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After two days of incident-free traveling, unless one counts a spat with an ennedi, the duo set off at daybreak.
Frost covered Seneca’s cloak and she moved around as much as possible to melt it. However, she was much more interested in the sight ahead. “Look. At. This.” She ran to the raging stream, a borderline river. “Where it all began, Neo!”
Neo, whose back still burned from the lashings, slouched over, and eased himself to the ground next to her. “Last time we were here you refused to look at me.”
She gazed across the stream. “Well, we’d just met by chance and you were a Monarch and I was an Untouchable. You’re still a Monarch and I’m still an Untouchable—”
“I’m a criminal.”
“Well, in these parts, yes. I guess.”
“And you’re practically a Monarch these days.”
She tucked her knees in. “Yeah, in Ddraigoch. Over here in Tamuria, I’m still Untouchable.”
Neo poked her shoulder. “Touch.”
“Wish I’d just have trusted my vibes with you. You are a good guy. I should’ve seen it but I had my blinders on.”
“I can’t blame you. If I were in your position then, I’d have thought the same. Especially with your brains. I mean, who wouldn’t?”
She drew a breath. “You’re about to be surprised. I’m just trying to find a way to convince them you’re an ally and not a product of King Ruslan.”
“Fighting off the Tamurian police force and freeing them?”
“Neo, it took about five kind acts from you just to get me to trust you. Remember what I said to you when we first met?”
“Something about being shocked.”
“I’d have attacked you the second I saw you had I been thinking. It’s the mindset of many Untouchables. I mean, before they started clashing with them, a whole police force watching is one thing but taken down to individual versus individual, these people would resort to cannibalism and you need to understand that.”
“But I’m with you.”
Seneca stared into the distance. “And that’s what I’m thinking about. How’re they going to treat me? Am I a traitor to them, even if I’m helping?”
“But they know you. Sen, there’s no way they’d think any different. What would your mom and dad want? To have continued that life or to have escaped?”
Seneca shook her head. “I don’t know. I really don’t know. I don’t know what to expect when I come across them.” She took a rock, stood, and chucked it into the stream, where the water rippled. She knelt and took another.
Seneca repeated this process for several minutes. At times, she’d mutter something to herself before firing another rock into the stream. Finally, she turned around.
Neo raised his eyebrows.
“I’m just having a moment.” She walked over, held out a hand, and pulled Neo to his feet.
“You okay?”
Seneca stared at the ground and fell into his arms, nodding, her head on his shoulder. “I will be.”
“You ready to free your people?”
Again, she nodded. “Let’s do this.”
Within the hour, they stood fifty yards from the tree-line. Ruslan had more than doubled his guards and they patrolled the whole perimeter.
Neo grabbed a tree branch swaying in the wind. “This is madness. It’s like he has his whole army alone around here.”
“Tell me about it. Wind isn’t going to do much here.”
“Got any Spirit portals?”
Seneca drew a circle into the ground before looking in all four directions. “Nothing.”
“And if we fire-traveled we’d run smack-dab into them.”
“We need to be stealthy. It’s the only way.”
“This sounds beyond crazy but it might work.” Neo pointed to the highest turrets. “If we can windsurf over them, we might be in the clear. Even if they see us, what’s not to say they don’t just let us go? I mean, we could be guards for all they know?”
Seneca studied the Palace before raising her index finger. “Or, and even though that’s a good idea, we can always snatch two of them toward us with wind control. We take their cloaks and hide in plain sight. Only flaw is we’re betting no one else sees us.”
“Better yet, it’d give us a ticket to—”
“The Untouchables.”
“Let’s try it. We’ll use my plan as a backup. But if we can look like Tamurian soldiers or police, we’re ahead of the game.”