Chapter 28 - Breaking Curfew
Tymos arrived late for the evening meal. He glanced around the crowded Great Hall until he spotted the red hair of his twin and wove his way through the tables to reach her.
Morov was immediately beside him. “I will bring your meal, Prince Tymos.”
“Thanks,” Tymos said as he found a seat at the table with Kryslie, Keleb and unexpectedly, Tymoros.
His father was leaning back, relaxed and smiling, so he was not about to mention the unsanctioned duel – if he knew of it yet.
“Tym, guess what?” Kryslie greeted him by rising to her feet and leaning forward over the table. She didn’t give her brother a chance to speak. “We are to go with Father on his next Royal Tour.”
Tymos felt the same excitement rising in him as affected his sister. “When?”
“So we get to Dira before the next season of storms,” Kryslie explained. “The Elders go there then to meditate. We are to join them.”
Tymoros, smiling, interrupted. “There are certain conditions though, as I have explained to Kryslie. You both must pass level delta before then. That means you must work hard this season.”
Keleb, slightly envious at the opportunity his friends now had, added with a grin of his own, “That will be hard, Tymos, when your heart is outside in the beautiful zekon making balls to throw at your sister!”
“Indeed,” Tymoros agreed. “And when he is distracted by the need to dodge others.”
Tymos pretended to groan and then asked, “How long are we to be away?”
“Well, we have to leave here to get to Dira before the storms, and that city is…?” Kryslie turned to her father.
“Four days away, by carriage,” Tymoros supplied.
“And we will be there for the second season of storms,” Kryslie went on.
“After that, we will do a sweep of the nearer cities,” Tymoros explained. “We will stay a day or two in each one. Sometimes we will travel by carriage, and sometimes we will take the long-range beams to get from city to city. That way you will get to see some of the smaller settlements – the towns and villages. You will be back here about forty days after the coming of the new sun.”
“I can’t wait!” Tymos exclaimed.
Tymoros rose from his seat. “Incentive to work hard,” he remarked before excusing himself to return to his suite.
Keleb felt like an outsider as Tymos and Kryslie discussed the tour. He looked relieved when Jonko joined them as the hall was being cleared.
“You eaten, Jonko?” he asked.
“Yes, with the President. What’s with those two?” Jonko asked.
“Don’t ask! They’ll start all over again.”
Tymos proved he was aware of them. “We’re to go with Father on his next tour,” he explained, and went on to tell Jonko what he knew.
Keleb inserted, “It gives them less than five weeks to pass level delta. They won’t have time to show their faces until then.”
Jonko gave a faint grin of agreement. “What’s so important about Dira?” he asked as he sat down in a spare chair.
Tymos explained, “The Temple of Creation is there and it is the most ancient of the cities. That is why the Elders go there to meditate and teach their wisdom to young ones like us.”
“I could do with a bit more of that,” Jonko admitted ruefully. He didn’t admit the reason but his friends guessed. “So you won’t really be away long.”
“No, it is only to be a short journey,” Tymos confirmed. “And even if we went everywhere by long range beam, we couldn’t visit all the cities. There are about a hundred of them, along with all the towns and tiny hamlets around each one. Too many to visit in the short time they will allow for us to have away from our studies.”
“Part of the reason is that they don’t want us to go too near the mountains,” Kryslie added.
Jonko saw the subtle change in expression on the faces of both Tymos and Kryslie. “There is danger in the mountains?”
“Yes,” Tymos admitted tersely. Then he shrugged as if trying to play down the danger. “Those intruders that came here rode horses. They tethered them to trees on the forest edge. The road guards backtracked the horses trail towards the mountains. Two of the horses were ridden off from here, but the trail ended abruptly. It is likely that the intruders were picked up by some kind of small aircraft.”
Keleb sensed that wasn’t all of it. “That’s not the only reason. There is something else too.”
