Valle : Book 2 of the Heku Series (41 page)

Emily was asleep. Chevalier decided to not bring it up again, though his mind wondered what exactly she meant by it. The rest of the night he laid beside her and watched her sleep, she never once tried to get up.

The morning light came in the window and Emily looked up and then stretched. She got up and got dressed, then checked on Allen. He wasn’t in his room, so she figured Sam must already have him. She grabbed her riding gloves and hat, and then left for the stables. There were two strange guards outside of her door, and she smiled at them as she walked down the stairs, the two of them in tow. They didn’t say a word to her as she made her way out to the stables.

“Good morning,” Kyle said, smiling. He waved the two guards away.

Emily looked into the stables and smiled. The seven heku guards were already brushing their horses down for the day.

“Good morning,” she said to Kyle, and then walked to each of the guards to see how they were doing. Kyle watched as each smiled broadly when she approached and talked excitedly about their horses.

“Oh, don’t saddle up today,” she said to them as she walked to Patra’s stall. Sam had already gotten Patra ready and Emily slid onto her bareback. She walked Patra out to the front lawn and waited while the seven members of the Cavalry led their horses out by their reins.

“Sorry about yesterday,” she said, but they all mumbled about it not being a problem. The stark white bandage on her neck suddenly seemed the focal point.

“Today, we’re going to start learning how to shoot from horseback,” she said, and they all grinned.

“The hard part isn’t shooting… the hard part is not getting bucked off the horse when they hear the gun go off,” she explained, and pulled a Remington long rifle out of Patra’s pack.

“Hold your horses steady, don’t let them go… I want to see how they react,” she said, leveling the rifle across her arm and aiming at an old tree by the west lawn.

She fired off one shot and quickly glanced at the horses. Four of them were looking at her curiously, one was taking a step back, and two were putting up quite a fight. The heku were pulling hard against their reins to keep them from running off. Emily slipped off Patra and took one of the more upset horses by the reins. She pulled hard until the horse was looking at her face on and calmed down.

The heku with the other panicked horse did the same, but only got nipped at. Emily walked over and took the reins from him, then yanked down hard on the bridle until that horse also looked at her calmly.

“I thought you weren’t going to move us out of the way of a mad horse anymore,” one of the guards said, laughing.

“Oh yeah,” she sighed, and climbed back onto Patra. “I forgot about that.”

Kyle leaned his head back and laughed, “Em, you’d take a bullet for us if you could and don’t deny it.”

He knew that was part of her charm. While most mortals viewed them as evil, unnatural creatures, she somehow immediately respected and cared about them as a species.

She shrugged and grinned, “Let’s try that again.”

Emily leveled her gun and shot. She glanced around, and all seven horses were standing calmly and watching their new masters.

“Good, they just needed to hear it to get used to the sound.”

Emily moved Patra over to a locked box and pointed, “Get your guns out of there. We’re going to have each of you shoot off a thousand rounds or so with your horses by your side.”

The seven Cavalry members moved off to a spot marked by Kyle as a shooting range. They held onto their horses and shot feverishly at wooden targets. Emily watched them closely to make sure their horses didn’t panic. After a few hundred rounds, she leaned forward on Patra and locked her feet behind her on the mare’s rump. She felt her eyes getting heavier and fought it for as long as she could.

Kyle watched as the heku fired over and over, then reloaded and did the same. It wasn’t hard for heku to do redundant tasks, and this fell into that category, they did as they were told. He wondered if they had shot enough and turned to ask Emily, but found her sound asleep on Patra’s back.

Kyle grinned and motioned for the guards to stop shooting. They turned around and followed his gaze to the sleeping mortal.

“She’s still tired from blood loss,” one of them said sadly.

“I’ll take her to her room,” the tallest heku said.

“No, I’ll take her,” Kyle said, walking toward her.

“Actually, Sir, we wanted to talk to you,” the guard closest to him whispered.

Kyle nodded to the tall heku, and he slipped Emily off of her horse and cradled her gently before walking into the palace.

“Ok, talk,” Kyle said, taking Patra’s reins and leading her into the stall.

“We were talking, after the attack on Emily, and decided that we want to be her personal guards,” Mark said to Kyle.

