To Stand Beside Her (27 page)

Once outside the room, Leila walked back to Anatolio.
“What did Nalick mean that I am already queen?”

Anatolio nodded his head
and replied
,
“
O
h, so you finally found out?”
Leila stared at him waiting for him to explain.
Anatolio tried to usher her back to her room but she stood with her hands on her hips waiting.

“Nalick was worried when you said yes to marry him that
in the time before the wedding
other countries might try to claim you.
Lior has many peace treaties that are very unstable and rest on the exchange of noble family members.
Nalick thought that if you were given the title of princess other countries might rightfully ask for your hand in marriage.
So he asked the priest
s
to make you the queen.”

“
B
ut how did everyone in the room not know that until now?”
Leila asked.

“See, when a royal son comes of age, about age twelve to fourteen, they get a marking on their hand; the same marking as the one you have. The same goes when the bride is chosen for a royal son. The difference is when one becomes king or queen, the lines are extended. When you are just a prince or princess the lines end at the wrist. Because your lines continue up your arm, you are not a princess but a queen.” Anatolio looked to see if she understood. He laughed to see her shocked expression. Since he met her, nothing seemed to shock her. Leila was the most experienced courier he had ever met, and yet she was only a few years older than him. Leila quickly pushed his right shoulder and tipped him off balance. Anatolio had not noticed he was leaning only on the edge on the wall behind him. Leila then laughed with him. Anatolio stared at Leila with admiration. Though she did not understand the court customs, there was so much he hoped he could learn from her.

Chapter 1
6

By the time everything had been settled and the paperwork signed, Nalick had returned to find Leila already asleep for the night
.
Leila woke the next morning to Nalick sneaking out of the bed next to her.
H
e did not want to face the wrath of Mauve
,
but little did he know that Leila already had told Mauve that she had asked him to stay with her at night time.
As soon as
Nalick
noticed he woke her,
he
sat down next to her.

“Busy day
starting already
?”
Leila
asked while yawning.
Nalick bent down and kissed her forehead.

“It has not slowed down since we returned, why should today be any different?
A kings job is never done
,
” Nalick replied.
“
I need to oversee
advancement day for the military
,
and I need to pick two more personal guards for you when you leave the palace walls.
Seems there is a high price on your head in many countries
,
and they now know where to find you.
”

Leila
replied
, “
Y
ou know that is just being a bit excessive.
I really can handle myself.”
Nalick knew she could.
From all the reports he had read about her, she was probably better than most of the men in his army
;
since she was a woman, most men would not take her seriously before it was too late.
Anatolio told Nalick how she handled the two young men the day before without even breaking a sweat.

“What will you be up to today?”
Nalick
asked.

Leila thought for a moment, “I don’t know
, s
in
ce we finally got rid of Endika
.”

“Would you like to come with me?” he
quickly
asked.

Leila shrugged. “Sure,” she replied
.
Beats sitting around here
, she thought.
Nalick was nervous but happy to be spending more time with her.

Nalick escor
ted Leila to the training court
yard.
It was already filled with men of various ages.
Leila watched as a line of men were getting numbers painted on their shoulders.
Leila and Nalick
stood together on a balcony that looped aroun
d three sides of the court
yard
giving them a view of
the
whole court
yard.

“I will choose the top eight to
spare with
me tomorrow so that I can truly gauge how good they are,” Nalick explained as Leila eyed him over.
A normal king would never put himself in such danger of getting hurt.
“Once I get everything going, I will come back up here with you to watch
.”

Leila
waved
across the way on the balcony
to
Anatolio
who
stood in the shadows.
Catching her
wave,
Anatolio
bowed his head to her.
Leila sat on the edge of the balcony with her legs dangling over the side.
She was happy to be outside and away from her room.
T
he group of men broke up into smaller groups
as they
started to put on protective clothing.
She smiled down at Nalick as he made his way through the crowd back to the staircase.
Leila
remembered
one of these events
from a previous courier
assignment
.

Leila
rested her chin on her arms that were sitting crossed on the railing.
Quickly
,
she scanned each group and had determined the winners of each match up.
To her left was a group of men with red numbers.
One looked very familiar
.
W
hen
Leila
gazed back across the way
she could tell
Anatolio was also carefully watching the same man fight.
Once everyone had fought once,
Leila
turned to Nalick
who was studying her as much as
he was
the soldiers below
.

