There were men in the forest I had never seen. Dangerous brigands, robbers of the lowest sort, cutthroats and traitors… fitting company for the kingsmen who tossed my life aside. Betrayers deserved no better fate.
Regrettably, there were also men I knew… the prince’s personal guard. Each one of them aimed arrows at stormlords, each one of them aimed their missiles at me, eyes cold as the winter snows, full of murder and hate. Why? I am no target? No one important? So why would they waste the arrows? Aren’t I on their side?
Why target a kitchen maid in the middle of a skirmish?
One fact answered every questions: all witnesses had to die.
Two lords engaged in hand to hand combat as I felt an arrow hit my thigh. I watched one of them fall, an echo of my dream, right as the pain hit me.
Startled, I looked at the fletching, sticking out of my leg. The colors of the Gilded Seat decorated the feathers. The colors of the prince: purple and gold.
Both of the stormguards stood near me, still at their post. One of them reached for me, lifting my leg. A spear of pain shot up my arm and spine. Fire in my bones. With a quick gesture, the soldier tightened a leather belt on my upper thigh, slowing the blood.
I didn’t feel any pain other than that. I refused to.
Full of anger.
Full of storms.
Full of piss and vinegar at being lied to.
At being disregarded over and over.
At being thrown out of my home because a child was worth so little to my own father. His own daughter… we have no worth. Not to the monsters who walk among men.
And now? These false men, the prince’s guards, the ones who plotted in the dark and shadows… now they aimed for me. They wanted the axe I had brought. But they wanted no witnesses to their theft.
Bastards.
Chapter Seven
Pride and Proxy
Men died because the First Stormwarden trusted me.
Right in front of my eyes, they were being slaughtered because I lied. And I let it happen. Regret held back the wave of pain in my leg the same way I clung to that stupid, pathetic lie. Like a mule too obstinate to drink clean water, too stubborn for my own good.
The storm raged all around us. And men and women whom I had asked for help began to die in the confusion. I could not stand that.
Wind howled so loudly around us that no one could talk anymore. Magically summoned, the storm winds gathered, focused on the axe.
I had a choice. As clear as a calm sunny day.
As obvious as the depths of a crystal lake.
Abruptly, startling the two guards, I turned my horse and rode as hard as I could into the winds. The heart of the storm is in the eye. That’s what the Stormwarden had said. That was the key. I understood now.
Standing there, waiting for someone to rescue me was only going to get every brave Stormguard killed. And anyone else with any honor left to speak of...
Behind me, the two guards raced after the flying hooves of my horse. Lost in the storm, they were only blurry shapes in the heavy fog.
Into the gusting storm, I sped, as fast as my horse could go. The wound in my thigh surged with the twisting pain of a spider bite, growing stronger. I would not stop to fix that wrenching sensation, to adjust my wound. Pausing would be the end of me.
Even if I ran, the men who came for the axe, they would keep coming.
Everywhere around me, the sky crackled with lightning and thunder. The storm ripped across trees and fields, pulling up logs, and throwing fence posts around like straw.
Bursting around the corner of the muddy road, I was suddenly surrounded by calm air and a strange quiet. My horse had reached the eye of the storm. We stood at the center of the weather magic that the mighty weapon called. Slowing my frightened horse to a walk, we stopped in the middle of the field of calm. All around us the wreckage of the storm left evidence of its mighty destruction, but, here, where I stood, there was not one drop of rain, no winds, no lightning.
No fear.
Reaching over my shoulder and behind my neck, I ignored the screeching pain in my leg as I pulled the powerful artifact free of its holster on my back. My shoulders ached from the weight of the armor and the effort of extracting the dangerous axe.
I persisted. There was too much at stake.
Something had to cut through the lies of Prince Benjamin and Marcus. Something had to stop the slaughter of the rescue party. The honorable people of Stormrage did not deserve death because of lies.
The two guards rode into the eye of the storm, shielding their eyes from the slashing winds until they realized that there was no storm where we stood.
Calm as a spring morning, they rode to my side, bewildered. Finally, we could speak easily.
“The men,” I said, “the men who came at us in the forest, those robbers… I recognized some of them. That’s why I ran.”
Both of them nodded, searching the surrounding land, the road, the torn-up trees. Watching the muddy road between the search party, the raging storm, and the three of us, they waited for the attack that was surely coming.
They kneed their horses slightly ahead of my own, never looking my way. They heard what I said all the same.
“I can only speak the truth when I hold this axe. And I tell you now,” I held my own breath, wondering what the axe’s magic would let me say.
“I do not know who my husband is.” One of the guards chuckled, never taking his eyes off the road.
Resolutely, I continued, “I do not know his name.”
The other guard looked at me, with one eyebrow raised. “That’s not really possible is it?” he mumbled. “You would have had to exchange something. You would have had to say vows. You can’t just marry someone and not know their name.”
“Not much of a wedding if you ask me,” the other man laughed.
“Maybe you were drunk?” The coarser one asked, mocking me.
“You mean you don’t remember the bedding?” the other asked, incredulous.
I ignored them both.
There are more trolls in the world than could fit under bridges.
“These men,” I replied, “...the ones attacking the stormlords at the camp site? Those men, I knew some of them. They were part of my escort.” Yes, the magic let me say that. I could feel a tugging the closer I got to a lie. A flexing of power—that was the axe’s measurement of truth.
“Whoever they are, when our pursuers arrive in this meadow, they will not be our friends. I can only hope that my flight with this axe meant that the slaughter behind us has stopped. More than anything, more than honor or life, they want this weapon. Their pursuit will be upon us soon.”
Both men nodded. “Accurate assessment,” one said.
“In my saddlebags,” I gave directions even as a wave of exhaustion shivered through my body. “Please hand me the five small leather sacks. As I hold this axe, I cannot grab them.”
One of the men reached over and pulled out the odd ingredients I had asked of the stormlords before thes harrowing attack.
I am not a sorceress, I started to say.
But the axe’s magic tightened like a string on a lute. I couldn’t say those words. The shaft of the axe vibrated in my hand as I tried to form the thought. What option was left to me then? I am a sorceress? I asked myself. Magic pulsing through my hands, grounding me to the muddy horse, the earth the animal stood on, and the pillar of storm clouds swirling above us.
“I am a sorceress,” I announced to the two men and the empty meadow. Imagine my own surprise. Brilliant yellow light sparked from the axe blades—the magic agreed.
“And, ummm,” I tried on more words, seeing what the magic knew that I did not. “This spell is a simple obscuring. We’ll need it.”
Dumbfounded, the guard looked at me, at the little leather pouches, and around us at the vast, wild winds that towered up to the moon.