Ashes of Dearen: Book 1

by Jayden Woods

  *

  In the morning, she met with High Chief Abrax.

  The princess’s summons astonished him—a fact he did not try to hide as he sat with her in the Crystal Dining Hall. His long blond braids swished about his shoulders as he turned his head every which way, as he if he might find some cosmic explanation in his crystalline surroundings.

  Fayr found little reason to explain herself. He had come here seeking her hand in marriage; now she offered a chance for him to take it. What else was there to say?

  When at last he spoke, Abrax’s humble tone surprised her. Coming from such a burly man with a jaw like a chisel, his voice was surprisingly soft. “I am honored, Princess. Of course I will marry you.”

  “Very good,” she said, then leaned back and clasped her hands before her. “Now how soon can you bring in your army?”

  The princess and high chief could not yet plan far ahead. Perhaps both were too overwhelmed by the suddenness of their engagement. Abrax understood why she wanted his troops as quickly as possible. He explained with regret that it would take many weeks to gather them. If he called all the men loyal to him, he suspected to collect at least a thousand. Fayr would also need to figure out how to accommodate them in Dearen, and how their ranks would affect her own hierarchy of reeves and knights.

  “I have many decisions to make,” said the high chief. “I will need to talk to Leonard Khan—er …” He scratched his braids, remembering that the situation was even more complex than he first suspected.

  “You understand, I imagine, that a marriage with me will increase your chances to become the next khan of Vikand,” she said. “How is such a thing decided, anyway?”

  “The man or woman who summons the most troops to his banner is Khan,” explained Abrax. “Or—if the match seems too close—then the two sides may fight until one side is vanquished. If there is already a Polemarch, however, that could sway the conclusion.” He shrugged his big shoulders. “There are no strict rules to this,” he admitted. “When the time comes for a new khan, it is like war in Vikand. But it may be that the Royal Horde readily accepts Richard as Khan. And if they do ...”

  “Then you must act more quickly than Richard,” said Fayr, “and gather your troops immediately. Gather a thousand hordesfolk and bring them here by the winter solstice. If you do this, then I will marry you.”

  Abrax nodded, and thus they separated.

  After he left, Fayr paced the palace hallways in anguish. She could not think of anything better she might have done. Her kingdom would tear itself apart if she did not find some way to pull it back together.

  Later that day, Gornum ran to her in a panic. He explained that the riots throughout Dearen had worsened. People murdered and stole from each other to gather what precious safra still sprinkled the landscape. Tigers killed some of the outsiders who yet remained in Dearen. Even if they protected the princess’s interests by doing so, their sudden brutality increased the fearful hysteria spreading through the kingdom.

  “Summon the high reeve of Dearen city,” said Princess Fayr, “and the reeves of the four towns of Dearen. Tell them to come here as quickly as possible. Also spread word to all the people of Dearen that three days from now, I will speak to them from the Royal Square at noon. I have much to announce. There is a great deal to celebrate, and a great deal to mourn.”

  Gornum bowed his head and left to do her bidding.

  Fayr agonized over what she would say to her people. She drafted many speeches and scrapped them all in a fit of frustration. She wished she had someone to turn to for advice. A few times, she had consulted the Yamairan suitor, Prime Synergist Deragon. Although his appearance filled her with dread, she recognized his wisdom and intelligence. He also seemed accepting of the fact she would not choose him as husband, but he might yet have a place in her court. Who she really yearned for advice from, of course, was Darius. She suspected Darius would have some laconic words of wisdom that summed up the truth in a single sentence. But Darius was gone.

  To her surprise, it was the harpist, Jeevu, who helped her find the words she needed. Ever since the storm that blew out the Haze, he had roamed the palace halls in a state of shock and misery. He cried often, and she saw him a few times sitting and staring at his harp, unwilling to pick it up again. Fayr passed him by each time, for she did not have the fortitude to offer words of comfort. Until one day, she heard him playing his harp again in the Gardens of Delight.

