The Channeling (Rise of the Witch Guard Book 3) Read online

  “You can give me the message,” Falon said.

  “It’s a secret,” the boy said, motioning for her to lean in close.

  Falon bent down.

  “Madame Tulla says it’s not polite to ignore your master, and she said it’s time for more training,” whispered the boy before bouncing out of arm’s range.

  “You!” Falon shouted suddenly recognizing the little scamp in front of her.

  “She says ‘don’t be late’!” Dani shouted before taking to his heels and scampering for the boundary of the camp.

  “Little dirt clod!” Falon shouted after the rapidly retreating boy.

  Although openly she was mad at the boy, on the inside all she could feel was a bottomless hole in the pit of her stomach. The one nice thing about being assigned to a manor on the edge of the Barony—and thus the very edge of the kingdom—had been avoiding the Old Branch witch that had practically enslaved her with that tattoo magic around her neck.

  With a shudder, she decided that trying to hide in her tent wasn’t going to help and that short of murdering the old witch in her tent there was no way to get out of this ‘training’. While after this last harsh winter she wasn’t ruling that out—either by her own hand or another’s—if she tried and failed…

  In short, she had no choice but to see the old woman, no matter what she eventually decided. Because one thing was certain: life was too short for her to live as a slave to some evil old witch.

  Right now, all she seemed to want to do was torture her and teach her magic. But what if that someday changed? She didn’t know how she could do it, but she was going to have to get out from under that old witch’s thumb.

  In the meantime, it looked like it was time to woman up and go beard the witch in her lair.

  Chapter 11: The Prince Makes His Plots

  “The Silver Stag will not be constrained, Lord Declan!” cried the Prince, the lace of his fine courtier’s outfit fluttering around his wrists and neck and he gesticulated wildly, “I don’t care how dangerous you think it is. The Barons of this land will pay their taxes to my father—the King—or I will know why!”

  “Temperance, my lord Prince,” advised a youngish, well-muscled man wearing a silver-gilded breast plate with a set of heavily bronzed arm, wrist and knee guards to go with the fine blade at his side, “the lords of this land respect the monarchy, I assure you.”

  “The assurances of your House would sound a lot more convincing out of the mouth of your father, Lord Quinn,” Prince William mocked angrily. “Furthermore, I do not find it strange that the scion and heir to one baronial house would stand in support of another! For now, hold your peace while I speak further with my noble advisor Lord Declan.”

  “As his Highness wishes,” Lord Quinn said with an angry frown as he stepped backward.

  “Well, Declan? Do you have a solution to this tax-evading petty tyrant of the midlands?” demanded the Prince, an eager look only partially hidden in his eyes.

  “My lord Prince, all we have to go on right now is a bit of spiteful court gossip from your glorious sister about how the Baron Froggor complains over the weight of his taxes while spending lavishly on the gowns of his young sister by his father’s last wife,” sighed the Prince’s Advisor.

  “You forget about how she boasts. She dares boast, Declan! It says right here,” he said, waving the letter in his right hand in the air, “how, and I quote: the Lady Grilla all but threw it in Princess Wilmina’s face how great was the increase in the strength of her brother’s army,” the Prince said with a thunderous face.

  “That hardly sounds like a quote to me, lord Prince,” Lord Quinn said neutrally.

  “Oh, in the Fie, young Quinn,” William stormed over and shoved his face toward the youngish lord. “What is it next, a plot by the various barons in this land to evade their taxes and rise in rebellion!”

  “I assure you that the House of Quinn has been and always will be loyal to the crown lands—” said the Heir to the Barony of Quinn, leaning away from Prince William’s increasingly reddening face.

  “Enough of your excuses,” the Prince shouted at Quinn, “and your delays!” he stormed over to Lord Declan. “Wilmina has ferreted out an incipient rebellion against my father, and it is time that I showed my true metal by cutting it off at the roots before it grows into an even bigger problem.” The Prince turned his face up to the ceiling as if beseeching the gods, “Must I settle the affairs of every single struggling barony in our fair land?” he demanded, his eyes reddening as if he were about to cry.

