Vankara (Book 1) (18 page)

“You should get
back to the palace, your majesty,” he addressed me like he knew the title was
false.

I turned back
around and climbed into the coach with Thomas’ assistance.  Dena crawled up
into my lap and hugged me tight around the neck as Bellas latched the door
closed from the outside.

I held Dena close
and put my hands over her little ears to help muffle the noise of returning to
our own world.  My ears were still ringing by the time we made it back to the
palace.  Before we even came to a stop, the door was unlatched and the opening
filled with the body of John Fallon.

“Are you all
right?” He asked, breathing hard like he had just run a great distance, his
eyes searching our faces to answer his own question.

“Yes, we’re fine,”
I told him.  “Bellas just wanted to talk.

The coach came to
a stop in the exact same spot we had departed from earlier in front of the
palace.

Fallon took Dena
out of the coach first and helped Emily and I make our way out of the iron
box.  Everyone had an expectant expression on their faces, waiting for me to
explain exactly what had happened.

I didn’t want to
discuss what we had just been through in front of the palace guards.  I felt
confident the truth about where I had been would be known to every curious
citizen of Iron City before the sun crested over the horizon if I made that
mistake.

“I know you all
have questions,” I said to the crowd.  “But I’m simply too tired to answer them
right now.  I hope you can all understand Dena and I need some time alone.”  It
helped tug at the hearts of the trio of bureaucrats to have Dena hugging my
neck tightly like any frightened toddler, unwilling to let her mother go in
front of so many strangers.

“Of course, your
majesty,” Gabriel said with a bow, to which everyone else had no other choice
but to follow suit.

“I’ll see the Queen
and princess safely to their quarters,” Fallon said before he turned to a group
of Queen’s guards.  “I want the watches doubled in force tonight.  I don’t want
to hear about anymore unexpected incidences this evening.  I think the Queen
and princess have been through enough.”

The guards clicked
their heels together in unison and yelled, “Yes, sir!”

Fallon walked
beside me back into the palace.  I faintly heard Gabriel ask Aleksander a
question.  I assumed the king of Chromis had intended to follow us back to our
rooms but thankfully Gabriel derailed him of his intentions.  I definitely
wasn’t in the mood or frame of mind to deal with Aleksander.

Once we were back
in the Queen’s chambers, I handed Dena over to Emily without any protest from
the little princess.

“She could use
another bath before going to bed,” I said to Emily.

Emily curtseyed
and took Dena to her private bathroom.

I took off
Fallon’s coat and handed it back to him.

“I’m afraid it
will need to be cleaned.”

Fallon took the
jacket and folded it flour side inward.

“I have a lot of
questions for you,” he said, draping the jacket across one of his arms, “but
they can wait until morning.”

“Thank you.”

Fallon and I
stared at each other for a moment.  He seemed to want to say something to me
but didn’t seem certain if he should or not.  I waited for him to make up his
mind.

“I’m sorry for the
way I treated you last night,” he finally said.  “I guess Emma knew what she
was doing when she made her plans.  To be honest, I don’t think she would have
suspected Thomas of ever betraying her.  He’s been in service to her family
since she was a child.  She trusted him with her life.”

“I suppose since I
didn’t have a prior relationship with him I had an outsiders view of what was
going on.”   

“Still, you
handled things as well as any good Queen.  Probably better than Emma would
have.  You’ve given me hope you’ll turn out to be the leader Vankara needs
right now.”

Even with
everything I had been through that night, Fallon’s words made me feel like I
could conqueror the world or at least ensure it stayed upright and balanced for
a short space of time.

“I hope I can live
up to your expectations, Marshall.  I will do my best.”

“You’re off to a
good start,” he grinned.  “And I’ll try not to be a complete ass to you
anymore.”

“Well now,
miracles do exist,” I teased.

“I guess I deserve
that,” he admitted.  “I’m just glad to see you aren’t one to hold a grudge.”

“Grudges are only
for unforgivable acts,” I said, thinking of Thomas.  “You only wounded my
pride.”

