Crystal Crowned [ARC] (8 page)

Vaulting off Lightning, she tackled the leader head first. He reared back to punch her and Vhalla dodged, bringing her knee up hard between his legs. The wind left him, and Vhalla pushed him off her. He stumbled off the stage with a menacing groan and a string of colorful words. She drew her sword fearlessly.

The crackle of ice lit up the air and Vhalla turned. But where the assistant had been was now nothing more than a charred mark on the ground, the temperature of the square rising by several degrees.

“Move and die!” Fritz shouted, holding out a hand to one of the remaining two Inquisitors. Jax was poised, ready to attack the other.

“Wh-who are you?” The leader scrambled away, looking between Vhalla and the Firebearer on the horse.

“The Fire Lord.” Aldrik threw down his hood, staring down the man who suddenly looked like nothing more than an ant beneath a mountain. He held out a hand and fire crackled off his finger, setting the leader ablaze.

Vhalla was expecting some further retaliation, but the remaining assistant by the stage fell to his knees and brought his face to the dusty ground. No one seemed to be able to process this reaction.

“My lord, my lord,” the man wailed. He turned his face upward, looking to Aldrik as though he were a god. “You have returned from the Father’s halls to save us.”

“Are you really who you say you are?” An elderly man moved away from the mother grieving over her fallen son.

“I am.” Vhalla looked on at the broken family in sorrow, wishing she could reverse the clock. “We are.”

“We can’t believe them,” snarled one of the Inquisitors, a blonde Southerner who viciously stared down Fritz.

“She is Vhalla Yarl,” Geral spoke up. “I would know that mess of hair from anyone.”

“You live,” the other Inquisitor Jax was threatening spoke with awe. “It’s true, the Prince of Mhashan lives.” The Westerner dropped to her knees as well.

“Vhalla Yarl,” the mother hiccupped her name softly. Everyone turned. “Will you end this?”

“I will,” she vowed without hesitation. Her people looked to her, and Vhalla would never fail them again. Vhalla jumped back onto the stage, addressing Paca. “The fires of Solaris, the fires of justice, burn bright and hot. The sun is rising, and it will cast this darkness from the earth. We will end the Supreme King.

“We ride to Hastan.” She barely noticed that Aldrik gave her an odd look from the corners of his eyes, but Vhalla was too focused on reassuring those gathered to give it much heed. “We will ensure the East stands with us, with the West, and the North! And we will end this.”

“So stand with Solaris, or die with the false king,” Aldrik decreed.

“The West harbors no love for the false king,” the nearest Inquisitor assistant spoke. “I am glad to kneel with my Emperor.”

“You’re pardoning them?” the grieving mother shrieked.

Vhalla looked between her and Aldrik uncertainly.

The Emperor took a long and slow breath through his nose. “Why did you serve the false king?”

“My daughter was in the Tower,” the man answered. Vhalla noticed the other Westerner shift, bowing her head. The family resemblance was suddenly apparent. “The King said she would remain safe if her family answered his call for Inquisitors.”

“And you?” Aldrik had noticed the apparent familial connection between the two Westerners and he turned to the Southerner.

“I-I-” the man stuttered. “There was no other choice. This or die.”

The Westerner to Vhalla’s left narrowed his eyes some, but he didn’t say anything. Vhalla keenly remembered Daniel’s description of the state of the capital. She understood many likely couldn’t understand what the Inquisitors had faced.

“Are your hearts loyal to Solaris?” Aldrik asked.

The three gave their affirmation.

“Then I will pardon you.”

“On one condition!” Vhalla knew that grieving mother could whip Paca into an angry mob if there wasn’t a condition added. Some form of punishment was due for the people to rest at night.

Aldrik turned to Vhalla. He gave her a long stare, but didn’t object. The singular act spoke volumes about the authority he had already given her.

Vhalla took a deep breath, praying she had formulated a good enough idea so quickly. “If you run off or oppose Victor, he will take your lives and the lives of those you love. Your deaths will help no one. There are patrols, I assume you are meant to report in, and he has the power to find you beyond all that. You do not want to be examples for that maniac.”

No one objected.

