I've already posted an early draft of this story here before, and got some nice comments. I kind of wanted to show it in a better state. This is the second draft of the first chapter of this story. If there is interest, I will post more of what I have. The entire story is undergoing revision from the ground up. Comments, negative and positive are both welcome.
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She hadn't slept in two days. She had hardly eaten in three. The oaths that bound her were dragging her to the north through murky forest. She avoided the road wading through green ponds, and running through thorny underbrush. She ran because her mind was on fire, and she was half mad from the oaths she'd sworn. Oaths she'd sworn before she was even born.
Everything was a mess. Not the least of the disasters was her clothing. Linen hardly protected her from thorns and thistles. Linen could hardly even protect itself, and it was fraying off of her at its seams. Her 'modesty' as the humans often so delicately put it was still well protected. It was covered by no illusions though. For all intents and purposes she felt naked while running through the woods. Her real hair was exposed in all its lackluster brown, and split ends. Her bright red eyes were showing instead of a more friendly pale blue or green. Her age showed worst of all in an altogether too young display. She hated how the humans would always think she was twenty. She wanted them to perceive her true age, and that was almost impossible without her illusions. The worst was that her signs were showing quite clearly. Her chains hung down from her wrists and ankles, and they glowed faint blue clearly even in the leaves she was dragging them into. The spider tattoos that laced her arms were racing back and forth in spiral patterns where she could usually hold them still. Being a magic-stripped mage running through the woods was her smallest mess though.
Behind her she left an even bigger pile of garbage. Two days before she'd been three layers deep in illusions. Her skin was an old woman, and a mushroom picker. She'd been sitting in the gardens of an older knight's manor in Spirit's Crossway. In the gardens there was a bees nest, and that was what had attracted her attention that morning. She needed to go get mushrooms from the woods, but she was hungry. She found a couple of bees in the flowers without any difficulty. She cupped her hands over one of the bees, and around the yellow creature bloomed the most delicious looking blossoms she could picture. The bee entered the illusion instantly, and suddenly found itself trapped. Magic circled its stinger, and squeezed until it popped out. Pain fed the illusion, and the blooms turned greenish-white with bee's blood. She plucked the bee out of her illusion, and crushed it between her teeth. She was going to repeat the process until she was full, but then the spiders on her arms began to flail. Her oaths were called. All of the work she'd done to gain the trust of the knight she'd been staffing for was useless.
Ahead of her was the largest mess. She had a good idea of who was calling her. There were only two from House Lancea who remained. Only their blood could call to her, and they were wading in a pool of vengeance. It was only natural that they would call to her, but the words their father had given her still rung clearly in her head. "Our family will not call your oaths until we've avenged your family." Their father had died that same day, but she knew the two had heard. The two were Lord Florent and Lady Marguerite. Florent was the titular Baron of Lancea, and would be Baron in full if he wasn't in hiding with his sister. Florent and Margy would be in hiding until they found a way to kill the man who put the bounty on their heads. Last she'd heard they were getting very close to that.
The bugs knew to avoid her in the woods because she couldn't shield herself. The other animals knew they only had to stay just out of her reach. It was an oddity in naked magic that voided all fear except what should be feared. If they'd sensed her under a web of lies they'd have run from her for miles. When they saw the truth as plain as day they knew what was happening. She was bound to keep going until she either reached her destination, or exhausted her own magics in the process. She wondered how many of the animals she'd passed were subjected to a lesser form of the same magic. Binds, pacts and oaths were the oldest form of magic, and not uncommon anywhere. The lesser beasts had no immunity to a forceful presence. Her bonds had been completely voluntary though, and every breathe held another whisper from her new master calling her to her destination.
