Future Dreams Read online

  Tales of Emoria

  Future Dreams

  T.J. Mindancer

  Mindancer Press

  Bedazzled Ink Publishing Company * Fairfield, California

  © 2006 C.A. Casey

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  978-1-934452-12-7 ebook

  First published 2001

  3rd revised edition 2006

  Cover art: Chris Schinella

  Mindancer Press

  a division of Bedazzled Ink Publishing Company

  Fairfield, California

  http://www.bedazzledink.com/mindancer

  Note on Pronunciation

  Jame is one syllable with a long “a.” Rhymes with “fame.” Tigh is pronounced “Tig.” Rhymes with “twig.” The spelling of her name follows the Ingoran rules of grammar where the “h” indicates the eldest daughter of the House of Tigis.

  Chapter 1

  Jame stopped to revel in the few heartbeats of magic that happened when the sun snapped into an intense orange and set the surrounding adobe buildings aglow. She always felt an indescribable ache when the glow turned to gray and the sun pulled away its strands of light and sank beneath the distant hills. The air was still cool from the lingering winter but the aroma of plants disturbing the desert sands told her that spring was only a week or two away.

  Jame sighed and ran a hand through her short blonde hair. Spring meant she no longer had an excuse not to visit home.

  “Home,” she mumbled. Where no one understood why she wanted to become a peace arbiter.

  She walked across the expansive plaza that had once been the reviewing ground for the army of the Southern Territories during the Grappian Wars. That late in the day, the plaza was deserted except for students, like herself, hurrying to evening lectures in the arbiter’s hall.

  The crunch of wagon wheels from just outside the wall gate drew her curious gaze. She stopped walking when the wagon rumbled through the gate. The metal bars on the cage that bounced in the wagon’s bed glistened in the last of the sunlight.

  When the wagon was within a few paces of her, she shaded her eyes to see the latest captured Guard and found herself staring into the palest blue eyes she had ever seen. Strong, dirt-streaked hands clutched the iron bars and a wild and feral woman drenched in mud and blood glared at her through ice-cold eyes.

  With animal-like alertness, this once proud warrior of the Guard froze Jame in place with an overpowering presence that rolled across her like water over ice. Jame shivered as a chill that had nothing to do with the evening breeze danced along her spine.

  A mad chortle erupted from the woman’s throat, breaking the spell that she had cast. Jame blinked and thought she caught a flash of sanity beneath the face twisted in sneering contempt.

  Jame stared after the wagon, trying to sort through what she had just witnessed. She had seen hundreds of Guards brought in on wagons over the last two years since the end of the Grappian Wars. But never had her soul been gripped with the sight of such coldness or madness. A disturbing realization struck her. Only one Guard had ever been described as having penetrating blue eyes and a compelling presence.

  “Laur’s waterfalls,” she breathed. “That’s Tigh the Terrible.”

  JAME SLUMPED INTO cushy pillows and stared out the window at the newly furrowed fields. She did her best to ignore the other two passengers on the coach—a pair of giggling young men from Glaus. By their own admission, they were on their first trip away from home for a cousin’s joining in Rihnon.

  If her aunt would stop treating her like a child, she wouldn’t have to suffer the inane chatter of young men without a thought in their heads beyond clothes and gossip. In the four years she had been in Ynit, her aunt had never stopped worrying about her safety outside of Emoria. Sometimes she hated being a princess.

  She pulled her pack from the floor, burrowed through her clothes, and pulled out the thick sheaf of loose papers haphazardly crammed into a leather binder. She stared at her notes for several heartbeats without reading a word. Her thoughts traveled to places she preferred not to visit. Why did my life have to be so complicated? Because I made it complicated.

  The coach swayed and lurched. Jame and the boys grabbed the ram’s horn shaped handles protruding from the gaudy panels. Rich people’s transport. Jame grimaced at the opulent overdone decor.

