Green Rider

Just in case someone was out there, she touched her brooch and faded out, then cracked the door open. The corridor outside was only dimly lit, and it was empty save for some old suits of armor standing at age-old attention.

She slipped out of the room, and using her own best judgment, headed in the direction she believed the throne room lay.

THE GHOST

Stevic G’ladheon was not sure he could take much more of the screaming. A few nobles had dared to defy Prince . . . no, he corrected himself, King Amilton. One noble lay dead with blood flowing out of his nose, ears, and mouth, a few others had given in to the strange power Amilton wielded before they met the same fate. Amilton would put his hands on their shoulders or heads. Bolts of black energy would spark and crackle around his hands, and the victim would cry out in pain.

“I pledge . . . my . . . undying loyalty,” the most recent unfortunate said. It was a plump man on his knees with head bowed. Blood oozed from his nose.

The fire seemed to burn within and without Amilton. His “loyal” servants, the nobles who had capitulated, stood behind him in the throne room. The strange stone that hung at his throat glimmered, and at times, seemed to pulsate like a living thing.

Stevic and Sevano had found an alcove with a bench beneath one of the tall windows that marched down the length of the throne room. The bench was carved of stone, and was cold and uncomfortable, but it was better than standing among the sweating, shaking nobles. Amilton had dismissed him and Sevano as unimportant when he discovered they were lowly merchants. Yet they were not permitted to leave.

The old woman, Devon Wainwright, stood among the nobles. Stevic remembered her back to the time he had visited Queen Isen to petition for recognition of his clan. Devon had been advisor even then, and as stern as a Weapon, but fair and careful in her judgments. She had aged a great deal in the time intervening, but her mind still seemed sharp. She talked quietly with a rather beautiful, statuesque woman with golden hair hanging long and loose to her waist. She wore black, a stark, mournful contrast to her features, as if a grieving widow. Soon Amilton would question their loyalties. Stevic hoped both would acquiesce without a fuss.

His seat was shrouded in shadow, and partially obscured by a thick pillar. If he remembered correctly from his previous visit, Weapons had stood guard in these alcoves. They were dark, he supposed, on purpose. He wondered what had become of King Zachary’s Weapons. He wondered what had become of the king himself.

Likely the king and all his Weapons are dead.

Fleeting thoughts, like what Amilton’s reign would do to commerce and relations with other countries streamed through his mind. But most of all, he wondered and worried about Karigan. He had been so close to finding her. The Rider Connly had told him some strange story of how Karigan came to Sacor City bearing a message for the king. Stevic was not clear on what Karigan was doing with a Green Rider message in the first place. Connly was vague on the details, for he had only just heard the story himself, but he seemed to think Karigan had survived many frightening adventures.

“Sevano,” Stevic said, “do you believe those stories that Rider told us about Karigan?”

The old man grunted. “I believe he thought them true. And why not?”

Stevic shrugged. “My own daughter . . . a schoolgirl . . . facing brigands on the road?”

“A resourceful schoolgirl. We taught her to be so.”

Stevic rubbed his upper lip thoughtfully. Connly had directed them to the castle where they sought out Captain Mapstone, but there was not a single Green Rider to be found. As they walked the castle grounds, they were nearly run down by the cavalry. They waited some time at Rider barracks for someone to appear, but no one did.

Then they resolved to speak with the king himself, but when they stepped outside, soldiers in silver and black were running wildly in all directions. Arrows whined over the castle wall and everyone was shouting. When an arrow took out a soldier right in their path, they retreated to the barracks to await the outcome. It was not long before soldiers wearing Mirwellian scarlet found them. They were mistaken for a noble and his guard and were taken to the throne room to be dealt with by Prince Amilton, and there they had been ever since.

Still one question remained unanswered: Where was Karigan? Had she made it off the castle grounds before the fighting broke out?

Stevic stretched his long legs before him and leaned back against the stone wall. Castellan Crowe’s voice lilted as he made the pronouncement: “And L’Petrie Province joins His Majesty’s grand purpose. . . .”

“There goes commerce,” Sevano muttered.

“Our dear lord-governor is not the one to go against the current,” Stevic said.

He allowed the shadows to hang about him. Amilton and Crowe were but distant things in a glittering light that did not include him. He gave up being surprised by Amilton’s use of magic and by the treachery of Zachary’s castellan, one of his most important advisors. He tried to ignore the scene of two guards in scarlet dragging away another body.

In the darkness, he imagined he saw a figure in green weaving in and out among the columns of the opposite wall. She was wraithlike and thin and hard looking. He could not see her clearly—she seemed to fade in and out of the light.

She carried herself like one who is hunted and keenly aware of all that is about her. She was self-possessed and unafraid. She turned to him and looked directly at him. Her features were filmy and blurred, but he felt her eyes on him, haunted eyes that had seen too much. Eyes he recognized.