Island Shifters: Book 02 - An Oath of the Mage (2 page)

Then, Kenley shrugged her small shoulders and did as her father asked-the one thing that always caused him to laugh and throw her in the air until her belly tingled.

She flicked her wrist and sent the ball screaming toward his face.

The adults in the room gasped and shouted simultaneously. “An airshifter!”

She hoped that was a good thing.

Kiernan marched down the tapestry-hung corridor toward the suite of rooms she shared with Beck and Kenley when they were in residence at the Nysian royal palace.

“Come now, Kiernan. You knew this would happen,” Beck pointed out as he easily kept pace beside her. The ever-present Royal Guard, only two since they were inside the palace walls, trailed unobserved behind them.

She shook her head of blonde wavy hair. “I know, but at five?”

“She is almost six,” he reminded her. “Besides, look at her parents.”

She turned her head to glare at him. Why was he grinning so ridiculously? Kenley was pureblood. There was never any doubt that she would be a shifter, and a very powerful one at that, but she was just a baby yet. Most shifters did not begin to develop their powers until their late teenage years.

Kiernan stopped in the middle of the hallway and put her arm out to stop him. “You are happy about this!”

“Of course, I am,” he confessed with a chuckle and simply walked around her without pausing. She stared at him in disbelief and then, with a shake of her head, followed behind and caught up to him just as he reached their suite.

Her handmaid, Leah, was anxiously hovering outside of the room with a handful of dresses flung over one arm.

Kiernan waved her away. “No.”

“But, Your Grace! The royal seamstress spent hours making these beautiful gowns! You are to choose one for Court this morning.”

“I already have more than enough perfectly suitable gowns to wear, Leah. I told the seamstress as much yesterday.”

The handmaid’s eyes widened in shock. “But, Your Grace, at least let me help you dress!”

“I can and will dress myself. Thank you, Leah. You may go.”

“Your Grace…”

“Goodbye, Leah,” interjected Beck and swiftly ushered Kiernan inside. When the door closed, he said, “I thought we were supposed to allow the servants to do their jobs.”

“Normally, we do, but I have other…” She let out a yelp when he swept her off her feet and carried her through the sitting room to their large canopied bed. Laying her down gently, he laid his large frame alongside hers and caressed her swollen belly.

“Are you finished gloating about our daughter?” she asked.

“I do not gloat, Kiernan. If you think about it calmly, you will remember that you were not much older than Kenley when you first discovered mindshifting. And, she has already bonded with Baya, so you knew it was just a matter of time.”

She nodded resignedly and remembered fondly her own bond with her Draca Cat, Bajan, at the age of six. Bajan had been dead for years now, but the pain still cut like a knife whenever she thought about him. “I just worry.”

“Well, try not to. It is not good for our son,” he said and pressed his lips to her abdomen.

“A son, is it?”

“I told you before, I am very rarely wrong.”

“So, you keep telling me,” she laughed and pulled his head down and kissed him deeply, feeling like the luckiest woman alive. The world had changed so drastically in the last six years that sometimes she had to pinch herself to believe it was real. Was it really just six years ago that she was confined to exile? That shifters were outlawed from living anywhere in Massa except the land of Pyraan? The Demon War changed everything for her and Beck, and it truly was a new world. A world where magic users lived free, and Kiernan was returned to the throne for which she was born. Both paled in comparison, however, to her marriage and child. Beck and Kenley. Her husband. Her daughter. Her life.

“Hmm…forget about Court. Let’s stay right here and the nobles can fight among themselves without us,” she murmured contentedly.

“If only we could. You know how much I despise the politics of Iserlohn.”

She raised her eyebrows. “And, this coming from the Prince of the land?”

“Prince by marriage only.”

She pursed her lips in a pout. “If you hate it so much, you could always leave me and go live a quieter life elsewhere.”

He grabbed her with a growl. “Over my dead body.”

She laughed and wrapped her arms around him. “That is what I thought. Now, let me up. I have to get dressed.” As Prince and Princess of Iserlohn, their absence would be tantamount to throwing fire on a stack of hay with the current climate surrounding her family. Before soup was served, a dozen rumors would have leaked outside of the palace doors regarding the probable reason for the missing royals.

Beck let go of her, and she stood from the bed and pulled her dress over her head and let it drop to the floor as she walked to the mahogany wardrobe. “Did Airron take Kenley to Captain…,” she paused and had to stop herself from looking over her shoulder for Miss Belle. The insufferable but dear woman was opposed to Kenley learning how to handle a sword with Captain Franck, but this was one area where Kiernan would not relent. No daughter of hers was going to spend her time sipping tea and learning embroidery. Not when she should be learning how to defend herself and her realm. She glanced back at Beck and finished her sentence. “…Captain Franck?”

Beck nodded and followed her. “She is there. Where is my black silk coat?” he asked, rummaging through the wardrobe over her head. As an earthshifter, he towered over her much smaller stature. All earthshifters exhibited an abundantly muscular physique and a powerful strength, but none alive today was as strong as Beck. Along with their friends Airron Falewir, a bodyshifter, and Rogan Radek, a fireshifter, the four of them were the most powerful shifters on the Island of Massa. “Did I leave it at home?” Much to her father’s dismay, home for them was the city of Bardot two leagues north of the city of Nysa. Beck adamantly refused to live at the palace. After a lifetime of exile, living behind walls was unimaginable to him.