  The wide-eyed young men looked shaken during the several heartbeats of excitement and then bent their heads together in a relieved chatter. Jame didn’t even hide her rolling eyes from them. She thanked Laur she’d been spared growing up around such silly young men.

  She gazed at the rocky beginnings of the foothills of the Phytian Mountains. The pressure from home to come to her senses and give up the noble but impractical pursuit of Peace Arbiter had grown from silent entreaties to loud emotional discussions. Her aunt’s strong insistence that she travel to Emoria as soon as the winter’s snows had melted warned her that she was expected to make a decision about her future and she knew that only one decision was acceptable.

  She wasn’t going to let four years of study be wasted on archaic ideas of what was expected of an Emoran princess. She loved her work as an assistant to the Military Tribunal. Her job could be heartbreaking and frustrating, but at the same time uplifting, and it completed her soul in ways that nothing else came close to doing. She reveled in the drama of arguing the cases of the former Guards against a society that wished these warriors who won the Grappian Wars for them would simply vanish, one way or another.

  A vision of Tigh the Terrible’s eyes that had haunted her dreams for the last few weeks flashed unbidden in Jame’s mind. Maybe it was just her kindhearted soul grappling with the realization that there was, at least, one Elite Guard who was beyond their attempts at rehabilitation. That there was a warrior who people believed deserved to just disappear. That thought gripped her in a soul-wrenching sorrow and she admonished herself for such a strong reaction to the fate of someone she had glimpsed for only a few heartbeats.

  The cultivated fields on the hillsides gave way to clusters of stone and thatch roof houses. They had reached the outskirts of Rihnon—a small city nestled against the southern flank of the Phytian Mountains. Jame leaned out the window, relieved to see the market sprawled between squat stone buildings in the center of the city. She couldn’t get off this snooty parlor on wheels too soon. Argis would have to be tied and gagged to travel in such a coach as this.

  Argis. Jame sighed. Another problem to deal with. She lifted sad amused eyes to whatever demented deity oversaw her destiny. This visit was sure to be memorable.

  The coach slowed to a cautious gait as the driver eased it around the sprawling fruit and vegetable stalls. Jame pulled her head in from the window and slung her pack over her shoulder, ready to explode from the overstuffed seat the moment the coach rocked to a stop.

  She jumped to the rain wet ground and put several paces between herself and the happy reunion between the young men and local family members before she stopped in the street market. The mountain air touched her senses and drenched her in an almost painful nostalgia. No matter how much she distanced herself from this part of the world, the beauty of the Phytian Mountains kept a tight hold on her heart.

  “Jame.”

  She turned around. Two young women, one tall and the other just topping her own height, rushed toward her. The taller one caught Jame into her arms and pulled her into a joyous hug.

  Jame grinned. “Hello, Argis.”

  Argis released Jame and held her at arms’ length. “You’re looking good.”

  Jame laughed and pulled the smaller woman into her arms. “Tas. It’
s good to see you.”

  “You look great,” Tas said. “What happened to that baggy green tunic?”

  “I’m an assistant arbiter now.” Jame stepped back to get a better look at her old friends. Both were clad in a patchwork of leather and armor and the hilts of their swords were visible over their shoulders. Argis’s usually serious gray eyes, half hidden by short wavy hair, sparkled with happiness. Tas’s impulsive, good-natured personality was reflected in her blue eyes and thick dark blonde hair that hung shaggily about her open face. “Look at the two of you. Full warriors.” Jame lifted the warrior braid dangling from Tas’s belt.

  “We were in a skirmish with a band of Quaron raiders,” Tas said. “Stopped them from taking the sheep on the upper back meadow.”

  “Congratulations, both of you,” Jame said.

  “We’ve made arrangements for a meal at the wayside near Epilatis,” Argis said.

  “Always prepared,” Jame said.

  Argis grinned. “Anything for my princess.”

  Jame managed a smile at Argis’s happiness. She adjusted her pack on her back and turned to the mountains and home.

