Guarding the Goddess Read online

  You must project calm and confidence at all times, no matter what you are feeling yourself. If you feel calm, the people will be calm as well.

  She’d said it so often that Ellina knew it by heart. It was the way Grandmamma had ruled for years and it was the way Ellina intended to rule now.

  In fact, her grandmother had been Potentate much longer than many in their line. That was because Ellina’s mother, shortly after being crowned, had been assassinated along with her father. Whereupon her grandmother—while still grieving the death of her only daughter—had been forced to resume the crown in order to keep her people and planet from falling into chaos.

  No, no—don’t think about that right now! Don’t think about assassination! Ellina told herself desperately. Of all times for that old fear to resurface, this was surely the worst. It’s all right—you’ll be all right, she told herself firmly, stealing a glance at Ty, who was striding along beside and slightly behind her. The big Kindred was scanning the cheering crowd alertly, one hand on his blaster and the other at the small of her back.

  Ellina was grateful for the small touch which no one else could see. She could feel the warmth of Ty’s hand even through the heavy brocade of her golden, jewel-encrusted gown. It was steadying—a reminder that her faithful bodyguard would keep her safe, no matter what occurred.

  But nothing’s going to happen, Ellina told herself firmly. Nothing, because the people love me. Just look at them cheer! Surely none of them out there want to hurt me.

  Unless there was another radical from the Southern Continent who wanted her dead, just as there had been at the Feast of All Feelings at her coronation, that was.

  Once again, Ellina had to work to push the worry out of her mind. If there was someone who meant her harm, Ty would deal with them—he would keep her safe. And in the meantime, all she had to do was keep waving and smiling and making the people love her…

  Which was exactly what she did. And all was well until they reached the end of the parade route and mounted the high platform erected there, just for this moment.

  At this point, Ellina was supposed to stand tall, so all the common people who might have missed her during the Grand Procession could get a good look at her. It was also a chance for a short rest. (This was mostly for the nobles, who weren’t used to walking so far, especially in their stylish high-heeled shoes which were more for show than for any practical use.)

  After the rest, Ellina and the nobles and guards would descend the platform to where the musicians and dancers were still playing and they would all move on back to the Palace.

  As Ellina took a moment to surreptitiously slip off her shoes—she thought no one would notice under the hem of the heavy gold gown—and press her bare feet to the cool wood of the platform, a little girl ran forward.

  “Potentate! Potentate!” she shouted as she ran and Ellina saw she had a huge armful of vivid orange and pink blossoms clutched in her arms.

  At first, Ellina wasn’t sure who it was but then she recognized the little girl from the Holy Mists the night before. Tutti—that was her name.

  Tutti had obviously squirmed through the barricades which held back the crowds and dashed through the musicians and dancers to take the steps of the platform two at a time. Having made it that far, now she was trying to get past the guards on the outer edge of Ellina’s coterie.

  The guards, for their part, weren’t going to allow it but then Ellina heard the High Priest calling instructions from his position down on the ground. He had elected to stay with the musicians and dancers for some reason, instead of mounting the platform to take his rightful place in front of the noblemen who were consort candidates.

  “No, no,” he yelled up at the guards. “Let her in—let the little girl in! And let all the people see it.”

  “Wait,” Ty said sharply when the guards looked to him for confirmation. “Let me check her first.”

  He left Ellina’s side for a moment and went to check Tutti over. He paid special attention to her armful of flowers but once he had apparently satisfied himself that everything was all right, he had the guards open a path so she could run straight to Ellina.

  “Oh, Potentate!” the little girl gasped breathlessly, when she got to Ellina. “I told you—didn’t I tell you—that I would bring you these flowers?”

  She handed the huge armful of blossoms to Ellina who took them from her and smiled. She was well aware of why the High Priest had wanted to allow this—the sweet little girl with the bouquet of blossoms almost bigger than she was made a charming picture when paired with the new Potentate. Still, Ellina wasn’t jaded enough not to enjoy the simple, honest gesture Tutti was making. Stooping down, she gave the little girl a hug.

