Back Into The Empire

I woke up early the next morning and meet up with the teenagers then headed out near Ravenhill. A few other mages from the academy meet us there a little while later. I put the teens on trench digging and pulling rocks out of the ground while the young adults worked on hill clearing with one group moving north from Raven Hill while the others headed south from hunters rest. It went a lot faster with a group of mages doing the work instead of just me as we got maybe half league of land cleared out. I figured it would take two weeks to clear out the hills on both sides. I rode back to the house where I had a visitor waiting for me inside. The queen.

"You majesty." I bowed as did Sura.

"I have need of you and your friends services." The Queen said looking at me and Sura.

"Of course." I nodded.

"Thank you for the tea Aurora." The Queen smiled.

"Glad you liked it your majesty." Aurora nodded.

"Follow me please. I will have to take us there." The queen said and lead us out past the barrier and held out her hands. I took one and Sura reluctantly took the other. We instantly traveled from the house into the woods. Sura doubled over like she might spew.

"You okay?" I asked. I knew it took some getting used to. The first time was always the worst.

"Yeah." She nodded standing up. "Where are we?"

"The Kingwood." I smiled and lead her across the barrier where willow was waiting on us.

"Princess Willow. Good to see you." I gave a bow and she shook her head at me.

"So what is this about?" She said looking at her aunt.

"One of our spies has reported the missing ship with the gold is heading for the dark elf capital." The Queen said leading us inside.

"Can we trust the information?" I asked as I followed them inside.

"Yes." A voice said. I turned to see Raven waiting for us.

"Raven. What are you doing here?"

"She is working for us now." The Queen said. Raven nodded and walked across the room toward the table where a map set.

"Once a year slaves from all over the empire are brought to the capital. I can not say for certain what the gold is going to be used to buy more slaves or not but if so they have enough gold to buy an army at best. At worst they could use the money to fund a war between the dark elves and the humans." Raven said pointing at the capital on the map. She ran her finger from darkwater up along the map to the capital.

"They can't take the ship back out to sea and risk our fleet taking it." The queen said. "I need the four of you to travel there and stop the empire from obtaining the gold." The

"You want us to sink the ship?" I asked. It wasn't like we could take it. Not in the heart of the empire. The Queen just nodded. Even getting aboard would prove difficult.

"It's a three day ride to the capital. You will pose as a trader looking to buy some slaves." Raven looked at me.

"I will provide gold for you like last time." The Queen looked at me.

"Let me guess, where suppose to go as slaves?" Sura scowled.

"You could pose as his body guard and **** handler. You will be even more hated by the the slaves then the **** owners." Raven smiled.

"We Orcs are used to being hated." Sura grinned.

"We still have the necklace the assassin who tried to kill me and my husband wore. A small alteration and Willow will appear to be a dark elf." The Queen looked over. I was sure Willow wasn't very fond of the idea.

"None of the imperial nobles know what you look like thanks to your father keeping you hidden." Raven said.

"You all will head out tomorrow morning and ride for the empire." The Queen said and we all headed out.

"So why the sudden change?" I said as I caught up with Raven.

"The queen agreed to make sure Nisha is taken care of." Raven said. I guess I should have known since that was the only weakness Raven ever showed. The queen took me and Sura back home to get ready for our trip.