Agent of the Dragon

Rhysa woke in a bed she hadn’t been in for more than a year. The last time she’d awakened in this bed, she’d just been beaten and raped. This time, however, the bedside attendant was neither Lord nor Lady Hermestus. Nor was it one of their apprentices. At first she couldn’t remember the young woman’s name. Then she remembered: Crysta--Lord Amonteus’ newest apprentice.

“Crysta?” Rhysa’s voice was faint. “What are you doing here?”

“Everyone in House Hermestus is busy. Most of House Amonteus is helping. Since I’m the newest apprentice, it fell to me to keep watch at your side. Lord Hermestus said you’d had this reaction before, and that you would be weak, but would recover quickly.” Crysta paused. “Is there anything I can get you, My Lady?”

Rhysa’s mind had been frantically working to put the clues together. At Crysta’s question, though, everything stopped. “Rhysa, Crysta. Just...Rhysa.”

Crysta’s eyes widened slightly. Then she let out a long breath and nodded. “Rhysa, then. Is there anything I can do for you, Rhysa?”

“Can you tell me what happened?”

“Not really. I know something major happened. I’d never seen Lord Amonteus lose his countenance before. Next thing I know, half of House Amonteus, and all of his apprentices and journeymen, were hauled here to House Hermestus. I was detailed to you early, so I didn’t hear much of what’s going on.” Crysta paused. “Can you sit up? Or Stand?”

Rhysa thought about it. “I think so. Scoot back a bit.” Crysta scooted her chair back several inches. Rhysa rolled to her side and found it was no worse than the morning after a rough midnight workout. She pushed herself to a sitting position, the sheet draped across her lap.

When Rhysa was sitting upright, Crysta nodded. “I’ll go see if someone who knows what’s going on can come in and explain.” Crysta stood and paused. “There are some clean clothes at the foot of the bed. See if you can get dressed before anyone else comes in.”

Rhysa stood when the door closed, and as she clutched the bed to stay upright. Maybe a little worse than the morning after a rough midnight workout. Still, she was able to make her way to the clothes Crysta mentioned. By the time the door opened to admit Lord Amonteus, Rhysa was fully dressed and combing her hair.

Rhysa turned to greet him and stopped short. His face was pale and sweating, his hands shook slightly. Unlike Crysta, she had seen Lord Amonteus out of countenance. This was far different. He was fighting shock. Something truly awful must have happened, or Lord Hermestus wouldn’t be allowing Lord Amonteus to walk around.

Suppressing her own weakness, Rhysa crossed the room, took his arm, and guided him to the chair. To her dismay, there wasn’t the slightest resistance as she gently pushed him down. This was beyond serious. If she’d realized it was this bad, she would have put him in the bed she’d just left. Too late now.

“Rhysa.” His voice was hoarse and breathy. “I need to--”

“You don’t need to do anything.” She tried to imitate Lord Hermestus’ tone, the one patients obeyed before they realized it. “If anyone needs you, they’ll come find you.” As she spoke, she tapped the magic overlay and scanned Lord Amonteus as she’d been taught.

He shook his head weakly. “No--.”

“Yes.,” Her interruption was firm. She did not like what her scan found. She pulled her scan back and let go of the magic. She took his chin and tilted his head so he was force to meet her eyes. She was surprised to see tears. “And,” she continued as if she hadn’t paused, “they’ll get me, instead. I’m better than you are at medical situations. And with the condition you’re in, we’d be attending to you within ten minutes. So you will stay and rest. I’ll have Crysta in here to keep an eye on you.”

As she’d hoped, the brusque tone goaded him to stand. As he struggled to his feet, she guided him to the bed, and before he could do anything, she gently but firmly shoved him into the bed. While still too weak to lift him from the chair, she had enough strength to roll him onto his back once he was actually in the bed. She tapped the magic overlay once more and carefully pushed his consciousness into sleep, making sure his vitals were steady. Then she turned to go find Crysta.

Before Rhysa reached the door, it opened and Lady Hermestus bustled in along with oddly muted sounds of hectic activity in the halls. Her eyes and mouth opened in surprise when she saw Rhysa.

