Chapter 18

"A miniature woman managed to kick you in the nethers and ran away?" asked the Commandant, looking dubiously at the Defender. "Just how did a woman only a foot tall..." He let the question drift off unasked, shaking his head. "I'll see that it's recorded on the duty report, dismissed."

The Commandant could be forgiven for being somewhat curt. He had a full plate set before him and only a day before a coronation - or a rebellion. In either case, he would need his defenders on their toes.

He glanced once again at the soldier as he strode out of his temporary office, set up amid the grandeur of the palace. Not that he expected to get used to this, but it was nicer than his normal posting. That office was now destroyed, having been in the destroyed part of the Defender's quarters. He imagined that once Keeley took up residence, he would be temporarily in a tent or office in the Palace until new quarters could be built. Assuming, of course, that the Theocracy did not hold Tressen within a few days.

Halfling merchants, running quick little sloops, brought word of the Theocracy fleet yesterday, saying they were only two days out. The haste with which the little folk conducted business, taking losses on their trade goods and leaving this very morning, had proved their word.

Further, half of the dignitaries from other nations had fled the city. The ambassadors of Costa Roja, Abia, and four Ghantian city-states had left overnight with two other city-states and several of the larger Realmslanders leaving this day.

Surprisingly, rioting had been light, with only a bit of looting of the abandoned embassies and a few riots that could well have been bar brawls grown large. The nobles were still restive, but had left only a tiny honor guard each in the square, all sitting in tiny knots and watching the palace.

The Commandant had pointed out that it might precipitate more violence if anyone were hurt during such a sweep.

He had already had the Captain of the Guard call up the reservists, and now the guard had four thousands under arms, but it hardly matched the numbers of the noble houses' private guards, and those were both better equipped and trained.

Tornadin and the other nobles who had already sworn to the uncrowned queen had put their troops at the Commandant's disposal, and they had been deployed where needed and a Blue Order wizard went with each platoon sent on patrol.

He was unsure if the added mage was a morale booster or simply made the Defenders more nervous than before.

"Leave?" asked Keeley, pulling an oilskin cloak over her shoulders even as she questioned. "But why? I thought I was to live here."

"And you shall," said Phillip, handing another cloak to Siska. "After we settle the city down and have things in place for your coronation."

Tornadin nodded agreement. He simply stood, rendered ineffectual by circumstance, and rubbed his hands together nervously. "My country estate is well-protected, my queen," he said. "Few can breach Ironoak without a full army."

Siska looked toward her mother who was busily talking to Tarmal. The two had the air of people making complex and private plans.

Mannis and Varan entered the chamber. "The horses are saddled," he said. "We would have gotten a coach, but it would have drawn more eyes."

"If the streets erupt, horses are better alone," said Phillip, shaking his head. "Is your whole squad going?"

"Yes, Mentor," said the Defender, nodding his head and tilting it toward the door to the stable yard. "They are mounted and await."

"Siskana?" asked Siska, her eyes going out of focus as if she were looking farther than the walls of this bare chamber. "Siskana is hurt." She looked toward the inner door and ran through it.

Phillip rolled his eyes and jerked an arm toward where Siska had gone. "Fetch her back here, Mannis, please," he said. "We've no time to waste chasing familiars."

Varan chuckled at the dazed look on Mannis' face but the tall red-haired Defender took off at a jog after Siska.

Siska was soon running down a corridor she did not recognize. It was not lit like the rest of the palace had been, despite being just as ornately decorated. Tapestries hung from the walls, as if it were already deep winter and someone was trying to keep drafts down. Dim light filtered in through curtained windows and she could make out highly polished floors and the gilding upon ornate woodwork near the ceiling.

Walking that hallway, she found a door ajar midway down the hall and pushed it open as Mannis came out of the stairwell behind her. "Phillip wants you back down there," he said, though his voice had little command in it. He could not bring himself to be short with Siska.

She glanced at him. "In a moment," she said. "A minute or two will make small difference."

