Foxfire (The Blood Oath) old version

Chapter 16: The Night Sister

    There was one more name on her list, one more name scribbled on the red parchment given to her by the Nightfather. Four had fallen; the Shade, the Keeper of Mystics, the Seer, and the Highprince of Bjaarmaland. Now, she stood upon the battlements that over looked the Royal Palace of Dale.

Zelos winced at the itch of the wound on her shoulder. Prince Balder had left her a parting gift, a sore decaying from the poisonous shaft of his spear. She could smell the stench of rot. The pain was another burden, but she had been taught that such feelings were of lower mortals.

Beads of purplish crystals lined her necklaces. They were life-gems and she had taken it from the Highprince. The crystals held the secret of restoration, but her wounds were healing too slowly.

She ignored her pain and reached down for the daggers in sheaths around her thighs. Zelos pulled them out. Their silvery length gleamed in the brilliant moon's light. The night's air was unusually cold. She pushed her hat down to her back and began to run along the battlement.

The first guard to see her was standing beside a beacon lighted in times of trouble. He was in crimson leather armour and a blue cloak customary to the Rangers of Elondale. Zelos was careful. She thrust her hand forward as he swam into view. Her dagger left, cutting through the air and in a heartbeat the guard dropped dead into the garden beneath.

She went past the beacons like a wind moving through a field of grasses. Her feet carried her fast without the augmentation from her bond to a blood-sigil. The second guard was in range. He was resting on the battlement, watching the maidens in a garden below. He was shielded by an arched wall that held a crested banner of the Duke, but his head was hanging out.

Zelos did not pause. The guard's head was pushed out of the arched wall guarding him. His mind had strayed from task, while admiring the garden girls tending the royal flowers at dusk. Her footfalls were muffled, but not enough to be disguised from a man standing a few metres away.

The guard heard her approach. Zelos let her dagger free with intent to kill. The guardsman pulled his head back in time and the dagger sailed away rapidly. She hastened towards him. The air around her was growing cold. For all her experience with bloodwielders, she knew immediately that it was no trick of nature, but rather the guard was a one bonded to a blood sigil.

The tip of her ears was growing numb. Cold wind rushed past her as she chased after the guard. Suddenly, the man stopped. He raised both hands in the air as if commanding rain the night sky to fall upon her. The air around him began to grow frosty. Ice crust formed from nothing, bonding together at a rapid rate. The guard was fading from her view. It was as if he was disappearing behind a translucent shield.

"A wall of ice," Zelos stumbled to a halt. " Bloody Protector," she recognized his blood-sigil.

Her time was running out. The palace of Dale was not a place protected by simple minded guards. One strike of the gong or light from a beacon from her escaping target and a thousand bloodwielders would greet her.

Zelos sheathed her daggers. The guard was bonded to the sigil of protection. All protectors were not drawn to combat. They lacked the aptitude for such. Now she understood the defense of Elondale. She had always thought its people to be drawn to Conjuration magic, but it was not so. Every station on the battlement had two guards. One bonded to Conjuration, and the other bonded to Protection. That way, it proved possible to be offensive and defensive at the same time.

Her blades left the sheath at her back in sharp hisses. She leaped in the air. One hard swing, her sword lashed upon the wall of ice and it shattered. Pieces of broken ice crusts bounced around the floor of the battlement. The impact sent the guard to fall on the ground.

He crawled on his back to move away. Zelos raised her boot and stepped on his torso to hold him still. The pointed end of her sword kissed his neck.

"Which way to Henrik the Magnificent," she whispered, "speak and see your life spared."

The man twisted beneath her foot, "I will die before I taint my tongue with betrayal," he spat.

"No you won't," she replied.

As fast as a flash of light, she pulled another dagger from the sheath at her thigh and struck downwards. The sharp edge lashed on the guard's right fingers, separating them from his hand. Blood spurted in thin long sprays and the guard opened his mouth to scream.

Zelos raised the tip of her shoe and shoved it into his mouth that his cries were muffled. "Silent," she whispered and pulled back her foot.

"He celebrates in the Royal hall of Patrons," the man cried. "Please, I have a wife and a kid."

She grabbed him by his cloak and slammed the hilt of her dagger on his head. The guard slumped on the floor, unconscious. Zelos walked over the fallen guard. She leaped off the battlement and settled her feet on the roof of a building lying below.

Her feet sank into a puddle of water as she made for the ground. She noticed a boy lying face down in the puddle. Beads of water fell from the roof in drops, scattering as they touched his head. At first, she thought him dead. But as she drew closer, her sharp ears picked up his heartbeat. He was no threat to her, probably some drunk fool who had taken more than required at his young age.

Zelos walked past the boy and slunk into the shadows provided by the garden's trees. It was now or never. The Royal hall of Patrons stood in sight. The outer walls were of pure white and its bronze domed roofs were held by great pillars at each side. Sounds of revelry where issued into the night by drummers and the sly fingers of harpists.

The noise was a perfect cover.

She stepped upon the cobblestone, a narrow path flanked by flower gardens. Zelos paused. She opened her palm and willed onto it the mark of a trident, her blood-sigil to Evocation. Immediately, she felt the warm surge of Evocation within her.

Once again, someone must die to see the wishes of her master fulfilled. The wound on her shoulder itched. Most things she had done had never felt right. But it was not her place to be inquisitive. To kill was her sole purpose in life. It was the very purpose her Dark Patron, Vvenom, had gifted her with his blood-sigil.

Two thick armed dark-skinned guards stood abreast at the door way. Their spears were crossed over each other, barring any form of entry without invitation. Zelos halted. They had not noticed her sword which she had sheathed at her back and concealed their hilts by dropping her hat over them.

"Seal of entry," one of the guard's voice thundered.

Zelos did not have any. She peeked between their shoulders and observed the scanty crowd of aristocrats.

"I must have left mine in the wagon that brought me here," she replied.

"A wagon," the guard chuckled, "what noble rides a wagon to the royal house?"

"You are not of proper dress to grace this event," the second guard added.

Zelos felt her hand reaching towards the sword at her back.

"Mine, mine," a young boy stepped down the stairs. The guards snapped in attention, their spears resting at their side. "What a wild beauty."

She studied the young boy. His brown hair raced down in patterns akin to a corkscrew. He wore a red velvet coat with a three headed eagle -his father's crest –sewn to the pocket at his right breast. She knew the smell of nobility when it was near, but royalty, she could tell even from afar. Many of them had met their demise at the end of her blade.

"Prince William," the guard said, "she comes without a pass."

William shot an ominous glance at the guard. The middle-aged man stepped aside immediately. The young Prince stepped forward and stretched forth his arm. "Join me, please. We can't turn our backs to such a rare sight now, can we?"

Zelos put her right arm in his and the prince led the way in.