Baron, Scott - The Dragon Mage 02 - Space Pirate Charlie: by Baron Scott

Author:Baron, Scott [Baron, Scott]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-04-15T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirty-Six

“But Father, I can’t just leave!”

Hertzall may have been seen as an oddity among the visla’s staff, but his many decades of quiet service had afforded him the opportunity to observe a great deal of things, some not entirely pleasant. To his knowing eyes, the writing was plain to see.

“Believe me, dearest, I have no desire to see you leave either, but it is the logical thing to do.”

Leila was pacing the room. She’d been pacing non-stop ever since they arrived at the groundskeeper’s little cottage.

“My friends? My animals?”

“Your friends will understand. And the animals? I’m sure they will be well taken care of. The visla is not one to take his rage out on his trophies.”

“But what about you? I can’t leave you here.” She turned to Charlie. “Take him with us.”

“Daughter, I am an old man. Well, relatively old, anyway. But what I’m trying to say is, this is where I belong. You are young and have your entire life ahead of you, and there is still so much you can accomplish. Me? I’m set in my ways, and I’m left to myself in this place, which is how I prefer it to be.”

“But I can make it right. I can apologize. Whatever it takes to earn the visla’s forgiveness and stay here with you.”

Hertzall smiled sadly at his daughter. “You fought Malalia, my dearest. And not like your childhood spats he always overlooked. You’re a grown woman now, and from what you saw, the visla is on a war footing and will do anything he has to in order to protect his interests. You’re a slave, Leila. Do you think you are not expendable to a man like him?”

“Your father is a wise man,” the Geist said. “While you may be willing to risk the visla’s mercy, I can tell you from personal experience, he will show none.”

“But he’s always been a good man.”

“To the public eye, perhaps. To the hundreds of systems he has ravished with the other members of the Council of Twenty, he has been an oppressor and tyrant. Here, you see him in his home environment, relaxed and content. Out there? He kills without mercy and leads with an iron fist.”

Hertzall walked to the stone chimney of his fireplace and leaned on the mantle, staring at nothing for a time. He then pulled on a seemingly fixed rock, working it free from its home with a series of tugs.

From within the small space behind it, he withdrew an emerald pendant the size of a large almond. The stone was a deep green, and the way it picked up the light as it slowly spun on the end of its chain made it glimmer with an almost enchanted glow as he grew close to his daughter.

As it turned out, that was precisely the case.

“Is that a Magus Stone?” the deadly Wampeh asked as he watched the light sparkle from its facets.

“It was your mother’s,” Hertzall said. “A dowry she had on her person when she was captured and sold into slavery.

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