Green Rider (58 page)

From time to time Karigan rested, sinking to the ground in a darkened close or alley, struggling to catch her breath and relieve herself of the suffocating gray world she submerged herself into every time she used the power of the brooch to fade out. Now she squatted in the narrow close between a Chapel of the Moon and a market, among the stinking refuse that hadn't sold in the latter. Both buildings were dark and empty, and she felt safe enough that she could drop the invisibility for a few moments.

She mopped sweat from her brow with her sleeve. The headache was coming back and exhaustion made her body tremble. Would the day never end? Or had it become an eternal nightmare?

Black clouds drifted across the nearly halved moon, and she darted into the street again, fading out and avoiding the light pooling about the oil-burning street lamps.

As she trotted along, King Zachary's short hunting sword slapped her thigh, a constant reminder of him. He had protested her further involvement with his brother's takeover, but Captain Mapstone convinced him Karigan was the only one to complete this mission. When Karigari demonstrated the power of her brooch, he could not argue.

"I must go," Karigan had said. "If my father is there, he may be in danger."

King Zachary smiled. It was a smile saddened by too many things. "I hope he knows how fortunate he is to have a daughter like you."

"I am fortunate to have him as my father."

Zachary lifted his sword and baldric over his head and awkwardly, with one hand, placed it over her shoulder.

"You want me to take your sword?" Karigan asked incredulously.

"Alas, brave lady, it is but a hunting sword. Yet it will be better than nothing, for I see you are without your own."

He had put his hand on her shoulder, and she could see many things in his brown eyes. Things she did not wish to think about.

"Come back…" he began, and she thought he might have finished with "to me," but he turned hurriedly away without saying another word.

Karigan wrapped her hand around the hilt of the sword now. It was a fancy thing with an intricate guard and blade etched with a hunting scene. Hopefully she would not have to use it. A hunting sword it was, but she did not pursue sport.

Before she knew it, her tired feet brought her within the shadows of the castle gates. A curious sight greeted her there: the Anti-Monarchy Society, gathered together, as if making some sort of plan. She moved closer and heard the confident tones of Lorilie Dorran who stood in the middle of the group.

"We can't deny something big has happened," Lorilie said. "But even if Zachary is dead and his brother now rules, it shouldn't change our plans. After all, monarchy in all forms is tyranny, and this monarch seems more tyrannical than some."

Her supporters glanced toward the gates. The gates were wide open, but well guarded by soldiers in Mirwellian scarlet. Others stood watch in silhouette on the surrounding wall, archers among them. Torches illuminated corpses swaying from nooses on either side of the gates.

Karigan would have to move fast lest the torches break the spell of fading and arouse the Mirwellians to her presence. A pair of sentries marched back and forth beyond the gates, and she would have to time it just right.

The Anti-Monarchy Society broke its huddled grouping and defiantly faced the gates. As one voice, they chanted: "Monarchy is tyranny, no king is a good king. Monarchy is tyranny…"

The sentries beyond the gate passed one another, and Karigan sprinted across the draw bridge. She nearly ran into a hulking soldier who appeared out of nowhere in the gray mist of her vision. She veered just in time to miss him. She bolted over to the guardhouse and leaned against the cold, stone wall.

Boots swung above her head. Ropes creaked on timbers.

The sound knotted her stomach. The hanged hovered above her like stiff marionettes some puppeteer had abandoned, the flickering of torches distorting their bloodless, wooden features.

The guard Karigan had nearly run into had simply stepped out onto the drawbridge to get a better look at the Anti-Monarchy Society. Miraculously, he seemed unaware of her.

She felt her way around the guardhouse and watched the sentries pace back and forth beyond the gates once more.

Instead of running straight across the courtyard, she continued to edge along the guardhouse, hurrying past the open doorway where lamplight glowed, and under the portcullis. Once she was inside the gate, she adhered to the shadows of the inner castle wall. One of the sentries paused his rhythmic pacing. The other joined him.

"Something wrong?"

"No… Just… I thought I saw something by the guardhouse caught in the light."

His companion glanced in Karigan's general direction. "Nothing there. Torchlight can trick your eyes."

"I suppose, what with those corpses hanging about."

Karigan listened no further and sprinted across the courtyard. There was a breezeway here, that separated the outer courtyard from the ornamental gardens of the inner courtyard and connected two wings of the castle. A glance at the main entrance to the castle convinced her she would gain no entry there, for it was heavily guarded by Mirwellians.

She swung her legs over the low wall and into the breezeway. Surely some guards would patrol this way. No sooner had the thought entered her mind than guards appeared from either end of the breezeway bearing torches. They paced toward one another. Karigan dived over the low wall on the other side of the breezeway, and fell to the ground of the inner courtyard right into a clump of rose bushes.

She yelped involuntarily and bit her lower lip before more could spill out of her mouth. The sickeningly sweet fragrance of crushed roses thickened in the air about her.

A torch-bearing guard paused near her on the breezeway and waited for the other to join him.

"You hear something?" he asked.

"Nope," the other said affably. "Quiet as the dead. Only interesting place is the throne room."

The first guard snorted. "I would like to show some of those nobles a thing or two myself." He sniffed. "Phew. Just smell those roses."