“Loyalty at the cost of innocent blood is not the foundation for a throne.” She stared into the eyes of the Easterners, pleading with them to understand what she was saying. “Two wrongs do not make a right. And killing those who have only fought for their freedom, killing them for the sake of vengeance does not make us any better than that which we are fighting against.

“So you may keep your lives,
if
you use them to help your brothers and sisters here in the East. Go as you were told. Use the crystal to find Windwalkers. But for every one you find, tell them to hide. Turn that wretched
thing
that Victor has saddled you wish as a gift. Be not the harbingers of death but the devotees of life. Tell the Windwalkers to flee, to perpetuate the belief that there are and will be no more in the East, for now.”

Vhalla would not let go of her secret dream that one day Windwalkers could study safely alongside other sorcerers.

“Spread this word to other Inquisitors who do not want to take children from their mothers. Do this and you will have earned your pardon.”

The Inquisitors looked from Aldrik to Vhalla, trying to decipher if she truly had the ability to make such a decree.

The Western man finally spoke. “At least if I am to die, then it would be as someone I can look in the mirror.” He stood. “If it would please our lord?”

Aldrik took a deep breath and gave Vhalla a look that she couldn’t quite decipher. His eyes were sad, but bright with passion. His shoulders were limp and heavy, but the corners of his mouth tugged upward ever so slightly in the smallest of smiles.

“It would please me greatly. As it is the first decree of your future Empress.”

Vhalla would forever remember the reaction of the people in Paca to Aldrik’s announcement that Vhalla would be their future Empress. The people embracing her, celebrating her, replayed over in her mind during their ride out of the small town. It played over until a different nagging thought crept up from the back of her brain, until this new thought spoke so loudly that she had no other choice but to address it.

“I’m sorry,” Vhalla said guiltily. “For running off as I did towards the Inquisitors.”

Her four companions looked at her in surprise.

“You don’t need to apologize, Vhal,” Fritz said cheerfully.

Vhalla shook her head. “It was reckless of me, and it put you all at risk as well. I’ll be more careful in the future.”

“Well, be sure you do,” Elecia said in a haughty tone. Vhalla shared a small smile with the woman before she turned her focus back to the road.

“Vhalla,” Aldrik summoned her attention quietly. “I would also be careful about letting people know our movements.”

She thought a moment. “You mean saying we were headed to Hastan.”

“We’re fairly easy targets right now. The more people who know we’re alive, the more people who will be hunting us.”

“I’ll be more careful,” she vowed. Vhalla wouldn’t apologize again. Apologies meant nothing, and they weren’t going to help them. She simply had to be better than she had ever been before. It was a journey she had been on for some time now, and Vhalla was discovering that the path to being the person she wanted to be had no end point. That there would always be room for her to adapt, to change, and to improve.

“Well.” Aldrik shifted in his saddle, casting off the weight of the morning. “You were never in any real danger. Those scraps of sorcerers can’t stand up to me.”

Vhalla laughed for the first time in weeks. “I forgot I rode with the Fire Lord.”

“Fire Lord,” Elecia snorted. “What a ridiculous title.”

“We could think of a title for you as well, ‘Cia.” Aldrik paused a moment. “Stone-Skinned Lady?”

“More like Stone-Hearted,” Jax sniggered.

“There is only one title I’m interested in,” Elecia spoke only once she was assured she had stalled long enough for everyone’s attention. “The Lady of the West.”

“We’ll see about that,” Aldrik chuckled. “Does your grandfather know you’re vying to overthrow him?”

“I’d never,” Elecia gasped.

“It’s nice to see you smile,” Fritz remarked to Vhalla from her left. “I haven’t seen it in I don’t remember how long.”

Vhalla shrugged. “There haven’t been many things to smile about.”

“There are, though. Don’t you think?” Fritz wore a small expression of joy himself. It was small, but it was there. “We’re all alive, aren’t we?”

“That we are.”

“I think we’ll likely give your father cause to smile as well, with his daughter coming back from the grave.” Fritz combed his fingers through his steadily lengthening hair.

That was something Vhalla hadn’t thought about. They had known in Paca of Victor’s claims of her death. Fear gripped her.
What if her father thought her dead and had left to flee Victor’s slow encroachment north?

