The Vacant Throne: The Legend Of Kairu Vol 3 (12 page)

I looked at Bill, shocked to hear his
full name and title while Aaron bowed slightly. “My Lady. What
brings you out this way?” Aaron said.

“
We are on a mission
to Thurlborn Peak from Ghanlar,” Cathy answered professionally.
“Kairu has stated that you may be able to offer us some
aid.”

“
What type of aid?”
Aaron asked curiously.

“
Just a place to
sleep for the night,” I answered. “We aren’t going to make it to
Riverside before sun down.”

Aaron looked up into
the sky and nodded. “You have a couple hours of sunlight left, but
I can see your concern. Come on, let’s go find my
mother.”

He turned around and we followed him.
“Thanks for helping us,” I said.

“
No problem...Kairu
was it?” He looked back and smirked and I nodded. “Plus it isn’t
everyday a Lord or Lady of Balendar drops by to visit. With
everything that happened at Thurlborn Peak we need to look out for
each other.”

“
That is very
commendable of you, Mr. Reed,” Cathy said. “I will be sure to pay
back your family for any goods you can share.”

“
That won’t be
necessary,” Aaron replied. “Just make sure the other Lords stop
their bickering and put a king or queen on the throne before
Balendar falls apart.”

“
That is the plan,”
Cathy responded.

Aaron led us through the front door
into his house. The warm familiarity was refreshing as we crossed
the threshold. The twins, Clare and Bethany, looked up from the
living room and smiled at the sight of me.

It was hard to believe it had only been
a couple of cycles. The twins had grown a lot but had still managed
to look completely identical; something they took pride in so they
could trick anyone that asked.

“
Andy!” They both
squealed as they ran up to greet me.

“
Well if it isn’t
Trouble #1 and Trouble #2,” I smiled.

“
Who’s number 1 and
who’s number 2?” Clare (I thought) asked.

“
I’ll leave you two
to figure that out,” I replied.

The girls looked at each other as Mary
walked in to greet us. She was still aging gracefully despite the
twins’ best efforts at stressing her out. Her frizzy hair was
starting to grey and was in its trademark mess. She smiled sweetly
at her guests.

“
I thought I heard
visitors,” she said.

“
It is a pleasure to
meet you,” Cathy said. “I’m Lady Sandra Middleton of Davalin. Thank
you for welcoming us into your lovely home.”

“
The pleasure is
mine,” Mary replied, flustered from the compliment.

“
Does Lady Middleton
seem odd to you...Andy?” Bill whispered to me.

I smirked. “Like you said when we first
met, she’s nice when she wants something.”

“
True, but she just
seems more...genuinely pleasant,” Bill continued. “More than you
would think from someone who has gone through what she has gone
through.”

I nodded slowly and
tried to think up something quickly. “We should keep an eye on her.
She could just be over-compensating for depression. When we get the
chance, I’ll talk with her.”

“
Same here,” Bill
said. “A lot rides on her. We can’t have her battling with inner
demons.”

I forced myself not to smirk at his
reference. “Agreed.”

“
Of course, we’ll
help you,” Mary said to Cathy. “We’ll do what we can.”

I snapped back to the conversation. “I
greatly appreciate this, Mrs. Reed.”

“
I told you to please
call me Mary,” she said to me.

I smiled. “I know.”

She turned back to Cathy and Bill.
“Allow me to show you the house.”

“
I would love to see
it,” Cathy answered politely.

“
I trust you still
remember where everything is, Andy?” Mary asked me.

“
He has a fancy new
name now,” Aaron stated with a smirk. “He’s ‘Kairu’
now.”

“
That’s a stupid
name,” Clare (I thought) said.

“
Bethany!” her mother
exclaimed.

Bethany’s eyes went wide at being
scolded and I quickly looked for something that was different about
her from Clare. I found a dirt stain on her sleeve and grinned at
her.

“
Got you now,
Bethany,” I said quietly. “I won the game.”

She made a face at me. “That doesn’t
count. Mom helped you.”

“
Way to go,” Clare
said, nudging her.

“
I’ve got to head
back out,” Aaron said to me as Cathy and Bill followed Mary to the
next room. “You should come with. I should tell Dad you are here
anyhow.”

“
Yeah, let’s go,” I
said. “Maybe we can find Natalie while we’re at it.”

“
Yeah, about that...”
he started sadly.

*****

It’s peaceful working on the farm. The
whole world could pass you by and you wouldn’t even realise it.
Helping Aaron out for the rest of the day reminded me of how
painful it was to leave in the first place. I had decided that
after this adventure was over, I would set up a small farm somehow
and disappear from the world.

How I was going to tell Cathy about
this was a different story. She never liked our time on the farm
and was happy to leave it behind. She had stayed in the house with
Mary, the girls and Bill. I just hoped she wasn’t corrupting the
little girls. Or worse, they were corrupting her.

Aaron and I used this
time to catch up. They were shocked when I had left them in the
middle of the night, but understood fully. Shortly after that,
unfortunately, Natalie and he broke up. Natalie had grown sick of
the farming life and wanted to go adventuring. Aaron, being a
family first person, couldn’t bear to leave his family behind
again. The break up was mutual but for the best, as he put
it.

I was unsure of how
much to tell him, but once I started, I couldn’t stop. I started
with my nomadic days to being found in the forest to my current
mission. He shook his head and laughed at my ability to find
trouble, but looked like he wanted to join. When I asked him to
come along he just shook his head and explained that if the war was
heading to Balendar, he would be needed to make sure his family was
safe. I nodded in understanding and didn’t press the
subject.

The rest of the day
and night passed quickly The Reed family treated us to a nice
dinner in an attempt to impress Lady Middleton. Cathy didn’t mind
the treatment and answered any questions the twins had. Her
demeanour was a lot more depressed than before and I suspected Bill
had had a few words with her.