  Lord Declan sighed while Lord Quinn looked on stonily. “What is your solution to this problem, my Prince?” the Advisor finally asked helplessly.

  As if blown away by a summer breeze, the tears disappeared and the red around his eyes faded as the Prince turned back to the members of his small court with an eager smile that did little to mask the viciousness that lurked under the surface.

  “Social justice!” the Prince declared. “We go and demand that the Baron of the Froglands pay his fair share. And if we find that the Baron has been holding out on the crown, if necessary, we shall coerce him through the power of force majeure to cough up that gold which is due to the King my father. More if we find out that it is not the fault of the Baron himself but instead that of his tight fisted lords or greedy peasants we shall help him collect his due!”

  “In other words, you want to start another war and extort money out of the Baron,” Lord Declan sighed, while beside him Lord Quinn’s frown grew thunderous.

  “You speak as if I was a money lender, breaking arms and going around collecting debts,” Prince William scowled, “when in fact we are about to embark on glorious quest to right the wrongs done both my father and my sister.”

  “And enrich ourselves along the way, also, I presume,” grated Lord Quinn.

  “We will only take a tax farmer’s traditional share. I would pass on the merely monetary gains entirely if I didn’t have such a large number of mouths to feed in my household,” the Prince said piously.

  “Such a large army to support, you mean,” said Quinn.

  “I dislike your tone,” the Prince said smoothly, his voice turning deadly the more gently he spoke.

  “I have been commanded by my father to lead our Quinn men in support of your highness, Prince William, which is exactly what I intend to do. Just make sure that in your desire to return your father his rightful share, you do not forget Quinn’s rightful share of any monies or goods taken during this war of belligerent aggression,” Quinn said flatly.

  “A man after my own heart,” Prince William smirked the deathly look disappearing to be replaced by an almost unseemly gloating before he turned away. “Then we are all in agreement?” he asked striding over to the baronial seat, “we march south as soon as the pass clears so we might teach that rebel Froggor the folly of ways. It is time the Froglands rendered unto the Stag that which belongs to the Stag.”

  A series of ‘Yes, your highnesses,’ dutifully swept across the room and the Prince seated himself upon the former Baron’s palatial rulers chair smirking as he surveyed all before him.

  He had a new campaign in the works and a plump—or, rather, make that ‘righteous’—target in his sights. The day couldn’t get much better…then his eye caught on the beautiful widow of the former Fist of the North and Lord of the Frost March, and the Prince thought of one way in which this day could easily improve itself.

  It seemed he now had yet another future conquest to contemplate.

  Throwing his head back and laughing, the Prince and current master of the North couldn’t help but take the moment to revel in the glory of youth, victory and being a son of the current King.

  He had lands, an army, and a growing list of nobles who owed him for their current station. Life was good, and was only going to get better if he had anything to do with it.

  “Oh, one more thing, my Prince. Now that we have decided upon our grand strategy for the Spring, that is,” said Lord D
eclan.

  “What is it, lord advisor?” the Prince asked charitably feeling in a great mood now that he was assured his own people were prepared to follow him in suppressing the Froglands.

  “The majority of our forces assigned to the border have either returned, or our messengers have returned with notice that the forces they were attached to have been destroyed. The latest group to return and report in was the one posted furthest out—the Fighting Swan Company,” Lord Declan reported as he looked down and read from the muster scroll in his hand.

  “Curse and foil the foul plots of all savages everywhere,” the Prince said, his face darkening. “Don’t they know that they’ve been defeated, their tribes conquered, and their lands annexed and formally absorbed into our own Staglands?” he asked rhetorically.

  “The minds of savages, primitive as they are, are difficult to fathom,” Declan said smoothly, “oft times, like children, they do not understand that which is best for them.”

