The Guild Book I - 1. Chapter 1

The Guild

Chapter #1

Lady Estelle walked down the board stairway leading outside the king’s sky palace towards the pier, wind and cloud blowing through her hair, giving a ghostly appearance to the tall pale woman. Arriving at the end of the pier she, stopped next to an elderly man. “So she comes,” the noble woman whispered in a pained voice.

“Yes she comes,” the old man, dressed in the gold and sliver robes of the prime minister, replied.

Sighing… Estelle let out a soft cry as she leaned on the shorter man for support. Today was the day she long dreaded… the day her rival was to come, the day the Guild ship arrived.

With a sudden rush the wind changed, coming down like a slammed first from above. Like a shark fin appearing out of the water, the bottom tail of a Guild war-liner came out from the clouds above.

The ship was gigantic; three times the size of the manta class warships of the kingdom of Wor. In shape it looked like a radiating star, four fins around an elliptical sphere bristling with gun ports.

Looking at the Guild war-liner, Estelle could not help but feel both fear and hatred. For the ship was not just a weapon of war but a symbol of the control the Guild had over both blue sky and the black void of space. It also reminded Estelle how hopeless she was in stopping what was about to happen.

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Gerick stood over Leopold, his sex buried inside the king. “Are you going to miss me?” he chuckled as he pushed himself deeper inside the man.

“We have always been together… it will feel unnatural without you by my side.”

“But you must endure it… for the good of the kingdom… for all the people on Wor. For too long we have been a dark world without the light of the Guild. You must take a Guild Mistress as your wife.”

“Which is the same as taking her Protector as my lover!” Leopold moaned as Gerick gave his manhood a tight squeeze.

“Which I’m sure you won’t mind,” Gerick laughed.

“You have been my bodyguard ever since I reunited the kingdom. I do not see why that has to change.”

“The Guild has a way of changing a man.”

“But I still will be your king.”

“You will be an Assemblyman… your face hidden behind a grinning gold mask.”

“I don’t see what the difference is… I will still rule all of Wor.”

“There is a big difference between the two. You are to become a member of the Guild… a man of the light. The people will see you differently and more importantly so will the Guild.”

“Gerick…”

“Leopold… we all have a purpose to serve in this life. Mine was to protect you. Yours is to return Wor to the Assembly of Worlds.”

“And Estelle’s?” Leopold asked.

“Well we both know what my sister wanted,” Gerick chuckled.

“To be queen and bear my heir… She will now have to content herself as my mistress.”

“You should send her away,” Gerick grunted as he made another deep thrust.

“I asked her to but she will hear none of it. She thinks I will change my mind about the alliance with the Guild.”

“She has always been attracted to power… like a moth to a flame. I only hope she will not get burned this time,” Gerick said, critical of his sister.

“So do I,” Leopold sighed.

“We better hurry this up… the Guild Mistress will be here soon,” Gerick said as he picked up his pace.

“I will miss this, my Prelate.”

“I will as well, my birth kin.”

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“Guild Mistress Terra, we have arrived,” an armored Guild Protector said behind his bronze mask.

“Very well,” the silver-masked Guild woman replied, boredom in her voice. “I guess that means I must make an appearance then.”

“Mistress, I know you did not ask for this assignment on Wor, but the Prelate would not have chosen you if another could achieve the Guild’s goals.

“I know, Falcon… and I am grateful that you have decided to join me in exile. You will be my island of civilization on this barbaric planet.”

“I am forever at your service.” The young man bowed, a smile hidden behind his grinning mask.

“And you service me well.” The woman's violet eyes shimmered from the holes in her mask. “Shall we go now?”

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The Guild war-liner, too large to dock properly at the pier, opened an iris-shaped door in its center, hovering fifty feet above the pier.

“Shall I send for a ladder, my lady?” the Prime Minister asked Estelle.

“No… Even though it would be amusing to watch the Guild Mistress have to crawl out of her ship, I am more curious to see how she handles this predicament.”

“There she is, my lady,” the Prime Minister said, pointing at a white-robed and silver-masked woman with raven black hair that billowed in the wind.

“I never knew they were so tall,” Estelle said clearly intimidated, a feeling which turned into shock when the masked woman jumped off the edge of the ship. That shock in turn quickly changed into amazement as her ladyship watched the Guild woman literally float down to the ground despite the harsh gale of the wind.

“Masters of the sky!” Prime Minster Toran exclaimed.