Kiernan pulled out a scarlet and black silk gown, the House colors of Everard, and stepped into it. “Three coats from the left.”

Beck found the coat embroidered on the collar and cuffs with King Maximus’ Golden Lions and slipped it on over his broad shoulders.

Kiernan whistled appreciatively. “You look very handsome, Prince Beck.”

He bowed graciously. “As do you, Princess Kiernan.”

Thanking him with another kiss, she quickly ran a brush through her long hair. When she was satisfied with the result, she exited the room with her husband and turned her thoughts to the troubling rumors about this evening’s council brought to her by the her personal guard, Captain Kirby Nash. It seemed that one of her father’s liegemen, Lord Davad Etin, intended to make trouble of some kind. That the Lord was allowing gossip to spread freely could only have one meaning—he had considerable backing for his schemes. And, they were schemes. He had always been the most cunning and ambitious of the nobles, but with civil unrest brewing in the section of lands he controlled, he was becoming desperate to lay the blame at the feet of another.

Her father?

She shook her head.
Not on my watch.

Attuned as always to her emotions, Beck gave her arm a brief squeeze. Highworld, but she was fortunate to have him.

Together, they descended to the first floor of the palace and when they arrived at the open doors of Grace Hall, she was surprised to find a line of citizens awaiting an audience with her father. For some reason, and totally against custom, he was seeing petitioners at the beginning of Court. All knelt to one knee or curtsied as they approached.

“Please rise,” she commanded and, with the help of the Sabers, a path opened up for them before the doors.

Kiernan was tense as she entered the hall and made the walk between towering black marble pillars to the front. For once, the colorful fresco of the city painted on the concave ceiling above did nothing to calm her. She would not feel at ease again until she knew exactly what Lord Davad Etin was about.

Her father, sitting on his throne atop a raised dais with three wide steps, looked resplendent in a scarlet robe with black trim, his dark eyes showing not a hint of the concern that plagued her.

The nobles occupied the spaces to the left and right of him. Lord Etin, Lord Winslow and the young Lady Conry sat to one side and Lord Hamilton, Lord Gregaros and Lady Knapp to the other. A clearer line of House loyalties could not have been made.

Kiernan and Beck took their places in the two empty seats to the immediate right of her father, and Captain Kirby Nash slid into position behind her chair and alongside her father’s personal guard, Captain Darin Morel.

A man was standing in front of the dais wearing a threadbare tunic and wringing his hat in his hands nervously.

“You may continue,” her father told him kindly.

“It is a disgrace, my King! An honest man just cannot make a living in Iserport. There is no work! Buildings are abandoned and left in disrepair and the roads are impassable. Rioters roam freely and terrorize the folks that are left. If not for the recent trade agreement with Haventhal, we would not even have enough food for our tables!”

An agitated murmur rippled through the crowd at the open doors of the hall.

The King’s eyes, hard as obsidian, turned to Lord Etin, the overlord of Iserport. “Davad? Would you care to respond? I was under the impression that improvements had been made and legitimate business was thriving again in Iserport.”

“Bah!” spit the petitioner.

Lord Etin met her father’s eyes squarely. “Your Grace, I assure you…”

The man spit again. “Bah, I say. Speaking my mind is gonna cost me my head, I realize that, but it is worth the price if I can leave a better life for my wife and children!”

Lord Etin snorted out a laugh and held out his hands in question. “Your Grace, how long are you going to let this farce continue?”

Her father raised his eyebrows. “Farce? This is neither the first nor the fifth complaint I have heard of the conditions in Iserport. Sources tell me that your lands are poised for civil war. What say you, Lord Etin?”

Kiernan smiled slyly. So, her father was not so unaware after all.

The devious Lord lifted one corner of his mouth. “I planned to have this conversation at Court, Your Grace. Are you sure you wish to have it now in front of so many…witnesses?”

“I have nothing to hide,” her father replied at once. “Answer the question.”

Lord Etin rose from his seat and walked down the dais steps to the petitioner who was still mangling his hat. Placing a hand conspiratorially on the man’s shoulder, Lord Etin turned back to the Court, but said loud enough so that the citizens waiting their turn at the hall doors could hear. “This man is correct. Life is deplorable in Iserport. I have made countless claims to the Crown for support and my requests have all gone unheeded!”

Kiernan stood. “Lies!”

Lord Etin shook his head. “No! Not lies, Princess Kiernan, and that is why I have called this a farce. The King is very well aware of the conditions in Iserport, because I have requested aid on several occasions and he has denied me.” He turned back to the petitioner and put his arm around his shoulders. “If this brave man can risk all to tell of the situation in Iserport, I can do no less!”

“Lord Etin…,” Kiernan warned.

“No, Princess! Let everyone hear how the King has forsaken Iserport. How he refuses to provide succor to the people who need it most—the women and the children!”

The whispers from the crowd grew tinged with anger.

“Father!” she whispered urgently. “Do something!”

The King did not turn his gaze from the belligerent Lord as he stood from his throne and all eyes in the room turned toward him. He was not a very tall man, but the compact, muscular body exuded power. He wore his black hair shoulder length with long sideburns, and his black eyes gave the impression that they could penetrate stone. “Bring him in,” he said softly to Captain Morel. The lithe Scarlet Saber moved down the stairs to a side door and a moment later escorted a young man into the hall.

She heard Lord Etin’s sharp intake of breath. “What is this?” he demanded. “What are you doing here, Kenith?”