“The mage who resurrected Stata is extremely old and powerful. He is all but bedridden, despite his powers. He followed you, my friend, knowing that where you went, so would your sister.”
That couldn’t be right. I said, “He was already waiting there before we left the palace.”
“Age, wisdom, and luck. For whatever reason, he suspected you might avoid traveling on the main road, and you did. Never gamble with the old. They’ve seen all the tricks, bluffs, and bluster. Besides, there were others on the main roads to stop her. He was just eliminating a possibility.”
“Why are you here?” Kendra said. “You want me dead, yet you are warning me. It does not make sense.”
“To plead with you one last time. Do not attempt to enter Mercia.”
There were mages and others waiting. But this creature didn’t want Kendra captured by them. It reinforced the idea that there were sides in the conflict we knew nothing about. We all stared at each other for what seemed a very long time, trying to understand what was happening and what it meant. Finally, Kendra said, “If we return to Crestfallen all will be well?”
“For a time. But already, the wyvern come searching for you. In Mercia, the dragon also will come to you, and that must be prevented at all costs.”
“If I shoot you with my crossbow, will you die?” I asked casually, hoping to trick her into revealing something important.
She giggled like a young girl and said, “Silly boy.”
Because of the response, I wanted to try. “My magic will not work on you?”
She paused. “You are too clever. Most of your attempts will be as fruitless as trying to tie my legs with strands of straw, but even a gnat takes a bite of a lion now and then.”
“So, I’m a gnat?”
“Essentially. It is your sister who is of extreme concern.”
Kendra said, “If we return home, we only delay the inevitable? Why not allow me to enter Mercia and help me?”
“It has never worked before.” The Blue Woman started fading as she spoke, and by the time her image shimmed out of existence, even her last syllables were fading, too.
Kendra was flushed, her face red, hair soaked, sweat rolling down her forehead. “What was all that?”
“You cannot go to Mercia. They’re waiting for you,” I told her. “The reasons do not matter right now.”
Tears streamed down her cheeks. Not tears of sadness, but of anger and frustration. “Why are they doing this? I can’t go, I can’t return home. What do they want of me?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who is that damned blue creature?”
Kendra had put her finger on a critical point. I’d seen the image and accepted and acted as if it was a woman, so my thinking and responses had been as I would speak to someone’s mother. My sister was correct in her question. The Blue Woman was no more a woman than me, and probably less. She was like Stata, which meant, the image we saw had little to do with who she was in reality. It might not even be a she. The image could take on any shape, and whoever was behind it chose what it wished to portray and what would sway us to her side.
If the Blue Woman had appeared to us a giant snarling blue wolf, we would have reacted completely differently. If she was a grotesque image of a helpless child, another.
“Motivation. She is trying to move us to do her bidding in some manner.”
“Damon, what’d you mumble?”
“You’re right. She is a creature, but one that can appear in any shape I’ll bet. A vicious wolf or helpless child. But it chose an older woman with a soft, reassuring voice. Never threatening. Always acting as if she is trying to help you, but she allows you to walk into danger.”
“You mumbled all that?” she asked, her tears slowing as she understood I’d figured out something that might help.
“Motivation was my comment. Why did she choose that image, and why come and warn us at all? She let us walk directly into that trap with the Kondor, but now she warns us of another?”
I noticed Elizabeth was awake and listening intently, but Tater snored on. Maybe not including Elizabeth earlier had been a mistake. So, I ignored her and continued, “Think about this from the idea the Blue Woman knowingly let us walk into a trap, not only with Kondor but with a more powerful mage than I’ve ever heard of. She knew and didn’t warn us.”
“She also let us go into that storehouse where huge men should have had no problem killing us. She wants us dead. Well, me.” Kendra folded her arms across her chest, a sure sign of defiance.
Elizabeth quietly sat and pulled her blanket around her to fend off the damp and cold of the night. In the next flash of lightning, her face was stern, her jaw clenched. There would be future sessions of explaining our actions and trust to rebuild, but that would come later.
I continued, “So, after not warning us of danger twice, she now tells us that six mages and ‘others’ will sense your powers when we enter Mercia. They are there to kill you.”
“She was not warning us. She was trying to scare us away from going there. Preventing us.” Kendra’s fingers were still curled into fists. “She also said I cannot go home because that has never worked before.”
“I think that was a mistake on her part. Not the truth in it, but she didn’t mean to reveal that there have been others before you.” My answer was deliberately short. It hung in the air like the punctuation of a thunderclap. “And if she is trying to prevent you from going there, I’m inclined to do the opposite.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
Elizabeth didn’t appear happy, but it didn’t seem her emerging anger was directed at us. Well, some of it was, but not all. She stood, the blanket pulled around her as she might a royal robe in the king’s chambers, and said, “There are happenings we know nothing of, but you must know that you are more than my servants, you are my only true friends. I will listen to your tales in their entirety, but for now, we continue to Mercia. Damon is right. The more this strange being wishes to prevent you from going, the more determined we should be to do the opposite.”
Kendra and I exchanged relieved glances and turned our attention back to her. We didn’t know what, or how much she had heard, but the general feeling of relief washed over me. At least it was in the open.
She peppered us with questions until I could not keep my eyes open in the wee hours of the morning. I rested my head on the straw for just a moment and woke to dim daylight. The storm hadn’t fully passed. Rain pattered, but the thunder and lightning had ceased. Kendra and Elizabeth were still sleeping. My eyes closed again while waiting for my head to clear and I fell back asleep.
My rest was needed, but it was also comfortable where we slept. Not the hay or the relaxing sounds of the rain. It was because of telling all to Elizabeth and holding nothing back. Her insights were keener than mine, and in several instances, she added small bits of information we’d failed to see or understand. However, the primary result of answering her questions was that she agreed the Blue Woman was trying to keep us from Mercia, first by allowing the Kondor trap, and Stata, then the men at the store, and finally the warning she issued to us last night.
Might there be six mages and ‘others’ waiting for Kendra? We all agreed there might. There might also be green elephants and water-sprites, too, but who could know? So far, the Blue Woman either lied, spoke in riddles, or withheld important and dangerous information. The most valuable thing she’d said was by accident.