Tymos nodded, and considered the wisdom of passing on the reason. “There’s no real need for you to know, or not to know. They have sent several groups of the Peace Corps to search the mountains. The first two groups brought back mutants, and found evidence of an alien ship having landed and left. A third group went to do a more thorough sweep of that area of the hills. They reported their arrival, and then nothing has been heard for ten days.”
“They were looking for those intruders,” Jonko guessed.
Kryslie nodded. “Father thinks that the mutants have formed an alliance with the intruders, and that the intruders are aliens.
“Oh,” Jonko said, concerned. “I don’t like the sound of that at all.”
“You don’t need to worry,” Tymos commented. “We are safe here. The protections have been strengthened.”
“True enough,” Jonko agreed. “But you will be going off the estate. And if this tour is a regular event, and they know you are going…”
Kryslie shivered. “How would they know?”
“Spies?” Jonko proposed, but he realised the Kryslie’s attention was no longer on him. He saw Tymos react to something unspoken, for he suddenly looked away towards the door of the hall, and then at Kryslie who was rising from her seat and staring in the direction Tymos had glanced.
Tymos gripped her wrist and held it tightly. His eyes met those of his sister, and Jonko was sure they were communicating.
Kryslie wrenched free, and moved to a clear space and transmitted away.
“What’s wrong,” Jonko asked. Both he and Keleb rose from their seats when Tymos did.
“No time to explain,” Tymos brushed the question aside and moved away to transmitted after his sister.
Tymos used his empathic awareness of his sister as his reference to transmit. She was standing in the dark, on ice-covered grass, turning slowly and peering into the darkness. She had told him only, “Someone is in trouble. Outside.”
Tymos tried to stop her, knowing the dangers of being out in the dark, alone, as well as she did, but she was not hearing him.
“Who was it, Krys? And what is the trouble?” Tymos asked in a quiet voice.
“I am not sure,” Kryslie admitted. “Call it a call for help. It wasn’t a coherent thought. It was a mixture of disgust, shame, desperation and…a desire to die.”
Tymos remembered a similar thought, aimed at him. “Krys, was it directed at you?”
“No, I am sure it wasn’t,” Kryslie spoke after a moment of consideration. “It was one of us, not one of those alien intruders. I am sure of that.”
“Someone like Zacary?” Tymos suggested. He felt Kryslie go tense. “Krys, it’s after curfew. If those aliens are trying to get at another of us – this might be a trick to lure us somewhere alone. We should go back and get the guards.”
“And let that creature win?” Kryslie challenged him. “No. Trust me, bro. This wasn’t a thought aimed at us and I am sure that we need to look for whoever did send that thought. It was very weak, hardly coherent. I think whoever sent it, is out here in the zekon, and does not want to be found. We haven’t got very much time to find him.”
Tymos stopped speaking, and let Kryslie mentally listen for the faint presence she had sensed. If this was a trick to get them, he was not going to let his sister go on her own.
“Come on,” Krys urged her brother. “Over towards the armoury.”
“What? Why there?” Tymos queried.
“I just recalled something I saw, after you went off
after Jonko,” Kryslie explained as they ran. “I was doing my cool off, and thinking about Jon. One of the children ran past, behind the guard. At the time, I probably thought he was on an errand. I think it was Sacul.”
“Krys, we have to let the guards look for him. Don’t you see? It’s like Zacary. He was convinced to drop me in a hole. Perhaps whoever influenced Zacary, has done the same to Sacul and they expect us to react.”
“Tym, it isn’t the same. He doesn’t want to be found – he’d rather die. If we don’t find him, the guards won’t. If we call him, he might answer. He trusts us.”
“We should check he didn’t return to his dormitory,” Tymos suggested. “Stay here. I will be right back.”
Tymos went directly to the area where the older children slept. The ones like Sacul whose parents were missionaries and living away from Tymorea. He did not use the beam in point, and didn’t turn the light on in the dark room. Instead, his eyes adjusted subtly so that he could use frequencies other than the visible to look around. All the beds were empty; it was not yet the official bedtime for these older children but there was a chance that Sacul might have crept into his bed to hide. To be sure, Tymos checked under the bed, in Sacul’s cupboard, and in his clothes press. As he thought about talking to the dormitory attendant to see if Sacul had reported sick, he heard his sister’s mental voice.
