The Witch's Daughter (Lamb & Castle Book 1) (21 page)

“Make him angry. So he’d chase us and forget about the ‘ship.”

“I mean with the box. I didn’t know
what
you were trying to do back there.”

“Had to put up a proper fight, din’t I?” Harold panted, sounding cross. “He’s stronger than he looks.”

“And what did you do with the crown, if it’s not in the box?” Never mind the Commander,
Meg
would skin the two of them if they’d come all this way only to lose the crown.

“In your bag. What are we going to do about them golem things?”

Amelia shook her head. “I’ve been racking my brains for a spell that might help, but I just can’t think of one.” The strange gentlemen’s ability to recover instantly from their injuries made a fair fight impossible. One of them had regrown an entire arm in a matter of moments – how many times could they wipe their slate clean, coming back whole and perfect from dreadful mutilation? She should have asked Meg to tell her more about golems when she’d had the chance. Maybe the strange gentlemen could even resurrect themselves like that indefinitely. Immortal, impervious men of stone, with only one thought between the two of them: to kill the White Queen. Whatever she and Harold could throw at them would only slow them down, and not very much, at that. At least they didn’t still have the lightning gun. They must have left their weapons behind in the tower.

Harold stopped and looked up. They could still hear Stupid’s excitable whining, and smoke rose in columns all around, ever changing colour, from pink to green to blue. He’d been trapped in that cage for a good long time, just storing up trouble. Amelia wondered if she’d ever get him back in the cage again… She heard the Commander shout to his two golem companions – they must be close by somewhere too.

“Right, then,” said Harold, “If we climb up that slope there, they’ll see us for sure. Can you let ‘em get a good look and then disappear us again? Quick like? Just so’s they don’t go off the trail and go back to the ‘ship?”

Amelia took a deep breath, and nodded. “I think so.”

With Amelia’s invisibility spell, they led the dragon prince’s men on a hectic dance away from the
Storm Chaser
, threading through the cracks and crevices of a landscape that had grown suddenly hellish with its eerily smoking rock and sudden bangs and whistles. Stunted trees burst into flame on a whim, purple and green.

Amelia’s feet ached and her limbs had grown almost too heavy to bear as she and Harold stumbled down a wide shallow gulley filled with scree.

Harold laughed, although his face was red and sweaty, and he too must be exhausted by the chase. “Oh, he’s giving ‘em a real hard time, your little pet is. Come on, down this channel here and –”

A dark figure appeared at the far end of the channel. Harold puffed up his chest as he put himself between Amelia and the golem. The second golem appeared behind the first. The two strange gentlemen might not have their lightning weapons, but they’d acquired swords from somewhere, and carried them with more confidence than the butcher’s boy.

“Excuse me, my good lady,” said the first golem. “Are you the White Queen?”

“Amelia, do your spell,” Harold hissed.

Amelia tried her hardest, but nothing happened. “I don’t think I can!” Meg had never warned her this might happen – yes, she’d tired during long magic lessons before, but surely when her life depended on it she could wring the energy from somewhere… “I can’t do it anymore!”

“Of course she’s the White Queen,” said the second golem. “And this young man is the White Paladin. He told us so himself. See, they bear the White Queen’s insignia.” And without further ado, he lunged at Harold.

Harold blocked the golem’s first strike easily, but a loose rock underfoot caught him off balance and the second blow struck his breastplate. “Amelia, get away from here!” he shouted, and she’d already had that idea for herself, but the other golem pursued and Harold couldn’t fight them both. She tripped on the treacherous slippery rocks, and fell. In the slow motion of oncoming disaster as the golem raised his sword to strike her down, Amelia saw that Harold was too far away for him to help her, embattled as he was with his own murderous enemy. She saw him deal a killing blow, hard and fast; she saw the freezing gleam of metal overcome the golem he fought, and her attacker froze too. Amelia rolled away, clung to Harold’s arms as he helped her to her feet. A moment later, the blade came crashing down into the space Amelia had just abandoned.

“Did you see that?” she panted as they ran.

“Stop one, and you stop ‘em both,” said Harold. He ducked as Stupid whizzed over his head, perilously close. A scream sounded behind them. The fire sprite must have struck head on with some force: the golem lay on the ground engulfed in raging violet flames, the gleam of metal visible. His twin stood nearby, a perfect statue of a swordsman, the look of determination still on his frozen face.