The day turned into night, but she could still see better than the ones who would stay out of the woods in the dark. Sleep was impossible when stopping meant fueling the fire in her mind. Even slowing would overwhelm her. Night in the woods reminded her of the training her mother had given her. They'd walked a short distance into the woods, and they were both wearing illusions three layers deep. They went in at night, and set their trap. In the morning they ate raw wolf in the early mists, but it was that night that she'd learned how to use magic. All of the learning, and all of the listening finally made sense after that. She brushed the thought out of her mind, and focused on her surroundings. She walked past a sleeping bear that stirred as it heard her footsteps. It didn't move, but it was agitated. She smiled to it, and soon enough she was past.
Night turned into day, and the chains felt like ice against her skin. They weren't bound to each other like a prisoner's chains. They weren't bound to a side world like a magician's chains. They were her human shape when she was otherwise stripped of all of her magic. They were even more than that, but she couldn't think on it with the flames in her skull. It wouldn't snow for another few months, but summer was dissolving slowly. She repeated her name in the morning mists so she wouldn't forget herself. "Hera. Caula. Quilla." She had even more names, but those three were the ones her mother gave her. Together they gave her the formal name Heracaulquilla which proved remarkably useful in the brief time she was at the court of Lancea.
The sun was going down as she entered Old Lancea. The weights began to lift as she was in the city of her master. Even still she felt numb to the world. The people passing in the streets saw a wild woman coming out of the woods. They saw a being of magic and went on their merry way. They stopped and stared for a minute. They had her image burned into their mind unknowingly. Naked magic was always truth, and her truth struck a deep chord with the ones moving along. For the most aware she was glass of water to refresh their lives. For the least aware she was hardly a sight at all, and her image was quickly buried in the sands of their lives. She knew if she stuck to the main streets she'd be buried just as deeply, and soon. She ducked into the alleys, and avoided as many people as possible.
The setting sun made the city's wooden buildings look orange. Most were actually painted white or blue. The port city's crossed supports that kept the wind from tearing the city apart were as evident as ever. Buildings were linked together a few feet above her head by plain wooden boards. Guild signs were carved into wood, and clearly marked the influence of the middle class. Shoots of steamy air came out of the drainage holes, and smelled of sulfur. Her steps began moving as her master willed, and she was lead deeper into the city.
She came to a broken door in a back alley. It was the kind of place she'd seen too often in the decade she'd been away from Old Lancea. There were times she could comfort herself in the knowledge that she was the thing to be scared of in the back alley. It was a lie sometimes. The lie reminded her of the disaster she'd just left behind. Sir du'Rastera had met her in the back alley when she was the old woman, and he'd asked her for the mushrooms she'd sold to make the gutters happier. She'd made him, and his party guests much happier than they would've been otherwise. For this she became one of his staff. For this she was so much closer to her revenge than she'd been before. It made her shake with rage that she was being forced to crawl back to a master she'd never met when she was so close. She opened the door.
"You've come," a woman said. The woman was laid out on a cot in a messy room. Hera's eyes took everything about her new master in. She wore a blindfold which also bound her shoulder-length white hair. She wasn't much older than twenty by the looks of her skin. She wore a long jacket over an ankle-length dress. The dress couldn't disguise the fact that she was missing her right leg. Hera couldn't tell if it was from above or below the knee. She was missing all of the fingers on her left hand, and two on her right. Caula thought the woman wouldn't be wearing the blindfold if she still had her eyes. Hera knew at once why she'd been dragged kicking and screaming from her life.
It was difficult to speak. There were words she knew she could say freely, but getting anything else to pass her lips would be like pulling a tooth. "If I bring your vengeance swiftly enough will you release me from my bonds? House Lancea means very little to me after what was done to me. I'm sure you understand, Margy?" The force that kept Hera presenting herself correctly kept her from moving around very much. She very much wanted to be moving.
The woman looked right at her despite not being able to see her. "Hera, I assure you, my vengeance will not come swiftly." She gestured to herself, and to the missing parts of her body. "Look at me. I've outlived all of my family--"
"And half your body too," she interrupted. Hera managed to take control of her lips, and she grinned as wide as she could. She wondered if she overdid it though. She wished the woman wasn't blind so she could ask.
