Ferus : Book 6 of the Heku Series (9 page)

Chevalier frowned, “They were?”

“But… they went to get Kralen.”

“You’re back safe now,” he
told her, and kissed her hand.

Emily looked over at
Chevalier, and he saw from her expression that she was starting to
remember the last two months, “I turned a lot of heku to
ash.”

“I know. No one’s blaming
you.”

She cleared her throat and looked around the
room, “Why is Dain crying?”

Chevalier grinned slightly, “He’s cried
since you left.”

“Let me have him.”

“Are you sure? You’re still pretty
sick.”

She nodded, and Chevalier
called for Silas to bring the baby. Dain immediately stopped crying
when he saw his Mom, and Silas laid him down by her. The
11-month-old nuzzled to her neck, and then frowned
slightly.

Chevalier let one of her
hands go and she wrapped an arm around the baby, then caught sight
of the I.V. and tried to get her other hand free.

“No, Em, you really need to leave that
in.”

She kissed the top of
Dain’s head lightly, and then frowned, “Why does my leg
hurt?”

“There’s an I.V. in your
leg, too,” he said, and grabbed her hand when she pulled it out
from under the baby.

“Get it out,” she said, trying to pull her
hands away from him.

“No, leave it in.”

“Get it out,
now.”

“Stop it, we’re leaving it
in,” he told her sternly.

Dr. Cook heard the small argument and came
into the room, “We can take the femoral I.V. out now.”

Chevalier nodded at him, “Do it.”

The doctor walked up
cautiously, and had the I.V. out in just a few minutes. He covered
Emily back up with a blanket, “Can you eat?”

Emily just glared at him,
but didn’t answer.

Chevalier smiled slightly, “Eat or we put it
back in.”

“Take the other I.V. out and I’ll eat.”

Chevalier glanced at Dr.
Cook, and he nodded, “Sure, we can do that.”

The doctor removed the
last I.V., and Chevalier let go of Emily’s hands. She sat up slowly
and looked around the room as Dain sat up next to her and leaned
against her arm.

“The second I’m stronger,”
Emily said angrily. “I’m wiping out both the Encala and Valle
Councils.”

“Let us handle it, Em.”

“No, this is my fight and I’m not taking
it.”

“I need you to tell the
Council everything that happened,” Chevalier said. “It’ll help us
deal with the other factions.”

“I don’t need the Council
to remove the current leadership from the other
factions.”

“You’ve done a lot of
ashing over the last few months. You need to back off before you
end up in another coma.”

Emily sighed, “I need to do it.”

She looked over when a
servant brought in a tray and sat it down on the bedside table.
Chevalier moved it to the bed and removed the dome. The bedroom
door opened again, and the entire Council, except Quinn and Dustin,
came into the room.

“Now?” she asked, frowning.

“Now,” Chevalier answered.
“Tell us everything you can.”

Emily was too weak to
fight back, so she ate the steak dinner while she told the Council
everything she could remember, leaving out anything that she
planned on dealing with later. She ignored the hisses and growls as
she moved to her time with the Encala, and she was glad that her
neck was covered with gauze.

When she was finished, she
looked over at Chevalier, but his face was turned away. She reached
out and took his fisted hand, smoothing it out gently, “I’m ok…
however, I owe them all a visit.”

He looked over at her, “Let us deal with
it.”

They all looked over when
Quinn and Dustin joined them in the room. Emily caught a glimpse of
Mark and Silas talking to guards posted outside of her
door.

“What did they have to say
for themselves?” Chevalier asked angrily.

Quinn glanced at Emily and
then turned to the Council, “They deny ever feeding from her. They
are claiming that the Equites that found her must have done
it.”

“The Valle?” Emily asked.

“No, the Encala,” Kyle
told her.

The Council all turned and
looked toward the door. Emily glanced around them, but didn’t see
anything happen.