  THE TRIO OF Emorans followed the well-traveled road that switchbacked up the steep ascent of the southern slopes of the Phytian Mountain range. Jame always wondered what the citizens of Rihnon would think if they knew the southern border of Emoria was just a half-day walk from their city. Of course, any traveler into the Phytian Mountains would be surprised to know they journeyed right by concealed passes into the forests and valleys of the legendary country.

  Jame was grateful she kept in shape with a daily climb of every flight of steps in the rambling fortress that dominated the military compound at Ynit. In the desert flat lands, climbing steps was the only way to maintain the lungs and legs of a mountain goat the Emorans boasted they possessed. Besides, she wasn’t about to give her friends one more thing to tease her about.

  “Mularke won her archer braid,” Tas said. “She got so drunk during the celebration she bet she could take the plume off of the queen’s banner on the palace wall and turn it into an eyebrow on the painting of Hekolatis on the tavern wall with a single arrow.”

  Jame covered her eyes. “Oh, no.”

  “Mularke managed to pluck the plume off the banner but it ended up somewhere quite a bit south of Hekolatis’s eyebrow.” Tas laughed.

  “So where were you during this display of skill?” Jame asked.

  “She was scaling the wall to retrieve the arrow and, of course, Jyac stepped onto her balcony at that moment,” Argis said. “It seems the noise of part of her banner being carried off woke her.”

  Jame laughed. “Do any of your stories end without you and Mularke getting into trouble?”

  Tas scratched her head. “Come to think of it . . .”

  They came to a meadow next to a towering shear bluff. The Emorans left the road and tromped through the spring grass and patches of yellow flowers to the bluff.

  “Jyac’s prepared a feast in honor of your return,” Argis said.

  “Really?” Jame asked as they eased through a sinewy fracture in the cliff wall and into a sinkhole.

  “It’s been two years since your last visit.” Argis frowned. “Everyone’s eager to see their princess again.”

  “I’m also eager to see everyone,” Jame said, “and a feast is always fun.”

  They climbed out of the hole using hand and foot holds first carved countless generations earlier and continued along a rocky stream, overflowing from the melting snows.

  “We’re all coming into our own now,” Argis said. “We’ve received our braids and are having thoughts of settling down and serving Emoria.”

  Jame avoided Argis’s gaze and nodded. “I’m coming into my own, too. I’ve served the Tribunal at Ynit as an assistant arbiter for the last two years.”

  “Working with cleansed Guards.” Argis grimaced. “Jyac wasn’t too pleased when you accepted that position. She feels it’s too dangerous.”

  “I know.” Jame kept from sighing. She was now sure her fears about this trip home were a reality. The queen and Elders Council were going to pressure her to give up what she wanted to do with her life. All because she was born to be Queen of Emoria.

  Chapter 2

  The first sensation that tickled Tigh’s awareness was, for the first time in weeks, she wasn’t chilled from the winter cold. The warmth seduced her into bouts of deep sleep punctuated by brief spells of hazy consciousness. Foggy dreams of people bending over her and unintelligible words hitting her brain like a wet sponge became a part of her mental landscape for what felt like an endless period of time.

  She opened her eyes. The room was narrow but tidy—furnished with the cot she lay on, a small desk and chair, and a stand holding a chipped ceramic basin. At the foot of the cot, she could see the top of the long wooden trunk filled with her personal possessions.

  The walls and ceiling were whitewashed and created an austere but not unpleasant atmosphere. A low window allowed the sun and the noises from the plaza far below to waft up on the gentle spring breeze. The window was barred.

  She shifted her eyes to the door and stared for endless heartbeats at the construction of bars and wood where there had been only wood before. She was home, and, during her long absence, home had been refurbished into a prison cell.

  Tigh pulled herself up and sat on the edge of the cot. Accustomed to being clothed in black leather, she gave her white leggings and tunic a puzzled look. She raised her hand to long black hair and found that it had been cropped short.

