Page 96 of Once Upon a Castle
Something in the usurper’s voice sent a thrill of fear along the magician’s spine. He must not antagonize Lector. Not yet. “This small piece cannot work its magic over great distances, but close at hand it is deadly. I shall demonstrate to prove my point. Summon two of your servants, one or both of them expendable.”
Snapping his fingers, Lector summoned two of the guards from the far end of the chamber. Rill faced them, the crystal glowing in his hand. He turned to one, said a swift phrase, and the man’s eyes became unfocused, like those of a sleepwalker. The magician addressed the other soldier.
“Kill him!”
The second man paled. “Lord Magician, he is my brother!”
“How tragic for you. He is a traitor and is about to assassinate Lord Lector. You will kill him,now!”
The man struggled against the magician’s spell but was no match for it. He drew his sword with odd, jerky movements of a stick puppet, at the same time struggling to keep the blade sheathed. Sweat broke out on his brow, and it was apparent that he fought the magician’s order with every fiber in his body.
Then his vision altered. Instead of his brother’s face, he saw that of a stranger. A stranger with his sword poised to strike down Lord Lector. In a flash his weapon was out, and he struck the illusionary assassin through the heart. His brother fell lifeless at his feet.
Lector was astonished. “Effective, but rather cruel, given their relationship.”
The smile that distorted Rill’s features was most unpleasant. “I shall show mercy, then.” He turned to the soldier. “You have disgraced yourself. Fall upon your sword!”
Without the least hesitation, the second man did as he was ordered, spilling his life’s blood at the magician’s feet.
Lector had gone pale, but his color came flooding back. This was true black wizardry. With Rill’s aid, he would soon have everything he desired: the power of the Andun Crystal, a kingdom to rule…and the Princess Tressalara to warm his bed. He smiled at the memory of her beautiful face, her slender, womanly figure. Subduing her would give him enormous pleasure.
Until humiliating her no longer amused him. He touched his ruined cheek again. The wound had healed badly. Her death would not be an easy one. And that would give him even more pleasure.
He fixed the magician with a grim look. “My patience is at an end. We must draw Tressalara out of hiding.”
Rill hid his fear. “As I said, I have a new plan. You shall soon have the princess in your power, my lord.”
“Fah! How can you accomplish what my soldiers cannot?”
In answer, the magician drew him to the window. He opened the casement and pointed to the high tower where Elani and Lady Grette were held captive.
“I shall lay my trap…and set it with a bait that she cannot resist!”
6
Tressalara looked upbetween the trees along the riverbank as a white hawk circled overhead. “Rossmine!”
She whistled, and the bird plunged down like an arrow to land on a branch beside her. A thin message cylinder was tied to its left leg. Wondering, Tressalara removed it. The tiny scrap of paper bore a symbol like a crown, and three words in Elani’s writing: “Beware the trap!”
Relief that her friend had not suffered for helping her escape flooded through Tressalara. So Lector was planning a trap. But what, and when? And what was the meaning of the symbol? A trap for a princess, no doubt.
She must send word back that she was alive and well, and that she had received the message. Tressalara plucked a tiny translucent pebble from the riverbank and placed it in the cylinder. To anyone else it would be meaningless, but when Elani got the message she would understand. In their younger days, Lady Grette used to scold that the princess’s escapades were a constant annoyance to her. “By the heavens, highness, some days you are a sore trial to me. Like a pebble in my shoe!” she would grumble.
A sheen of tears came to Tressalara’s eyes. What she would not give to turn back time. She watched as Rossmine flew off, wishing that she herself had the power to fly away to the castle and reassure her friends.
Dashing the tears away, she returned to her tasks. There was no shirking on her part. She was willing to do anything, no matter how menial or difficult, to prove her discipline and devotion to the cause of freedom. She must prove to Cador and the rebels that she was capable of sharing their worst hardships—and worthy to lead them into battle.
Tressalara winced as she lifted the water bucket from the river. Years of riding and fencing had kept her strong and supple, but every muscle in her body groaned with fatigue. So much for the idyllic country life, she thought, grimacing again. It was still better than sitting quietly in the solar, trying to learn embroidery—but not by much.
By Saint Ethelred’s eyes, she would be glad when Cador returned to camp and her punishment ended. The women were working her to the bone! Dawn to dusk she was at their beck and call without a moment’s respite. Fetch this, chop that, clean this one, empty that one, fill yet another. By nightfall she would gulp down her portion of stew, stoke the campfires, and then drop wearily onto her bedroll at the foot of Cador’s camp bed and fall immediately asleep.
Only to toss and turn and dream of the highlander. At times they were nightmares, where his light eyes changed to dark, his golden hair to black as he suddenly turned into Lector. Those dreams left her shaken. Did they mean that he was as untrustworthy as the usurper—a greedy, ambitious man who wanted the throne for himself? Or was that only the product of her unspoken fears?
Once, though, she had dreamed that Cador remained himself, and that had been more frightening; for in that dream they had been standing on the riverbank in the moonlight, and he had looked deep into her eyes, caressing her cheek lightly with a lover’s touch, pulling her to him and pressing his hot mouth to hers. Tressalara had awakened with a pounding heart, both relieved and devastated to find his bed still empty.
She had used the opportunity of her punishment to pick up gossip and learn more of the enmity between Cador and Lector. Two years before, Lector had led a party of raiders across the border in Kildore. Cador’s elder brother and his pregnant wife had been killed, but not in the fighting. They had refused to reveal whatever information Lector had sought and were executed for it.
Tressalara, only fourteen at the time, had not known of the raid. Nor had her late father, who had been ill with a lung fever. But the king should have discovered Lector’s perfidy later, when he recovered his health. More proof, she thought sadly, of how her father had turned away from the duties of a ruler in his quest for spiritual answers.