The room beyond was dark and seemed to have no outside windows. She summoned light to herself and it coalesced from around the windows and formed into an orb in her hand, shining brightly. The light of the windows only dimmed a moment before returning to normal.

Siska quirked up an eyebrow. That was not how she had been shown to create a light source, but it did seem to work. The room was filled with covered furniture. The linen sheets over the pieces gave them an otherworldly look, making a room that was likely lovely an air of eeriness that bordered on scary.

Near the fireplace, Siskana lay in a tiny pool of blood.

A dead cat lay beside her, its fur still smoking from whatever had slain it.

At Siska's footsteps approaching, Siskana lifted her head and smiled weakly. None of that seemingly limitless energy seemed left to the little homunculus, she simply laid her head back down and breathed deeply. One of her little legs was bent at an odd angle and there were great rents in her robe, some new some old.

"What happened to you, Siskana? How did you get here?" Siska picked up the tiny copy and held her little body in both hands. Miniature arms and legs hung downward and Siskana let out a wail of pain from her leg shifting.

Quickly, Siska sat her upon what must have been a covered chair, making a spot for the miniature woman to lie on a padded surface. Blood began darkening the sheet and Mannis shook his head. "She's hurt badly to loose so much blood at such a size," he said.

"You're taught to tend wounds," said Siska brusquely. "Tend hers." Tears were welling in her eyes but refused to fall.

Mannis blinked once, but then moved, kneeling beside the chair and pulling a small knife from his belt. He slit away the tiny robes and began examining the deep bite marks on Siskana's chest.

Siskana shoved his hand back and gestured to the fireplace. She had fallen near that white marble tower against the wall. She pointed at it again, with more emphasis, before collapsing onto her back and allowing Mannis to examine her wounds.

Siska walked to it. "Why do you care about this fireplace, Siskana?" she asked, and then looked back at the homunculus.

Siskana shrugged then shook her head, but again waved a weak hand toward the fireplace.

It was a rather plain-looking fireplace. Well-made, to be sure, and crafted of fine blue-veined marble, "It's but a fireplace," observed Siska.

A look of stubborn annoyance came to Siskana's face at Siska's confusion and she gestured upward, curling her hand forward and upward in a motion. It was almost a gesture Siska had seen wagon drivers give one another when angry.

"She's setting the flue," said Mannis. "Open the flue."

Siska crouched down and reached up under the mantle of the fireplace. She fumbled for a moment before she found a iron handle and was able to pull it. It opened partially before stopping.

"It's stuck," she said.

Mannis was then cutting small pieces of cloth from his handkerchief with the sharp little knife and pressing them, like gauze, to Siskana's wounds.

Trying again, Siska heaved with both hands, but the flue was stuck fast.

Muttering an incantation in frustration, Siska pulled strength from the stones about her feet and head, possibly shortening their lives by a few years (not that it would matter to stone) and dumping that strength into her arms.

With a mighty heave, she pulled again. Something inside the chimney snapped and there was a sliding sound.

From the flue slid a wooden rod as thick as Siska's wrist. It continued sliding until it clattered to the floor at her feet. A six foot length of wood, polished to a glassy gleam and bearing an orb of blue-white crystal the size of a man's fist atop it.

"A staff?" asked Siska.

Mannis nodded. "Looks like a staff to me," he said, agreeably enough.

Siska glared at him a moment. "Wise arse," she said, but smiled. She bent and picked up the long pole of wood.

The world shifted before her eyes. The room was not dark and filled with covered furniture. It was brightly lit by lamps and the furniture was uncovered. Beautiful furniture it was, too, crafted of heavy oak and polished until it shone. The cushions were embroidered and fringed, as well as covered in silk. She looked to where Mannis and Siskana should be, but there was no one there.

The door burst open and she leaped back, clutching the staff before her, as if ready to use it to bash whomever rushed in.

It was Tarviel that sprinted into the room, slamming the door behind himself. He held the very staff Siska held. With a gesture, the furniture slid to block the door and he looked about frantically. From the corridor outside someone slammed into the door and the furniture, despite its weight, slid slightly inward.

