing with a quill before rolling up the scroll, attaching a weight to it, and opening the window. He aimed carefully at the closest archers, and tossed the scroll to them. The note fell like a stone, almost clobbering the archer on the head.
“Nice throw, soldier,” Ian said, and the Highborn man grinned in response. The archer examined the note. A general came up to Vasha, asking her to follow him, and she did, with a last goodbye to the group.
Moments later on the ground, the archers were dipping their arrows in a hastily acquired barrel of tar and setting the heads on fire.
They started letting loose on the living dead rapidly—but something amongst the dead was draining the light, making visibility hard.
“Of course,” Ian said with a snarl. “They have darkweavers. Tarngol bastards with their unnatural magic. I didn't think a Golubrian could stoop this far...”
“Some people will do anything to ensure their victory.” Winifred watched the advancing dead in numb silence, unable to process what was happening.
Her people, the Golubrians, the ones who were supposed to respect the dead, were using them as puppets. Her mother likely believed it to be a perfect demonstration of why the Kanthian methods of treating the dead were flawed, but Winifred saw it instead as perverted manipulation by a nation claiming to be something it wasn't.
Her mother didn't care about Golubria at all. She didn't care about “freeing” the common people. She only cared about power.
“My gods. This is actually happening. There are dead people. Dead people walking!”
“Kiara, I believe we mentioned that little fact to you before,” Winifred said, breaking out of her torpor long enough to reply.
“Yes, but it's another thing entirely to see the actual dead people.” Kiara flapped her hands for good measure. Her dark eyes were wide in astonishment, a little fear, and a disproportionate amount of excitement.
Definitely the type who would go running towards danger, as opposed to from it like every other normal person.
“I concur,” Ian said. “I didn't take Winifred seriously at the start either. I hope our guards are capable of getting over their horror. Seeing something like this would quail most hearts.”
Winifred pouted, pressing her fingers against the window. “I can't believe that my mother would endorse this. I thought I knew her. Turns out I was wrong. I never knew her at all. Associating with the Tarngol!”
“That's who we're having trouble with in Fjorn,” Bethany confessed. “They're responsible for this.”
“Yes,” Winifred said. “And the Golubrians. A crazy cult of them, anyway. We're not exactly making ourselves more popular, are we?”
Ian went to rest a hand on Winifred's shoulder, sending strange tingles through her spine. She also recalled, rather painfully, people's assumptions that they were already married.
As if falling down a shaft was how people got married. As if carefully dancing around one another, seeking out the lies, was the basis of their relationship to make it work.
We need more time. And we may not have it. I may not have it, she corrected, a flash of cold streaking through.
Ian's lips curled in fury as several of the dead set on a werewolf. “I wonder who the head of the cult is. The one employing the Tarngol, causing the cult itself to radically change direction—and perhaps even their faith?”
“No one good,” Bethany said. And Winifred didn't know.
The king and queen paced nervously around the room, clearly wanting to do more than be stuck here, waiting for something to happen. Luckily, they didn't have to wait long, since a soldier burst through the double doors a few minutes later, his blond hair awry, blue eyes manic. “Sir,” he barked in a clipped voice, saluting, “there's been a breach in the palace! The first wave of werewolves is trying to fend them off now. But there's a chance they may penetrate as far as here!”
Ian nodded, taking the statement along with the two generals and king and queen.
“Is there anything you lightweavers can do to help our side?” Ian asked. “Suggestions welcome.”
“You can send me down from the palace,” Kiara growled. “I'll show them a thing or two.”
“You're needed to protect the king,” Bethany hissed. “Try something that you can do from here.”
“I could try lighting up the dead better,” Winifred said, “but what use would that be?”
“Have to try something. I'll need to go and defend the breach. Winifred—in case we don't meet again—I think you deserve a pardon, and I'll vouch for it myself. Just make sure you keep striving to help.” He smiled at Winifred briefly, making her stomach flutter, then left the room.
She really hoped this wouldn't be the last time they saw one another.
“This is why you're married,” Kiara observed.
“I'm not!” Winifred examined the nervous king. Being here made strategic sense. Invaders would look to the throne room and royal chambers if they wanted to assassinate. Leaving would risk discovery if the Golubrians had surrounded all the exits. Short of shoving the royals in a cupboard, this was the best solution for them.
But they would never have been in this situation, if not for Winifred. “I'm sorry for this,” she said.
Kiara slapped Winifred on the back of her scalp. “Don't be. If not you, they would have just found someone else. Lucky for us they picked a spy with a conscience, eh?”
“Doesn't feel particularly lucky,” Winifred said, though she smiled at Kiara's attempt to cheer her up.
Faint screams reached them from the open window. People were falling to the dead. Many dead lay blazing with flames, but many others had swarmed the werewolves and taken down some of the ordinary archers.
“There's too many,” Bethany said. “The front there has fallen. The archers are retreating.”
“They are avoiding the lit fires, though. Anything we can do about that?” Kiara pointed out how the dead moved. They flinched away from the fires, distressed by the light. Instantly, an idea began to form in Winifred's mind, seeing this behaviour.
“We could make a big light.”
“Impossible,” Bethany said. “Lightweavers can't combine powers. Otherwise we would have far stronger light sources than what we already have.”
“I could try a minnow storm, maybe. Beasts roaming around... but I don't know if I can make them big enough...”
“You did it in the forest,” Kiara reminded her. “When we got stuck last time.”
“We didn't have an open expanse back then like this. They can avoid and adjust far easier.”
Bethany cleared her throat, brushing her delicate fingers together. “I could try taking the light. It doesn't work at far distances like that, but I can cover quite a lot of ground.”