“Oh, you clever thing!” Amelia grinned. She knew, though, that Stupid couldn’t sustain such a blaze for long. Sooner or later, he’d exhaust himself just as she had. He’d have to retreat, and then the burning golem would merely get up again – unharmed, pristine, and rather annoyed. Nevertheless, it gave her an idea.

“Can you call the wyvern?” She put her hands over her ears in readiness, but Harold’s piercing whistle still hurt her ears. An answering shriek echoed through the rocky landscape. Soon, the shadow flickered huge and close across the floor of the gulley.

“Get up on higher ground,” said Harold, climbing up. “He can tell friend from foe if we’re out in the open.”

The two of them sprinted across the open plain of bare rock and twisted scrubby bushes, the two golems not far behind them.

“Wait, wait,” Amelia panted, staggering to a stop and holding her aching side. “If I can just manage a
little
magic…” The easiest spell she knew; the very first thing she’d learned from Meg. Surely, if she could do nothing else, she could do this. Drawing on her last reserves, she flicked her fingers, and a tiny pathetic fireball whizzed through the air. The spell might be weak, but Amelia’s aim had improved considerably since that first lesson – the dry leaves and twigs of a nearby bush went up quickly, consumed in green fire. Her fingers spat out a series of sparks, still feeble compared to what she knew she
could
do, but enough to make the golems think twice, enough to hold them at bay at least for a minute or two. She could see the guardsman now too, watching her for the slightest mistake, the first opportunity, but nonetheless he kept a warier distance than the two golems. The thought struck her that he must not be as fireproof as his men. She didn’t say as much to Harold, though. The golems might be constructed things, mere living statues, and she took solace in that thought as they burned, but she didn’t know what this other man was. What had the Black Paladin said about using magic against magically unarmed opponents? She couldn’t in good conscience direct the wyverns to harm him, nor did she want human blood on Harold’s hands, if she could avoid it.

“Amelia?” Harold tugged at her sleeve, warily. The light suddenly dimmed, as if a storm cloud passed over the sun, but the sky was cloudless blue.

“Amelia!” came Percival’s voice from above. “Harold!”

Amelia looked up to see the underside of the
Storm Chaser
passing overhead, low enough that she feared it might accidentally crush them. Last she’d seen him, Captain Dunnager hadn’t been in a fit state to fly the
Storm Chaser
another fifty yards, but there she was, and the rope ladder already down for them to climb up. No sense in sneering at providence; no grace in asking how a miracle works…

When she reached the top, Amelia was startled to find Captain Dunnager waiting there to help her over the railings. She stared at him a moment, her mouth hanging open. His amber eyes looked hollow and bruised, but he still had the strength to haul her onto the deck, and he grinned that gold-toothed grin at her in spite of everything.

“Everybody hold on tight, now,” the Captain warned.

The
Storm Chaser
soared upwards, the wind seizing Amelia’s hair and yanking it back. “How did you know where to find us?” she asked.

Captain Dunnager laughed. “Seen a brush fire or two in my time, but never one like that.”

Amelia looked down. The bushes had gone up in a rainbow of flames, a ridiculously cheery wall of fiery death, but she didn’t care: it kept Commander Breaker and his strange gentlemen at bay. They’d have a hard time pursuing the
Storm Chaser
on foot, at least.

When Amelia looked up again, she noticed Percival at the wheel. “But, but,” she stammered, “if you’re not…”

“It was about time I took my share of flying this thing,” Meg’s voice resonated from all around them, strong and bright, resonating melodious from every timber of the
Storm Chaser.
“Don’t worry, dear,” she teased, all too light-hearted for the situation in hand, “My body’s safe and cosy in the cabin for the time being, and I won’t exhaust myself. We won the crown, didn’t we? Just like I said we would.”

Amelia sank onto the deck, clutching her bag. She pulled out the glittering tiara, turning it this way and that in the light. “We did, didn’t we?” She’d beaten the Black Queen to the finish by mere minutes, and she’d escaped with not only her own life and those of her friends, but with the crown. “Is that it? Is it all over now?” The moment of triumph, now that it had come, felt oddly hollow. “Can I go back home now?” Back to Springhaven, where she would… what? Hang her sword and her crown over the mantelpiece and go back to her knitting?

