*
“Is she ready?” Lord Telvani demanded of Farthen the second he walked in the door. Lord Farthen looked up from his desk and scowled at him.
“I’ve not had enough time for what you want,” he complained.
“I don’t care, the time to act is upon us. The Treymayne Ieldran is getting suspicious and no doubt they will bring their suspicions to our Council who will have to do something about it to appease them. We need to have the project underway before they find out the true status of the King and Queen.”
“And what if we can’t?”
“That is not an option. Have it prepared for tomorrow.” He turned to leave, expecting Farthen to carry out his wishes whether he liked it or not, but the man stubbornly continued.
“The latest group has run into some further complications. We’ve succeeded in at least not simply killing them outright, but there seem to be,” he paused, “other risks involved.”
“I don’t care about the risks, I care about the results,” Telvani bellowed, turning back to him. “Are they able to do it?”
“Well, yes, but-”
Telvani cut him off, in no mood for more excuses. “Then we do it tomorrow.”
He slammed the door behind him. He had worked too hard for this to have it all be destroyed because Lord Farthen needed more time to feel comfortable enough giving him a definite answer. He stomped to the tower and looked out over the landscape below. The walls of the castle that Farthen had commandeered to conduct his experiments spread out over the land and closed out the world. His gaze wandered to the courtyard below where several people meandered about with no real aim. Perhaps a better description would be that they kept things in.
He left Farthen and his staff to make the preparations. There were things that he needed to accomplish back at the palace, but first he needed to make another stop to check in with the mages watching over the King and Queen. It would be just his luck to have them wake the day before his plans made their waking irrelevant.
The carriage ride was longer than he would have liked given the number of arrangements he had to see to before the day was out, so he used his time to plan. Once they had completed the project tomorrow, he should have the entire Council at his command. When this was accomplished, it would be an easy thing to oust the Queen, though he would have to be careful going about it. Even if the Council all agreed to put him in her stead, the majority of the people still saw her as a savior: The woman who had been one of them and who stepped in to stop the evil Nathair from continuing his war on Treymayne and bringing back blood-magic.
He sighed. Those had been the days. Free to run things behind the scenes as he saw fit. Now that he was a more public figure, he had to play by certain rules. And he didn’t like rules.
So undermining the Queen’s reign was sure to be a laborious process, though discrediting her to the point of her own people wanting to dethrone her would go a long way to making up for all her whining. Already he had put the base of several scandals into play for when they were needed.
As they rode up the long pathway up to the Queen’s chosen castle, he looked out over the maze of gardens that housed the Kiani Stones. It was a shame that their essences had been removed from them after Layna hosted the Three and moved the stones to their present location. If only the Order had known they were there before Layna had gotten her hands on them…
The carriage slowed to a stop and Lord Telvani stepped out, his shoes crunching the gravel below. Servants rushed to greet him and several guards nodded as he passed, his own entourage closing in behind him. He went immediately for the bedchambers and left his guards in the hall to enter that of the King and Queen.
He drew aside the curtain around the bed - and froze, his heart nearly stopping in his chest. They were gone.
“Lord Telvani,” the voice of his head mage sounded muffled and Telvani whirled around. The man was carrying a mound of sheets which he was trying to maneuver in order to speak around, but he was not having much luck.
“Where are they!?” Telvani demanded. “Have they woken up?”
“What? No.” The mage glanced at the empty bed and realization dawned on his face. “Oh, no, I was just getting tired of staring at that awful color all the time since you have me here day and night, so I wanted to change it. And since you won’t allow any servants to step foot in here,” he lifted the sheets, indicating that he was forced to do it himself. His tone revealed the annoyance he felt over this.
Telvani felt the color rise in cheeks in anger. “Where are they?” he roared, and the man cowered before him.
“There,” he said simply, pointing to the corner of the room where Telvani now noticed two people were laying. He strode over to them and peered down at their faces, feeling their skin. It was as cold as ever and their breathing was so slow as to be hardly noticeable.
Lord Telvani’s own breathing resumed. Rotating back around to face the mage once more, who was now struggling with the sheets, he growled, “My head mage and you can’t figure out a way to use magic to do that?”
The man paused his movement and looked thoughtful. “You know, I didn’t even consider it. I don’t usually have to bother with these things you know,” he gave Telvani another sour look.
He watched as the man finally got the bed remade and he levitated the two back into it. When they were properly situated, Telvani addressed him again.
“Make sure that there is no change between now and tomorrow. I don’t want any glitches in the plan. If anything happens and they wake up,” he arched a brow, “take care of them.”
The man looked at the two of them doubtfully. “I’m not sure I can…” he began tremulously, but shut his mouth at the look Telvani gave him when he looked up. He gulped and glanced at the two once more.
Telvani glared. “You’d better hope they don’t wake up then.”