Chapter 27: Fears & Flights

As the crowds dispersed, Roxi bundled me towards the cordone of palace guards at the gate and the departing noble court. Noticing our approach the guards readied their weapons and prepared to defend their liege, before lowering them again as quickly as they had raised them once they recognised us.

The sea of blue Duchal Guard livery quicked parted as we continued forward only to close again behind us as we passed into the echoing gatehouse tunnel. 

Step. Step. Step...

Passing through the dark tunnel, I let Roxi guide me as I struggled against my mind’s attempts to drag me back to a different place. The memory of acrid smoke and rotting meat burned my nostrils and I could hear the haunting scratching and creaking of the chains, hanging from the streetlamps as their fetid warnings twisted and swayed in the wind.

Step. Step Step...

A hand squeezed my own, dispelling the waking nightmare. Squeezing it in return, I let myself be pulled in closer to Roxi as we walked.

Step. Step…                       Step. Step. Step...

Ahead the darkness cloaked silhouettes of a small party, halted at the patter of our footsteps bouncing off the stone around us. Our pace slowed in reaction, but the group ahead continued their pause as if they were waiting for us.  

Picking up pace again, Roxi led us onwards towards the waiting shadows.

We exited the gatehouse into the Palace’s entrance garden courtyard. Our eyes struggled to focus on the former shadows as they adjusted to the pale light of a waning crescent moon that almost seemed dim compared to the twinkling milky star filled night sky above and the much brighter flickering torch in hands of one of party in front of us that made me want to squint and look away after the dark of the Gatehouse’s tunnel.

“Aisling? Roxiel? I was not expecting you to be still out?” came the voice of the Duchess, the barest hint of surprised concern leaking through cracks in the imperious tone of her public mask. 

Glancing down to where she had me pulled into her side, Roxi smiled. “Our date finished late,” my companion simply put, her candour about it stirring up a bubbly mix of happiness and embarrassment inside me. 

“You were there at the… the judgement?” she asked, halting in the middle as if she was trying to diplomatically think up an appropriate euphemism for a public beheading.

Giving her a hesitant nod, I swallowed attempting to work a wad of saliva past the knot forming in my throat.

“We’d set out to return just after sunset, we could hardly avoid it with the masses between us and the Palace’s main entrance,” Roxi replied.

...

An almost painful silence reigned before the Duchess finally ended it by clearing her throat. 

“Aisling, you are shivering,” she said looking my way, before glancing back up at the Amazonian Goth wrapped around me. “Let’s get out of the cold before my Healer yells at me for hampering her patient's recovery. I am sure one of my receiving rooms can be made ready with a fire, blankets and hot drinks.”

“We need to talk,” she stressed, as one of her attendants was already rushing ahead to see that such a room would be ready for us before we got there.

This time with the Duchess leading, our trip into the palace and up to the receiving rooms time not interrupted by any disdainful stewards. Instead we made our way up (at the Duchess's leisure) to the very same receiving room we’d first met her, just in time to see a team of maids filing out.

With the door closed behind us, we each moved to our own seats and I gratefully sunk into the coach I’d chosen, thankfully to be off my feet after the long day we’d had. Honestly given how much we walked up and down the city’s sloped streets I half expected I’d find I’d gained at least a point in endurance if not more.

Snatching up a pillow from beside me, I brought it up to my chest to hug.

A shadow moved in my peripheral vision and I found myself weighted down by a soft wool blanket, which was probably a good thing as moments later I felt myself bounced ever so slightly upwards as Roxi let herself drop down onto the coach next to me.

Looking to where the Duchess was sitting across from us, I could see she had also slumped into her armchair instead of sitting all prim and proper like a noble on show should. That said she hadn’t quite made the switch to the Hyde-like private persona we’d met on our first night in the city. However despite her posture there was a palpable thread of tension that almost seemed to radiate out from her, holding her up just enough to prevent her truly sitting comfortably.

Reaching towards the low table between us, the Duchess poured herself tea from an ornate blue and gold pot and raising it to her face breathed in its aroma. Her tension wavered as it seemed to dissipate for just a second.

The moment passed and she took a sip before setting the cup down again. Shifting forward in her chair her gaze drifted until it reached me and the furrowed brow of her practised sharp stare relaxed, softening her expression.

