Worlds Unseen - Rachel Starr Thomson (beach books .txt) 📗

prisoner against your will, my lady,” he said. Libuse favoured him with a gracious smile.

“I trust my imprisonment will be over soon enough,” she said. Then she turned and addressed the captain, who snapped to attention at her voice. “Captain,” she said, “Surely you will not object if my old friends accompany me to my drawing room. I wish to speak with them in private.”

The captain’s eyes narrowed, but he nodded. Libuse turned and led the way to a small, finely furnished room off the foyer. She closed the doors behind them. When she turned back, Maggie was shocked at the change in her face. Her guard down, the princess was pale and afraid.

“Libuse,” Huss said quietly, “do they suspect you?”

She nodded unhappily. “Almost certainly. I do not know how much they know. But if they are investigating me, then it will not be long until they find out far too much. I have covered my tracks carefully, my old friend. But an experienced hunter will find them.”

“Do you know who gave the command for your arrest?” Jerome asked.

“Zarras,” Libuse said.

“Antonin Zarras,” Jerome said for Maggie’s benefit. “The Overlord of the Eastern Lands.”

Huss seemed to be choosing his words carefully. His voice was low to ensure that no one outside the room could hear. “I have never wanted to know the extent of your involvement with the Ploughman and his rebellion,” he said. “I felt it was wise to stay ignorant. But now I feel that it may be best to know.”

Libuse nodded. “What can I say?” she said. “My personal fortune is nearly gone. I have given every penny I could spare to the Ploughman. And I have returned the stolen goods of the people to the people whenever I could.”

Huss’s eyebrows shot up. “You have raided the Overlord’s treasury?”

“The money in it stank of blood,” Libuse said sharply. “Taxes taken from starving people. It was never Zarras’s to take, so I gave it back.”

“You will be removed from the Governing Council,” Huss said.

“Worse than that,” Jerome said, his handsome face raging. “She will be charged with treason and executed. Do you doubt it, Master Huss?”

“For theft, I doubt they would be so harsh. The people would not take kindly to the execution of their princess,” Huss said. “But I think that you are in great danger, are you not, Libuse? Unless I miss my guess, your ties to the country militia are more than just financial.” His voice became gentler, and he stepped closer to the woman. “I have seen your promise on the finger of the Ploughman, have I not? The ruby he wears did not come from any country woman’s treasure.”

Libuse hung her head. When she looked back up, her eyes were filled with tears. “I love him with my life,” she said. “If the Governing Council ever finds out…”

Her voice trailed away, and she looked at Huss pleadingly. He nodded, his face grim. “They will never let you leave this place,” he said. “That is certain. Yet if you stay here, you are waiting for the blade to fall.”

“Help me,” Libuse said quietly.

“Of course we will,” Huss said. “I will go to the Overlord. I will…”

“No, Master Huss,” Jerome said. “You must not become involved. If the princess is forced to leave the Governing Council it will be a great enough loss to the Eastern Lands. We cannot afford to lose both of you.”

He looked at Libuse “I will come for you tonight, my lady. Be ready to flee through the tunnels at midnight.”

Libuse nodded, her face grave. There was a sharp knock on the drawing room door. Huss looked at the heavy oak.. “It seems they grow tired of having the princess out of their sight,” he said. “So we must return her to them for a time.”

*

The three left Libuse’s house in silence. Huss’s brow was wrinkled with worry. Jerome was deep in thought, planning out the rescue. Maggie walked beside them, distraught at her inability to offer even a word of comfort. Everything was happening so fast, and she was still struggling to put together Huss’s earlier revelations with what was happening now. Struggling-and yet a clarity was beginning to emerge. She felt a strange strength and a sense that her feet had found their old path at last.

“They want the Ploughman to come for her,” Jerome said.

“And he will,” Huss answered. “He knows what will happen when they find out what she has done. Make no mistake, he will not abandon her to them.”

“But if he comes here,” Maggie said, shyly, “what then?”

“Then they will be waiting,” Huss said. “They will kill him.”

“No,” Jerome said. “No, they won’t have the chance. The Ploughman will not come here. Libuse will join him in the country before word reaches him of the arrest.”

“Have a care, Jerome,” said Huss. “This is no easy task you take upon yourself.”

“Nothing worth doing is ever easy,” Jerome answered, a slight smile playing on his face. “I believe it was you who taught me that.”

Huss nodded. “I suppose you will be dragging more of my pupils into this.”

“Is it also you who says, ‘He is a fool who does with one hand what he could do with two’? I am not such a fool as to think I can do this alone.”

“And among the students of Huss you are likely to find many willing to help you,” Huss said, with a deep sigh. “When I was a student of the secret, I and my classmates kept our knowledge safe, deep in our hearts. Why do my students insist on wielding knowledge as a sword?”

The two men fell silent for a long moment, and each face betrayed such conflict that it hurt Maggie to see it. At last Huss smiled a thin smile and said, “Go, Jerome. You have very little time.”

