Chapter 8 #2
In the back of the castle keep lay narrower hallways with sleeping quarters for the staff, storage areas, and a small infirmary. Syla entered one of the rooms and bared her own teeth when she found not only Teyla, lying in a bed and holding a compress to the side of her head, but Cousin Relvin.
Speaking of the competition that Syla needed to thwart…
Relvin’s focus was on Teyla as he alternated frowning and pursing his lips at her. “I can’t believe you wandered off and let yourself be captured by stormers.”
“I didn’t let myself be captured.” Teyla lowered the compress and tucked her shoulder-length brown hair behind her ear, revealing a cut along her jaw to go with what had to be a contusion on her head.
Syla set her spectacles on a table beside her bed.
“Lieutenant Vanbarik said they must have toted you over their shoulders down into the tunnels and ordered you to apply your moon-mark to open the secret passage to the hidden shielder chamber.” Relvin raised his eyebrows toward Syla. Wanting verification?
Syla had no idea how the stormers had found and apprehended her cousin.
“Lieutenant Vanbarik wasn’t there,” Teyla snapped, lowering the compress with a pained grimace. She needed a healer, not a lecture. “I wasn’t even there for most of it. Not with awareness.”
Teyla shifted into a sitting position and grimaced again, though the second gesture might have been less due to physical discomfort and more the awareness that she’d been used against the Kingdom.
“Two men in black leathers leaped out at me in plain sight,” Teyla said.
“It was so unexpected. I did yell for help and try to fight them off, but they were so fast that I barely blurted a word before they dragged me into an alley, flattened me against a wall, and put a damp cloth against my face until whatever was in it caused me to lose consciousness. I didn’t expect— I mean, I wouldn’t have thought— The sky shield is back up, right?
I didn’t think there would be danger in the capital. ”
“Unfortunately,” Syla said, “the sky shield only keeps out aerial predators, not humans.”
Teyla slumped back against her pillow. “I know, but the military… I’d thought they’d reestablished order, especially in the core of the capital.
I was near Moon Watch Museum—I’d heard that it and the temple and everything else on that block had been destroyed and wanted to see if there’s any hope for rebuilding.
I always loved that museum. Do you remember when we used to play there as children? ”
Syla, a couple of years older than Teyla, said, “I remember that I was training to become a healer, and you sneaked into the temple to steal antiques from the collection I’d recently started, thanks to a few foundational gift pieces from Uncle Savarik.
As I recall, you claimed that such wondrous items should be on display in a museum instead of tucked away in my room. ”
“I wasn’t wrong. Curator Landol praised me for being a conscientious contributor to the museum at such a young age.”
“You stole my tonsil guillotine.”
“You had it stuffed in a drawer and barely knew it existed. I framed it and hung it in a room full of ancient torture implements.”
“It’s a medical instrument.”
“It looked like a torture device. My tonsils agreed.”
“Vocal, are they?”
“When need be. And delightfully still intact.” Teyla opened her mouth to show them off.
Relvin cleared his throat. “We’ve wandered away from the topic about how my sister, however inadvertently, allowed stormers to gain access to the shielder.”
“It could just as easily have happened to you.” Teyla’s frowning blue eyes said she wished it had happened to him.
Syla would have preferred it that way too, if only so Relvin would have no reason to look smug and superior as he made accusations about his sister instead of defending her. It wasn’t as if any of this had been Teyla’s fault.
“The stormers, especially the dragon riders,” Syla said, moving to sit beside her cousin to examine her injuries, “are talented fighters and probably didn’t have much trouble avoiding the enforcers patrolling the streets.”
“I’ve been talking to people and gathering information for a newspaper article,” Relvin said. “It sounds like you’ve spent time with stormers lately and have learned quite a bit about them, Syla. Especially that one who singled you out in the throne room and wanted to chat.”
“His people chose for him to chat with me.”
“Because you two have some kind of weird relationship.”
It wasn’t weird. It was wondrous.
“Please step outside, Relvin,” Syla said. “I appreciate you coming to the capital at my behest, but I want to heal Teyla and wait for the rest of our kin to arrive before we discuss our plans for the future.”
“Teyla is fine. It’s not like you get wounded by having a rag pressed to your mouth.”
“I hit my head trying to escape those men. Hard.” Teyla left the compress in her lap but probed gingerly at the side of her head.
“Let me take a look.” Syla made a shooing motion to Relvin. She had plenty of experience healing people with an audience, but she would prefer him to go away.