“I won’t speak any more of it as I can see it has affected you, but I am sorry you saw that out there. Both of you,” the Duchess voiced with some gentleness. “But I won’t apologise for the act in question though, it was sadly necessary. My actions are in the hope that it will ward against further bloodshed at betrayal's blade and protect my people during the coming storm.”

The tension tugged on her like a marionette’s strings until she was sitting upright, her spine straight, her knees together and her hands folded in lap. Her very posture conveyed the image of sheathed steel.

I could feel my own posture straightening in response to the tension that was now emanating from her and through the cushions under me I could tell Roxi’s was too.

“The storm is in part why I want to speak with you both. My knights have reported that those same soldiers you saw at Fort Brightsteel have now moved to seal off the western pass into the Giant’s cradle, likewise other allies of Baron Redwood have moved into the eastern pass,” she paused, giving us a chance to work out the implications of what she had just said, before stating them outright. “No further allies of mine, nor supplies will reach the city until this storm passes, nor is there any hope of escape for the majority of my people.”

As much as I’d grown to appreciate the city, valley and my time here, I didn’t want to get stuck here. If they were coming from Fort Brightspring there was a good chance the soldiers from Fort Brightsteel would recognise us and if the city fell I had no assurances I would not be trapped in a death loop. Stuck respawning in this city only to be killed over and over.

Trapped.

Despite the blankets and warm fireplace I was starting to shiver and feel as cold as I had down in the valley. Squeezing the pillow to my chest I tried to keep my arms from trembling.

“As soon as Redwood’s main force reaches the Highlands, he will enter the Cradle to lay siege and assault the city. It will then be a matter of if we can weather and overcome the storm or not...”

The Duchess’s words seemed to fade into the background as I felt the cold setting into my bones.

Sound came rushing back as an arm wrapped around me and with a slight tug and a moment of vertigo caused me to fall into Roxi’s now familiar side, where I was then held in place.

“And overcome it we will!” the Duchess declared her words sounding full of conviction and almost ringing in my ears after the silence. “But that is a matter for myself, my knights, my soldiers and my spy.”

Pulled against her as I was, my head was gently resting against the groove of Roxi’s collarbone and the top of her left breast. I could feel my pulse slowing to synchronise with the calm thump thump of her heart’s own beat as it echoed through my head. I could feel her warmth sinking in through my right side.

“What about us? We can fight too!” I objected, before my brain caught up with my mouth and my own surprise at what I’d said set in.

“I know you can,” Cerys smiled apologetically in a way that reminded me of my parents.

“But, what concerns you is that task of mine you both agreed to complete a week and one day ago in this same room. It is my wish that my knights spirit you away from the city tonight,” she stated. “Both so the two of you will be safe from the coming storm and so you will be well on your way to carrying out my request to investigate where Baron Haverhill and his faction have been receiving aid from and who are the masters pulling his strings.”

“Bu—” Roxi interjected, before she was silenced with a raised hand. 

“That said, considering the extenuating circumstances of the last week and Miss Aisling’s state of recovery, I must offer you a chance to delay if necessary. Though no more than one maybe two days at most. I would offer more, but the longer we leave it the more dangerous it will be to fly you out, not only with Baron Redwood arriving soon, but also once the new moon starts waxing it will be harder to fly the distance unseen.”

Her weight shifting next to me, I could tell Roxi was about to speak up on my behalf. Likely to request those days of rest. Leaning away from her I pulled free of her arm and straightened in my seat.

“I don’t need any longer,” I voiced, looking the Duchess in the eyes.

“I have spent enough time in bed or lazing around recovering and even with today’s extended excursion, I feel if I spend any more time recovering I’ll do myself harm out of sheer stir craziness,” I protested, my voice growing louder out of fear of more enforced bedrest. “As long as you give us time to change, pack and hopefully a couple hours rest, we… Umm, or at least I can leave tonight.”

A thoughtful expression replaced the faint smirk the Duchess had been wearing since my admission to the potential for another accident occurring out of my boredom.

“I can do better. I will have additional snacks and tea brought to this room, and while you work your way through those, I will have the maid staff pack for you. Leaving out your armor and travel clothes of course and once you are done you may go and take your rest back in your rooms. I will have the maids wake you in three hours time so you may dress quickly and leave.”

Lifting her cup, she downed the last of her tea before setting it back down on the low table.

“I’ll go speak to my staff. I will see you in roughly three hours when it is time to say farwells,” she stated as she stood and walked to the door.

“Rest well.”