  She turned at a noise and pinned a hapless assistant healer outside the door with an intense gaze. The poor man shook so hard that he rattled the bowls and plates on the tray he held. He put the tray on the floor and fled down the corridor.

  Tigh frowned at this extreme reaction to her—considering she was the one behind bars—and wondered if her face was disfigured in some way.

  Her legs shook as she got to her feet and she steadied herself against the wall for several heartbeats. She half-stepped and half-lurched to the ceramic basin and squinted into the tarnished mirror. Expecting, at least, bruises and scratches, she stared at her unblemished face. Her skin had a sallow tinge and her face was too thin.

  She frowned at the hollowness in her stomach and wondered how long she’d been unconscious. Using the wall as support, she walked to the door and plopped down cross-legged in front of it. Between the amply spaced bars, she lifted the lids off of the plates and bowls. The aromas of Ingoran prepared dishes rose up with the steam and socked the pit of her stomach with an almost physical punch. She snatched up a skin of water and took a long swallow to wet her dry mouth.

  Tigh heard what sounded like an assemblage of soft boots padding up the corridor. Five gray-robed healers arranged themselves in front of her door as she lifted a forkful of spiced boiled potatoes and egg to her mouth. She raked disinterested eyes over the group as they studied her with steadfast curiosity.

  “So, Tigh.” Loena Sihlor, a plump woman with gray-streaked red hair and the chief healer of the military compound, knelt down. “How are you feeling?”

  Tigh stopped in mid-chew to stare at Leona. She then dropped her eyes and stuck the fork into a bowl of asparagus.

  The group conferred together for a few heartbeats and came to an agreement that Tigh looked fine.

  Pendon Larke, an elderly assistant healer, knelt next to Loena. “In case you’re wondering, you’ve been cleansed. You’ve only been back in your own room for just under two days. But for the last month you’ve been in the cleansing wing. Don’t worry that you can’t remember anything about it. We’ve observed that none of the Guards remember the cleansing process.”

  Tigh put down her fork and stared at Pendon. She had been in someone else’s control for a month? She had been defenseless, at their mercy? “A month,” she rasped, surprised at how her voice scraped against her ears. “Cleansed.”

  “Yes,” Pendon said. “We’ve also observed tha
t most Guards don’t notice their violent tendencies are gone.”

  Tigh looked deep within herself, felt for her very essence, and came up with a stranger.

  “You are no longer Tigh the Terrible,” Loena said.

  Tigh pinned Loena with hard eyes. “I will always be Tigh the Terrible.”

  VISITORS. TIGH GRABBED the iron bar lodged well over her head between the narrow walls. She pulled up and held the position until her arms burned and her nerves calmed.

  The hard clicks of Ingoran boots against the wooden floor echoed in the corridor. She dropped off of the bar and shook her arms out as she watched the door with apprehension. Seven years and a nightmarish lifetime had passed since she had last seen any member of her family. Now her parents had traveled all the way from Ingor to see what was left of the daughter who was heir to the House of Tigis.

  The gray-robed assistant healer appeared and slipped a large key into the door lock, the resulting grate of metal against metal echoed down the quiet corridor. Tigh stepped back against the window and the door opened. Her mother and father entered the cell and their presence seemed to suck the air out of the confined space. She could only stare at these living remnants of her shattered youth.

  Paldon Tigis, dressed in a well-tailored Ingoran tunic and leggings, had the open confident face of a successful merchant. Her eyes, taking in Tigh’s residence for the last seven years with a quick appraising glance, were of a darker blue than Tigh’s but her black hair and fair complexion left no doubt that they were closely related. Joul Tigis, clothed in a simple, but delicately spun long tunic and leggings, cast sad encouraging green eyes at Tigh. She noticed his light brown hair had streaks of gray that weren’t there the last time she had seen him.