Kingdom of Stars (The Young Ancients: Timon Book Three) (3 page)

"I'd
heard about that. I'm sorry. She... Countess Alan was my cousin." The
woman looked away, and cringed a little, as if expecting him to send her away,
or scream at her. Or... Maybe she just didn't know what he was going to do? He
didn't either, so that made two of them. He wanted to be the kind of person
that didn't blame others for things they had nothing to do with however, so
tried to work from there.

"Ah.
Well... Mindy and I were planning on going to the Capital on our next off day.
Would you like to come along? You too, Karl." It wouldn't hurt to make
friends fast after all. Yes, it was using his position and wealth to do it, but
he was twelve. He had no illusions that he'd be easily making fast friends at
the school. It wasn't even the plan. He was mainly there to use it as a remote
base of operations in the real war that had started. The War against the Ancients.
At least some of them.

Remote
from Tor, who was, it turned out, infected with the mind of their enemy. King
Cordes the first. Since his brother could read fields, which basically meant
mind reading, and Timon couldn't be trusted not to think about things, that
being what he did in the main, it made sense for him to stay well away from the
man.

Tiera
was still at the school, with their brother not a half mile away, which was
dangerous. She was managing it the hard way, by learning to control her every
thought. That meant it was up to him to set the real plans in motion. He was
pretty close to the only person that really could, for the time being.

It was
what he had planned for after class, or at least luncheon. They'd started at
nine and would run for three hours. At least the people that had
stayed
would
be. Over half the class had taken off, which didn't bode well for the next day,
he didn't think. Petra acted like she didn't mind it, but she also looked at
the backs of each student that had gone away when she said to. Memorizing who
they were.

Unlike
at Lairdgren, there was no wall around the practice area at the Printer school,
so people stopped occasionally to look at them. It was a bit annoying, but one
of the boys that stopped about them looked a little familiar, his thin frame
looking slightly more gawky as he stretched a little more, growing fast, like
nobles did. He needed a haircut, but otherwise seemed to be in good health.
Wallace, Timon recalled.

Timon
waved, and got one back, which was noticed by Bethany, who cringed a little.

"Fucking
traitor." She blanched a bit and looked at Timon hard. "A friend of
yours? Or, a relative?"

"Customer.
Or, well, his father has been in the past. I run the kingdom's Fast Transport
Service? Well, I own it at least. Right now my wife, Patricia, is
running
it. You know, since I'm here." Plus business had been a little slow. It
was picking up at least, as the rebellion limped along.

That got
several of the people to stop and look at him, and it wasn't with doubt or even
shock this time. Karl let his laugh rumble as he saw it happen, and moved
closer to them.

"All
right everyone, just because our new class mate has a Fast Carriage, that
doesn't mean that you all get free trips everywhere. Just me, Bethany and Mindy
here." He said it with a straight face, as if it actually had been agreed
upon already, which got Timon to chuckle.

"If
you want free trips, get with Karl." Tim tilted his head a tiny bit and
winked. "I'll lend you a craft for it. If you take paying work, you have
to stick to normal rates though. Accepting it means you work for me, by the
way, but so far no one has complained about it too much." It just meant
Timon still owned the craft and not be out competed too much.

It was a
strange thing, but giving free rides had generated more business than anything
else so far. Once people got used to getting places fast, they really didn't
want to go back to the old ways and take weeks or months to do it anymore.

His
words though, got a laugh, which was a good natured one, and from just about
everyone in the area, including Karl. Who rubbed at his shaggy red hair and
sighed.

"Ah,
that would be nice, now wouldn't it?" Then he acted as if it hadn't been a
real offer, but just light teasing. Timon thought he got the idea. The man
wasn't stupid, but taking that kind of a deal, while in public, might make it
seem like he could be bought. Petra had just named him her assistant, which
would mean that some of the students might want him to be on their side, so
they wouldn't have to work as hard. Given the pain that Tim had gotten from him
earlier, it seemed like a good idea to him, come to think of it. Maybe he'd
take one in private? Or something else. A shield, perhaps? Everyone should have
one of those.

That of
course, would both be useful and probably something that Petra was going to
insist on for everyone. That and flying rigs. If he were older, and not her
friend, Timon would have at least insisted that she sleep with him for that
sort of thing. As it was he didn't actually want to do that with her. She was
just a bit on the large side for that. He'd done some things with his wife,
since it was kind of required by law, and she wasn't all that large herself,
but Petra...

Well,
they could work out something else. It was nice to be paid for his work, and he
didn't have so much gold that a little more wouldn't be a good thing, but Pet
was just drawing her allowance from home, and whatever Countess Printer was
paying her to teach. It wasn't going to be near enough to outfit her entire
fighting section in the same fashion that the Lairdgren school was. They didn't
even have real practice weapons yet. Not magical ones.

Timon
shook himself a bit and smiled, "well, I'm sure we can work out a special
rate for the students here. Anyway, what's next?" They had an hour left
and Karl decided that showing off how good he was at teaching was a plan, which
meant trying to instantly transform Tim into a hardened warrior, it seemed.
Thankfully he did most of this by going over the suggestions that they'd gotten
earlier, and he was allowed to try most of the unarmed stuff on Mindy. It was
easier to pull off than with the much larger man really. For one thing he could
aim blows at her face without jumping. He was about five-six now, so she was
taller, but not so much he couldn't reach that high.

It was
one of the things that Tor had done to him, making it so that he'd grow taller
than he might have otherwise. It was mainly that, and giving him a conscience
like a normal person. Unless there was more that had been hidden from him that
he hadn't guessed yet. Technically that second part was only half of what a
normal person had. It... still wasn't easy to deal with. Guilt, shame,
embarrassment, these were things that had only been a faint glimmer before for
him. Now, ever since his brother had changed him in his sleep one night, near
Noram Day, Tim had been dealing with new things that he wasn't ready for.

