“Yes,” Aramus told her, for he felt she should know how Cassius felt about her.
“Aramus,” Ha-Lah hissed, for she felt she should not be frightened, when that was not a concern as he’d let nothing happen to any of his girls.
“But…you’re a king,” she said.
“And you’re a daughter, and when you have one, you’ll understand which is most important,” Aramus shared.
She stared up at him with her lips parted.
“All right, well, we came to save you from your citizens for a spell while we had luncheon with you, but if you’re feeling unable to rein in the honesty, we should let you eat alone,” Ha-Lah stated irritably.
“Perhaps we should have a moment alone,” he suggested to her.
“Perhaps we should take that moment later, after dinner, when the girls are down,” Ha-Lah retorted.
When the girls are down.
Would he and his queen have girls?
He’d like girls with her ringlets and those crystal eyes.
Therefore, he decided, they’d keep going until she gave him just that.
At least two.
Or, perhaps, three.
“My queen, I did not say—” he began.
“We’ll discuss it later,” she interrupted.
“Ha-Lah—”
“Don’t worry, Auntie Ha-Lah,” Aelia singsonged, dancing to his wife, taking her hand and tugging on it. “Nothing will happen to Uncle Aramus or you or me or the boys,” she threw her other arm out to indicate “the boys,” in other words, his men, “or anybody. I mean, Uncle Aramus is the king of the seas. And you control its beasts.”
Aramus’s vision turned white.
“Shh, Aelia!” Dora hissed.
She’d told them.
And she’d told them to keep it a secret.
But…
She’d told them.
“Everyone out,” Aramus ordered.
“Uh-oh,” Aelia whispered.
“Out!” he thundered when no one moved.
“Let’s go, minnows,” Nav murmured, beginning to herd the girls.
Ha-Lah looked as if she was going to assist in that endeavor.
Therefore, Aramus stated what he thought was the obvious, his eyes pinned to her, “Not you.”
“Uh-oh,” Aelia repeated.
“It was a secret, dummy,” Dora snapped under her breath.
“I forgot,” Aelia replied.
Dora took her hand as they made their way across the expanse, and Aramus heard her mumble, “It’ll be all right. Auntie Ha-Lah will make it that way.”
Aramus was not certain of that.
“My king—” Ha-Lah began.
“In a moment,” he gritted, turning on his boot, stalking to the stairs behind his throne, and by the time he was down them and arrived at his wife, the doors at the end of the hall were closing behind the others.
“They’re girls,” she said the minute the noise of the closing doors finished ringing around the room. “They’re no danger.”
He looked down at her. “I see I have failed impressing on you—”
“Husband,” she said softly, leaning into him and putting a hand to his chest. “It is not an issue.”
“Aelia shared it openly.”
“Yes, to you.”
“In a way she would do the same to anybody.”
“And if she did it to anybody, she is young, those anybodies who do not know of what she speaks will not understand what she’s saying.”
“I see that is all right with you,” he noted.
“I love that you wish to protect me, but—”
“Sirens damn it, Ha-Lah!” he thundered, and at his sudden loss of control, she dropped her hand and took a step away. “Mercy died before our eyes!”
“Aramus,” she whispered.
“Do you not understand what is happening across realms?” he demanded.
“Darling—”
“Do you not understand, that at this very moment, there are bounden holders throughout our land receiving news they very much will not like and that they may wish to share that with me in unpleasant ways, doing that using you?”
“It will be fine,” she assured in a pacifying voice.
“I know you wish me to believe that so I do not worry, and you are correct, it will be fine. But that will take time. And in that time, I must protect my throne. I must protect my reign. I must protect Cassius’s daughters, my men, my citizens. But most important of all, I must protect you.”
Her face softened at his words, but she began, “I have power—”
“And Fern of Airen has power, and she’s been abducted and imprisoned.”
She opened her mouth to retort.
But Aramus was not done.
“And Melisse has power, but she was abducted and impaled with a unicorn horn.”
It took her a moment to get there, but she eventually did.
“Perhaps I made a poor decision, sharing what I did with Aelia and Dora.”
He was heartened that she was able to admit that. She could be proud and stubborn in that way.
But even if a part of him worried he should not push it, the stakes were too high.
He had to do just that.
“And as all my men, save Tint, were at the foot of my podium, what tidepool were you visiting, alone with two little girls?”
She did not quite hide her guilty look.
“Ha-Lah,” he growled, so angry, he was unable to go on.
“It was on the castle grounds,” she assured him.
“You go nowhere without a guard,” he informed her.
Her brows rose. “In my own home?”
“In it, especially around it, I do not give a fuck. Unless you’re with me or my men, you have a guard.”
“Aramus, obviously as we were at a tidepool, I was close to the sea. I could—”
“I wasn’t opening this up for discussion.”
“We seem to have this conversation frequently,” she snapped.