“Tymos, I’ve found him.”
When he transmitted to her new location, he found Kryslie on her knees with her head under some dense foliaged bushes. He didn’t wait to be asked to help; he knelt beside her, ignored the freezing ice under his knees and used his hands to try to move the solidifying ice around the younger boy. His hands were numb with cold by the time they had him free of the ice. Together, they half lifted, half dragged Sacul out onto the zekon covered grass.
“He’s in a bad way,” Kryslie said as she felt the coldness of Sacul’s skin. “We need to get him to the infirmary.”
Tymos was taking off his jacket to wrap around the boy, and after doing that he lifted him over his shoulder. The boy’s weight was no problem, as it was he was small for twelve years old.
“We’ll need to be quick. Our own activities have been noted,” Tymos warned Kryslie.
Kryslie glanced down at the blinking purple light on her monitor. They were being summoned to see President Reslic. She knew they should answer the summons immediately – but they had to help Sacul.
“You take him, Tym. “ I will explain things to his Excellency,” Kryslie decided.
Tymos moved a few feet away and tried to transmit. “Damn! We aren’t able to move more than just ourselves.”
“Guards!” Kryslie called loudly. Then she spoke quietly to her brother, “They aren’t far away.”
Men wearing dark clothing and visible only due to the tiny red and green point lights on their night goggles arrived moments later, and formed a circle around them. They activated dull lights that made them silhouettes against the faintly luminous zekon.
“Prince Tymos, Princess Kryslie,” the leader of the group greeted them, neutrally. He walked closer and asked, “You summoned us?”
“We have a sick child, Armon.” Tymos had recognised the gruff voice of the Guard Leader.
“We will tend to him, Prince Tymos,” Armon spoke aloud. He sub-vocalised into his head set and one of his companions came and lifted Sacul from Tymos’s shoulder. He moved aside and transmitted away.
Armon spoke again. “I should thank you for finding him. We have been searching unsuccessfully since before dusk. Now, I expect I don’t have to tell you that you have broken the curfew. May I have the honour of accompanying you both when you answer your summons?”
“Honour, Armon?” Kryslie asked lightly, but with a grim smile on her face that the guardsmen wouldn’t see, even with their detection equipment.
Tymos was equally composed when he remarked, “No doubt our monitor signals alerted you to our presence here. I am glad, for Sacul’s sake. You will wish to have our transmitters? I do not expect to be treated any different to other miscreants.”
“That is the protocol,” Armon agreed, accepting the two transmitters and stowing them in his utility pouch. He sub-vocalised again, and the other guards began to move away as Armon transmitted Tymos and Kryslie to the President’s Palace. Once there, Armon led them to the President’s formal office.
Yeven admitted and announced them, then withdrew.
Reslic turned from the window, and sat down in his chair. He leant back and listened to Armon’s report, as he studied the two children standing at attention before him. Neither seemed resentful, nervous, resigned, or rebellious.
“Thank you Armon. I will take things from here,” Reslic directed, and turned his full attention on the children in front of him. Armon bowed, turned and strode from the room.
He continued his scrutiny for what seemed like a long time, but neither Tymos nor Kryslie changed their neutral expressions. He sensed nothing from them, and noted they were putting his lessons on shielding their minds to good effect.
“Why?” he asked with abrupt sharpness.
Kryslie relaxed her stance slightly to meet his gaze. She knew his terse question was, “Why had they gone out after curfew.”
While she considered how to phrase her answer, Reslic stood up and came around his desk.
“I had to. I felt Sacul’s life slipping away. He didn’t want to die, not really, but he felt he had no choice,” Kryslie stated her belief with out sounding defiant. As an after thought, she added, “Sir.”
“Why did you not speak to the guards before you went off?”
“It wasn’t that clear cut, Sir,” Kryslie told him flatly. “He didn’t want the guards to find him, but he trusted me.”