"You die this night, Wizard, like your king before you and the rest of your kin," screamed a voice through the door.

Tarviel had a haggard, worn look. He was exhausted. Siska knew he had been casting spells, and had probably cast his last until he could rest for a while.

She doubted that the people outside would allow him that rest.

Apparently, he had yet one spell in him. He lifted the staff and began to incant. The milky blue crystal atop it flashed for a moment, then went dark again.

He then ran to the fireplace, shoving the staff up into the chimney and shutting off the flue. Luckily, the fireplace was cold.

No sooner did he rise from that before the door creaked inward then busted off its hinges, falling atop the furniture pile and into the room.

A crossbow bolt took the wizard in the chest, then a second. Siska screamed. "No!" she said, leaping forward. A third, then fourth bolt leaped from his chest as they impacted his body with enough force that one ran clean through him, striking sparks from the fireplace as it hit the marble.

Tarviel fell to his knees, then forward onto his face. The men who had chased him came in to prod at the corpse with their drawn swords. The men were dressed in finery, as if they had been attending a ball, a detail that stuck in Siska's mind, with another ball fresh in her memory.

The sight of her great grandfather lying in a spreading pool of blood made her weep openly. The surroundings grew hazy as she reopened her eyes.

Mannis stood before her. "I've done what I can for her," he said. "She needs a healer."

Siska blinked a moment, looking about her as if unfamiliar with the surroundings then nodded quickly.

Siskana was prone on a large pillow, clutching at her side still. One of the homunculus' tiny legs was splinted to the other. However, the expression on her miniature face was one of embarrassment.

"She fought me removing her robes," said Mannis, noting Siska's lifted brows. "I finally had to hold her down with one hand and tie the knots with the other."

The miniature of Siska glared at Mannis, but was blushing furiously. Naturally, she felt much the same, if simplified, emotions that Siska felt herself. If Mannis had tried to disrobe her... That thought bore no further examination as a crimson flush suffused Siska's own cheeks. She hefted the staff, instead. "I think this may be of some import," she said.

"It looks important," observed Mannis, eyeing the rod. "Do you wizards often wedge your staves in chimneys?"

Siska gave him a peculiar look. She had been noting a rather smart tongue on Mannis of late. She wondered if it were a good sign or bad. Appreciation for wit was not lacking in her, though. Was he simply growing somewhat more comfortable in her presence?

Rather than think too hard on such matters, she kissed his cheek and patted his hand, looking down at the trussed up homunculus. "Consider viewing her as the best you'll see," she said. Siskana sniffed and crossed her arms, despite the wince of pain that gesture brought to her.

Siska held the staff out to Mannis. "I shall carry her if you'll bear this," she said.

He reached for it, but as soon as his fingertips brushed the polished wood of the stave, a white flash erupted from the point of contact. When vision returned to both Siska and Mannis, he was sprawled on the floor, shaking his head and some five paces further toward the door. They both stared at the wood, black spots dancing before their vision. "Or perhaps you can carry it?" asked Mannis, picking himself, and apparently his wit, up off the floor.

He scooped Siskana up, despite her squeaks of protest. Those squeaks were sounding more and more like speech every day. He wrapped a bit of white cloth cut from the dust sheets about her gently and the little copy of Siska ceased her protests, smiling warmly at Mannis instead.

Again Siska lifted a brow at this interplay, but held her tongue. "Phillip will be fit to be tied by now," said Mannis.

In truth, when they returned to the small cloakroom off the stable yard, Phillip was in a fine lather. "Where in the One's sight have you two been?" he said. His hair was standing up from his head, as if he had been running fingers through it.

Siska held up the staff and he fell silent despite the words seemingly ready to roll of his tongue. "The Staff," he said in a hoarse whisper. The capital letters were quite apparent.

