Chapter 43: Borrowing the art of war.
An already long day became even longer with the news Cosmos delivered. Immediately upon her return to the vale, Sigrid summoned her family, the immediate ones only.
While she was taking a bath, her grandparents, parents, brothers and Deanna arrived at the vale. They joined Sigrid for dinner and dismissed everyone with the exception of Cosmos and Lanai.
The doors leading into the dining room were heavily guarded by ten knights, allowing the family to discuss openly without holding back.
As soon as they started digging into their food, the questioning started.
"Why did you summon us?" her father, Paxton started.
"Is it related to you special abilities?" Duchess Mila followed up with a question of her own.
"Roland returns tomorrow." Sigrid said, she wanted to get straight to the point and move things along as quickly as possible.
Time had moved fast, it was already approaching eleven, and her body was weary.
Five seconds of silence passed and then conversation picked up but every face at the table was rather ashen, they knew what Roland’s return meant for their family. It spelled the beginning of their troubles.
"Is he bringing Emmah?" Nathaniel asked.
"Of course he is," Duke Thorin slammed a hand on the table. "I sent five of the retired soldiers to keep an eye on Roland, they did not make it to the land of mist, they found the knights and Roland’s army on its way back. They were victorious but Roland was injured by a Nemorian sword mage, a sword almost removed his arm but a woman appeared and threw herself on him and the sword cut her instead."