“He was unconscious,” Reslic pointed out.
“Not when I first felt his mind,” Kryslie insisted.
Reslic accepted that and changed the topic. “It could have been a trap – to lure you out alone. To lead you out into some danger. There are other races in the universe with psychic powers and not all are friendly.”
“I know that! Tymos felt one. The leader of those intruders was another. This didn’t feel like that sort of mind.”
“Remember this,” Reslic said sharply. “That intruder met you, probably learnt things about you, and has probably tried to influence others before…you haven’t had experience with such subtle warfare. Always be wary of such callings.”
Kryslie didn’t drop her eyes. “You are right, of course, Sir,” she admitted. “I was wary. It was not until I recalled seeing Sacul running off alone that I knew who called.”
“Have you anything to add, Prince Tymos?” Reslic switched his glare.
“Krys was right. She knew it might also have been a trick – like the thoughts I had directed at me. And I went to check that Sacul hadn’t slipped back to his bed.” Tymos paused and added, “And you will recall that Krys could tell the minds of the intruders from those who live on the estate.”
It was clear from his stance and direct return gaze, that Tymos was backing his twin.
“Indeed,” Reslic allowed. “But do you recall Zacary? Even with our precautions, a mind such as that alien intruder influenced him to try to harm you, Prince Tymos.”
“We couldn’t sense things so well then,” Kryslie commented. “We hadn’t reached second stage.”
“That was not my point, Princess Kryslie,” Reslic spoke harshly. “The point is that someone, one of our own perhaps, might have been trying to get you both alone.”
“We considered that, Sir,” Kryslie stated.
“Good, at least you understand. None of us like to think that will happen, but it isn’t impossible,” Reslic told them and then added severely, “I will not allow either of you to risk yourselves.”
Tymos said flatly, “We will not be children much longer. You cannot confine us here forever.”
“You have not graduated yet, Prince Tymos,” Reslic stressed, not reacting to the implied c
hallenge.
He turned his attention back to Kryslie. “Should such a situation arise again, and you don’t wish to bring it to my attention - you should go to your father. Both of you are particularly sensitive to the psychic aspects of our power, and of the three of us who are Governors, he is the one most aware of the subtle nuances of it.”
Kryslie looked down, not because she felt guilty or reproved, but because she still believed that she had acted correctly. Reslic took her chin in his hand and gently lifted her face. “Do you understand? Will you abide my instructions in future? There are others here who are trained to deal with such psychic matters.”
“I understand,” Kryslie admitted, not betraying her mental reservations.
“You have been here long enough to know the reason for having a curfew, and why we enforce it so strongly.”
Kryslie did not answer; she had sensed a fleeting image in Reslic’s mind, of two lifeless red haired children and felt his controlled grief. She knew her twin had shared that vision, through her mind. They both knew whose children they had been. Tears came unbidden to her eyes. It was the thought of causing more grief to her father that finally made her defiance slip away.
Reslic dropped his hand, realising that Kryslie had sensed something he had thought well shielded.
“I am not denying that your motives were well meant,” he said, turning away. He couldn’t deny they spoke the truth either. “I cannot treat you differently to other curfew breakers. Come back and see me before your lessons tomorrow. Yeven will take you back to your apartments.” Reslic looked away, and Kryslie glanced at her brother since he wasn’t looking at them. “Yes Sir,” she agreed and Tymos echoed her. Neither delayed making their departure.
Yeven was waiting outside the office, and must have known he’d be needed. Tymos forced a grin at him.
“Could we prevail on you to take us back to father’s suite?”
“Of course, Prince Tymos,” Yeven agreed gravely.
On his return, Yeven slipped into speak to Reslic. “Is there anything more that you require, Sir?”
“No thank you. If I need anything, I will have Montel, come.”
“I will have him bring you a drink of wine, Sir,” Yeven suggested.
“If you think I look like I need it,” Reslic agreed.
“I know you, Sir,” Yeven reminded him as he bowed and retreated.