  “Thank you, Tutti,” she said, smiling. “You’re very sweet to bring them to me. But won’t your grandmother be worried?”

  “No, she’s okay—I left her back behind the barricade,” Tutti said, grinning. “So do you like them? The flowers?”

  “They’re beautiful,” Ellina said sincerely. “In fact, I think these are the prettiest—”

  But just then a shout from below her made her look up.

  One of the court fools was dancing on the steps. He was dressed in colorful rags and laughing, putting on a show for the crowd who were all eagerly watching the show on the platform. The musicians, seeing what he was doing, began playing a lively jig and the fool danced lightly up the steps until he was almost at the top. Then he pulled out some balls and started to juggle.

  The scene was charming, if somewhat unexpected, Ellina thought. Tutti clapped her hands and laughed and even the guards seemed amused. The nobles were distracted too and momentarily stopped jockeying for position around her.

  “Who is that fool?” Ellina heard one of them ask another. “He’s quite a funny fellow but I don’t believe I’ve seen him before.”

  “Because you haven’t been to Court recently. I think he’s part of a traveling troupe of performers,” was the answer. “They came to court just yesterday and were so amusing they were asked to join the Grand Promenade.”

  The one person who didn’t seem a bit amused, however, was Ty.

  “Who authorized this?” he growled, moving to make room between Ellina and the top step, where the fool was dancing and juggling for the crowd. “This wasn’t part of the program! You!” he shouted at the fool. “Who told you to do this?”

  “Ugh—that Kindred bodyguard of the Potentate’s is such a kill-joy,” a familiar voice muttered. Turning her head, Ellina saw that it was Hennessy Tolland, talking to Jennor Peebles, another of the nobles. “He’s unbearably entitled too! Thinks he can do anything he likes just because he guards the Potentate.”

  “If you ask me, off-worlders shouldn’t be allowed at Court at all,” Jennor replied snobbishly.

  “I couldn’t agree more.” Hennessy sniffed. “And believe me, when I am consort, it’s going to be my first order of business to keep any foreigners out of our Court and off our world.”

  Ellina opened her mouth to tell him that he would never be consort…but that was when the first explosion happened.

  Twenty-Four

  Something’s wrong—I know it is! There’s something off here.

  Ty’s instincts—on high alert for the entire parade—were now screaming at him as he made his way towards the laughing, dancing, juggling fool.

  “Hey!” he shouted at the fool. “What’s going on here—who sent you?”

  Still laughing, the fool turned towards him and lobbed one of the colorful balls he’d been juggling straight at Ty’s head.

  Only juggling balls didn’t normally have blinking lights on them, did they? Lights that started out green and then turned red in mid-air.

  It’s a bomb! A Goddess-damned matter incendiary! If it touches anything before it blows, the explosion will be twenty times as great!

  Ty’s body was acting before the thought even finished flashing through his mind. Years of instinct and training took over and he rai
sed his blaster—thank the Goddess he already had it out and ready—and shot the device in mid-air, before it could reach him.

  The bomb exploded harmlessly in a bright shower of sparks and a puff of smoke but that only confirmed what Ty had already guessed. The bomb was a MID or matter incendiary device. As long as it didn’t touch anything and only exploded in midair, it would do little to no damage. But if it was allowed to land or touch any solid object—if it touched any solid matter at all as it blew—the chain of destruction it caused would be catastrophic.

  Just one of these small bombs could take out the entire huge wooden platform they were all standing on and leave nothing but a gaping crater in the earth below.

  Thankfully, the fool-who-was-clearly-not-a-fool had tossed the bomb in a high arc, so though the explosion was loud, it didn’t seem to hurt anyone. Ty realized at once, however, that the high toss was no accident.

  He was trying to get it over my head, he thought, his gut clenching with the realization. He was trying to toss it directly at Ellina!

