Empress Unborn se-7 Read online

  “No, you’re not.”

  “Wulfston, it’s my husband they’ve taken!”

  “And that’s his child you’re carrying,” he reminded her. “You were fortunate that the drug did not harm the baby-for Sukuru still let you drink the wine after he knew you were pregnant. You don’t know what these people are capable of if they have no care for the health of an unborn babe. Will you be as careless as they are? Will you take your child into the midst of Adept conflict?”

  “I can take care of my baby and myself,” Aradia insisted.

  As if the matter were settled, Wulfston turned away and began putting coins into a leather pouch.

  He thought she wasn’t capable of helping! To prove her strength, she let her powers reach out to her brother, grasping control of his body, paralyzing his muscles.

  As if her powers were nothing, he straightened and turned on her, moving as freely as if she had done nothing! “You see?” He spoke her own horrified thoughts. “Aradia, you just don’t have your old powers right now.”

  It was true! She had always been stronger than

  Wulfston. Now he was coming into the full strength of his powers, while hers…

  She tried to fight down tears. I never cry, she told herself, but even that weakness would not be denied.

  Wulfston saw, and gently put his arms around her. “Please… we both know it’s best that you stay here. I know it wont help for me to tell you not to worry, but I promise you this: we will bring Lenardo back to you, safe and sound. I swear it.”

  It was just as difficult to persuade Julia that she could not go along. “If I’d only developed Adept powers instead of Reading!” the girl fumed as she and Aradia stood on the quay, watching Wulfston’s ship sail out through the entrance to Dragon’s Mouth.

  “Julia, we need a good Reader here, to follow their progress,” Aradia told her.

  Julia did not dignify that offering with a response. She knew she was no more able than Wulfston’s Reader, Rolf, to tell where Sukuru’s ship was out on the ocean-and since it would be even father away by the time Wulfston caught up with it, they would have only the Watchers’ reports from Readers closer to the action to let them follow Lenardo’s rescue.

  The ship dropped below the horizon, but Julia could still Read it, and Aradia Read through the girl. For a long while they stood there, but finally Julia put out her hand to Aradia-something the girl had never done before. “Let’s go back to the castle,” she said. “There’s nothing more we can do.”

  “We can prepare for a homecoming party,” Aradia suggested, and Julia managed a small smile.

  Together, Lenardo’s wife and his daughter walked up to the end of the quay, where servants waited to take them back to Castle Blackwolf.

  All that day, Watchers sent Readers’ reports on the progress of the two ships, but by morning there was nothing more. The last thing anyone Read was that they had disappeared into a storm.

  A storm, Aradia wondered, or an Adept battle? If the latter, then surely they would be home soon, for Wulfston’s powers were far superior to Sukuru’s.

  But the next day passed with no word, and then a third day. Aradia did not sleep well the first two nights; she kept waiting for Lenardo’s mind to touch hers, and would not deliberately put herself into deep slumber lest she miss his first contact. She knew he would go out of body, to tell her as soon as he was safely on his way home!

  And when he didn’t, she knew that something was terribly wrong. Wulfston had not been able to catch Sukuru’s ship. She refused to face the worst possibility-that Lenardo and Wulfston were dead, whether in Adept battle or natural disaster.

  No-they were her husband and her brother. If either were dead, surely she would know it!

  So she faced the fact that it might be weeks or months before the two men she loved best could get themselves out of whatever predicament they were in and return to her. She nearly cursed the child in her womb that had turned her into a passive female who could do nothing but wait while her men were in danger.

  But it was Lenardo’s child. Possibly the baby was all she would ever have of him. She lay down and folded her hands over her abdomen, trying once again to Read the child in her womb.

  Frustrated, she realized that it was essential to keep herself healthy, and that meant sleeping. Deliberately, she used the mental exercises her father had taught her when she was a child, to put herself into a deep, restful sleep.