  “Well said, Lord,” the Prince glowered sourly. It seemed conquering the tribals wasn’t as easy as simply crushing them without mercy on the field. Sadly, if he was to make his mark upon the kingdom and build up a loyal cadre of supporters to support his bid for the crown, he couldn’t afford to stay here and properly subjugate them like he’d like. Besides, it was too cold for him to remain in this wretched place long-term.

  “My point was not about the primitives, as irksome as they might be, but rather regarding the recently returned units. Of the companies which were not annihilated, nearly half had their former leader elevated to the knighthood and given lands here in the north which they will need to organize,” the Lord Advisor said pointedly.

  “Ah, yes,” the Prince said happily as yet another fine plan of his came into fruition. He then lazily waved a hand, “Ensure the competence of the lieutenants in those companies and fighting war bands and, where necessary, appoint a competent replacement for the unit. I leave this matter in your capable hands. You know who is deserving of a new field command.”

  “Thank you for your confidence,” Declan said, bowing low.

  “If there’s nothing else,” said the Prince standing up. It was almost time for lunch; all this politics and strategizing had built up a powerful hunger.

  Around him, the knights and petty nobility of the north bowed like a wave as he passed. These formerly intransigent holders in the north had learned nicely over the winter, proving that even stiff-necked northerners could learn—if properly motivated.

  Whistling a jaunty tune, the Prince headed to the dining hall.

  Chapter 12: More Tulla and the Magi Training

  Steeling her resolve Falon made a fist, reached up and…timidly knocked on the piece of wood attached to the tent flap.

  “Come in!” called out a voice—one which the mere sound of sent chills down her spine.

  Screwing up her courage, the leader of a company of warriors and fighting men—a girl who had faced two major battles, been seriously injured on more than one occasion, witnessed an assassination and kept quiet out of fear, received a knighthood and lived to not tell the tale, and finally a young woman who had gone toe to toe in personal combat with spirit-possessed barbarian warriors without cowering—hemmed and hawed unable to decide if she was really going to subject herself to the clutches of the old witch again.

  “Well, come in or get gone whoever thou art,” called Tulla, her voice growing cross. “I can hear you shuffling around from foot to foot outside my tent flap.

  Swallowing around a suddenly dry lump in her throat, Falon Rankin, Knight and Lieutenant—and, it just so happened, very unwilling witchling—slowly opened the flap and then stepped inside.

  “Ah, if it isn’t the little Rankin girl, Muirgheal’s dotter, come to cast her shadow on me doorstep. Come in, my dear, come in,” said the scheming Old Branch Witch.

  “If I’m here it’s only because you sent for me—and no other reason,” Falon said stiffly.

  “No need to be rude, my little half blood,” Tulla said sharply.

  Falon paused. “Why I am I here?” she asked when she was sure she wasn’t going to say anything that might get her in trouble—or cause the old witch to use the spirit thorn tattoos which now encircled her neck.

  “I would have thought that obvious,” Tulla look surprised, “thou art here to show me how far thou’ve progressed in thy studies over this harsh winter, and then it’ll be time for a little training my little witchy-wench.”

  “I was afraid of that,” Falon sighed.

  “Never show fear, my dear. It’ll only get you killed or worse,” Tulla said darkly.

  “Fear’s natural. Its only giving into that fear that hurts you,” Falon disagreed.

  “On no, little my witchling. There are any number of things out in this big bad world that upon sensing fear will do far worse than hurt you,” Tulla said darkly.

  Falon shrugged.

  “Magic. Now,” Tulla ordered, “it’s time to show me what thou’ve got.”

  Falon nodded and immediately began to draw power from the earth, up through her feet and into her body.

  “Good,” Tulla approved, “sense the magic, feel where it wants to go. Show it the way.”

