Queensmen

Chapter 18

~An Entrance~

Oris didn't need to think hard about that one, she already knew the answer. She had come too far for something as meager as a wall to stop her. She needed to be in the palace. If she wasn't, Rodholf wouldn't be able to find her.

What had stunned her was the fact that it had barely been ten minutes since she had come in contact with the palace, however indirect said contact was, yet she had already been targeted.

Oris shook her head, feeling that the situation was a bit too humorous. Fate was clearly at work again. So much for my plans to blend into the shadows.

"This," she began, running her thumb over the red stain drawn over her lips. "Do you think this will be able to break me?"

For a moment there was silence, silence she was afraid of because if her closest maids had no faith in her, her chances of survival would plummet. They were the physical extensions of her will. If they didn't think she could make it, what would make them fight for her?

"Hell naw!" Andrea yelled suddenly, scattering Oris' train of thought. The girl clapped her hands together cheerfully and grinned. "I'm with you, Mistress."

"Really?" Oris teased with a smile, a relieved smile, while examining the deep red on her thumb. "And what about your fellow maids?"

"This servant is with you," Seline muttered, color flooding her cheeks, "always."

"Of course, I'm with you, Mistress," Mayree cleared her throat, looking a bit flustered. "We all are."

"I'll do my best," Keziah added.

"Then I have no doubt we'll make it through," Oris said softly, a plan already forming at the edges of her mind. "Mayree, can you—"

A knock on the carriage door interrupted her. "My Lady?" A squeaky voice asked with misplaced uncertainty.

"Faeradaigh?" Oris called back as though she wasn't sure that it was the fat eunuch that was asking for her. It was a game nobility liked to play, pretending that they had lost the ability to recognize each other's voices.

"It is I, My Lady," he replied.

"So it is," Oris let out a loud sigh of relief. "If it had been any other. . ." she purposely trailed off, she herself not knowing what she intended to imply.

"Never," the eunuch declared. "I shall never allow anyone unworthy disturb your rest, My Lady."

"I am glad." Oris smiled lazily, watching as Mayree and Andrea clapped their hands over the other's mouth to silence the laughs that would have given them away.

Even Seline had a slight twitch to her lips and Keziah's eyes glittered with mirth.

"Faeradaigh, why haven't we advanced into the palace?" She tried her best to inject distress into her tone. It wasn't nearly as much as she felt and it was for all the wrong reasons as well.

"Well," he started then went silent. Oris could imagine him wiping at his sweaty face again. It wasn't a pleasant image. It never was.

"Well?" she repeated, trying to coax what she already knew from the man.

"The gates can't be opened by this time," his voice dropped a beat in volume as though the words were a secret and did not state the obvious.

"Which time?" Oris scoffed, not having to fake her displeasure. "It is clear that the guards are on orders not to let us in."

"My . . . My Lady," Faeradaigh stumbled over his words while fumbling for a reply. "The maids. . . They must no hear such words of. . .treason."