Margy frowned, and Hera was sure she wasn't getting the full expression due to the blindfold. "I'm sure you'll miss your tongue when it's gone. I'm the last, Hera, and there are too many to count responsible for this."
Hera didn't reply at first. She looked around instead. The room was her entire home from the look of things. Clothes were hanging from a rope over a stove. There was a pot on the stove that filled the room with the scent of old porridge. Whoever was taking care of her had left an assortment of things on the floor. Margy wouldn't be stepping on anything, but it couldn't be good for a Baron's heiress to be living in garbage. Suddenly, the thought struck her. "You're the Baroness of Lancea now, aren't you? That's why you called me?"
"I am." She wasn't quite as fiery after she said it. She liked to be recognised as the only heir, but there was only one thing that could mean.
"Your mission with Florent didn't go right? It flopped like a drowning fish?" She wanted so desperately to break free, but she could only feel control returning in her fingers. She'd lost the battle for her own lips, and they were once again far too straight.
"Renaud's men found us out. My brother didn't survive what they did to him, and I lived only by chance." There was a fear in her voice buried deep underneath a layer of rage. A very human illusion. "You see their handiwork. I've only just recovered."
"You've 'only just recovered', and you're going to throw me into a furnace? Margy, I'm not a toy. If you bind me -- if you truly bind me -- I need to be your sword."
She smiled. "Savon is my sword. You'll be my whip. I want to drink in every precious moment of their pain. Every last drop, and not a single less." She reached her hand out for a pact. "We'll all be avenged together."
"Savon's filled your mind with fake promises, Margy." It was enough of a shock that Hera felt some control return. "I'm a poisoner, and not a torturer. I'm not going to take any pleasure from their pain because all I want is them to breathe as much as my family does right now; not at all!" Her legs were back, and she walked to the corner of the room with the hanging linens. "All I sense in you right now is Savon's magic, and that means that Florent never had a chance to develop your magic skills! A dog could bind me harder than you could. All you have is blood." She ripped down the clothes. The woman couldn't control her. She was free. "All you have is blood!"
The woman looked indignant. "I have magic, little spider girl. Savon taught me your bindings, and that is all."
"Savon's younger than me." Hera spun around in the room. She really wished the woman could see her giant display of disobedience. "He's a child, and I'm surprised he had magic to teach you at all!"
Suddenly, her legs locked, and Hera was balancing on a single foot. She couldn't move a muscle to steady herself. She tipped forward slowly, and then the ground rushed up quickly. She felt the stop painfully. When she could move again she got to her feet. Standing over her was the grown up version of a boy she had hardly tolerated. He looked older than her by about five years even though he was seven years her junior. His brown hair was bundled in a short ponytail, and he looked as lanky as ever. The only illusion he carried was a false authority in his grey eyes. There was a barely visible wisp of air between his chest and a ring on one of Margy's remaining fingers. He was being her source. "Where are your brothers, Savon?"
"Where is your sister, Hera?" he replied. She felt a pang of guilt, and bit her lip. Her sister would've savaged him for a remark like that.
"You two will not start this," Margy cut them off. "Savon, were you aware that Heracaulquilla is merely a poisoner? You gave me the impression she'd suit our needs well."
"Excellence, the difference between a poisoner and a torturer is small." He turned to Margy, and then back into Hera's eyes. "Wouldn't you agree?"
"Excuse me?" It was impossible to look as indignant as she wanted when she had no control of her face. The turd was making her smile politely as she said it. "I think there's a big difference." The smile kind of worked when she thought about it. "I kill them as quickly as possible. Poison is useless if they get a remedy in time."
"Isn't poison the biggest game of chance in assassinations?" He was amused by her inability to do anything.
"If you let go of me, I'll show you why you're wrong." At first her statement sounded right, but then she realised she needed to add something. "Oh, I'm not going to kill you, I just think it needs a demonstration." She turned to Margy who looked intrigued.
"Alright." Savon raised a hand, and the binds fell from her.