“You’re Cavalry,” he reminded them.

“Right, which is led by you, and you are her guard. She spends a lot of time in the stables, which is where we will be a lot of the time. If we have two guards with her at all times, that would leave five of us out on the streets at a time. Once we get more Cavalry, things will be less hectic,” he said, watching Kyle for a reaction.

Kyle slid Patra’s door shut and turned to them, “Seems you have put a lot of thought into this.”

“We have,” another heku said. “Emily is important to us, and what happened the other night… wouldn’t have happened if we had been watching her.”

“Ok, I’ll ask Elder Chevalier and let you know in the morning,” Kyle said, then stood back while his Cavalry unit got their horses settled.

***

“Who are you?” Chevalier asked when the strange guard came in carrying Emily.

“Cavalry, Sir,” he whispered, laying her on the bed.

“Is she injured?”

“No, Sir… she fell asleep,” he said, and bowed before leaving the room.

Chevalier shook his head and gently pulled her clothes off, then covered her with a blanket. He watched her for a few minutes and then went out to call the doctor. He wasn’t sure she should be sleeping this much. Once the doctor assured him it was perfectly normal, he sat outside of her door and waited for Kyle.

Kyle came up finally and sat in the chair by Chevalier.

“Fell asleep, eh?” Chevalier asked.

“Yeah, curled up on Patra, again.”

Chevalier smiled.

“The Cavalry has an idea,” Kyle said.

“What kind of idea?”

“They want to be Emily’s personal bodyguards. They had some valid points… they are with her a lot during the day, there’s enough to have two with her at all times and still have the streets covered. Then, as more Cavalry are trained, her ranks will grow. I’m her guard right now, and I’m over the Cavalry,” he explained.

Chevalier thought for a moment, “Two guards at all times… are they loyal to her?”

Kyle grinned, “You have no idea. She has them completely charmed.”

Chevalier shook his head and smiled, “Yeah she has that affect.”

“I think it’s a good idea.”

“So do I. Let’s wait until their promotions to the Cavalry, and then we’ll add that to their duties. How close are they?”

“Just a few weeks away, things are coming along smoothly. Emily wants me to order paint ball guns though, and I’m not sure I want to,” Kyle said thoughtfully.

“If Em wants them…” Chevalier said, and shrugged.

“I’ll get them ordered right away,” Kyle said, and headed down stairs.

Chevalier sat deep in thought throughout the night, trying to come up with a better plan for Emily’s protection. He was shocked when she came out and then realized he’d been there all night.

“Mornin,” she said, pulling her hair up into her hat.

Chevalier stood up and hugged her tightly, “Good morning. Going to stay awake today?”

She blushed, “I’m so sorry, it won’t happen again.”

He laughed, “It’s ok, we all know you’re tired from the blood loss. How’s the neck?”

“Fine,” she said, and he eyed the clean bandages taped to the side of her neck. He figured she must have changed them when she got up.

“Don’t hurt’em too bad,” he said, kissing the top of her head. They walked down the stairs, hand-in-hand, and then split up on the fourth-floor. Chevalier headed to the council chambers, and Emily went outside. She stopped at the doors when a heku guard put his hand out.

“There’s been a delivery,” he told her, and pointed a large box.

“Oh, thank you,” she said, and eyed the box. It took several tries, but she was finally able to pick up the heavy box and stumble out the front door. She thought it was odd that the heku guard at the door didn’t help her, but she hated to complain. She knew she was heading for the barn, but wasn’t able to see where she was going.

“Gah, Em,” she heard Kyle hiss as he lifted the box from her arms.

“I think the guns are here, that was fast.” She smiled and stretched her arms out.

“You should have called us to get this,” he said, and sat the box down to open it.

“Ok all,” Emily said as the Cavalry unit came. “I got some guns to play with.”

She held up the paintball gun and smiled, “While I’m sure Kyle had no qualms about using real guns on you, this will just have to do.”

She watched as the heku each took a gun and looked at it.

“See, this will be fun,” Emily said, and then grabbed a gun and loaded it. She looked around and saw Kyle deep in conversation on a cell phone in the corner of the stables. She grinned at the Cavalry and held her finger up to her lips. Their eyes grew wide as she aimed carefully, pumped the gun, and shot him square in the back.

