The Silence Within (The Young Ancients: Tiera) (12 page)

"After I close later, if she doesn't come to find me first, then."

The conversation wound down about then, which was fine with Tiera, since, while she loved her brother, he tended to be a little boring at times. True, he often had wonderful magics to share and managed to get himself into trouble more often than not in incredibly diverse ways, but he couldn't carry a decent conversation to save his life. That was due to his work ethic being stuck to the on position all the time, she thought. He couldn't just be happy sitting and chatting, he had to
do
things without end.

It was why he had a full bakery display case, even though no one had been in to buy anything while she was there.

In conversation, you couldn't just complain to him about something, like needing more sleep, because he'd find out what you needed, and then work out some magic to fix it for you. That or he'd fret over not being able to help you enough, when all you really wanted was a nap. Then he'd shut down and go glaze eyed, thinking about what to do.

He was brilliant because of it, but also weird.

She smiled at him, knowing that all of that would reach him pretty easily, since she wasn't hiding it at all. That was the point. It was mean, though true enough, but would also, hopefully, keep him from finding out what she was really thinking. There was a small chance that he might just try and stop her from killing Count Morris and Sandra when the time came. He'd actually told her to kill them all, the whole family, but she was nearly certain that had actually been the Ancient King Cordes, talking through him. Tor didn't tell people to kill, even if it was the only option.

He was capable of
doing
it, and had, but it wasn't his normal way at all.

She walked out of the shop, waving to him, trying to hold her mind as blank as possible. It was harder than it should have been, since thinking about Sandra left her feeling angry and out of sorts again. Not as much as she would have a month before, but enough that it tried to steal her control away.

She jogged, slowly, back to her room. Tiera wouldn't need a basket of treats for the afternoon, and it would make a decent meal to replace dinner. Then she had to head straight back to the practice square, since being late would make her look bad and the others would make fun of her. If it happened to Havar or Karen, no one would say much, as long as it wasn't too big of a time gap. If
she
was the last one in, even by a minute, then Kolb would mock her for it. That wasn't fair, but she sort of understood why that was. After all, she had a long time to live with bad habits, if they took hold, and Kolb wouldn't want that for her. As a family member it was his job to help raise her, but not the others so much.

Thankfully the person being attacked wasn't her, as she thought it might be, and instead was a likely looking fifth year girl that seemed to have been drinking that morning. The healing amulet would have cleaned that out for her, but instead of just admitting to her weakness, she'd tried to hide it. That had Kolb pointing to her covertly as Tiera walked in. She waited for the others to get there however before moving, padding up behind her as she moved in to strike a much smaller girl that was probably a first year.

Given the sloppy blow, that was probably just the tall dark haired girl's way of taking it easy. Unfortunately, that wasn't going to happen that day. They were at war after all, and somebody had to remind them all of that, or they'd get lazy.

This time the fight was one sided again, but went the other way around. The girl she didn't know, except by reputation, wasn't just a bit tipsy, but was near to falling over with drink. That meant she didn't do very well against Tiera, even if she wasn't holding to any kind of rules at all. She tried to dig her eye out at one point, which hurt horribly, but didn't stop the battle. After about five minutes of both of them going full out, Tiera had the other girl pretty much tired out and trying to cover herself from the worst of the attack.

Without asking if she should, she jumped back, waiting for the woman to stand. It took a while.

"What the fucking hell?" She sounded blurry and like she might just need to throw up. "Who do you think you are?"

It was Karen that answered, by laughing and jumping on her, thrashing her with pure abandon, stomping her after she fell to the ground.

"Get up Mags. You know the score, coming in drunk is about as bad as not showing up at all. You'll have to answer for it. Be thankful your warning was from a first year. We
were
planning to set Kolb on you."

When the woman wasn't able to get up on her own, but still fighting weakly, Havar got to have his turn. It was less of a beating and more like a prank, pulling the woman by the arm to the pond near the back and tossing her in bodily.

"Gah!"

That let them all know that she didn't have a temperature amulet on. If she owned one. It was very possible that she just didn't. They were hard to get, if you didn't have family that could provide them for you.

There was a round of applause then, from behind them, which got the woman in the water, Mags, apparently, to growl and shake her fist.

"You're all monsters, you know that?" She sounded upset and like she might just actually mean it.

Tiera nodded.

"We know. Now, are you coming out, or are we going to continue in there?" It would be to her advantage, but seemed interesting enough for Tiera to try. The woman was about six-eight or nine and waist deep. Tiera would have to fight with the water around her chest...

That wasn't lost on Mags, but it didn't help her a lot. In fact, Tiera nearly drowned her. Twice. Then had to pull her out by the hair, so they could heal her and get to the rest of the day.

This time they all flew, because the word had been spread by the first session that they needed all their gear on them from then on. Mags didn't have hers, clearly, and some of the other first year kids didn't own flying gear at all, which got Kolb to stare at her, expecting her to give them a ride. She shrugged and shook her head. After all, they'd already done that one.

"We need to move as a group, so how do we carry someone that doesn't have flying gear or a shield? I think we need rope."

That got some people to run at least and while it took longer than ten minutes to move the three miles to the range, with a few of the people dangling under some of the others, sitting in rope chairs, they all made it alive. Tiera carried Mags herself, and was very careful, since her punishment was either over, or hadn't happened yet. Depending on what the others said. They hadn't been beating her for that reason, but Kolb might count it anyway, since it had been pretty one sided.