“Mark, come inside,”
Chevalier said, and stood up. He turned to the Captain when he came
into the room, “Double up her door guards. The Council needs to
meet.”

“With who?” Emily asked, gently rocking
Dain.

“The Valle want to talk to
us, and I don’t trust them,” Chevalier said, heading out the
door.

Emily watched him go and then laid down
after glancing at Mark, who was standing guard at her door.

Once the Equites Council
was seated, Derrick showed in the Valle representatives, Elder Ryan
and four Imperial Guards.

“What do you want?” Chevalier growled.

Ryan sighed, “We came with
a peace offering, and a diplomatic solution.”

“Peace offering?” Kyle
asked skeptically.

“Yes… we give him to you,”
Ryan said, and turned to one of his guards. The Imperial Guard
hissed and blurred toward the door, but the other 3 Imperial Guards
caught up with him just as the Equites Guards flooded into the
room.

“Why would we want one of your guards?” Zohn
asked.

Chevalier hissed and then spoke, “It’s
Rasmussen.”

The Ancient threw back his
hood and glared at the Equites Council, “You can’t keep me
here.”

“Put him in a cell for
now,” Quinn said. “And new orders are that Emily is to be kept out
of the prison. She no longer has free access.”

“Yes, Sir,” Derrick said,
and the Equites Guards pulled the Ancient out of the
room.

Once things quieted down,
Ryan spoke, “Now the Valle wish to discuss an alignment of the
Equites and the Valle, in hopes to take out the Encala
together.”

“Why would we align
ourselves after what you did?” Zohn asked. “You forced a member of
our Council to turn seven of our covens to ash, against her
will.”

“We realize now that was
wrong. We apologize for taking it to that level and for the amount
of pain it caused her,” Ryan said.

“Pain?” Chevalier asked.

“Yes… we should have
stopped once she began to show signs of suffering, but things got
out of hand,” Ryan explained. “We now understand that she is not a
weapon and wish to return as her friends.”

“She failed to mention the suffering part,”
Kyle said, narrowing his eyes.

“We as Elders recognize
the mistake we made in breaking the alliance, and want to know what
we would need to do to restore it.”

“That alliance was made by
Emily,” Quinn said. “She took it personally when it was broken, and
I’m not sure she would wish to continue it at this
time.”

“Please, let me apologize to her.”

Chevalier thought and then
called for Emily. A few minutes later, she came in through the back
council doors, being supported by Mark. The brighter lights in the
council chambers brought her paleness out further, and as she sat
down in a chair beside Chevalier, the council members grew
angry.

Emily looked over at Ryan, “What do you
want?”

Ryan’s eyes grew wide, “Who did that to
you?”

“The Encala did… why are you here?”

Ryan’s features softened
and his voice quieted, “We want the friendship back, Emily. We want
to realign ourselves with the Equites and to join them in
exterminating the Encala.”

Emily took a glass of
juice from a servant, and turned back to Ryan after taking a drink,
“Bring Exavior here and I’ll think about it.”

Chevalier frowned and turned to her,
“Why?”

“Elder Exavior was banned
from coming to Council City. It was part of the conditions for his
return,” Ryan explained.

“Then no,” Emily said, leaning back in her
chair.

“Please, reconsider… the
Equites and the Valle could wipe out the Encala quickly, and then
peace would return to the heku again.”

“No”

Ryan sighed, “Think about it, at least.”

Emily shrugged, “I’ll think about it.”

The Valle Elder smiled, “Good, then we’ll
return and wait for your call.”

Elder Ryan and the
remaining Imperial Guards moved out of the Equites Council Chambers
quickly, and the door was shut.

“That was interesting,” the Chief of Defense
said, turning toward the others.

The Council all turned to
watch Emily as she stared into the glass of juice. She finally
sighed and called for the Cavalry to mount up. There was a rush of
movement inside the palace as the Cavalry left for the stables and
guards replaced them at their posts.