“Yes, we unfortunately do,” he returned just as crossly.
They stared at each other.
Or, more aptly, she glared at him while he glowered at her.
A part of him, the part that loved her spirit, wished to soften his stance, or at least any ensuing words.
Another, stronger part of him, forced him to drive his point home.
“It is your lot as queen,” he pushed.
“I did not agree to it,” she returned.
He withstood that blow and retorted, “You did not, it is true. But then you did when you fell in love with me.”
She looked away, the elegant sweep of her jaw and line of her neck tense in her anger.
He gave her the time it took to understand she had no choice but to concede that point.
She took that time, returned her gaze to him and nodded tersely.
But she asked, “It will always be this way, won’t it?”
“I’m sorry, my love, but yes. It will. But I will point out, as it seems you haven’t noticed, that it is not just you. I go nowhere without my men and they are my friends, my brothers, but, baby, they are also my guards.”
He saw that had not occurred to her as the flash of understanding blazed in her crystal-blue eyes.
“All right, fine,” she muttered her concession.
“It has been a trying day, you walked in with those girls, and there was nothing that could make me smile. Except you walking in, with or without those girls.”
The anger leaked from her expression.
“Though it gives me great joy to watch you with Cass and Elena’s daughters,” he told her. “It makes me yearn for our own.”
And that made the warmth suffuse her face.
She moved to him again, lifting both hands to wrap them around each side of his neck.
And only then did Aramus relax.
“I see you’re becoming very adept at handling your quick-tempered, stubborn wife.”
“You aren’
t quick-tempered and stubborn. You’re independent and spirited.”
She began laughing quietly. “Yes, I prefer those words too.”
He grinned down at her.
A shadow crossed her eyes just as she moved a hand to stroke his beard.
“You do know,” she said softly, “I will be fine.”
“I do know that, baby,” he whispered in return, “for I will make it that way.”
She held his gaze a moment, before she nodded.
“Shall we have luncheon?” he suggested.
“Yes, let’s,” she agreed.
He bent his head to kiss her, his intention a light peck.
She came up to her toes and pressed into the kiss, thus it ended anything but a light peck.
They then strode to the doors with their arms wound about each other.
For his part, Aramus did this hiding his thoughts, which were centered on the fact he was rather rabidly concerned for his wife’s safety.
This was, on the one hand, logical.
On the other, a quarter of Keel Castle’s grounds were bordered by ocean, which was at his wife’s command. But regardless, there was a dock, which was guarded on land and at sea.
The rest of the castle grounds were protected by a fifteen-foot wall, which was manned with soldiers. There was a gate to get to the lane to the castle that was staffed with guards and a portcullis to enter the courtyard that was manned by more. And the castle itself had yet another cadre assigned to it.
And there were a further one hundred in the guards’ quarters that could come at any sign of trouble.
She was safe there.
She was safe in her home.
She was certainly safe by the sea, for she could make herself that way.
In foreign lands, that was one thing.
But as she put it, in her own home, was entirely another.
So why was Aramus so utterly terrified she was not?
He knew the answer to that, he was in love with his queen and times were rife.
He also knew there were other answers to be had, and he’d put it off, for a number of reasons.
But in times this rife, now that he was home, he needed to seek them.
From olden times, the King of Mar-el had a secret weapon.
It was just, due to its perils, he had to be very careful about using it.
“I do not think this is a good idea,” Ore said as Aramus dismounted at the neck of the abyss.
He looked up at his brother still on his mount and saw Oreti’s eyes aimed at the opening, and they were not narrowed only against the stiff sea breeze.
He was not surprised at Ore’s reticence. The abyss did not look welcoming. Indeed, the entire area was craggy, bleak and uninviting.
Aramus did not refer to that.
“No matter what you see, or hear, or feel, you do not descend this chasm behind me,” he ordered.
“Cap,” Xi murmured.
“No matter what,” Aramus said.
“Who thought I’d want to be back in that throne room listening to landowners griping about fence placement disputes,” Nis muttered.
But Bond dismounted.
Aramus turned to him.
“No matter what, Bond,” he warned.
Bond got close and dropped his voice.
“My king,” he began, and Aramus braced, for none of his men addressed him in this formal manner.
His next words explained it.
“As you are aware, I do with honor what my father did before me. I am in direct service to my king. And as I’ve taken up that mantle, it is my duty now to share what my father told me. This being that your father told him that if you were ever to come to this place, I should do what I could to talk you out of walking that path.”
He said this, pointing to the narrow path that ran the side of the gorge.
“Rest easy, my brother,” Aramus replied.
“The royal missives are being received, and thus far, there are no reports of unrest. With the end of bondage in the Southlands, which are known to be barbaric, and we are not, they must have known that this would happen here and be waiting for it.”
“It is early days.”
“True, but we are prepared.”