The two moved off, conversing companionably, and Karigan breathed again. She plucked thorns out of her hands, arms, and legs, and stood up.

"I'm doing well," she muttered to herself with sarcasm as she unsnagged her coat from one of the bushes. "Vicious shrubs."

She trotted along the garden paths to where she remembered the ballroom was. Perhaps she could enter there, undetected. But when she reached the ballroom entrance, it was ablaze with light. Inside, soldiers in silver and black were jammed together under many watchful guards in scarlet.

She turned away, but the sound of a commotion just outside the doorway caught her attention. A guard pulled on the arm of a small, struggling prisoner.

"C'mon, li'l Greenie. Tagard wantsa li'l fun."

"Nooo!"

Mel
? Karigan cursed silently. As a member of the Green Foot, Mel would be treated just like any of the other soldiers, or even worse.

The guard slapped the writhing girl and knocked her to the ground. Mel cried out again in a terrible sob.

Karigan knew the feeling. The helplessness of being under the power of someone much bigger and stronger than she. She could almost smell the foul Garroty and feel his hard, callused hands on her.

Without another thought, King Zachary's sword was in her grasp. Although it might ruin everything, she could not simply let the soldier hurt her friend. She knew… she knew the fear.

She crept up silently behind them, and though the light from the ballroom touched her, she was barely perceptible. The soldier was too busy with his prey anyway and would not have noticed Karigan even if she were fully visible. He giggled like a boy.

Karigan plunged the sword into his back.

There was no sound, no outcry from the soldier. He simply collapsed on top of Mel. Her cries were muffled beneath him. Karigan hoisted the man away, and Mel curled up into a ball in a fit of sobbing.

"Mel," Karigan whispered. She reached down and touched the girl. Mel cried louder and kicked out. "Mel! It's me, Karigan."

Mel rubbed her eyes. "Karigan?" Her tone was one of disbelief. "Where… ?"

Karigan touched her brooch. The gray world fell away and she sighed with weariness. No sooner had she appeared than Mel sprang over to her and wrapped her arms around her. The girl wept into her coat, her whole body wracked hard by sobs like unrelieved grief.

"Quietly now," Karigan said in a soothing whisper. She stroked Mel's hair and rubbed her back, keeping watch on the ballroom door, fearing they would be discovered at any moment.

"It w-was so't-terrible." Mel's whole body shuddered.

"You're fine now," Karigan said, still stroking. "You're fine."

Then Mel pushed away, sniffing, her face wet with tears. "It's… it's really you."

"Who did you think?" Karigan smiled down at her.

"I-I thought you went away, or were dead." Mel wrapped her arms around her again and a new freshet of tears began. "The captain's dead, isn't she, and King Zachary… ?"

"Absolutely not."

Mel stopped in mid-sob. "What?"

"They are both alive. We had some trouble, but we made it."

"Truly?"

Karigan nodded, and Mel wiped tears off her cheeks, a wide grin shining on her face. "Thank you, Karigan. You don't know how happy I am."

"I can guess," Karigan said. "We can't stay here. Those guards are going to miss this fellow soon." She pointed at the dead soldier. "Help me pull him into the bushes."

They each took an arm and dragged until he was concealed in the darkest shadows they could find beneath a clump of shrubbery.

"He didn't hurt you, did he?" Karigan asked.

Mel shook her head, then shivered a little. "He… he frightened me."

"I know," Karigan said. "Listen to me, you have got to get out of here. Is there somewhere you can hide?"

Mel thought for a moment. "Maybe at the stable."

"Good! You hide as well as you can, all right? There are some things I've got to take care of here, and it may be a while. Don't be scared, but don't come out of hiding. Do you understand?"

Mel nodded.

"Good." Karigan looked down at her friend, but her face blurred. She rocked on her feet, assailed by dizziness. She passed her hands over her eyes.

"You all right?" Mel asked. "You look… I don't know. Not good."

Karigan shrugged. "I'm fine. I've just been using my brooch an awful lot. Now you run. I've got some things to do."

Mel started away, but glanced over her shoulder at Karigan.

"Go," Karigan said, waving her off.

Mel disappeared across the courtyard and Karigan prayed she would reach safety unmolested. She sagged in the shadows herself, closing her eyes briefly and taking a breath. She just wanted a nice long sleep in a feather bed. But just as she thought she was at the end of her endurance, she pushed herself to continue.

She wandered the inner courtyard looking for an entrance into the castle. She did not use her brooch as long as no one was about to detect her. Every time she faded out, her headache intensified and the brooch sapped her energy.

She came to some great glass doors, an unusual contrast to the massive stone walls of the castle. In fact, there were many windows here that glimmered like black ice in the moonlight. Whatever the room beyond, it was dark, and no guards were nearby. She tried the latch, and it yielded easily to her touch. She took one last look behind her, and stepped inside.

She wished she had her moonstone now to reveal the room and aid her in navigating its vague expanse, but the moonstone was gone forever, just so much crushed crystal.

The room, she decided, was some sort of sun room or study. She could make out the shapes of bookshelves and the edges of heavy furniture. She wondered if this was a place King Zachary spent much time in.

She moved across the room with care, but still jammed her thigh on the edge of a table. She barely managed to suppress a cry of pain.

"I'll be black and blue from head to toe," she mumbled, rubbing her throbbing thigh.