The Caste - On Hold, major edits and title change.

Chapter Fourteen

Corvus crawled out of the culvert to the Detroit side of the lake. Off in the distance, he heard the rumbling of an engine, closing in on his location. He jumped behind a wall of rock hoping to conceal himself from the approaching noise. The noise simmered to a dull roar as it came to a stop in front of the rock wall. Corvus poked his head around the side to look at who or what was waiting for him on the other side.

A muscular woman stood on a circular metal hover board revving the engine with her foot. Blue flames shot out from under it each time she revved the engine. Corvus had never seen a woman as tall as she was, she appeared to be well over six foot in height. Her hair was fashioned in a large, spiked, bright purple Mohawk, which may have added to her imposing height. She wore tattered clothing made of mesh and leather and a two-handed sword adorned her back. Corvus doubted it was there for decoration.

"Hey, weirdo." She called out to Corvus.

"Weirdo? This coming from the woman who has a caltrop on the top of her head while calling it hair. Kettle..." Corvus heard himself say.

So much for my stupid stealth skill, I blew my own cover.

The fact that she addressed Corvus in the first place reminded him she had already seen him well before he had seen her. She rode her hover board behind the rock and looked at Corvus with a smirk on her face.

"You're Cam's kid that makes you weird by association. Don't worry, kid, your dad sent me to collect you," She said. "I am Makenna Wyse, a friend from the rebellion of old."

"He sent you? How do I know you aren't lying or trying to set me up?" Corvus asked.

"Ask him yourself, he will tell you I can be trusted," She said as she tossed a transmitter to Corvus.

"What Mak says is true, Corvus." Camlin's voice came over the receiver. "She's there to bring you to the lab. I asked her to look out for you, the Caste has increased their security measures this side."

"How are we going to be all stealthy with her on that rumbling board? That is like a ticker tape parade leading its way to the lab," Corvus protested.

"Indeed, it would be if she rode it here. She will be leaving it at the stables," Camlin said. Corvus heard his side of the transmission click off.

"Stables? I didn't realize there were any stables in Detroit," Corvus said.

"Yes, shockingly enough, there are stables here for the lack of real horses. I came here for the joust the Caste is putting on. If anyone asks, you are my squire. Let's go," Mak said.

Corvus climbed onto the hover board and wrapped his arms around her waist. "Joust? I don't even know what that is."

"Think of it as two people riding towards each other at a high rate of speed to bash each other with two long wooden sticks..." Mak laughed. "It's a glorious sport, a sport enjoyed by our people centuries before the Caste took over. They did it with horses back then, but when was the last time you saw a horse?"

Horses were a myth to the general population. Corvus had seen drawings of them in Karen's books and had always believed them to be a thing of legend and myth like the monumental Kraken in the stories she had told him.

"I will take your silence as a not ever," Mak said as they pulled to a stop.

"I have only seen them in books. Ardelia told me that there were still herds of wild horses roaming the Great Plains and some up in the Upper Peninsula, though," Corvus said.

"She is right, beautiful animals they are. After our rebellion got squashed and we were all wanted, Camlin changed my papers and I high-tailed it out to Wyoming. I learned a lot about horses, seen a few, and got into the various horse sport of old," Mak said as she took her hover board into its stall.