“Oh, no,” said Meg, gravely. “You’re the White Queen now, my girl.”

Amelia stared at the crown in her hands, the physical embodiment of her title. She thought of putting it on, but felt too ridiculous to do so. Meg had been calling her the White Queen from the first days of their journey, long before she’d ever shown the merest hint of queenly qualities. “And what does that mean, exactly?”

“That all this has only been the first step in your journey. From here, we’ll have to go on and find the White King.”

Amelia could scarcely believe her own ears. Could this really be Meg, suggesting that a Queen is nothing without her King? “But… but… all that about the seal maiden and everything. And now I’m to marry some king I’ve never even seen before and –”

“I said you’re to
find
the White King,” Meg interrupted sharply. “As to what you must do when you find him… Well, I’ll leave that to your judgement.”

The story continues in

Lamb & Castle

Volume II:

The Assassin Princess

J.M. SANFORD

1: THE BLACK QUEEN’S NEXT MOVE

Losing a battle may not equate to losing the war, but with the White Queen already crowned, Bessie Castle
had
all but lost the Queens’ contest. What could the would-be Black Queen do – steal the crown back from the girl who was its rightful owner? Adventure over, Master Greyfell had returned Bessie safely to her home City of Iletia, where he kept a close eye on her to make sure she resumed her studies at the Antwin Academy. No point in talent going to waste, so he’d said. Bessie had other ideas.

She crouched on the window ledge of the fourth floor dormitory, pausing a moment to scan the sharp angles of the roofscape around her. The moon shone bright and crisp in the chilly autumn night, illuminating the jumbled rooftops of the City in shades of grey, the shadows black as the void. She didn’t know the way well: during her first year at the Academy she’d had little patience for the kind of tomfoolery some of the more boisterous girls engaged in, and then she’d gone off chasing after the White Queen. With a deep breath as if preparing to dive into icy water, she slipped out of the window, just like so many girls before her, and dropped to the roof below. She kept her footing easily despite the loose tiles, and moved quickly to the shadows. She smirked: keeping teenaged spies-and assassins-in-training in check must be like spinning silk from clouds. Climbing out of windows and stalking cat-like across the City’s rooftops by moonlight practically counted as extra lessons for a girl like Bessie Castle, who’d been forced to master her natural fear of heights at the age of eleven, in her first year’s climbing lessons. The skirt of her simple but elegant grey uniform had been designed with the need to run or climb walls in mind.

Her heart thudded now as she made her way from shadow to shadow. Getting caught out of bed would lead to some awful punishment from the Headmistress, but the real shame and scandal of it would come from the fact that she hadn’t been sly enough to get away with it. She slowed, treading even more carefully. A little planning earlier in the day had shown that her path would take her directly under Master Greyfell’s window. Bad enough to be caught out after curfew by any of the Masters at the Academy, but Master Greyfell… He’d know what she was up to. There’d be no excusing it as youthful japes or even a tryst with a young gentleman. She wished she still had Greyfell at her side as Black Paladin, but he refused on the grounds that the White Queen had won by the rules of the contest. Bessie had pored over the rules again in her free time and found nothing expressly forbidding her from taking the crown from the White Queen, if she could, and as long as she could do it before the White Queen discovered her White King. Greyfell stubbornly insisted that trying to steal the crown from its rightful winner at this stage in the contest would be unsportsmanlike, at best. Bessie had rehearsed excuses in her head, and rejected each one as implausible, so that she breathed a sigh of relief when she dropped down off the roof and into the narrow passageway behind the girls’ lavatories. There in the outer wall was a hole just big enough for a small and determined girl to climb out through, and a smart grey cloak where she’d hidden it the night before. With some difficulty, she squeezed through the hole. It didn’t make for a glamorous story, but every once in a while one of the students found the hidden exit useful. She stood, brushed off her dress, and covered up her uniform with the cloak before walking out into the street.

She saw Bryn well before she reached her destination, the tall figure sitting hunched on a high wall, cat-like profile and huge ears silhouetted plainly against the glow of many streetlights blooming in the night sky.

Bessie hurried closer, less concerned with absolute silence now that she was outside the walls of the Academy. “Bryn, come down from there!” she hissed. She’d barely raised her voice above a breath, but his head whipped round suddenly.