“Lords of the Void,” Estelle finished, looking up at the sky above her with dread.

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“I see that grav belts have yet to arrive on this world,” Terra sighed as Guild Protector Falcon floated down to join his mistress by her side.

“You must remember my lady that Wor has been under interdiction for the past four life cycles. That is well over two hundred Groundlings years… years without the light and guidance of the Guild.”

“Which is another way of say that the Prelate has sent me to the backwater… nay the sewer of the Outer Sphere.”

“Not so, my lady… from our reports there are still temples that worship the Light. This flying barge is proof that our priests have maintained the old ways, preventing this world from falling to the darkness of the ground. Such could not be said of Petra, Glossen, and Santor.”

Terra’s face took on a disgusted frown. She hated being proven wrong and even more so being told that she should consider herself lucky that she had not been sent to a “darker” world. “As you say…”

Seeing that the rest of the entourage – the mistress’s guards and servants – had joined them on the pier, Captain Falcon offered his arm to Terra. “It’s time, my lady.”

It was on that pier that Lady Estelle, a woman who had bowed to no one since becoming the King of Wor’s wife, bent knee to a Guild Mistress, the first Guild Master in 238 years to have come to Wor.

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Prime Minister Toren, having led the Guild entourage into the crowded throne room, bowed before his king. “Your majesty… may I present Guild Mistress Terra.”

“In the name of the people of Wor may I welcome you to our world,” the deep-voiced, bearded Leopold said with a bow of his head, triggering an exclamation of shock from the gathered nobles.

Terra, amused that this groundling king seemed to understand his proper position decided to be gracious, and dipped her chin with a slight nod. “We accept the welcome of your people in the spirit it is given.”

There was then an awkward silence. King Leopold had long prided himself at his skill of reading people’s faces. But staring at him now were the dozens of silver, bronze, and clay masks of the Guild’s men with their carved smiles. If he dared, which he did not, he would have ordered the masks ripped off their faces.

Finally, however, Falcon, in his bronze mask carved with a wide toothy grin spoke. “King Leopold, my mistress has been traveling for the past three weeks to arrive here. May one of your servants show us to our quarters?”

“Yes… Lady Estelle may I trouble you to guide our guests to the south wing?” Leopold asked his ex-wife.

Even though Estelle knew that her former husband was asking her to do this in order so that she may spy on the Guild, it infuriated her that the nobles gathered there today would not forget that her name was now linked to that of a servant. Still, even though her eyes could not hide her feelings from the king, her voice was submissive. “As his majesty wishes.”

Not even looking to see if she was being followed, Estelle walked out of the throne room towards the isolated south wing. Only a month ago the south wing had been an abandoned shell. Guild priests though had changed all that, turning the south wing into a miniature palace in its own right. In fact if Lady Estella was honest with herself, the south wing was now grander than all the rest of the sky palace. This granted her no comfort, however.

On reaching the end of a long, gilded hall Estella was stopped by a security door. On the other side were the quarters the Guild priests had prepared for the Mistress. No one in the royal court, not even Leopold himself knew what was on the other side of the door. For that reason the king had sent Estelle as guide.

Turning around for the first, time Estelle saw that all the masked Guild’s men had followed her, including the silver-masked one with the narrow carved smile of the Guild Mistress. Lady Estelle then found herself pushed roughly aside without warning by the gloved hands of the ever present bronze-masked Protector. She yelled in protest but no one came to her defense. Her screams quickly muffled by the same Protector’s hand.

As she struggled to free herself from Falcon’s firm hold, Terra, her masked faced never changing, raised a single finger to her lips calmly as if she were trying to silence a panicked child. It did not have that effect.

Terra, tried from travel through the void, was not amused by behavior. “Remove her.”she sent telepathically to Falcon.

“Is that wise sister?”the Protector sent back.

“She is my rival… I will not have her stand in my way.”

“But why does that have to be the case?” Falcon chuckled.

“What are you suggesting?” Terra asked, probing into her brother’s mind. In it she saw her twin brother’s nude body entangled with the pale limbs of Estelle. “No… no brother, I will not have her as a sister!”

Terra, lets be reasonable. You were sent here to link the Guild blood lines with that of Wor’s royal family… specifically that of Leopold’s. Doing so will not only help restore health to our thin blood but tie this world forever under the rule of the Guild.”

“I know why I am here!” Terra sent with a metal barb that stung her brother’s mind.