  And then the fool threw another bomb and another and another and he had no more time to think—only time to react.

  One by one he shot the small but deadly bombs out of the air, only vaguely aware that the nobles on the platform were running and screaming—panicking like a heard of startled terga-beasts, he thought distractedly as he continued to shoot.

  Then some of the acrobats raced up the steps as well. At first Ty hoped they would try to overwhelm the fool but then he saw, with a sinking heart, that they were dressed in the same multi-colored rags that he was. They dived into the panicking crowd on the platform and began engaging the guards in hand-to-hand combat.

  Still, Ty could do nothing but keep shooting. He was well aware that if even one of the bombs got through it would blow Ellina and the entire platform to bits. He couldn’t let that happen—he had to protect her no matter what.

  “The Potentate! Guard the Potentate—shield her!” he bellowed at the guards behind him as he continued to shoot—though all the shielding in the world would do her no good if even one MID got through. He wanted to take aim at the fool himself, but the bastard seemed to have an unlimited supply of the small, ball-sized incendiaries and he kept tossing them at Ty—and occasionally trying to get one above or around him—still trying to reach Ellina.

  And then his blaster clicked and he realized, with a horrible sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, that he was out of charge.

  Gods, no! It can’t be!

  He spared a glance at it but the energy bar was empty. It must have been drained by his rapid firing. On the plus side, it appeared the fool had only one bomb left but Ty knew he had no more charge to shoot it. He had a spare blaster—of course he did—but as he started to reach for it, the fool threw his last bomb directly at Ty’s face.

  Acting on instinct, Ty caught it…and threw it straight up into the air as hard as he could.

  It was the only thing he could think to do—the only safe place to throw it. He couldn’t deflect it into the crowd and he couldn’t let it get to Ellina. He could have thrown himself on it, of course, but the very contact of his body against the bomb would have started the chain of destruction guaranteed to blow the entire platform to rubble.

  So he threw it straight up and prayed that it would detonate high enough not to hurt anyone but not so high as to touch the craggy rock ceiling above them which was the roof of the Central Corridor.

  Please, Goddess, he prayed. Please!

  And then the last bomb exploded and a low, ominous rumbling began above his head.

  Twenty-Five

  Ellina watched numbly as Ty moved almost too quickly for her eyes to follow. He was shooting at the juggling balls the fool in brightly colored rags kept tossing at him, blowing them out of the air with showers of sparks and puffs of smoke.

  The crowd below seemed to think this was part of the show—they were cheering and shouting happily as they watched. But Ellina knew the truth—she knew this was no show. This was real and if even one of those bombs got through…

  Suddenly a bunch of acrobats who were clearly not acrobats stormed the platform. The guards all around her—both Kindred and the special unit of Chorkay guards Ty had been training—began fighting them off but the screaming, panicking nobles were getting in the way.

  They were all rushing this way and that, pushing and shoving, trying to get away from the bombs and the assassins, heedless of anyone’s safety but their own. Their high-heeled shoes clattered on the wooden platform and their high, panicked shrieks added to the general pandemonium.

  Ellina would have liked to try and get away herself but where could she go? The steps were blocked and the drop from the top of the platform was twenty feet or more. Besides, she felt frozen—trapped in her heavy skirts and rooted to the spot, though she was buffeted back and forth by the panicking noblemen pushing and shoving around her.

  She felt a tug at her heavy skirts and a small voice shouted, “Potentate-what’s happening? Are those bad men?”

  Tutti’s going to get trampled if I don’t keep her close! she thought, coming back to herself. Dropping the armful of flowers, which were immediately trampled by the scuffling, high-heeled shoes of the noblemen and the boots of the guards, she leaned down and wrapped her arms around the little girl protectively.

  “Stay close to me, Tutti,” she said, raising her voice to be heard above the noise. “Everything is going to be all right.”

  “But the men! The bad men!” Tutti was starting to cry.