She flexed her fingers for a moment to test her control, and then bolted past the man in a single sprint. She turned on her heel, grabbed his opposite arm, and pulled herself up to his neck. He wasn't strong enough to keep her up, and they both fell to the ground. She laid on his back with her head over his shoulder. She waited there for a moment before speaking. "I'm immune to my own poison. If I'd got your throat there would be poison travelling into your mind already, and you'd be dead very soon. Is that a game of chance?"
"Get off of me!" He said it, but there was no true command. She wasn't bound to follow it at all, and so she laid there.
"Is this a game of chance, Savon? Am I useless to you as a weapon? Are you children stupid enough to think you can torture Duke Renaud's men from here to Uverrille without help from someone who can kill effectively?"
"Hera, stop!" Margy said. There was still no binding. Savon was Marguerite's source for the binding magic, and with his concentration gone she couldn't keep a hold of it.
"I'm not going to break your sword. It's just strange that his younger brother, and his older brother both accepted my place in Lancea. He forgot the lessons he learned twelve years ago, and now he's your right hand?"
"He's the only one I have left, Hera, get away from him!" This time Hera obeyed, and stood up nonchalantly. Savon got to his feet, and rubbed his shoulder. It had taken the brunt of her assault. "I've heard enough. I will have your oath to me, Heracaulquilla. Making sure Duke Renaud gets his due is more important to me than whether every lackey along the way pays the same. With Savon as my sword, I will have you as my shield. Just as my father would have had it."
"When my sister was killed protecting him he released me to seek my own justice. I'm going to keep doing that instead." She turned to leave the hovel.
"And then he was dead within the year," Savon said while moving to block her path. She tried moving around him, but the assault had drained the small reserve of energy she'd been keeping during the journey. She was starting to get very tired, and very fast.
"And then he was dead within the year. You think I didn't know that?" She enjoyed her full facial control. She could look as hurt as she actually was. "My family has been House Lancea's shield going back to the emancipation of the humans! Baron Gauthier was a second father to me! Florent was almost a cousin! All that you two will accomplish is slowing me down. I only have my father's magics, and they aren't nearly the shield you need."
"We don't want to slow you down, Hera," Marguerite said. "We want you to speed us up."
She tilted her head, and frowned, "What?" The statement didn't make sense at first. Hera knew that skulduggery was best done alone, and at first it seemed like a blatantly stupid idea. The she bit her lip, and started really thinking about it. The only way they could be beneficial is if they were going to use magic on a grander scale. Pooling their resources would allow them to strike out in an unexpected way. "I get it, never mind the question."
"Swear the oaths, Heracaulquilla," Savon asked. "We'll make the duke regret that he ever crossed us."
"I swore my oaths before you were even born, Savon. I don't need to say them again to anyone." She felt power start to crawl over her again as if to hold her in place. "I'm not rejecting the offer, I just refuse to give you a new oath when the old one will do!" The power receded.
"That is fair enough," Margy said.
Hera bowed to the both of them. "If you don't mind I have to gather some old friends. I haven't seen them since I left the city, and I'm sure they've missed me."
"You may find some of your old friends have died," Savon said. "Five years ago the duke's men began rounding up the old staff wherever they could, and had their throats slit in the alleys."
"That wouldn't do very much to these friends," Hera said without any intention of explaining it. "Would you like to come along?"
"No, I have to prepare Marguerite for bed," Savon said as he moved to pick up scattered clothes. "Just don't leave the city, or we'll compel you here again."
"I wouldn't dream of it." With that she was out of the apartment, and back into the alley. She was exhausted, and all the exertion of trying to keep up with the two inside had her physically shaking. She bit her lip again. She went back inside. "I can find them easy enough tomorrow, and now that I think about it I should get some sleep." She went over to the clothes Savon hadn't managed to pick up, and made herself a little nest out of them quickly. Before Savon could object she'd pulled a flowing dress over herself as a blanket. He objected, but she wouldn't move. It wasn't nearly enough to make up for the days of compelled travel, but it was a start.
[Chapter break]
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Topic: More Draft, Less Daft (Read 2796 times)