  Aradia dreamed she was Reading her baby at last. Her mind took her inside her own body, and she saw the shape of her child, sleeping sweetly in its private ocean. It moved gently, drifting with its mother’s breathing.

  She moved. The child was a girl-not an infant, but an infant-sized perfectly formed young woman, long golden hair drifting about her slender body. Her back was to Aradia, who approached slowly, wondering at the revelation. This was what her child-Lenardo’s child-would be.

  As she came nearer, the girl’s body turned over, very slowly, to face her. The face was utterly beautiful, although the eyes were closed.

  Still sleeping, still unconscious-when would there be an awareness for her to touch as Lenardo had promised?

  Nonetheless, it was wonderful to see her child, so perfect, so beautiful, rosy-cheeked with health. She could count her fingers and toes, see that her limbs were straight and strong. Lenardo would be so proud of such a daughter!

  As she watched, Aradia saw the girl’s soft pink lips begin to move-it was as if she were trying to speak.

  “Yes!” Aradia urged. “Speak to me. I’m your mother. Tell me that you’re there, child!”

  The lips moved again, but still Aradia could Read no thought, no mental presence. She went closer, looking into the beautiful face with its still-closed eyes fringed with dark lashes. If she watched the lips move, perhaps she could make out what her daughter was saying.

  No… not quite. Not…

  The child spoke. Very clearly, in a voice not of youth and innocence but of incredibly weary experience.

  “Aradia. Mother. You and Lenardo have given me life. You owe me that-and after I am born, I will give you what I owe you. “

  Bewildered, Aradia stared at the serene face, speaking such strange words. Then the girl’s eyes began to open-She woke up.

  It was morning again, and she knew there had been no news of Wulfston and Lenardo, for she had left strict instructions that she was to be awakened if there were.

  So she lay there for a moment, remembering her strange dream. I probably dreamed of our daughter grown up because if she were, she’d be able to help us now, she thought.

  Again she tried to Read the child for herself-

  — and touched something!

  There was an awareness!

  It was incoherent, no more than a vague sensing of life-but what did she expect of a babe in the womb, not to be born for six months yet?

  Oh, Lenardo, she thought, your child is conscious! Come home safely, my husband, as soon as you can. Meanwhile, I will care for our daughter, until you can see her for yourself!

  Chapter Two

  Julia and Aradia remained at Castle Blackwolf, waiting and hoping for Wulfston and Lenardo to return.

  As weeks passed with no word, their fears grew; the Africans’ plot was far more devious than it had seemed at first.

  Sukuru and Chulaika wanted Wulfston, but he would not cooperate. They had had both Wulfston and Lenardo helplessly drugged-they could as easily have kidnapped the two men together. Instead, they took only Lenardo, knowing that with Aradia pregnant, it was Wulfston who would follow. They must be holding Lenardo hostage to force Wulfston to fight for them.

  If they had taken the two men together…

  “We were fools to tell them how well we work together,” Aradia told Julia. “They know better than to take Lenardo and Wulfston on the same ship-they’d have taken over the crew the moment they woke up, and been back here the next day.”

  “The moment Wulfston finds Father,” Julia said, “th
ey’ll escape.”

  “But Wulfston can’t Read,” Aradia reminded her. “Lenardo can’t contact him except through Astra. If they can knock her out, or separate her from Wulfston… that could be why it’s taking so long.”

  As the days dragged on, the two women often repeated the same conversation, encouraging each other not to think of all the possible reasons there was no word of the two men.

  Although there was no invasion fleet from Africa,

  Wulfston’s lands could not be left unprotected. His network of minor Adepts gathered at the castle, along with several Magister Readers and a dozen from the Path of the Dark Moon, while reinforcements were sent from Tiberium to aid the Watchers along his coasts and borders.

  Then one day, when Julia was helping a healer to direct his powers toward eradicating a tumor in a boy’s knee, she felt the touch of Master Clement’s mind. “Go to your room, Julia. We must discuss what you and Aradia should do now.”