  Ellina picked her up and held her, feeling the little girl’s legs wrap around her waist as she cradled Tutti small frame close.

  “It’s all right,” she said in the little girl’s ear. “It’s all right. The guards will protect us.”

  But could they? The acrobats all seemed to be armed with long, deadly collapsible poles which they had withdrawn from their colorful rags and were using to parry the guards’ blasters and swords. The metal poles were thin and flexible and they seemed able to deflect blaster shots and sword thrusts with equal ease. How long before they fought their way through the guards—who were being pushed and shoved by the nobles so they could hardly fight—and got to her and Tutti?

  Her heart racing, she looked anxiously at Ty. The big Kindred was shooting with amazing precision, blowing each bomb out of the air before it could touch any solid surface and spread its chain of destruction. His blaster was a blur, targeting each colorful ball that was not a ball almost before it left the fool’s hand. But how long could he go on, never missing a single shot?

  And then something seemed to go wrong with his blaster. Ellina saw him look at it and then saw the fool throw one last bomb.

  Ty dropped his blaster and caught the bomb in mid-air, then tossed it high in the air. There was an explosion—a much louder one than any of the previous bombs, Ellina thought distractedly—and then a rumbling began, right overhead.

  As a dweller in an underground city all her life, Ellina knew the meaning of that sound.

  Cave-in, she thought, feeling her stomach give a sick twist. Oh no—cave-in!

  Most of the tunnels and corridors used in the kingdom were so well reinforced there was no fear at all of cave-ins. But occasionally, an older tunnel which hadn’t been properly tended would give way, burying unwary travelers below tons of rock and rubble and the shifting green sands of the barren world overhead would come pouring in like an evil, unwanted rain.

  The screaming around her intensified—the nobles knew what the sounds meant too, for all that the palace was the best reinforced structure on all of Helios Beta.

  “Get out of my way!” someone shouted in her ear. It was Hennessy, she saw. He was wide-eyed—his carefully coiffed hair wild and his eyes rolling in their sockets. He shoved Ellina to one side so hard she nearly dropped Tutti and ran past her, wild to get away from what was about to happen.

  Something huge fell—so close to her that Ellina could feel the wind of its passage�
��and then, suddenly, a boulder the size of a large dining table landed directly on Hennessy’s head.

  Well, it might be more accurate to say it landed on his entire body, Ellina thought numbly. For the boulder crushed him to jelly and then went right on through the wooden planking of the platform, as though it had pressing business with the ground below and it couldn’t be bothered with stopping.

  Guess I won’t have to worry about the High Priest trying to make him my consort now, she thought and a crazy, hysterical giggle tried to rise up her throat. Ellina swallowed it back down with some difficulty. Calm—she had to be calm.

  But being calm wasn’t easy considering the circumstances. There was more rumbling over head—more rocks and boulders raining down. Tutti was screaming in her arms and clutching her so tightly Ellina could hardly breathe and Lor had run down into the bosom of her gown and had curled where her third breast should have been—if she’d had one—and was crouched, trembling there.

  Again, Ellina wanted to run—wanted to take herself and Tutti to safety. But there was no place to run to. The panicking nobles and fighting guards and assassin acrobats blocked her way to the steps and the vast hole behind her where Hennessy had gotten smashed was too big to jump over or easily get around in the melee. The crowds below were panicking too—screaming and shouting and trying to get away—no one wanted to be caught in a cave-in, of course.

  She looked for Ty, but he was nowhere in sight. Then she heard another loud rumble, directly over her head, and looked up.

  “Oh no,” she breathed. Overhead, a jagged rock—almost as big as the boulder that had killed Hennessy—wiggled like a loose tooth in a socket. Then it broke loose and came rushing down—rushing towards her and Tutti and Lor.

  It was too late to run—even if there had been anyplace to run to. So Ellina did the only thing she could. Bowing her body over Tutti’s much smaller frame, she crouched down, trying to shield the little girl as best she could before the boulder hit them.