Reslic thought on his interview with the High King’s children and spent moments reinforcing the shields on certain memories. They had come unbidden when he touched Kryslie’s face. He knew she had sensed them and understood what she saw.
Montel, his night attendant brought in the warmed wine he liked and then withdrew. Reslic sipped the drink and wondered if something like this night’s events had happened sixteen years back, causing those younger children to break curfew and not be found until too late. He still felt he had failed, back then, to protect Ty’s children. Time had not eased the grief of that long ago night. It still roused anger in him. That was why he had not set the penalty for breaking curfew – but left it until the morning. He did not wish his anger at himself to colour his judgement, and in spite of her unrepentant defiance, Kryslie’s motives had been of the highest merit.
Despite going to bed late, and having their usual interrupted night, alternating with each other to get up when Llaimos woke for feeding, Tymos and Kryslie were awake early. They dressed and transmitted to the infirmary to visit Sacul.
Madame Teena, the senior nurse, allowed them into the room where Sacul was sleeping.
“How is he?” Tymos asked quietly.
“We treated him for hypothermia and are alert for signs of pneumonia or other infections,” Madame Teena assured him. “When he wakes, Rogert, our senior psychologist will talk to him. We expect him to make a full recovery.”
Kryslie moved close enough to take one of Sacul’s limp hands in her own. The boy’s eyelids fluttered as if he was on the verge of waking up. She sensed his fleeting awareness of her and patted his hand. “Get well, Sacul. We’ll talk when you are better.”
Madame Teena shooed them out, but they did not protest. They still had their morning duty of the nursery inspection. Only this morning they would not have time to play with the children since they would need time for breakfast and to see the President, before their morning lessons.
From the nursery, they went to the Great Hall where the servants were finishing preparing the tables for breakfast. Delia found them there and organised trays of cereal and toast for them. However, once they sat at a table, their appetite deserted them.
“How long do you think we will lose free movement for?” Kryslie asked her brother. She hadn’t started to eat her cereal, just stirred it around in the milk.
“Three days is usual,” Tymos mused aloud. “Stenn was grounded for a week, for trying to help us that time.”
“That isn’t the same as breaking curfew,” Krys countered. “Though he could’ve put himself in danger.”
“So maybe a week,” Tymos thought aloud. “You weren’t exactly sorry for doing it.”
“We saved Sacul’s life,” Kryslie said flatly.
“I know, and as far as I am concerned, any penalty is a small price to endure for that,” Tymos told her.
“And I won’t say I won’t do the same thing again, in the same circumstances,” Kryslie warned. “If I had gone to father or someone else first, and waited to find them and convince them, the faint flicker of thought I had would have been gone. No one would have found him by just looking. I had to act quickly.”
“You don’t have to convince me,” Tymos assured her. “I backed your choice because it was right. I’d do the same again. And if someone was trying to get at you, they’d have a rude shock to discover there are two of us.”
Kryslie sent her brother a wordless sense of gratitude and tried to force herself to eat.
Tymos echoed her reluctance, “I’m not hungry.” He was thinking uneasily about the coming interview, in spite of what he said. He hoped that Reslic would not decide they were not ready to go with their father on the tour. The problem was that he had never heard of Reslic delaying setting a penalty for a curfew infringement.
Acting together, they took their untouched breakfasts towards the servery. Delia and Morov intercepted them and took the trays. Delia gave them a look of concern, which they ignored as they went to the beam in point.
Before they transmitted to the President’s palace, they checked each other’s appearance, straightened their clothing, tidied their hair and took a deep breath.
They had, without consulting each other, donned their formal uniforms. Tymos was in purple and gold, and Kryslie was in red and gold. If asked, they would say it was to remind themselves of the responsibility of their position and rank. Any questioners could draw their own conclusions from that. In fact, it was a subtle gesture of defiance. They both believed they had acted correctly and in accordance with the expectations of their rank. Or rather, the expectations of that rank once they were fully trained and adult.
They went to the small antechamber outside the President’s office to await his summons.