Act 33.

"We are sorry," said the Queen to the young man who stood before her in her audience chamber. "What did you say?"

The young man shuffled his feet, which were in boots covered with the dust of the road, as was the rest of his clothing.

This was normal for someone in his field of business. He was a messenger, and their biggest jobs were to run from town to town or city to city, delivering messages. But he was a little more specialised judging from the crest on his coat.

He was one of King Jeffrey’s personal messengers. So when he arrived here, The Queen had thought perhaps a ball was being thrown on King Jeffrey’s behalf and that she had been invited. She and the King were on good terms and he was very helpful her first year on the throne, in helping her establish a strong rule. The fact she was so young had caused some to question her authority, but the backing of King Jeffrey of the lands to the south went a long way towards keeping the nay sayers quiet. Since then she had proven herself in her short time as Queen, and her and Jeffrey had become friends.

Now here she was getting news she had never expected to hear and she was perturbed. And the messenger knew it and was afraid he would be the brunt of the anger. Messengers always were. It was a hazard of the job, but the pay, especially in a royal court, was very good, and the job was not all that hard.

He cleared his throat.

"The King wishes to know why you sent troops onto his lands and raided the grain stores that lay near the borders of our countries," he said again. "We have had a bad crop this year with the drought that has touched our lands, and the stores were our reserves. Yet your crops were bountiful this year and you needed none extra."

The Queen sat in stunned silence after the messenger had finished speaking. Linda could see that she was confused and hurt by the message. Confused at who could be doing the raiding and hurt that King Jeffrey would even think that she would do such a thing to him.

The Queen took a deep breath and said in a calm voice,

"You may tell your King that we did not order any raids on his stores and that we shall endeavour to find out what has been happening, and who is falsely representing us. And tell him that we are personally insulted that he should believe that we were capable of doing such a thing."

The messenger let out a breath of relief that he was not going to receive a beating or worse, and nodded.

"I shall bring him your message," he said.

He then bowed and left the audience chamber.

The Queen, without loosing her composure, dismissed the others in the room. They all left talking low amongst themselves. Linda, of course, stayed.

The Queen wiped her eyes.

"I can’t believe it," she said in a small voice. "I can’t believe that Jeffrey would think that I could do such a thing to him."

"As my Queen knows," said Linda trying to find something to comfort her with. "Sometimes royalty will say things just to appease the angry factions of there people. It is possible the harshness of the message was only because his lords were angry and he had to look as if he believed them and not you, even if he didn’t. Sometimes even you have had to say what you did not believe to stop a conflict among your own people.

This seemed to make the Queen feel a little better.

"Your right," she said. "His lords would believe that I could do this. A lot of them are not fond of me."

She straitened up and got a determined look on her face.

"So now we must find out what is really going on," she said.

She turned to Linda.

"Champion, we need you to investigate this," she said. "Find out who is trying to make us look bad in front of his highness. Find them and bring them to us. We shall begin talks with the King to establish a dialogue to avert any hostile reactions that may be called for by the King’s lords."

"I shall do as you ask, my Queen," said Linda bowing.

She left the Queen and hurried over to the tower where Mikako had her laboratory.

She walked in on the mage as she was staring into a bowl filled with what looked like regular water.

"Doing some scrying?" asked Linda.

"A little," answered the mage. "More like trying to see the future really."

She straightened up.

"Many mages can, if done right, see a little into the future," said Mikako. "I was trying to see if I could."

"Can you?" asked Linda.

"Unfortunately, not so far," said Mikako.

"Well, we have a problem," said Linda.

She told Mikako about the messenger and what the Queen had decided on.

"Then where shall we start?" asked the mage.

"I suggest we head to the southern borders and see if we can’t find where the raiders came from and where they may have gone. After that I thought I would wing it," said Linda.

"I don’t exactly know what wing it means," said Mikako. "But I know I don’t like the sound of it."

Linda laughed.

"Don’t worry," she said. "I am good at winging it. You’ll see. But for now let’s get ready."

The two left the tower to prepare.