“Well, I just
wanted you to know you can count on me from now on.  I’ll try to be the advisor
Emma wanted me to be for you.  I’m not infallible, of course, so don’t expect
me to be right all the time.”

“Thank you, Marshall.  I appreciate that.”

“I better go and
let you get some rest,” Fallon said turning towards the door.  “You’ll need it
for tomorrow,” he called over his shoulder as he stepped out of the room.

Chapter 11

Fallon’s statement
proved to be quite prophetic.

For the better
part of the morning after my encounter with Adam Bellas, I was practically
interrogated like a criminal by the three leaders of parliament on every minuet
detail I could remember.  Gabriel and Fallon tried their best to steer the
politicians’ questions in another direction once I had answered them all at
least three times over but they seemed fixated on finding a way to track down
Bellas and make him pay for his treasonous actions.  When I told them where
Bellas said we were, a parallel world, I could see the disbelief in their
eyes.  I felt sure they all assumed my mind had been tampered with in some way.

Isabelle Granger
was the only one not as concerned about finding Bellas as she was voicing her
protestations against his claims concerning her college’s involvement in the
plagues. 

“His accusations
are completely unfounded,” Isabelle assured me sitting stiffly on her seat in
the semicircle of chairs we had placed around my desk for everyone.  “I can
promise your majesty that we at the College are not responsible for the plagues
that have befallen so many in our world.  Just the thought of someone believing
we could be responsible for such atrocities makes me sick to my stomach.”  She
placed a fisted hand against her corseted midsection as if to prove the point.

“And what about
his claim the plagues are magical in nature?” I asked.

“I promise your
majesty we will look into it.”

“You never
considered the possibility before now?”  It seemed odd to me a woman of such
intelligence and verve had never even considered the involvement of magic in
the plagues.

“No, your majesty,”
Isabelle’s eyes dropped away from mine for a fraction of a second, but that was
all I needed.

She was lying.

“But I can assure
you,” she continued to defend, “we are not the ones responsible for causing the
plagues.”

I knew without a
shadow of a doubt the Royal Sage was withholding vital information from me, but
I couldn’t very well call her out on her lie without any proof to the
contrary.  I needed to know more and knew of only one place I might be able to
find the answers.

“What about the
fae?” I asked to no one in particular since I wasn’t sure who would be in
charge of such information.

“We really don’t
know much about them,” Fallon answered. “We’ve tried to send spies into fae
territory but they never make it back from their missions, for whatever reason.”

I sat in silence
for a moment in order to gather my thoughts.  I needed information.  Most
importantly, I needed to know the truth.  It was obvious Isabelle wouldn’t
freely tell me what she knew about the plagues unless I had some sort of
leverage to use against her.

“Then I would like
to arrange a meeting with the leader of the fae,” I announced.

From the audible
gasps which came from those in front of me, you would have thought I said I
wanted to run naked in the streets of Iron City singing an aria at the top of
my lungs.  Even Gabriel looked somewhat taken aback by my suggestion.

“I’m afraid we
can’t allow that,” Thaddeus Irondale said with a finality which seemed above
his station considering I was the Queen.

“Absolutely not,”
Constance Wright chimed in stridently.  Her face was contorted in a very
unattractive fashion, like she’d just eaten a lemon without adding any sugar. 
“We haven’t formally spoken to those heathens since the wall was built.  As
leader of the black party, I can assure you we will never agree to such a
meeting.”

“And as leader of
the white party,” Samuel Able said somewhat irritated his counterpart seemed to
be stepping into the limelight without him once again, “I can assure your
majesty that neither sides of Parliament will allow for such a meeting to take
place.”

I wasn’t sure I
particularly needed their permission but they seemed completely confident I
did.

“I see,” I said,
not actually seeing why they were so adamant in my not conferring with the fae
leaders and possibly discovering the true cause of the plagues once and for
all.  Had they all lost sight of the fact we were supposed to be serving the
best interest of the Vankaran people?  Perhaps working behind the gilded halls
of parliament had blinded them to their real purpose.