“Then you know that I too must have a child… a child who will grow up to love and protect the future Assemblyman and King of Wor.”

“I know the tradition! Why a groundling though?”

“Why… would you have your child… a half breed, have a Protector of purer blood than himself? Falcon sent back… knowing his sister well.

The comment had its effect, for Terra quickly saw the risk of her child having less pure blood than Falcon’s child, for by Guild custom and law that would place her child in the role of the inferior. Still she found grounds to protest. “But why THIS groundling?” she demanded, not seeing why her brother wanted the former queen of all women.

“Have you not heard of the cuckoo bird?”

“Yes I have…”Terra replied suspiciously. “So you wish to lay your egg in the king’s nest.”

“Exactly, for do not doubt, sister, that while the king has divorced her ladyship, they still share a bed.”

“Damn you, Falcon!”

“Think of it this way… would you rather have your child’s Protector raised as a bastard, or your child’s half brother?”

“Damn you! So be it… play the role of a cuckoo bird then. May the babe be born as sickly and weak as your mind.”

“Then he will be strong indeed,” Falcon chuckled.

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Estelle did not hear a bit of the debate between the Protector and the Guild Mistress, nor had much time passed, for the thoughts between bonded brother and sister passed quickly… their conversation between the minds only taking a few blinks of Estelle’s frightened eyes. But as soon as it was done, she felt the strong arms holding her relax, the hand removed from her mouth. Released she ran away down the hall, crying toward her former husband’s personal quarters.

On arriving at the thick oak door, Estelle pounded against it in a panic as tears ran down her now blotchy red face.

“Lady Estelle!” the king’s deep voice boomed from the end of the hall Estelle had just ran down.

“Leopold!” Estelle wailed as she ran into his arms.

Taking firm hold of his former wife, he looked her over in vane search for injury. “Are you alright… they did not hurt you, did they?”

“They are awful… plain awful!” Estelle continued to cry.

“They are the Guild… they are not here to be pleasant.”

“Why are they here then?”

“My guess… they want peace… their own sort of peace with a half-blood Guild’s man as king. A king they can control.”

“If that is so… why did you agree? Life is not so horrible here. We have been surviving without space travel.”

“We have been surviving… but given a few more decades not even the Guild priests would have been able to maintain our sky ships without Guild replacement parts. Without sky ships the kingdom… our civilization would collapse.”

“Still,” Estelle protested, not believing what she was being told. To her and to most people on Wor, surviving the interdiction had become a badge of pride. Very few knew that half the sky fleet was already out of commission.

“Estelle, there are some things you don’t know about. You cannotcannot imagine how frail a thread is holding up the kingdom.”

“Better freedom and death than slavery under the Guild!”

“Ahhhh, my pretty propagandist. What am I ever to do with you?” Leopold chuckled fondly as he brushed her cheeks with his large hands before lifting her up into a kiss.

Her voice weak from her lover’s strong kiss, Estelle felt her legs weaken from under her. “We can’t let them win.”

“We won’t,” Leopold promised as he guided her toward the bedroom.

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Once he had seen to Estelle’s needs and when he was sure she was deep asleep, Leopold left their bed and made his way to his study, where he knew a package awaited him. He already knew what was inside it, having opened it when the Guild priests delivered it. Inside was the treaty that would return Wor back to the Assembly, the alliance of planets held together by the Guild’s trade vessels. There was also the list of demands. The first of which had been met when Leopold had painfully divorced his queen. Now with the Guild Mistress on Wor, the second demand, that he become a Guild’s man had to be met. That entailed a series of small sacrifices.

To become a Guild’s man he first needed to look like one. So opening the box Leopold took out a small blue bottle, pouring the gel-like substance inside it in his hands. Then, taking a deep breath he rubbed it into his thick and heavy beard. The effects were quick, his beard soon fell off and his hands coated with a sticky mixture of hair and gel.

Going to the bathroom Leopold washed his face to find it now clean shaven and if what the Guild priests had told him was true, it would remain so forever. Returning to his desk , he took out a white bottle whose contents turned his blond hair to a deep shade of blue.. Next, he put on a blindfold over his blue eyes, and when he removed it his eyes were then an unnatural yellow. This process of changing his body continued for most of the night, taking pills, apply ointments, performing an act that he could only call self-mutilation. When done, he clad himself in the white robes of the Guild and covered his face behind a smiling gold mask.

Leopold then left his chambers and made his way to the south wing, where the door opened at his very touch.