  Falon ran through the various magics she’d practiced over the Winter. From body strengthening—using magic to give her muscles the strength to overpower grown men—to increasing her agility, enhancing her eyesight, and to a lesser degree even improving her hearing. And although she couldn’t show it off right now, she mentioned how she had learned how to keep a small bundle of magic in her core which allowed her to jump, grab hold of tree limbs to increase her speed, or to change direction suddenly without losing control of her magic. She could only do it for a second or two before she needed to touch the ground again, but for a few critical instances she could manage the magic despite the interrupted flow of power from the ground.

  All in all, she was quite proud of her accomplishments.

  Tulla, on the other hand, despite initially smiling and nodding was now clicking her teeth and tisking.

  “All of it body modification arts,” the old Witch said with a frown, “well I suppose it can’t be helped that thy magic would flow in that direction. Now that thou’re back in camp, though, we’ll definitely have to broaden thy horizons.”

  Falon was suspicious and disliked the sound of it, but as she wasn’t in charge of her training regimen there was little she could do about it.

  “We’ll also want to start thee off with a little moon training,” Tulla added judiciously, “that fuzz on thy face is definitely the sign of an inferior working.”

  “I-I-It’s not mine!” Falon stuttered and protested.

  “That’s even worse,” Tulla said critically, “don’t worry; after I’m done with thee, thou’ll be able to work a beard spell on thyself like a master. No one will be able to tell whether it is natural or not!”

  Falon silently prayed to Rathtyen the Huntress for succor and relief. The women of old were never mentioned as suffering through this particular torture, or being forced to practice that particular spell on themselves instead of willing victims like, say, Ernest or Duncan! It wasn’t fair at all!

  However, fairness did not seem to be in Tulla’s vocabulary as she soon had Falon sitting on the floor in a meditative position.

  “To start off, body enhancement is just the tip of the needle when it comes to woman’s magic,” the Branch Witch lectured, “but because that’s the direction thou seem to be inclined, we’ll start off by adding effects before separating them entirely. Firstly, thou’re going to learn how to wrap thy fists in pure magic force. Imagine a yellow…or green, or pink, or red, or whatever pretty color thou prefers, wrapped around your fist and then give it the power to smite your enemies! After that we’ll start separating that force from your fist and projecting it against thy enemies. There’s also bringing thy mind and body in tune with nature—the plants, the trees and even insects—feeling them with thy magic until thou
can reach out and urge them to do things such as grab your foeman or let you hear what someone is saying. Magic is literally endless and, unlike those idiots in their Ivory Towers who think it can be quantified and dissected, we witches know the universe is endless, boundless and ultimately unknowable and uncontrollable,” she finished with satisfaction.

  “You mean…we can’t ever really understand our powers?” Falon asked with surprise.

  “Lass, thou’ll never understand it here,” Tulla said, using a stick to reach over and lightly tap Falon on the forehead. “Not really, anyway. But what you can do is feel it and know its moods and ways in here,” this time she tapped the young woman in her chest over her heart, “in the same manner a mother knows the moods of an unruly child—or husband. Thou may be taken by surprise at times, but thou’ll know the gist of it in thy heart. Thou’ll be able to sense it, and if that’s all thou learn from me then know that it’s the most important thing. Magic is not about the head—although that’s important too—it’s about the heart. Thou have to feel it in thy bones and then thou’ll be able to do anything.”

  “Magic is in my bones… I just need to be able to feel it,” Falon nodded in agreement.

  Tulla sighed. “Every witch’s approach is slightly different. Let’s start off with practical application. Now, call on thy magic and imagine the power of the earth wrapping itself around thy hands like a mitten. Keep drawing it until thou can literally feel it. And then we’ll go to the next step,” said the old Witch.

  “Okay,” Falon said, her brows furrowing as she tried to imagine how to do this new working.

  “Good…thou’re getting there. Now I want thou to…” Tulla instructed.

  Chapter 13: In Camp and Rumors of Night Raiders

  Stretching her limbs until her joints started to pop, for one blessed moment she was a girl at leisure and completely contented with her life.

  Then someone ‘knocked’ on her tent flap—which was really just a rasping of rough leather against the canvas, and was far more annoying than any genuine knock against wood could have been.