“Personally,”
Thaddeus said, “I don’t believe we can trust anything Bellas says.  He hasn’t
exactly proven himself to be the trustworthy sort.”

“Agreed,” Isabelle
was quick to add.  “Perhaps we should just feel blessed he returned your
majesty and the princess to us unharmed and simply forget the whole matter
entirely.”

There seemed to be
a grumbling of agreement amongst the bureaucrats.  I can’t say I was very
surprised.  They all seemed to have a common mindset:  sweep things under the
rug and forget they ever happened.  Well, they could do what they needed to in
order to sleep soundly at night, but I had other plans which would clearly need
to be kept secret from them until the time was right.

A few minutes
later the meeting was convened.  Fallon and Gabriel stayed behind so we could
have our own discussion.

“You seem
convinced Bellas actually took you to a parallel world,” Gabriel said to me,
watching me carefully.  “What makes you such a believer?”

“I wasn’t at
first,” I admitted.  “Not until…not until I saw April Pew.”

Gabriel eyes
opened wide and his lips parted slightly.

“Either of you
want to fill me in on who April Pew is?” Fallon asked, crossing his arms over
his chest as he leaned against the side of my desk confused by the significance
of my statement.

I looked up into
Fallon’s dark blue eyes suddenly finding it hard to admit the truth.

“She’s me,” I
finally blurted out.  “She’s who I was before I became Sarah Harker.”

“Just how many
people have you been?” He questionsed with a raised eyebrow and a hint of
humor.

I couldn’t help
but smile slightly.  “Only three,” I answered.

“Only,” Fallon
shook his head in disbelief.

“How old was the
April Pew you saw?” Gabriel asked.

“The same age I am
now.  She was still living with the Pews,” I couldn’t help but shiver at the
prospect.  I didn’t want to imagine the horrors my alternate counterpart had
suffered living in the Pew household for so many years.  It was a wonder she
was still alive and sane.

Gabriel simply sat
in his chair with a troubled look on his face. 

He and I both knew
it was proof Bellas had indeed found a way to breech the veil between our
reality and an alternate one.  The consequences of such a thing boggled my mind
with world ending possibilities. 

“Well, there’s not
much to be done about Bellas at the moment,” Fallon said to us, pulling Gabriel
and I back to the problems we were facing in our own reality.  “What do you
want to do about visiting the fae?”

I looked from him
to Gabriel.

“I still want to
go and see the ruler of the fae,” I told them.  “If there is the slimmest
chance we can discover what is causing the plagues, we need to take it.”

“Agreed,” Gabriel
said.  “I know of a way to get you there and back within a day but you can’t
leave until after the opening ceremony of Parliament this afternoon.”

“What do you know
that I don’t?” Fallon asked, casually taking a half seat on the top of my desk
angling his legs towards Gabriel.  “As far as I know, we would have to travel
back to the Outlands outpost first and then travel at least two days to reach
the fae capital city from there.”

“When the wall was
built,” Gabriel said in a conspiratorial whisper as if the study wall had ears,
“the vanakaran king then made sure there was a way we could access fae land
from right here in Iron City.”

“You mean there’s
a hole in the wall somewhere?” Fallon asked.

“Yes, more or
less,” Gabriel answered.  “But only I know where it is.  King Leopold asked
Emma and me to keep it secret.”

Gabriel looked at
me.  “Right now you need to focus on the opening ceremony of parliament this
afternoon and the formal dinner this evening with the members.  Fallon and I
will take care of the details of your trip into fae territory.”

Fallon stood from
his temporary seat on my desk.  “I should get a few things prepared myself.”  He
turned to me.  “Try to wear something comfortable.  We’ll be on horseback most
of the night.”

After the men
left, I walked into the Queen’s bedroom and rummaged around in her closet.  I
couldn’t find anything which looked casual and certainly found nothing which
would be comfortable to ride on horseback for hours on end.

I finally sent a
note via Emily to Inara and hoped the Queen’s best friend would just do as
requested and not ask any questions.