Her Argean friend grinned that enormous white-fanged grin, pleased as ever to see her. “Miss Bessie!” He bounded down from the high wall, taking the long leaps effortlessly while Bessie could only look on in hopeless envy. He stopped himself just short of wrapping her up in a big furry hug. “I’m so glad to see you again, my good friend,” he said. “You’re growing tall and true, as I knew you would.”

Bessie raised her eyebrows. She’d always been small for her age, and even the decent meals provided to students of the Academy hadn’t been enough to help her in that regard. “You’re looking very well too, Bryn. I trust business is good for you?”

“Very good, very good,” Bryn nodded enthusiastically. “I’m glad to find Iletia a fine and thriving City, so that I will be quite happy to stay here as long as I can be of service to you.”

They walked down into a narrow covered alleyway, out of sight. So late in the evening, there weren’t many people about, and nobody who would interfere with the private business of an Argean. The few madmen who would even think of doing so were busy in taverns at such an hour.

“Thank you. I promise it won’t be long before I need to hire
Sharvesh
again.” She only hoped she’d be able to keep her promise.

“Ah!” This obviously reminded Bryn of the real purpose of their meeting. “I have the items you requested.” With a flourish, he pulled a crystal ball from an inner pocket of his coat. Even in the shadows it glowed faintly from within, bright flecks and flaws in the stone catching its light and magnifying it.

“Thank you,” said Bessie, taking it from him carefully. She always felt anxious handling expensive items, and it had taken more than three months of her Academy allowance to even rent the crystal ball for the night. “Did you get the call spell, too?”

He hadn’t been happy about that, but he’d found a way to get hold of it anyway. He handed her the ceramic tablet, and she refrained from asking him how he’d been able to acquire it. Bad enough she was asking him to stop in Iletia, possibly indefinitely, when his livelihood depended on travel… But, as long as she had
Sharvesh
at her disposal, she had a Warship, and that at least was a start.

The echoes of the alleyway seemed to chatter and gossip, and Bessie moved swiftly on, looking for somewhere quieter. Still, much as she wanted to find a place where she wouldn’t be disturbed or overheard, the busy City offered few such places, and she didn’t like carrying the expensive crystal ball around so late at night, either. She’d worn gloves to cover her conjuring rings, and kept to good neighbourhoods, where the streets were well-lit and the people walked sedately. She forced herself to walk like a young lady of leisure too, idle and carefree.

Eventually they came to a subway where the paving stones were clean and unbroken, and the lamps bright – a safe but secluded place. She sat down on the steps, where she judged she was more or less out of sight, but could still see the feet and legs of people walking by through a grille. Raising the crystal ball, she stared at her reflection: her face childish but serious, her dark eyes in shadow. Then, with Bryn keeping watch, she spoke the call spell. Presently the faint glow within the crystal ball brightened and a new face appeared within to replace her own image, distorted by the curve of the ball’s surface. The man in the crystal looked to be in his fifties or sixties, although everyone knew that an Archmage might be much older than he appeared. Despite his wrinkles and white hair, his features were strong, and his eyes piercingly blue even in the crystal ball’s haze.

“Good evening, Archmage,” said Bessie, with a smile and a deferential bow of her head. “I seek an audience with you. I am Elizabeth Castle of the Antwin Academy.” She thought she’d better get the Antwin name in quickly, if she was to have any credibility at all.

“Yes. A third year student, I see.” The man smirked. “Unless the pins have changed since I was of an age to dally with Academy girls. Of course, it wasn’t the
Antwin
Academy in those days.”

Self-consciously, Bessie put her hand to the amethyst pin at her collar. She’d only received it a few weeks ago. “Quite right, Archmage: I’m a third year,” she admitted, quietly. She’d almost forgotten she was out after curfew, and guiltily she checked the street above her for any sign of legs that might belong to any of her Masters. They weren’t far from the Academy: from the top of the stairs she’d been able to see the rickety old clock tower.

“And you’ve acquired my personal call spell from somewhere, despite your tender years and the fact that I haven’t heard the name ‘Castle’ before. Most irregular. New money, are you, Miss Castle? The daughter of an upstart house in the grand City of Iletia?”