"Going down." She called this out so the other woman could find her feet in time to stand. It worked, since she went
really
slowly. Not all of the others were as nice to their packages, and some of the kids were dropped on their butts in the dirt. "Hey, watch it! They need to be able to run back."

That got a groan, but not as much as the exercise did, since the others had heard all about that too, from the morning class. This time Kolb and Tiera were on force lance, and both had very high end ones. Technically she wasn't allowed one at school, but she hadn't turned her weapons in at all, since she was planning to kill some people. It made a warped kind of sense to her at least, and Kolb didn't say anything about it.

Some of the people circled around, which was, she realized, what she should have done earlier, and attacked them from behind while their friends made it to safety. It was a better plan than hers had been by far, and while Kolb and she fought bravely and even well enough, the eight people managed to take them after a while. Two of them were for her, the others all ganged up on the head Instructor.

Then they did a very similar run back toward the school, but with Havar calling out what was supposed to be done. He wasn't as nice about it, staying on the road and calling out to people if he could still see any hint of them as they hid. After a bit he started to yell if they weren't hidden fast enough, and by the end, the school in sight, he only gave them a few seconds to vanish, which was a lot harder than it sounded like, since the good cover was farther away. She made it each time, but barely. One of the others did too, but only by using military grade Tor-shoes.

Even Kolb was called out once. He didn't complain though, just pushing to do better on the next round.

Then they were all let go for dinner. The afternoon class was easier than the morning one, being several hours shorter, at least the way
she
did it. There were still things to do that night, like check on Alice and her project and make certain they got what was needed. After munching on the rest of the rolls in her room, she headed out, using her Fast Carriage for it, since she'd walked and run a lot that day already. She wasn't sore, but didn't want to be coming back in the dark if she could help it. That probably was going to happen anyway. Everything always took longer than it should, didn't it?

It wasn't hard to find the new training center by air at all, since Alice arranged all the buildings that Tor had for her in a large circle. There were seven of them, not the six that Gerent had mentioned, which meant that Tor was around somewhere, or had been. Really, that probably meant
her
job was done as far as this went. There was no one outside that she could see, and Tiera wasn't going to go to each door and knock. The places were huge after all, and even if she got the right one there was a better than even chance that no one would hear her.

There was movement back in the woods, once she looked, and three people came walking out, not a minute after she got there. One of them was wearing all orange too, which looked hideous on her. It was a bright color, one that Tiera didn't think was natural at all. Easy to see at a distance however.

She used the low mode of her craft and floated to them, since they were actually over half a mile away. When she settled and got out, there was a bit of a surprise, since it wasn't Judy, Alice and Tor like she'd thought at first, but Gerent, Orange and Carol Coltress.

Tiera smiled and snapped her fingers playfully.

"Right!
Beatings
. Sorry, we can go and do that now. Do you know where Bonita has gotten to?" She spoke to Carol, but it was, very strangely, her Aunt that spoke.

"She's coming here, along with Burkes, tomorrow. She's helping to manage the first students for me, so that Judith Kerry and I can work on actual training. Gerent came to see about that marriage proposal." This last bit was shared with a deadpanned face, but a look that lingered on the little man next to her, who didn't blush at all for some reason.

He normally did, so it was different, though not a bad thing. Carol sneered at the Ancient and crossed her arms.

"Do
not
play with his heart, Madam, or we will have words." She seemed legitimately cross about it too.

"Who's playing? He already agreed to it. I have witnesses. In some eras we would have been married right there."

Tiera had to nod then, since it was just true. She'd seen it herself after all. It had clearly been a joke, but if Alice thought that pretending it was real would work to actually trap the man...

Well, she was probably right.

"All right. I'll get with mother and Count Lairdgren to set this up. Someone should tell Tor that he's paying for it all, or at least doing the baking." After a beat she grinned and rolled her eyes. "Silly of me, sorry.
I'll
do the baking. I was just being lazy."

Gerent held up what seemed to be a set of silver plates, about the size of a large gold coin each, but square. She didn't recognize it at all, but she could get the basic idea.

"A Timon built river? Like what he uses on his wall?" That was pretty special but it would get the water close enough to all the houses, if they did it right. Most of the water would even end up back in the river if it was set up correctly.

Gerent let his head come up, proudly.

"A
wall
too. He donated them for the project. Isn't that amazing? I feel like I'm letting everyone down already, not doing my part." The words aside, the little man didn't seem to feel any shame over it at all. At least his face simply looked happy.

Carol laughed and explained that part at least.

"Gerent
guilted
him into it. In all my very few years, I've rarely seen something done as well in regards to the use of emotional leverage."

The small dark haired fellow shook his head sadly though and looked away.

"It wasn't like that. I just asked him to do it, that was all. He said he had extras and while no one could afford to buy them for this, it's a worthy project, isn't it? I mean, going to the stars? That's a dream come true." Gerent spoke gently, and his words got even softer after that. "I dreamed, when I was little, about going to a better place, up in the stars. In my head it didn't matter how big you were, or who was in charge, everyone was equal. I know that isn't how things are, but..."

That got Carol to point at him with a single finger, which was pretty rude, especially in Royal circles.

"Like
that
. We could send him around to tell that tale and earn enough funds to cover this whole thing without a single problem."
She
seemed proud of it too. As if she had something to do with it, what so ever?