“Bond—”
“And we began operations even before we left Wodell to ascertain if that Rising was attempting a foothold on our shores, and thus far, there’s no murmur of it.”
“This doesn’t—”
“Aramus,” Bond got closer. “The quakes have ceased. We have not felt one for some time.”
Aramus understood his friend had to do this.
So, he fell quiet to let him do this.
“We all saw her murdered, my brother,” Bond stated quietly, coming finally to the meat of the matter. “But if told Queen Mercy would die for her country, she would not have shirked that honor.”
“She did not die for her country. She was made a martyr.”
“Queen Mercy would not have shirked that either. The only thing she would have changed is not allowing her son to see it.”
Aramus clenched his teeth, for he was right.
“We can keep her safe,” Bond asserted.
He was now referring to Ha-Lah.
In a low voice, Aramus shared, “The Nereus men do not love like normal men love.”
“Yes,” Bond muttered.
“My father with my mother, it was legend.”
“Yes,” Bond repeated.
“My grandfather with my grandmother.”
“Aramus, I know.”
“It is the gods who bring them to us, it is the women who force the fall.”
Bond fell silent.
Aramus had to choose his next words wisely, for his men did not know what was within that abyss.
Only the King of Mar-el knew.
And his heir.
“I can no longer go on not knowing what I’ve come here to know,” he felt it safe to say.
“I wish you to rethink your ability to do that,” Bond urged.
Aramus stood quiet and closed his eyes.
But all he could think was just how angry he became at the thought of Ha-Lah in any danger.
How much she chafed at that.
And how much danger the both of them faced along with all their friends.
Indeed, everyone on the continent.
He opened his eyes.
“I must descend.”
Bond drew in an audible breath before he nodded.
“I did my best,” he said.
“You did, my brother,” Aramus murmured.
He then clapped his friend on the shoulder, and without looking at the others, he turned to the mouth of the abyss.
He was a large man, the path was narrow, the fall so far, he could not see the bottom, just hear the whoosh of surf all the way to the top.
But he did not hesitate taking his first step, or his next, or the ones after.
As his father told him, the farther he descended, the deeper the darkness that surrounded him.
However, unlike others, who, if they tried to take this journey, would eventually find themselves blind and either have to turn around, or end up falling to their deaths, he could always see the path before him, a magical light guiding the way of the king who was proclaimed thus by the gods.
But his father had not told him, for his father had never found reason to take this descent, about the sound of the angry sea at the bottom, and how, step after step, the volume increased, so as to become a din, a thunder, a roar.
And as it churned, it splashed, so much eventually the mist felt like rain.
Aramus was soaked to the skin by the time he could see the tempest whirling at the base. The water was agitated to the point it was all white, the chasm wide, the swirl violent, the knowledge immediate that if he should fall into that foam, he’d be sucked deep, perhaps his drowned corpse taken to the earth’s core.
It was humid but chill, wet, dank, dark, and as he wound his way around and around
the abyss, again and again, he wondered if he’d been descending ten minutes or if time had warped and he’d been gone ten years.
A man could go mad down here, he thought, just as he saw the lanterns.
Orbs of green and blue glass, glowing from within, perhaps twenty feet in front of him. They hung at odd intervals, and only very dimly lit what appeared to be a circular opening to a cave on the side of the cliff path.
As his father had warned him not to do, Aramus did not hasten his step. One stumble on this slick rock, and it would not be Ha-Lah who would be lost to him due to the fates.
It would be he who was gone forever.
Carefully, he made it to the orbs and stood outside their murky glow.
“It is I, King Aramus,” he called against the crash of water behind him, feeling a complete fool.
“And it is I who receives The Head.”
The Head?
“Enter, King of the Sea,” the voice bid.
Dodging hanging orbs, Aramus did that, and even though he went through no door, the moment those orbs were behind him, the thunder of the swirling sea became naught but the sound of gentle waves lapping a shore.
Aramus did not like that.
He also did not question it.
He further did not like that beyond those orbs there was nothing but pitch dark.
He did not question that either.
“It has been long,” a voice came from the shadows.
Aramus knew not how to respond.
Thus, he simply said, “Yes.”
“Did your father tell you of me?” the voice asked.
It sounded old, but strong. Wise, but elusive. He could not even pinpoint from where it was coming.
And in those shadows, he could see not a thing.
“Yes,” he repeated.
“So you know, you do not descend without peril. And you do not learn without sacrifice.”
Shite.
“I know,” Aramus confirmed.
“The unicorn and the balls, the shadow and the cock, the sage and the heart, the crystal and the head,” the voice sang eerily.
And nonsensically.
“May I sit?” Aramus requested.
“Do you wish to sup with your bride?” the voice asked.
“Yes.”
“Then no, my king. I think your visit should be brief.”
Aramus forced himself to breathe evenly, but deeply.
Then he began, “There is much happening.”
The Dawn of the End Page 17