Mark came and helped Emily
out of the Council room.

“What are we going to do
with Rasmussen?” Kyle asked when they heard the Cavalry leaving the
palace grounds.

“Banish him again, I guess,” Quinn said.

“I foresee Lady Emily
going after Exavior,” Dustin said, deep in thought.

“I agree,” Kyle sighed.
“She seems to still have a bit of a vendetta.”

“What do you think she’s thinking about?”
Quinn asked Chevalier.

“Either going after
Exavior, the Valle, the Encala, or all of them.”

“She’s still pretty weak.
We have a week or so before she’ll feel up to doing that,” Zohn
told them. “We either need to come to an agreement, or figure out
how to stop her.”

***

“Emily?” Mark whispered,
and touched her arm lightly.

She sat up and looked at him, “What’s
wrong?”

“The Council needs you for
a few minutes.”

“What time is it?” she asked, yawning.

“It’s 5 o’clock.”

“Ok, have some breakfast
brought in, too?”

Mark nodded and left the
room when Emily got out of bed. She’d regained most of her strength
back in the week since the Valle visit, but was still pale and
sometimes had dizzy spells. She dressed quickly and tied her hair
up as she walked down to the back entrance to the council chambers.
When she walked in, the Council turned to her.

“Sorry, we know it’s early,” Quinn said.

“Come, sit,” Chevalier
told her, and motioned for the chair beside him.

Emily sat down after
taking a tray full of fruit and coffee from a servant, and then
turned to the trial area. Her eyes narrowed when she saw Encala
Elder Aaron standing beside their Chief Enforcer, Frederick, and
two guards.

“It’s good to see you are well,” Aaron said,
smiling.

Emily frowned, “No thanks to you.”

“We regret what we had to do to protect
ourselves.”

“Whatever… why did you wake me up?” she
asked, grabbing a few grapes.

“We’ve come to ask the
Equites to realign with us, so the Encala and the Equites can
remove the Valle faction,” Aaron explained.

Emily grinned and looked at Kyle, “Is this a
joke?”

“No,” Kyle told her, and
grinned slightly.

“So… you all feed from me
every three days until I can’t even move, and now you want to be
friends?” she asked, frowning.

“We apologize for what we did, again… but we
had to protect our city from your abilities.”

“You wouldn’t have had to protect yourselves
if you had let me go.”

“That wasn’t an option
either. We felt that the Encala would be the best place for you… at
the time…”

“Until you almost killed
me, and then you figured you’d drop me off in the middle of nowhere
in the mud?”

Aaron frowned, “That’s another thing… we
want to know who took you from the Encala palace.”

Emily smiled, “You have no idea who returned
me to the Equites?”

“No, and we need to know, for security
reasons.”

“Why would I tell you that? The heku saved
me.”

“It’s important that we know.”

“I’m not going to tell
you, and I’m not recovered enough to forgive you for the constant
feedings,” she told him.

“At least think about it and let us know,”
Aaron asked.

“Oh, one other thing,” Emily said. Everyone
turned to her and then spun toward Frederick when he dropped to his
knees, gasping for breath as he tore the shirt from his burning
chest.

When the Encala’s Chief Enforcer fell to the
ground, Emily released him, “That’s for the kiss.”

“You kissed her?” Chevalier growled.

Frederick growled, and
then blurred toward Emily, but found himself quickly pinned to the
dirt floor of the council chambers by Kyle and Dustin. He fought
against them, and glared with feral eyes toward Emily.

“Calm down or we’ll put you in our prison,”
Dustin yelled at him.

The Equites finally let
him up once he calmed down, and he turned and stormed out of the
council chambers, followed the other Encala.

Emily sighed and got up to leave.

“You neglected to mention the kiss during
our briefing,” Zohn said, turning to her.

She paused at the door,
and then left without saying anything.

Zohn frowned, “Strange,
Aaron obviously fed from her, yet she chose to burn the
kisser.”