"A staff, anyway," said Siska, deciding that her tongue and Mannis' were well matched, after all. Mannis smirked beside her, similar thoughts evident on his freckled face.

"No, that is The Staff," said Phillip. "The badge of office of the Magus of Tressen."

"Well, then, with a queen and staff, the Blue Order can have a new Magus," she said, holding it out to him. Phillip leaped back as if she threatened him with it.

"If you're carrying it, no one else may," said Phillip, tucking his hands beneath the opposite arm to prevent their being anywhere the staff might touch them.

"Then how can I give it to the Magus?" asked Siska.

"You are the Magus - It will accept only the most powerful Wizard of the Blue Order." Phillip looked at it longingly but with a bittersweet knowledge in his eyes. "Like the crown, it knows beyond our own ken."

Siska blinked at him. "I'm an apprentice, not a wizard," she said.

Phillip nodded. "And normally, that would be enough to make a wizard, even one less gifted, more powerful," he said. "But your power is so far beyond that of any other wizard. The staff knows who is strongest."

"I don't want to be Magus," she said. "I'll resign the Blue Order, then someone else can take it up."

"You'll do no such thing," said Tarmal, walking in from the downpour outside and shaking water from his cloak. "The council won't accept your resignation - I'll see to that. You still owe us money, if no other reason serves."

Siska glared at Tarmal and then at Phillip. "Why is this happening to me?" she asked, suddenly sounding very much like an upset little girl.

"Because of what you are Siska. Your power demands duty in equal measure." Phillip's voice sounded resigned, as if he, too, wished her life were simpler.

"I don't know the first thing about being the Magus," she said, glaring at the staff. "I'm an apprentice." Her voice ended that last sounding small and lost.

"You're the Magus," said Tarmal, shrugging. "It's not like you were just promoted to queen or anything."

"No, that was poor Keeley who had that thrust upon her," growled Siska, sudden petulance blooming in her chest. "What's next? Mannis made Commandant of the Defenders? Siskana forced to serve as the Admiral-General?"

Mannis and Siskana gave forth remarkably similar squeaks and seemed to cringe in unison as if Siska's declaration might truly make something happen.

Tarmal barked a laugh. "The fates work in such ways, Siska. They made you and Keeley friends knowing that you both would be forced to work together later."

"You've never been spiritual before," said Phillip, lifting an eyebrow at his friend's words.

"One need not wear his religion on his sleeve to have it," said Tarmal with a shrug. "It does not stop something from being truth."

Siska turned, still clutching the six-foot length of hardwood and its glowing cap. Phillip and Tarmal leaped back as it swung. "If I'm the Magus, then you folk have to do as I say, no?" she asked.

Hesitantly, Tarmal nodded. "Within the strictures of the title, yes," he said.

"Then Phillip is my advisor," she said, trying to force an imperious tone into her voice. "And you are my counsel," she added, making Tarmal take another step back as the staff swung around toward him again. "Mentor Phillip will continue my education and you will keep me abreast of matters of office, especially as I know nothing of the office or the matters."

"As ordered Magus," said Tarmal formally, bowing his head slightly and making an odd gesture with his left hand, lifting it before his chest and holding forth two fingers. Phillip echoed those words and the motion a moment later. None had given that reply or gesture in over a century.

The city needs you to be strong, a voice in her mind said. It was Tarviel's voice, speaking clearly into her conscious thoughts. The Theocracy comes and there are enemies within who would depose your friend before she can even be crowned.

Tarviel? asked Siska into her own mind. I thought you came only in dreams.

When you hold the staff, I can speak to you, he said. Seize control of this matter, you are the Magus of Tressen, it is high time the city had one and you shall act the part. She felt a welling of resolve form in the pit of her stomach and stiffen her back.

"We should move Queen Keeley to Tornadin's manor," said Siska, cinching her cloak about her. "Things are in motion and matters must be resolved."

Phillip and Tarmal blinked at one another and at the sudden change in Siska. There was no mockery in their tones as they both repeated: "As ordered Magus," and the bows.