Vhalla looked ahead. This far into the middle of the continent, the hills by the southern mountains had begun to flatten, and there was at most a small slope to the land. She could see a far distance, but her home was still well out of sight.

They rode the day with the wind on her cheeks. There was no spark, no magic calling to her in it. Once in a while, she’d clench her hands into fists, foolishly thinking that her magic would return simply by being in the East. But her magic would not return to her unless there was enough to restore the flow to her Channel.

They saw an old road sign that was the first marker of Leoul. The dusty road and worn fences, which penned in livestock and pastures, began to look familiar to her. It all began to connect like a puzzle of memories, and Vhalla could suddenly recall obscure details like how many trees one farmer had in their field, or how many windows another home had.

A child-like squeal rose up in her throat as Vhalla shot out her finger, pointing at a lone tree in the distance. “My farm!” She clutched the reins tightly. “Can we go faster?”

“Works for me!” Fritz cheered and kicked his horse into a lively trot.

The rest of them did the same. The old gnarled oak still stood tall and laden with leaves, even during the winter months. It sat between two large fields that looked a lot smaller than she remembered. Her home came into view.

And Vhalla’s heart stopped.

It was exactly as she’d left it. The thatched roof that looked thinner by the year. The barn with the broken door that had never been fixed. The weeds determined to crawl up the flagstone. Her eyes had seen horror and blood, but somehow they could still look upon the structure that had given her eleven happy years without it spontaneously combusting from being under her stare.

Smoke rose cheerfully from the chimney. The smell of bread wafted in the air as they drew closer. Vhalla glanced over her shoulders, making sure everyone was still with her. The logical part of her brain warned her that this could be a trap. That it could all be a plot to ensnare them.

Vhalla dismounted quickly and paused for a breath at the door, listening to the shuffling within. Her tensions broke, and she knocked feverishly.

“Father!” she called, keeping her voice barely under control. There was a clamor from within. “Papa!”

Casting aside her hesitations and fears, Vhalla pushed open the door, only to have it pulled the rest of the way.

Her father stood on the other side. Of average height and muscled even in age, the rich tone of his skin betrayed every hour he spent in the field. Hair that matched hers in color and tone spilled down in a mess to the bottom of his ears.

“Vhalla?” He blinked, as though she was about to disappear.

“Papa!” The child within her was unleashed, that little girl who desperately wanted her father to hold her and say everything was all right. The girl who had been thrust into the world fearful and unknown. That girl finally won for the first time in months, and tears spilled onto Vhalla’s cheeks. “Papa, Papa, Papa. . .”

Her knees lost all their strength, they were suddenly world weary and exhausted. Her father gripped her upper arms, following her to the ground. They stared at each other in awe, the rest of the world utterly forgotten.

“You’re okay.”

“I should say that to you, little bird.” He pulled her in for a tight embrace.

“I’m sorry. I should have come home sooner. I should’ve been here. I became a lady. I sent coin. Did you get it?” It all spilled out, uncontrollable. “I wanted to come home, Father, but I did so many things. I didn’t even know who I was. I didn’t know what I wanted. But I know now, I know.”

“Hush.” Her father held her cheeks and smoothed away her tears. “You’re working yourself into a frenzy for no reason.”

Vhalla swallowed and nodded, the last of her tears escaping on a laugh. “I’m so happy to see you.” Worry had given birth to grief, which shattered in the face of joy.

“I am happy to see you.” He pulled her in for another tight hug. “Are you all right?”

“I am.”

“I heard so many stories, tall tales all focused on my little bird. I was worried, but I was proud.”

Vhalla sat back on her heels, rubbing her face. She felt foolish for crying so much when nothing was wrong. But, if anything, she cried because it was right and perfect and everything she hadn’t dared let herself hope for.

“Now.” Her father stood. “I am sure you have much to tell me, but let’s start with your companions.”

“Right.” Vhalla stood as well, having completely lost herself in her father being alive and well. “Well . . .” Her eyes scanned their rag-tag lot. It was actually a humorous sight. The disgraced lord, the Southern Sorcerer, the Western noble, and the Emperor.

“Fritz is my dear friend; we met in the Tower of Sorcerers.” Vhalla introduced her friends to her father in the order they dismounted. “He’s helped me countless times and is a really gifted Waterrunner.”