“What!?” Kyle yelled, and shut his cell phone before turning around, his hand against the paint on his back.

Emily was already turned around and looking innocently at her horse while the seven Cavalry members looked around nervously.

Kyle’s eyes narrowed and he walked over to her, “Problems with the gun? Misfire maybe?”

She turned and smiled sweetly, “Yes, that’s it, it was a misfire.”

Kyle took the gun from her and grinned, “Now no more misfires. Get your horses ready,” he called to his guards.

He set her gun down and went to saddle his buckskin mare. He winced when another shot slammed into the back of his leg.

“Damnit, Emily,” he said, and blurred to her, then threw her over his shoulder. The guards watched, shocked. They were told that no one was to touch the Elder’s wife.

“Put me down!” she yelled, laughing. She aimed her gun at one of the guards and shot him in the hip. He grabbed his leg and then looked up at her, smiling.

“Did she shoot you?” Kyle asked, spinning to look at the guard.

“Nope,” he answered as green paint dripped down his leg.

“Get her gun,” Kyle said, turning so she was toward the guards. One of them came up and took the gun from her hand. She struggled, but couldn’t hold onto it.

“Ok, ok, got my gun now put me down.” Emily laughed.

“Are you going to behave?” Kyle asked.

“Of course!” She sounded offended, but he could feel her laughing.

Kyle set her on her feet, “Shall we get started?”

Emily nodded and climbed up on Patra, suddenly serious, “Here’s what we’re going to do. One of you will wait here where I am, and one of you will take off running. Once the running heku hits the blue line drawn on the lawn, the mounted heku will take off and try to shoot him. Remember, center mass. You won’t kill the heku you are aiming for, but if you can at least stop them, then you have time to get off of your horse and do…” She frowned, “Whatever it is you do.”

“Ok, who wants to be the runner while I do the shooting?” She laughed as all of their hands shot up.

“You,” she said, pointing to a heku at random. “Ready? Run!”

The heku took off across the field, and the second he touched the blue line, Emily kicked Patra in a full gallop. By the time she caught up to him, she had her rifle perched on her shoulder and pulled the trigger, hitting him between the shoulders.

He laughed and turned to her just as she extended her hand out to him. He looked back at Kyle, and then hopped behind her on Patra and she gave him a ride back to the others.

“See, easy enough,” she said as the guard slipped off of the mare. “Pair up and get going.”

Emily and Kyle watched and commented as the heku practiced the drill. She was impressed. They were exceptionally good with the guns, naturals.

“I was thinking, Em. Why don’t you do the promotions at the ceremony.”

“Me?” she asked, shocked. “Aren’t you supposed to? You’re their Captain.”

“I’ll be there, but I was thinking maybe you should actually pin on their Cavalry insignia.” He smiled when her face lit up.

“Really?”

He nodded, “They would appreciate it too, I’m sure.”

“When is it?” she asked.

“Three weeks, I think we’ll be done by then,” he told her, and then went into his plans with Emily for the next week of training. Once the exercise was over, they gathered in a semi-circle around Kyle and Emily.

“Great job! Hope that helped. We have new recruits coming in a few weeks, and I want them to leave your horses alone, so I’m going to order name plates. I’ll need your name and your horses name by tomorrow.” She watched as they looked around at each other.

***

Emily was getting nervous. Tonight was the promotion ceremony for the Cavalry, and while she had been excited, now she was starting to panic. Chevalier brought in the palace tailor and requested something western. She wasn’t sure what that meant, but she was too nervous to question any further.

The tailor dropped off her dress in a black dress bag and she’d been staring at it for an hour. Chevalier had already joined the other Elders for the promotions that were ahead of the Cavalry. They were to be promoted last, as it made each of them a Lieutenant.

Sighing, Emily stood up and unzipped the garment bag and pulled off her clothes right in the bedroom. Sam and Allen were already at the ceremony that was to be attended by the entire Council City guard staff and most of the city. She was extremely nervous, and remembered the look on the faces the first time they saw her, most hated her and glared as she walked down the center aisle.