Jerome nodded and left the courtyard. Huss and Maggie were left looking after him.

Huss turned after a while and started for the house. Maggie fell in stride beside him.

“Jerome risks a great deal for Libuse,” she said.

“Yes,” Huss answered. “He risks more than you know. But I am afraid he does not have much of a choice.”

They were about to enter the door when Maggie asked quietly, “Does he love her?”

Huss stopped and gave Maggie a long look. He smiled slightly and said, “Yes. He loves her, as any subject loves a sovereign who thinks only of her people and would give her life for them. The Empire will never recognize Libuse as a queen, but her people have never seen her as anything else. And Jerome is very much a son of his people.” Almost as an afterthought, he added, “In that sense Jerome loves her. But not in any other way.”

*

The forest pulsed with power as Virginia felt the creatures of the wood draw near. In their footsteps a wild drumbeat echoed. The wind played around Virginia’s head like a living thing. She heard voices in it: exulting, laughing, swirling and dancing on the eddies of the air.

“Free!” an ethereal voice cried. The wind danced and shivered as the voice coursed through it.

“The hold of the Blackness is broken,” said another, one that spoke with a voice timeless and strong and deep: the sort of voice an ancient tree might have, if it could speak.

“Where has the witch gone?” roared another voice, the voice of youth and battle and tooth and claw; the voice of wolves and hawks and bounding deer. “Let me at her!”

“Gone for now, is she,” whispered the voice in the wind, trailing silver tendrils through the air.

“We have defeated her purpose,” said the tree-voice. “Rest content.”

“I have rested for five hundred years!” roared the animal-voice. “It is time that I act again!”

“Peace,” said the tree-voice. “The time to vanquish our enemies will come when it comes.”

“What have we been loosed for, if not to fight?” demanded the animal-voice.

“We have been loosed to prepare. And to help this one, as we have done,” said the tree-voice. Virginia was suddenly aware of eyes on her. A warm breeze blew through her clothes and hair gently, kindly.

“Sees much, the blind one,” whispered the wind-voice. “She has set us free.”

They fell silent. They were waiting for Virginia to speak.

“No,” she faltered. “I did nothing. It was you who rescued me.”

She heard a sound like the near-silent laughter of a wolf.

“Your need loosed our chains,” rumbled the animal-voice. “We feel the power in you… the life in you. We have waited five hundred years in darkness, bound and blind, for you to call us out.”

“But I didn’t call,” Virginia said, her voice full of wonder.

A voice spoke in her memory: “Through you I will wake the world.” She shivered, as one shivers at the touch of delight.

Again they waited. Virginia said, “Who are you?”

The wind-voice rushed past her ears. “We are the Children of the Burning Light!”

“We are the Brotherhood of the Earth,” said the tree-voice. “We are the living spirits of the forest, of the beasts, and of the wind.”

“What happened to you?” Virginia asked.

The animal-voice growled. “We were banished by the traitor Morning Star, held in darkness that we might not rip out the throat of his Empire.”

“We fought in the Great War, gloriously,” said the tree-voice. “With all of our Brethren and the righteous children of men.”

“So few,” whispered the wind. “Few men in our ranks.”

Virginia felt as though sharp eyes were piercing through her. “Have you children of men forgotten so soon how it was?” the animal-voice asked. “How the teeth and the claws and the antlers of the beasts ran red with the blood of traitors, how the trees sent their roots and branches to block off the roads, how the wind beat on the gates of the city? Do you no more tell how the River-Daughter and the Sea-Father swamped the ships of the enemy?”

Virginia hung her head. “I am afraid we have forgotten everything we ought to have remembered.”

She thought she heard the wind sigh, and the tree-voice said, “But the race of men was always short of memory. Or have you forgotten, Gwyrion?”

The animal-voice grunted in reply, like the grunt of a boar.

“Forgotten,” repeated the ethereal wind-voice. “What else have you forgotten, daughter of men?”

Virginia held her head up again, and her face was wet with tears. “We have forgotten the King himself,” she said. “We have forgotten that there was ever a world of beauty before the Empire.”

“The Empire!” the voice of Gwyrion, the animal spirit, spat. “Unholy offspring of Men and Blackness! Spawn of death and rebellion!”

The tree-voice spoke then. A note of heartbreaking sorrow strained its words. “Have you truly forgotten the King? Can there be any hope for a world that has forgotten him?”

It was the wind spirit that whispered, “She has not forgotten.”

“I have seen the King,” Virginia said. “He came to me on a hillside near my home.”

“Far away, your home,” said the wind.

“There!” roared Gwyrion in a voice full of triumph. “The King’s feet have walked our earth again! Hope lost? How could you say such a thing, Tyrentyllith?”

The tree-voice answered, “You are right, my brother. Of course you are right. He will come soon if in this generation human eyes have seen him.”

“He will come soon!” Gwyrion roared. “We, the Children of the Burning Light, will prepare the way for him! We will fight, as we did in the Great War, and this time we shall see who will rise the victor!”

“In good time, proud