“Red fourteen, red twenty
-
six, and blue sixty
-
two
are the best
,”
Leila
said.
“Though I doubt blue sixty
-
two will make it to lunch today.”
Nalick scanned the crowds below and found the man she was talking about.
He watched as he was easily beat time and time again.
As
Nalick
looked for the other numbers, he recognized the faces.
They were already officers in the army, but they had entered anyways because Nalick was looking for more personal guards.
Everyone in high
-
ranking positions
was
looking for a way to gain closer access to him in hopes of becoming an aid to the king.

“Why blue sixty
-
two?” Nalick asked.

“
H
e is thinking too much.
When he finally figures out how to just react rather than think, he will be better than most of the people that are down below,” Leila explained.
Her analysis was exactly correct.

“So what about you,”
Nalick
said
;
she turned to him
,
giving
him a questioning look.
“Where would you fit down there?”
Nalick was curious about all the combat reports on the ghost courier.
Leila smiled coyly.

Nalick gazed down at all the men still fighting.
“Which could you beat?”

“The list would be much shorter if I could name the ones that I might not be able to beat,”
Leila
responded while turning to gauge each man again.
Nalick grinned.
He figured that much but wanted to see how modest she would be.
Leila caught his smile and asked, “
S
o when you do this, you personally fight each of the top men
?
Have you ever been beaten?” She tried to turn the tables on him.

“Once or twice,” he responded nonchalantly.

“Tomorrow should be interesting then,” she replied. Watching the men below, her gaze stopped on number fourteen, the man who looked like Anatolio. His style was quite similar to Erich’s and Leila doubted she would be able to beat him, but the rest were less impressive.

Somewhere in the crowd below a whistle was blown to indicate it was lunchtime. Reluctantly, the soldiers quit fighting. Leila joined Nalick back in their room.

“What about the guy that I saw that looks like Anatolio?” Leila asked.

“That is his oldest half-brother, Nikias. He actually commands quite a large portion of the army already. I have a feeling he is here because he wants to additionally have the post of watching over you. I am sure that is why Pallas, another half-brother is here also,” Nalick explained.

“Nikias is very good,” Leila said. “Anatolio acts like he has no family. He always seems to be following me, day or night.”

“He has just his mother who refuses to leave her job as a maid to one of the cities nobles. So I gave him an apartment in the palace when I asked Anatolio to come work for me. His father’s family, including his half-brothers, does not acknowledge him at all as being part of their family. Basically he is an illegitimate child and will not inherit any title or money from his father. That will all go to his half-brothers,” Nalick explained.

After they were finished eating
,
Nalick asked, “So I was wondering,” he paused
and
stopped
talking trying to formulate his thought
s
.
Leila watched him search for words.
She
knew
what he wanted to ask
but was finding it fun to watch him unable to talk.

“I didn’t think you ever got tongue tied,”
Leila
said to him
leaning in to distract him with a kiss. Pulling away she caught a slight blush in Nalick’s cheeks
.
“So you want to know if the rumor
s about me are true?
No
,
I can’t sail a ship on my own, nor can I fly like a bird.
Also I can’t disappear into thin air.”
Leila watched him smile as she named off myths she had heard about herself over the years.
“Can I really fight?”
Nalick nodded his head.
A
s he had watched her over the days, he began to doubt how true it was.
She had such a kind heart
that
he could not
imagine
her actually hurt
ing
another person.

“It’s just that,” he paused again.

“I don’t need to actually harm someone to win.
Erich did not take
no
for an answer.
He wanted me to be able to protect myself, and in the last few years it has really come in handy.
Trust me, I don’t periodically get sewn up by Roger because I think it is fun to get stitches in me,” she chuckled.
A knock at the door interrupted them
to go to the next round of trials for the guard posts
.

Nalick walked with Leila to a different wing of the palace.
Inste
ad of the wide-open court
yard, they went to a room that had a stage down in the front of it.
The seats that th
ey passed were on an angle slop
ed down towards the stage so that everyone seated would have a good view of the event.
On the stage to the right were empty seats at a table.
Nalick led the way past all the seated men and took Leila to the front of the room.