Bessie already knew Archmages didn’t put a lot of stock in material wealth. She’d have to interest him on some other level. She suspected somehow she already had, otherwise he would have ended the conversation by now. It surprised her that he’d apparently never heard of the Castles, though. He must not be that old after all…

“No, Archmage, the Castles are an old family. Very old, and fallen on hard times. You’re aware of the legendary contest to find the Dragon Queen, I assume?”

The Archmage snorted in derision. “You may assume that much safely enough, my dear. By any chance are you the girl claiming to be of the Black Queen’s bloodline? Your representative has already contacted me twice in his efforts to recruit your Black Mage.”

“Yes, and I apologise for disturbing you a third time, but the challenge is greater now than ever. The White Queen has the crown and is seeking her King even as we speak, accompanied by a powerful witch.”

She’d hoped that would be enough of a break with dull tradition to interest him, and she was right. His face loomed larger within the crystal as he leaned forward in his seat. “A witch, you say?” His blue eyes narrowed in a look of disapproval, but she thought she saw the glitter of intrigue in them too. Mages and witches had been bitter rivals since time immemorial: men and women practising mostly very different schools of magic. The idea of a
witch
taking the place of the White Queen’s Mage was scandalous, or so Bessie gathered from Greyfell’s comments on the matter.

“I fought her once or twice,” said Bessie, nonchalant as she could. “I’m not ashamed to say she has me quite outclassed.”

“If she’s taken the role of White Mage, then of course she does, young lady: your studies at the Antwin Academy cover magic only tangentially, and the most mundane kind, at that. Poisons and potions and silly little charms… Hardly magic at all.”

Bessie could have kicked herself. Her skills in magic might be hard-earned, but they were nothing compared to those of even a low-ranking mage. She bowed her head, biting her lip in a shameless show of contrition. “That’s very true, Archmage,” she said, not looking up. “I’m in no position to judge truly powerful magic users.”

“Don’t blubber now,” said the Archmage impatiently. “I hate girls who cry. Tell me honestly – is the White Mage really a
woman
? I can’t believe the Dragon Lords would ever stand for such a thing.”

“And yet, the White Queen has the crown,” she reminded him. She’d scarcely been able to think of anything else for weeks. “I’ve done my best to play by the rules, but I need a Mage, a Commander, and a Paladin.”
Damn Greyfell and his love of rules.
She looked up at a pair of legs going past the grille, but by the dandyish colours of the striped trousers she knew they didn’t belong to Master Greyfell, nor did they have his gait. A couple of ladies of the night passed the other way in high heeled boots and frilled skirts that showed a daring amount of calf.

“The answer is still no, young lady. I have more important things to tend to, far beyond your capacity to understand. Nonetheless… I like your spirit. Does the White Queen know the whereabouts of the throne room yet? Do
you
?”

Bessie shook her head. She and Greyfell had tracked the White Queen’s path all around the countryside before they’d finally come to the fabled jade temple that housed the Dragon Queen’s crown. Throughout the journey she’d realised more and more that the White Queen had blundered along with blind luck on her side. “The legends say that the Dragon Lords hid the throne room so that only the rightful queen would ever be able to find it.”

“Then perhaps you are not the rightful queen.”

Bessie was rapidly losing her patience. “Perhaps legends exaggerate for the sake of a better story,” she snapped.

The Archmage laughed. “Oh my dear, you’ll have to learn to keep a better grip on your temper than that. But, you know, the legends
do
exaggerate on one or two points. As many theories as there have been on the location of the throne room, all
intelligent
arguments point towards Ildorria.”

Ildorria.
Bessie knew the name at once. Many of the original Flying Cities had been lost over the millennia. Many had crashed, but Ildorria had simply vanished without a trace. Once again she wished she had Greyfell with her – he knew the history of the Flying Cities better than anyone. Had Ildorria’s sudden unexplained disappearance been contemporary with the beginning of the Queens’ Contest, hundreds of years ago? Bessie tensed as she heard the tap of smart footsteps on the street above, and craned her neck to look. No, those boots were far too fancy to belong to Master Greyfell, and too noisy. The man’s footsteps rang out like the iron shoes of a carthorse as he walked past the grille. She did her best to ignore the noise, returning her attention to the crystal ball. “I must reach the throne room before the White Queen, Archmage, and take the crown back from her. What can you tell me about Ildorria?”