“Oh.” She took in the rest of the scene and obviously came to a conclusion. “Tell me.”

Rhysa described the condition Lord Amonteus had been in when he came in. When she described what she’d done, Lady Hermestus nodded her approval. “Very well done, chi--Rhysa.” Rhysa noticed the abrupt change in address, but ignored it as Lady Hermestus continued. “What he had to tell you, though, is important.” Lady Hermestus turned very serious. “Please, have a seat.” Rhysa sat, sensing she wasn’t going to like what she was about to hear.

Lady Hermestus looked at Rhysa in silence for a while in order to collect her thoughts. Then she began--and Rhysa wished she hadn’t.

“Let’s start with the pain you felt right before you collapsed. Doubtless it felt familiar.” She paused and Rhysa nodded cautiously, and Lady Hermestus continued. “It was a modification being made to your House Kasteryn tattoo.” She gestured to the mirror. “Take a look before I continue.”

Rhysa stood and slipped her tunic off. She turned her back to the mirror and looked over her shoulder. The first thing she noticed--the crossed arrows were gone. As she puzzled this over, something else caught her eye. At the nape of her neck, above the sword pommel of House Kasteryn’s sigil, floated a crown. In her mind, she heard one of Lady Kasteryn’s lectures on local heraldry: “Crowns all have to do with leadership. Vertical position indicates relative rank in the House hierarchy. An upside down crown indicates a leader’s disgrace within a House. A crown located above the sigil as a whole indicates a House Head.” She’d shown Rhysa her own House marking. Rhysa was now looking at the House Head sigil in the mirror.

“But--.”

“No, you just sit back down and I’ll continue.” Lady Hermestus’ voice was kind and firm--motherly, though there was a great deal of unease beneath it.

Rhysa put her tunic back on and, sat to listen to Lady Hermestus. Her mind knew what was coming, but didn’t want to admit it. She feared Lady Hermestus was going to make her face it.

“You have that tattoo--” Lady Hermestus’ voice began to break, and she paused to collect herself. When she spoke again, it came out in a rush as if she was afraid she wouldn’t be able to get it out. “That tattoo means you’re now the Head of House Kasteryn. Amelia’s dead.”

In the following silence, Lord Amonteus’ breathing could be heard clearly. Irrelevantly, Rhysa’s mind fixed on how well Lady Hermestus was holding her composure despite the pain she must be feeling. Rhysa’s own mind was stuck in a cycle of irrelevancies and denials. Eventually, a single thought floated to the top of the jumble her mind was in. “What happened?”

“We’re not sure. At the moment, it seems someone detonated an explosive set-spell.” A mixture of awe and fear crept into the grief on Lady Hermestus’ face. “The house is more or less gone. Almost no one survived.”

Rhysa nodded even though her mind couldn’t compass what Lady Hermestus was telling her. The building utterly destroyed. Nearly no survivors. Lady Kasteryn was dead, that was obvious, but why did Rhysa now wear the House Head tattoo? And what about....

“Elise!” Rhysa surged to her feet, fear and hope and grief warring inside her.

Lady Hermestus roughly pushed Rhysa back into the chair. “Elise was in the salle. She is alive, if only barely.”

Rhysa went limp with relief. Barely alive meant hope for recovery. “Anyone else?”

“Of those others you were actively friends with, only Tathan, who was in the stables, survived. A couple of slaves, a man and a woman, were sleeping in their rooms in the building foundations, and they survived. No one else, yet.”

“How are they?”

“The slaves are severely burned. In order to escape, they had to crawl through fire. They said there were more alive down there, but when we got there, they’d already died of smoke inhalation. Tathan is in bad shape, but not as bad as Elise. Both of his legs are broken, his hip, and an arm. He has a severe concussion. No internal bleeding, fortunately.”

“I need to see Elise.”

Lady Hermestus opened her mouth to refuse, but under Rhysa’s gaze she closed it and nodded. “Follow me.” She led Rhysa into mayhem. The halls were crowded with people hurrying from place to place and in and out of rooms. For so much activity, there was surprisingly little noise. Rhysa guessed Lord Hermestus had activated a sound suppression set-spell to prevent his patients from being disturbed.