Outside they found a dozen mounts arrayed into four ranks of three. Keeley was inside, behind the first rank, with a horse to either side being ridden by a Defender. Varan was on the right of her and Siska was placed in the center horse behind her. Phillip and Tarmal flanked her in that formation with another blue-robed wizard riding in the center position at the head of the column. Defenders rode the remaining horses, all sitting at their ease.

Defenders were trained to fight in all conditions and situations. They were as ready to fight from horseback as afoot or aboard ship. Half of them sported heavy crossbows and the other half had the thick elkhorn bows that Coghlanders usually favored.

Even as they cleared the narrow gate in the back wall of the palace grounds, a half dozen more mounts rode up. The Defenders moved automatically to intercept them, but Phillip called them down. "Thean, I believe we can dispense with the escort," he said.

The brown-haired woman tossed back the hood of her cloak and glared at him. "In addition to any other reasons, my orders have not been changed," she said. She gripped the hilt of her long-bladed sword as if considering using it on her charge to enforce her right to protect him.

Two of the other guardsmen chuckled. Their brown cloaks were indistinct, but they wore the livery of the guard beneath them. The sixth horse was a pack animal, laden with foodstuffs and what seemed to be a tent. Thean waved a hand at it. "But if you refuse to allow us to come, we will simply follow and stay near to hand."

"There's no need for that," said Keeley, dancing her horse around Varan's and smiling at the soldiers. "You're welcome to come, of course, squad leader."

Thean's expression softened to a smile. "Thank you milady," she said, wiping back a lock of hair that had become matted to her forehead. "Perhaps with a queen being crowned, some sense will come to the people of this city." The look she directed at Phillip spoke firmly as to which particular citizens were in need of sensibility.

The ranks of horses were jostled as they moved down the street and Phillip found himself bracketed between Thean and that young guardsman with the Defender's blade peering over his shoulder. Mannis, who rode very close to her on her mount, took his place beside Siska; the two were speaking quietly.

Thean had managed to secure a tall mount, indeed, and managed to be sitting slightly higher than Phillip. She rode close to him, too, he noted with an unsettling pleasure. "I couldn't let you take a romantic ride into the country without me," she said, almost managing to sound demure.

Phillip blinked up at the sodden sky, then back at Thean. "Romantic?" he asked. "It's raining in sheets."

"And we'll have a good chance to help one another dry off, hmm?" asked Thean, pressing her tall brown horse closer.

"I could cast a rain ward," said Phillip quietly.

"Don't you dare!" hissed Thean. "I want you cold and wet when we get to the manor. It's my place to dry and warm you - If I want to by then, you stubborn old man."

Tarmal chuckled and then looked quickly away before Thean could turn her acidic tongue onto him. Thean's men were already wise enough to ignore her activities of the heart, or to at least not make comment on them. Gulchof did spend a moment leaning in close to one of the other soldiers to say something, but he did so quietly.

In truth, most of Thean's men were more than happy to have their squad leader infatuated with a man. In the past, she had been much more tolerant during her periods of romantic interest.

Siska idly bounced her heels off the flanks of her mount, much to the horse's consternation as it thought to gallop and saw itself surrounded. She was not goading the beast, however, simply idly moving. Her attention lay with Mannis who was still cuddling the tiny Siskana in his arm, swaddled like a baby.

The little homunculus watched about herself with great interest, but Siska also noted a great deal of attention from Siskana went to Mannis, himself. Why was she leading me to the staff? Siska wondered, looking at the staff in question. It gleamed wetly from across the shoulders of the horse, tied in place before the saddle. The staff seemed to cause a horse no harm, though it did harm people in great measure, flashing and flinging away from it those who touched it.

"She's quite taken with you," said Siska, finally breaking the long silence, despite Mannis and her riding closely.

He smiled down at the miniature copy of Siska and then at the young wizard, herself. "Well, she is beautiful," he said in a warm voice. Little Siskana cooed at that and Siska felt her own cheeks flush at the compliment.