When the morning sun rose on the
horizon, it was time to leave. I thanked Mary and said a proper
goodbye to everyone before walking down the familiar trail to
Riverside. Cathy put Bill in charge of scouting so she could hang
back with me and we could discuss a few things.

“
It was good to see
them again,” she stated.

I smirked. “I didn’t think they could
win you over. You were happy to be away from there.”

“
It’s not where the
action is,” Cathy started, “but it has its merits.”

“
What does?” I
asked.

“
The farm, the
family,” she answered.

“
That’s very Human of
you,” I teased.

She chuckled. “Well that’s what I am
now. I have to get used to it. Besides, isn’t this how depressed
humans act? By longing for something better?”

“
A farm and family
are better?” I asked sceptically.

“
Sounded like the
right thing to say,” she smirked.

“
So Bill had the talk
with you,” I said.

“
Yes,” she smirked.
“According to him, you said I was repressing my depression. You
made him all worried about me.”

“
He didn’t need any
help for that,” I chuckled. “You simply being polite freaked him
out. From what Vincent told me, Lady Middleton was quite pleasant
to be with. Why would Bill be worried about this pleasant attitude
now?”

“
He never knew her,”
Cathy answered. “All he has seen has been the past few days. He
thinks I am still in shock from the loss of everyone.”

“
I suppose that would
be right in normal circumstances,” I said.

“
Unfortunately,” she
responded. “We need to get rid of him. He will only become an
anchor of how I am supposed to act when we should be dealing with
the future.”

I nodded slowly. “Then it might be best
to send him back to Davalin at Riverside.”

“
That’s what I was
thinking too,” Cathy said thoughtfully.

“
How are you going to
break it to him so it doesn’t sound like we are dismissing him?” I
asked, watching Bill walk ahead of us.

She smiled. “Well someone has to send
the message to Davalin to prepare for war. I will of course, be too
busy so it will fall upon Bill to do this important task.”

I turned to her and
smirked. “You are better at this than I would have
thought.”

“
I have years of
experience under my belt,” Cathy replied.

“
That sounds dirty,”
I joked, keeping a straight face.

She laughed. “It would to you.”

We marched on through the morning until
Riverside rose before us. The settlement was far from the largest
in Balendar, but it served a very significant purpose to the lands
around it. With the river running through the middle, it was the
closest trading post for all the farming communities along the
border. It also meant that all the food that went to Thurlborn Peak
went through Riverside. This made the Lord a very powerful man and
someone we needed to get onside quickly.

As expected, the Lord
was out of town so we had no reason not to get to the ferry
quickly. Cathy took a moment, while I got our tickets, to send Bill
back to Davalin with his mission. Bill seemed reluctant but agreed
to go. The job was too important to turn down.

Cathy strolled over to the docks and I
handed her a ticket. “He’ll head out in the morning. Should take a
day to get back up there if he tags along with a caravan,” she
said. “I gave him some of Lady Middleton’s gold to help him
out.”

“
Good,” I nodded.
“It’s a shame to see him go.”

“
He seemed to think I
was going to murder you if he wasn’t there,” Cathy
smiled.

I laughed. “I don’t think we have to
worry about that.”

“
Nope,” she replied
sweetly. “But buy another hat from a merchant on the ferry and I
will kill you in your sleep.”

I chuckled. “I learnt my lesson, don’t
worry.”

“
Good,” she said,
still smiling sweetly.

She headed for the ferry and I looked
over to Bill to wave a small goodbye. He smiled and nodded before
heading away from the docks. I turned around and followed
Cathy.

Chapter
11

The ferry ride down to Thurlborn Peak
was slow and boring. The ferry was nearly empty except for a small
group of soldiers and carried with it an air of desperation and
suffering. Countless refugees fleeing the capital had passed
through here on their way to a more peaceful land in the north. To
many, the city was already lost.

We emerged from the
ferry to view Desroche’s parting gift to Balendar. As the Lords’
armies marched on the White Castle, Desroche’s brainwashed army set
fire to food stores and houses hoping to slow Balendar’s
reconstruction and leave them vulnerable when he came back with a
new army. It worked perfectly. If he marched now, the capital would
collapse and the rest of the cities would fall one by
one.

We thanked the group of soldiers for
their information and they set off to assist the ongoing
evacuation. Our goal was at the other end of the market, where the
grand Stairway of Kings lay untouched by the battle. Without delay,
we hurried for it.

The once bustling market had been
reduced to a couple of stalls protected by the city guard that
handed out what was left of the food to the homeless. The crowds
parted as they recognised Cathy as Lady Middleton. A couple of
soldiers had taken interest and helped clear the way so she could
get to the stairs more quickly. Cathy thanked them as we
climbed.

“
Do you remember the
story I told you when we climbed these stairs for the first time?”
Cathy asked.

“
Sort of,” I
answered. “You were uniting kids to form a street gang.”

“
Yeah,” she said.
“Every time I come back here, I am reminded of it. This time, I
believe I have come full circle.”

“
What do you mean?” I
asked.

“
I had taken control
of someone with power and united the weak against a much stronger
foe,” Cathy explained. “Now here I am, inside a person of power,
hoping to reunite the weak against a much stronger foe.” She
stopped and turned back to the market. “Look at them.” I stopped
beside her and faced the market. “They have no idea what is coming
their way. How are they going to hold against the
Evenawks?”

I smirked. “First time dealing with
doubt?”

“
Is that what this
feeling is?” she asked.

“
Yes,” I said facing
her. “When we were balancing each other’s emotions we could
overlook the importance of our tasks. This is definitely going to
be a tough task, but I wouldn’t say impossible. We take it one task
at a time and worry about the big stuff later.”