  “But we’re healing-” she protested.

  “Panatus can take over,” he told her.

  Reluctantly, Julia turned her duties over to the young Magister Reader and went up to her room. She could, of course, have held the conversation with Master Clement anywhere, but it could be unnerving to nonReaders to have a Reader sitting apparently in a trance while she communicated with another Reader far away.

  Aradia was also in the rapport, created by Master Clement all the way from Zendi. The Master of Masters was out of body for this communication, his mental voice firm and clear, similar to his normal speaking voice except that mentally he sounded younger than he really was.

  “All precautions have now been taken to care for Lord Wulfston’s lands in his absence,” Master Clement told them. “It is time for you to return to Zendi.”

  “But Lenardo-” Aradia began.

  “When Lenardo returns, he will contact you from wherever he lands,” Master Clement pointed out.

  “Aradia, the journey to Zendi is safe for you now. Later in your pregnancy it could be dangerous to your child. Also, I want you here, under observation of the best Readers we have.”

  “Yes, Master Clement,” Aradia replied with uncharacteristic meekness. But she had an underlying reason. “With so many members of our alliance missing, our strongest Adepts should be centrally located in Zendi, prepared to moved in any direction from which an attack might come.”

  “Until your child is born,” Master Clement agreed, “you should be sheltered here, protected by lands we hold on all sides.”

  Julia wondered if Aradia could Read that Master Clement did not verbalize all his concerns. She had a lesson scheduled with him, so after Aradia had left the rapport to set their retainers to work preparing to leave Castle Blackwolf, she asked, “Do you fear an attack, Master?”

  “An attack? Child, what would give you that idea?”

  “Our situation might give anybody that idea,” she replied. “Since the Aventine Empire fell, we have more land than has ever been under one government before. But we have lost key members of our Alliance. Torio and Melissa are gone, and now Father and Wulfston. Lilith meant to leave her lands in the care of Zanos and Astra while she came to aid Aradia in her confinement. Her lands are bordered by enemies. If Zanos and Astra are not back by then, will she dare leave her lands with only her son to care for them? Ivorn’s not much older than I am.”

  She clearly felt the old man’s surprise as he told her, “Julia, these are not problems for one so young.”

  “But they are my problems,” she insisted. “Master Clement, the word will spread beyond our borders that Father and Wulfston are gone. Our best Reader, and one our strongest Lords Adept-and if the news of Aradia’s pregnancy spreads as well, they’ll know she can’t function at full strength. Don’t you think some of our neighbors might take this as the best time to attack?”

  There was a pause. Then, “Yes, Julia, I do. However, they will mistake our vulnerability.”

  “What?”

  “Where do you think they will attack, child?”

  “Along the northern borders-especially here, along Wulfston’s northern coast, and Lilith’s borders to the north and east.”

  “Why do you think the attacks will come there?”

  “Along those borders are lands which have refused our offers of peaceful trade agreements,” she replied. “With Wulfston gone, they’ll try for a foothold here. Lilith is a strong Adept, and her son is growing in power-they may attack now, knowing that once Ivorn comes into his full powers, they will face a much stronger adversary.”

  “Yes, you are quite right. Now, Julia… if you wanted to attack our Savage Empire, knowing what you know, would you choose the same plan of attack?”

  The way the question was worded, the answer was probably no. But then he would ask-

  “Think of your father, when Aradia first gave him the city of Zendi,” Master Clement prompted.

  Suddenly Julia knew. “Wulfston’s lands and Lilith’s, and Father and Aradia’s lands-their people will defend them to the death! They’ve known tyrants like Drakonius-and it’s worth fighting to remain part of the Savage Empire. We’re most vulnerable in the old Aventine Empire, where most people had a pretty good life under the Emperor’s rule. In only four years they haven’t had time to develop any loyalty-and lots of them see us as worse than the Emperor because we caused the earthquake in Tiberium.”