Winifred was about to say that this was pointless, before realizing. “Actually, maybe you should. My bracelet might be able to absorb the energy, if you can siphon and direct it to the bracelet. Can you do that?”
“Bracelet?”
Winifred showed them, unclasping it from in her boot. Kiara didn't recognize it, but the others did.
“I've never seen one of those before,” Bethany said, fascinated. “They store excess light, don't they?”
“Yep. Which I can use if the bracelet is touching my body. It draws from me, but it might be able to draw from other sources, too. If you can bring light no longer attached to here, maybe we can power it up.”
“Let's test it.” Bethany glanced down at her own glow-necklace. A second later, the light had vanished. “And... pushing it towards the bracelet. It's working! It's taking it!”
Kiara punched her sister in the arm. “Excellent. Hurry up.”
“So I'm doing this... why?” Bethany raised her hands, sucking out all the light sources in the room and a little beyond. She directed the energies to the bracelet, which gulped it all up. How much power did it contain? Enough for what she wanted to do, hopefully.
“I'm planning to make a really, really big light. Like...” Winifred's eyes rested on a picture on the left wall. Of a sun, rising above mountains and fields. “Like the sun.”
“You're joking,” Kiara said.
“Let's find out.”
“That's really advanced lightweaving,” Bethany said, doubtful. “Even if it's only a temporary fix. Assuming you want to strengthen the light, you'll be attaching it to the air. And you need to thread it. A big glowing ball won't be enough unless you find a way to break the molecular level and dig extra light out.”
Winifred merely smiled at Bethany. Yes, it was true. No matter how strong a lightweaver, they could never boost the light beyond a soft glow. But with all this magic stuffed into the bracelet right now, she felt fairly certain that she could combine the individual light sources together, rather than just create a big ball. Harder effort. Just like forming millions of tiny fishes, temporarily changing the properties of air.
That had to work, right?
She concentrated, drawing on that awesome power in the bracelet. More than she'd ever had in her body. Almost too much to handle. She thrust out the weavings, seeking the air to bind it to, then locking it together, causing each air particle she touched to start glowing. Several times, she fumbled the links, and patches of light revealed themselves in the late night air. Fixing the connections, she touched particle after particle, until it all coalesced together into incandescent light.
“Oh, by the endless dark,” Kiara whispered, hand over her mouth.
The king and queen had come to watch the huge, orange orb hovering above the gardens. Bigger than the palace itself. A light so bright that it turned the entire garden underneath into a crisp, clear image. No haze. No dark colors. Just light greens and shiny polished grays, and now the writhing dead, who had been struck comatose. The light itself penetrated further, reaching parts of the streets, though it didn't quite cover everything.
It was almost too bright to look at.
Winifred grinned, and Kiara cheered. “They're confused!” Kiara said. “The dead don't know what to do! They're trying to find shelter but there isn't any!”
“The troops are pretty confused, too,” Bethany pointed out. “As you can imagine.”
“That kind of binding won't hold,” Winifred said, for some reason feeling exhausted. “The air won't stand for it. It will drift apart by itself in a few hours. Shame.”
“You... brought the sun back?” The king said this now, his yellow eyes wide in shock. His hands trembled as he stared into the brightness.
“Of course not,” Winifred said. “This is tiny, compared to the real thing. And it doesn't have all the chemical components a sun should have. It's just a clever imitation formed by vibrating the air molecules.”
“A tiny sun, then,” Kiara said. “You made a tiny sun.”
“Consider the tiny sun a gift from me,” Winifred said with a grin. The king and queen gave her a hard stare, which made the smile vanish.
“We accept,” the king said.
The human troops were the first to recover. They took advantage of the confused dead to hack through them, felling the superior numbers. The few remaining werewolves tore through the dead as well.
Winifred stared up at her sun, disappointed she couldn't bind it into existence. For some reason, boosting the light made it impossible to affix.
Which explained why they could never achieve something beyond the glow of the city, the fields, and the waters.
Because something bright and blazing didn't burn for long.
Muffled shouts came from outside the rooms. Kiara instantly prepared herself, a shield erupting from her arm, big enough to cover the king and queen.
Impressive work. She'd come a long way since her blobby little elbow covers. Winifred remembered that what Kiara was trying to master was a full light cover, essentially making her defended against most weapons. But she couldn't do that and shield someone else at the same time.
“The royals are mine,” Kiara said, careful to back the king and queen into a corner. They started shifting, assuming the worst, but stayed behind her shield.
The doors erupted open. In bounded a werewolf, scratched and bloodied, but grinning fiercely, teeth bared. He snarled something, then morphed into Ian.
Winifred stared, horrified, eyes tracing for dangerous injuries on his form.
“We repelled them. Including the First Wolf, but that wasn't fun,” he said, panting. “But what I don't get is why we didn't—oh. Hello.” Now he noticed the miniature sun. “Damn. That's impressive.”
“Courtesy of the former traitor,” the queen stated, making Kiara and Winifred beam.
“That explains why we didn't get many other dead coming in. They can't stand such bright light.”
He seized Winifred in a sudden hug then, his chin pressing painfully against her head, and a little of his blood touching her clothes. Oblivious to all that, he spun her around, laughing and cheering.
Well, Winifred thought sourly. They'll never drop the wife and husband talk now.
She closed her eyes, allowing herself to be swept in the hug. Wishing against hope that her mother hadn't been along the dead. That she had seen the risen armies, and finally realized that what the Golubrians were doing was wrong.
All she could do was hope, whilst a false sun blazed in the light blue sky.