CHAPTER 35
I decided to jot down all that had happened, everyone chipped in with various battles and occurrences. At last we had written down a very good account of the last few months. With all this information in front of us, we could look back and see if the past events could help with new ideas. As it turned out; this actually initiated our breakthrough.
We had sat around the table for hours when we were discussing my journey to the other Realm. Bay suddenly spoke up; ‘what if they have found out about your meeting with the Royalty? They would know they were helping us and not believe anything we said!’
We hadn’t thought of this at all, and realised Bay was right. If they knew of my journey, then they would most definitely be on their guard. ‘It would have been better if the Kings and Queens had decided not to help at all,’ lamented Grenville. His words seemed to repeat themselves in my head.
‘That’s it!’ I shouted, and everyone jumped in shock and surprise. ‘I think I know how we are going to do this. We have to make sure they do know about my meeting, but only we know what was said at that meeting.’
I set about telling them my idea, they listened, the smiles growing on their faces. The kitchen erupted with ideas, and with a lot of input from everyone, we came up with, what we thought was, a workable plan. To make this as authentic as possible, we couldn’t let anyone else in on what we were going to do; the less people who knew the truth, the more it would be believed. We knew it was going to be hard on us, everyone had to be in agreement. We had to keep to the same story to enemy and allies alike.
Clax set about preparing food and drink for our last meal, before our greatest performance so far began. We couldn’t stretch out the meal though, as much as we wanted to, we knew we had to begin straight away to pull this off. We ate, hugged, and wished each other luck. The next minute, my friends grabbed me and dragged me out to the garden. They screamed and shouted at me, pushing me down to the ground. I got kicked and hit, although nowhere near as hard as it looked.
‘Why didn’t you tell us sooner?’ Shouted Eirickr, ‘you would have us die for nothing?’ I tried to reason with him, but he wasn’t listening. The others all joined in; ‘were you trying to make a name for yourself Intercessor?’ growled Grenville. The insults went on; Luna shouted,’ we came from Spain to help a deceiver, I am calling to my clan, we cannot even leave immediately as we would be killed. You have signed our death warrant Intercessor!’
Some of the nearby wood nymphs revealed themselves with all the commotion and Oswald shouted to them; ‘Look at Abigail, she is no longer an Intercessor, we have no need for one anymore. She has been to see the Royalty, and she thought to delay telling us what happened.’ The wood nymphs moved closer to hear what was been said. ‘The Royalty have wiped their hands of the mortal plane, it bores them now. They said Cailleach Bheur could have this realm, she was welcome to it. Now what do we do? We will be surely killed for going against her and siding with the Intercessor,’ The nymphs looked terrified, they too had sided with Abigail, they didn’t know what to do.
‘We could kill her,’ said Bay, ‘but they might just kill us after it is done. We are doomed!’
Gwent shouted out; ‘I have it! We could trade her for our lives. I don’t want to deal with Cailleach Bheur though, she may still kill us. If only we could somehow get word to Dagdar. He will follow the rules of surrender.’ Some of the crowd turned to the wood nymphs and told them to spread the word, the war was lost. All should bow to the word of the Witch, for she would be our next Queen. We begged them to take care of themselves, as it was now every man for himself. We no longer had the protection of the Royalty and the line of Intercessors.
As they were leaving they heard, ‘you are now our hostage traitor until we can think what to do with you.’ I was then dragged back inside the cottage.
Phase one of the plan was now complete. We knew word of the mutiny would spread fast amongst our allies. It would also get back to the enemy, but in an indirect way. Once word got around that the Kings and Queens no longer cared about them or their battles, and the Intercessor had deceived them; Dagdar and Cailleach Bheur herself, would be swamped with surrenders. We only hoped our troops would go along with their leaders and no heroes would emerge to spoil the outcome.