  “Child, you are too wise for your years,” said Master-Clement. “Lenardo and Aradia are teaching you well. If Portia had treated the Readers she ruled as the members of our Alliance treat their people, they would not have turned against her. But we are wise if we can learn from the mistakes of others, and not make them all ourselves.

  “Now,” he continued, “enough of government; Aradia and your father will teach you that. Show me what you have been practicing of Reading.”

  Julia had been practicing her fine discernment, and earned praise from Master Clement when she showed him how she could Read something like the tumor in a boy’s knee down to the level of individual cells.

  “Not Torio, not even your father, could Read so well at your age. Now show me distance.”

  Julia enjoyed these lessons, for her horizons were constantly expanding. Reading was a joy-had been ever since Lenardo had first touched her mind and taken her out of her life as a misfit among the guttersnipes of Zendi. Once she understood the necessity for etiquette and protocol in someone who would rule her own lands one day, she had carefully developed her habits and her language until her teachers could find no fault.

  She loved to learn-it was the one quarrel she had with her friend Galerio, for he found the fascinating knowledge she longed to share with him quite boring.

  She demonstrated for Master Clement how far she could Read, and with what accuracy, then showed him her new skill at Reading other Readers without being detected. She Read Panatus, now helping the healer with one of many sessions to straighten the bones of a child who had suffered rickets before Lord Wulfston came to rule the land.

  ” Julia, that is not a skill for a Reader in training!” Master Clement chided. “Until you pass your exams to become a Magister Reader, you should not even try it.”

  “Why not? I can do it-I learned it by Reading with Father when he does it.”

  “Because, child, it takes a certain wisdom to use one’s skills properly. I understand how difficult it is for you to see that some kinds of wisdom come only with age.”

  “Or experience,” she protested. “Father says I’ve seen a great deal for someone my age.”

  “And I agree. However, you are also at the time of life when your body is changing-you are becoming a woman, Julia. Until you have become accustomed to the changes, they will affect your feelings, your judgment. Your body will affect your mind.”

  “Then teach me to leave my body!” she asked eagerly. “I’m ready-you’ve tested all my skills. Let me take the next step.”

  “If it were only your Reading skills,” he told her, “
I would agree that you are ready. But moving beyond your body must wait until you have passed completely through puberty. So practice your other skills, Julia, and learn other things. Let Aradia teach you more languages. Study music-”

  “I have no talent for music,” Julia protested. “When I tried to play the lute, it sounded like a sick cow.”

  “Then by all means practice upon the lute! I shall set Master Juna to teaching you as soon as you return.”

  If there was anything Julia hated, it was being made to do something she was not good at, and never would be. Her only hope was that Master Clement might forget this part of their conversation, so she did not argue-that would certainly set the notion firmly in his mind.

  Her ploy, however, did not work. Hardly were she and Aradia back in Zendi when Master Juna was there with her lute and a schedule of lessons. And when she protested to both Aradia and Master Clement, she got the same answer from both: “Learn to play well enough to accompany singing, and it will suffice. It is good discipline for everybody to learn to do some things he has no great talent for.”

  Aradia was glad to be back in Zendi, although her anxiety over Lenardo’s safety grew as the weeks passed with no word from him. If he and Wulfston were detained in Africa, surely there were ways to send messages! Traders came from the Nubian lands. Was neither man free to write or send a letter?

  The expected attack came upon Wulfston’s northern border. Lilith and Ivorn rode to join Wulfston’s army. Readers and minor Adepts flocked to their aid, and the attacking force was repelled as easily as swatting a fly.

  Aradia was pleased that the attack was so easily routed, but frustrated to be left in Zendi, far out of the action.

  It was Julia who pointed out, “If you were not pregnant, you would still not have gone so far for a battle that was over before you could’ve arrived.”

  Aradia had to smile. She had long ago accepted Lenardo’s adopted daughter-but now she was learning to love her. The girl had been a bundle of mischief before Master Clement took over her training, but she was growing up into a fine young woman.