The Silence Within (The Young Ancients: Tiera) Read Online Free

their destination at all. She climbed out when Tiera did however and smoothed her shift, which was probably what she'd been wearing when she'd escaped from the rest facility.
    "Is this your home?" The words held awe, and her face looked a little pale.
    "Nope. I have no clue who lives here. It's new. I figured that I'd just go and knock. Gerent lives by the river, the real one. The silver one here though..." She didn't wait, walking up the path and then knocking, even as the other women held back. Like a servant might, in a similar situation.
    After a few minutes someone finally came to the door, looking rather happy, all things considered. She had a very nice gown on, all in blue, and her hair was done up in a decorative fashion. The deep brown curls almost made Tiera feel envious, since her own hair was deadly straight and black, which was kind of boring.
    The woman went wide eyed when she saw who was there and then jumped forward, grabbing Tiera by the shoulders, then into a tight hug.
    "Tiera! Everyone has been wondering when you'd be around. Come in. You too, ma'am." She didn't look at the other woman very closely, just waving for her to enter, paying almost all of her attention to Tiera, holding her closely, as if they were friends or something.
    It might even be true enough, she figured, even if it wasn't anything that Tiera really felt, for the most part. The woman had once been engaged to her older brother Tor, and then said nasty things about him in public. True, she'd been ordered to do it and they'd mainly made up, but that didn't leave her feeling warm and comfortable with the situation, did it?
    Of course, when she and Gerent had been thrown in a Galasian jail and raped by the guards for sport, it was Tiera and Timon, along with a few other people, that had come to get them out. That might leave Trice feeling a good bit more inclined to like her than was totally needed. Still, a hug was better than someone trying to kill you, most of the time, so she took it and tried to look happy about the whole thing.
    "Hello. I saw this place and wondered if Timon had put it up. The silver river, you know. That seems like something that he'd do, doesn't it? Is it yours?" She smiled and waited, knowing that if she was wrong, that would probably be a real difficulty. After all, in the noble world you were supposed to know things like that, even though half the time people just couldn't. That didn't matter however. It was one of those things that made their lives harder than they should be and would allow the people that wanted to the ability to take offense. It was kind of a sport for some of them.
    Taking offense.
    "Um... You've been away for a bit, haven't you?" There was a pause, a sucked in breath and then a rushing ahead, like someone telling bad news that they figured you needed to know. "This is Timon's and my house... While you were gone, we got married. Sanctioned by the King, and real. This isn't a joke. There were reasons for it, but..."
    Tiera just stood for a moment, looking at everything and wondering what the trick was. It could be a gag after all, or something else. Perhaps a trap for some spies? Timon was twelve after all, which was too young to marry. It wasn't truly impossible, but if he were going to do that, Tiera would have suspected that he'd have married Captain Petra. They were going around together after all. Or at least she'd thought that was the case.
    "Congratulations?" That sounded right at least. Tiera smiled and looked around the place, which was both huge and grand. The frames of the doors were all gold in color, like the metal, and had fine carvings along the sides and top. Through the door looked to be a sitting room, done in cream and blue. There was carpet that ran over the entire floor, and in a light color, which would have been a horrible idea if it couldn't be replaced instantly, thanks to magic.
    There was an appreciative murmur from behind her and Trice let go, not letting her face fall