“Gladly,” Teyla said.
Lips pursed again, Relvin remained where he was. Syla looked toward Fel.
He stepped close, looming effectively, almost a foot taller than Relvin. “You will exit the room, Lord Relvin.”
“Now that most of my cousins are gone, I’m a potential heir to the throne,” he told Fel.
“Some might even believe me a better choice to rule than Syla. Thanks to my years of speaking with various wealthy and influential individuals for newspaper articles, I have more connections than she does. I certainly am more likely to get backing from the military.”
“You will exit the room or I will carry you,” Fel said.
Relvin’s eyes narrowed to slits. “If I do gain the power of the throne, my first action will be to fire you.”
“Promise?” Fel’s expression grew wistful.
The response puzzled Relvin, but Syla laughed.
Despite the fantasies of fishing and nude beach-walking that surely popped into Fel’s mind, he rested a heavy hand on Relvin’s shoulder, his intent clear.
Relvin lifted his chin, glared, and pushed the hand away, but he did walk out of the room. He slammed the door on the way out, as if leaving were his idea.
“He has the maturity of my cousin’s hounds,” Fel remarked.
“Goofy puppies, are they?” Syla asked.
“One runs, jumps, and barks its head off if a raven lands in a tree. It seems to think it can bark the birds into falling from the branches.”
“My cousin does bark a lot.”
“I’ve noticed.” Fel opened the door, stepped into the hall, and looked both ways, probably to make sure Relvin wasn’t spying with his ear pressed to the wood, then took up a position out there.
“Let my aunt in if she comes, please,” Syla asked as Fel reached to close the door.
“She also barks a lot.”
“Mostly at you because you destroyed her tractor.”
“It was trying to kill me at the time.” Fel closed the door.
“It was a magical tractor,” Syla explained at Teyla’s confused expression.
“Does that make it more or less alarming that it was trying to kill your bodyguard?”
“I’m not sure. Is the lump on your head your only major wound?” Syla waved to indicate the cut, but it wasn’t deep.
“I think it’s the only big one. I suppose I should be grateful, but I’m mostly chagrined that they knocked me out so easily. You may recall that I’ve had combat training.”
“I remember bandaging your arm after a fencing incident involving antique cutlasses in the museum.”
“I was just a kid then. I’m a lot better now. Usually, I cause the other person to need bandaging. But the stormers… Well, I think those were riders. Maybe bonded.” Teyla looked hopeful, like it would be embarrassing to have been outfought by lesser combatants.
“Two against one is difficult to deal with under any circumstances.” Syla lifted her fingers toward Teyla’s head but hesitated, remembering how she’d used her power to attack the stormer, to cut off his air and render him unconscious.
Her gods-gift had come so easily for that.
It would have let her kill the man; she was certain.
She’d never heard of anyone in her family with the ability to use his or her gift to kill.
Usually, the power lent itself most easily to assisting with one’s passions.
Like engineering, for Aunt Tibby, and deciphering puzzles and forgotten languages for Teyla, who adored history and archaeology.
Another cousin was a woodworker and made beautiful furniture.
An uncle was a shipwright and embedded magic in the vessels he crafted.
Syla had always used her gift for healing. How dreadful to think that defending herself against enemies—killing people—might have become her passion.
No, she hadn’t killed anyone yet, and she didn’t intend to. Though… she admitted that the scrolls might not have been stolen if she’d finished off the stormer. Would she come to regret that she hadn’t?
“It’s right here.” Teyla pointed a couple of inches above her ear. “Go ahead. I give you permission to heal me.”
“Thank you,” Syla said with a smile, though that wasn’t why she’d hesitated.
Reminded that her cousin was in pain, she pushed aside her self-doubts and rested her hand on the side of Teyla’s head.
Her healing magic came readily to her, the moon-mark on her hand warming almost cheerfully as she sent a trickle of her power into the contusion to repair blood vessels and lower the inflammation.
Teyla closed her eyes, slumping back with a sigh as Syla healed the damage, and the swelling went down.
“I practice my sword work with a couple of the guards an hour in the evenings several times a week,” Teyla said. “I’m not inept.”
Was that something Relvin had said? Probably.
“I’m certain you’re not,” Syla said.
“When that odious Lord Verrinmark came to court me and couldn’t accept that I wasn’t interested, I practiced on him.”
“Were bandages involved?”