It had
been a chore, though he was sort of getting a handle on the worst of it. It
seemed mainly based on lying to yourself. For instance, he'd let thousands of
people die, suffocating to death with the Gray plague. He'd taken the healing
amulets slated for them, so regular men and women would die. Yes, he'd saved
some lives, since soldiers died of it too, which meant he'd single handedly
crippled the rebellion, but
that
wasn't the problem. It was the grannies
and children that haunted his sleep. So he told himself how it wasn't really
his fault, but the
King's
, since Richard could have ordered him not to
do it. Or Tor's, for not just making some more and fixing it.

Instead
the Ancient King in his brother's head had backed the play, which was part of
why Tor had altered him, and left him feeling like he was. All guilt ridden and
ashamed of himself. His brother wasn't really in control though, and changing
him might have been part of Cordes's plan to keep him from being effective in
the war that was just starting. The Ancient war.

Or, it
might have really been his brother doing what he normally did and assuming that
having power gave him the right to do whatever he wanted, since no one could
stop him. Except... That really wasn't how Tor thought. Even Cordes didn't. No,
that was the way
Tim
viewed the world and always had, at least deep
down. It was his way. Take what you wanted to and if no one could stop you,
then you had a right to it. Even now, after everything, it made a strange kind
of sense to him. Wasn't that the ultimate goal of political and personal power?
To gain control over others?

He didn't
like
it when Tor did that to him, forcing him to be more like his
brother, but Timon understood it. It was up to him to fight against it, and to
hold himself as a whole and complete person, not letting shame and all that
other emotional garbage influence him in what had to be done. It was hard
though.

Next to
him Bethany was talking to Karl, her voice still shy, and her gaze averted. At
least that's what he thought was going on at first, until her eyes went far
wider. She was looking East, out over the ocean. There was a row of focus stone
buildings in the way. In this part of the world it made a white and gray mixed
substance that was part glass and another stone. It was pretty enough, and
gleamed a bit in the late winter sun. That meant he had to blink for a second
when the craft that came over it, growling and roaring at them, came into view.

Without
waiting Timon yelled. It wasn't exactly a manly thing, but it worked well
enough.

"Shields
on! Everyone, get back... into the craft!" He had to run to the bench
along the low wall thing, which wasn't a real wall at all, being only a few
feet high and made of regular stone. It was a bit rough, as was the shelf along
the top of it. It took a bit to get to the amulets, snatch them all up
clumsily, and then work a craft up, but he had people loading about the time
that the mechanized looking thing stopped near the far side of the space and
began to settle.

Timon
didn't freeze, but had to make himself not gape at the thing. It was familiar
looking, but Tiera had explained about the clones,
and
how they could
seem like anyone, including people he knew. They might have Cordes inside them,
or possibly Gray, which would mean he might be able to tell, if he could read
them closely enough. He also might not. It wasn't something that he'd had a lot
of time to practice.

Hopefully
this time it would just be a visit from Blue or one of
her
clones, who
except for the dead one, Cordes Blue, were just themselves. His Aunt Cynthia
and her kids. The craft seemed right for it, but wasn't one he recognized. It
was enough to get him to hold his breath a bit, in fear.

Luckily
Petra had closed the outer door of the big craft, which was silver on the
outside, and shaped like a rectangle at the moment, since that was the way he'd
left it. The space inside was big and open, since Tim had been using it last to
haul lumber for his brother in-law, Tovey. It meant both that everyone fit
inside easily, since there were only about twenty of them, and that he could
see them all when he turned, just before the thing in front of them opened
fire.

"So,
no, probably
not
the Blue's come to visit." He muttered, holding
the craft in place. That part wasn't hard, since the weapons that hit it were
based on energy, he thought. Light beams of some kind, by the look of the twin
beams. They didn't do anything to his craft, which was basically a shield built
in a way that it could be seen. Tor had come up with the original idea, but
Timon
had designed and made the craft. It held, easily. That was good, since he
doubted that anyone but Petra had a shield on them here.

"I
don't have any weapons on this. Should we ram them?" He was joking of
course, since doing that would probably send debris into the school dorms
behind them. That or they'd trash one of the other buildings.

That
being the case he sighed, trying to act relaxed, and like he did things like
this all the time.

"Have
a seat everyone, we need to draw them away from the area."

From
behind him there was a grunt, and when he turned again Petra, or at least
someone, had seats appearing. Since her hand was on the wall of the craft, he
figured it was her. She was good with magic, having been around a lot more than
most people over the last few years. Having the friends that she did made that
almost natural, really. She saw him looking and nodded.

"Do
it. Take us out over the ocean, but don't lose them. I want to see who they
are."

There
was noise from the others, a lot of it scared sounding, but in that gruff,
fighters way. It was hard to explain, but almost impossible to miss, once you
heard it. A kind of dark muttering that sounded like threats, but if you
listened to the words you understood that it was mainly about planning, or an
attempt to work out what was going on, rather than anything else. It actually sounded
pretty hard and warrior like, for all that there was really an undertone to it
that spoke of terror. Tim felt that too. It wasn't as strong for him, he didn't
think, but it was there anyway.

He could
be wrong on that one though. Maybe he felt what the rest of them did?

A moment
later he took the craft up, moving slowly, so that the other craft would be
drawn along, if their goal was to do anything other than attack them. Or, more
likely,
him
. Unless Petra or Mindy had made enemies with some Ancients
while he wasn't looking? It was, he knew, just possible that Pet might have,
though it wasn't likely. Mindy... Well, other than him, odds were the girl had
never met another Immortal at all. The same was probably true for the others,
but there was always the odd chance that this ship was after one of them.