As they made their way through the halls, Rhysa caught sight of Crysta. Putting a hand to Lady Hermestus’ shoulder to stop her, Rhysa caught Crysta’s eye and beckoned her over. “Go back to the room I was in. Lord Amonteus is sleeping. Keep an eye on him. I don’t expect trouble, but if he starts to have trouble breathing, find me or one of the senior apprentices in House Hermestus.” Rhysa paused and turned to Lady Hermestus. “Can you have someone make up a couple doses of chamomile tea with an infusion of Lemon Balm and a tincture of Passiflora?” At Lady Hermestus’ nod, Rhysa turned back to Crysta. “If he wakes, give him a cup of that. But no more than one cup at a time.”

Crysta’s eyes widened at Rhysa’s brisk and commanding tone. She glanced at Lady Hermestus but didn’t wait for a response. She dipped a curtsey and hurried off.

Watching Crysta’s retreating back, Rhysa realized what she’d just done. Flushing, she turned to Lady Hermestus, but Lady Hermestus’ smile stopped the insipient apology. Rhysa felt her face grow hotter.

“Shall we continue?” It was a casual invitation. Rhysa nodded wordlessly, still embarrassed at having taken charge with the Lady of the House present.

Despite herself, Rhysa gasped with shock when she entered the clean-room Elise was housed in. Elise’s face was dark and pulpy with the after effects of broken bones newly reset. Her head was held between stabilizing blocks to keep it from turning. What was visible of arms and legs had the same newly reset look as her face. What Rhysa could see of her friend was bad enough, but the pattern of bandages, slings, and supports told a more dire story yet. Mentally Rhysa tallied the evidence: broken spine, two--no, three--impalings, severe internal bleeding, and a severed hand newly reattached.

Rhysa looked down at her friend. She wasn’t aware of having crossed to the bed. She gently stroked the fingers of one limp hand, and shook her head at the damage. They called this surviving? And yet--though the eyes were closed, Elise’s chest rose and fell regularly and easily.

“Bryn took care of the worst damage: the impalings, the severed hand, and the broken spine.” Lady Hermestus’ voice was soft. “Athyr and Coramin exhausted themselves setting fractures and stopping the internal bleeding. They’ve put pain blocks in place so she could rest.”

Rhysa nodded dumbly, only vaguely aware Lord Hermestus would have exhausted himself nearly as much as the journeymen Lady Hermestus had named. After a brief pause, she heard Lady Hermestus take her leave. When she heard the door close, Rhysa looked around and dragged a chair to the bed. She sat, her hand lightly covering Elise’s fingertips. She let tears trickle down her cheeks, but held back her sobs to keep from disturbing Elise.

She didn’t know how long it was before she saw a flicker of Elise’s eyelids. Rhysa wiped the tears from her face with her free hand. When Elise finally opened her eyes, Rhysa smiled solemnly at her. Elise’s mouth twitched into the faintest of smiles in return before going slack again.

“You look like hell.”

Elise huffed softly--as close to a laugh as she could get. “You’re just jealous.” It was said in the faintest thread of a voiced whisper.

Rhysa grinned briefly. “You in any pain?”

Elise’s head gave a miniscule twitch to the side. “No. Just weak.” A silence fell, and Rhysa listened to Elise’s breathing as they looked at each other.

“Rhys--.” Rhysa felt Elise try to lift her hand. She lifted Elise’s hand to support it from underneath, and felt the weak fingers tense slightly to hold on. “Rhys--,” Elise tried again. Her eyes widened briefly then faded slightly. “Rhys--I, I--I’m tired.”

Hurriedly, Rhysa tapped her magic and scanned Elise. She saw Elise’s heart slow. She saw Elise’s respiration grow shallow. Then she felt the tension go out of the hand on top of hers. Gently she withdrew her hand from under the limp fingers, even as the sobs began to surface. She pushed her chair back so not even a single tremor would disturb the form on the bed. Rhysa buried her face in her hands, and finally released the sobs she’d been holding back for Elise’s sake.

#