  The most extraordinary fact was not only that he played his harp again; it was the fact he played a tune in a minor key.

  She walked towards him slowly, picking her way through wilted violets and ferns. He sat on a gilded bench, tears running down his cheeks as his fingers stroked the strings. The melody from his harp seemed to pluck the emotions within her own heart, and she repressed the urge to weep with him. As painful as the sounds were, they were also comforting: a sweet reflection of the agony within.

  When he saw her, he stopped and looked up with surprise. Then, most strangely, he offered her a smile through his tears.

  “I hear the difference now, Princess,” he said. “The minor key … it has a special beauty to it.”

  His comment broke Fayr’s resolve. She sobbed and fell down beside him, wrapping him in her arms. Together they wept, and at last, Fayr understood what she must say to her people.

  On a golden noon, Fayr stood above the Royal Square of Dearen City. The palace glittered behind her in all its crystalline glory. Silver clouds swept in tufts across a cerulean sky. The wind stroked Fayr’s long satin dress in rippling colors around her body. A crown of jewels, softened with tiger fur around the rim, sat upon her head. The purple tendrils of her hair lashed the sky. Below her, more people filled Dearen city than she had ever seen at once. There were hundreds—maybe thousands—of desperate men and women filling the square, streets, and alleys.

  “People of Dearen,” said the princess. Her voice rang like a bell through the wind. Every person in sight waited in breathless silence to hear her words. “For the first time in our recorded history, Dearen faces a great challenge. We live without the Haze.”

  A soft sound, like a unanimous groan, passed through the multitude.

  “I come here today to tell you something, people of Dearen. It is a great secret, protected by the Violenese for countless generations. It is the truth behind safra. The truth is that for centuries, the Haze has protected Dearen from harm. But by doing so, it weakened us. We grew dependent on its presence. We took it for granted. But worse than that, we ceased to understand pain or danger. We let ourselves believe they did not exist. We lived in a dream, Dearens. And now it is time we woke up.”

  A murmur of discontent rippled through the crowds. Fayr held up her hand, and they fell silent. A cloud passed over the sun, sending a shadow through the city, as if upon the princess’s command.

  “Now that you are awake, I have good news and bad news to share with you.” Fayr took a moment to catch her breath. “Some of you heard rumors that a Wolven was spotted fleeing from the palace several days ago. The rumors were true. A Wolven infiltrated our defenses and killed my brother, Prince Kyne.”

  The congregation moaned with dismay. Fayr struggled not to let a sob escape her throat.

  “I survived, however,” she said hoarsely. “All of you here survived that day with me: the day the Haze disappeared. We are still alive. For the moment, our enemies have fled. Perhaps Friva still blesses us, despite the absence of the Haze. But we must not take our fortune for granted, as we took safra for granted. We must learn from what has happened and move forward. For that reason, I am proud to announce—” Here she choked, and it took her even longer to recover. “I am proud to announce my engagement to a Vikand chief. We have not yet sealed the arrangement, but if all goes as planned, we will marry less than a fortnight from now, on the day of the winter solstice.”

  She did not know how it started, but somehow, the name of Darius spread through the masses. She first heard i
t murmured not too far away; then she heard echoes of his name echo across the square. People’s voice came together in a chant. “Chief Darius,” they said. “Chief Darius. Chief Darius. Chief Darius!”

  She wanted to faint with horror. How did they even know about him? Most had certainly never seen him, for Darius seemed to like his privacy. But Fayr must not have paid enough attention to the rumors spreading during their courtship together. His absence at the feast of Friva’s Hall, it seemed, had not lessened him in the eyes of the population; in fact, it had increased their fascination with him.

  “Stop … STOP!” A sob must have escaped her throat, loud enough to silence the chanting. She struggled to breathe at all. “I … I did not say it was Darius,” she groaned. “I believe that Chief Darius died defending my brother against the Wolven.”

  A silence more terrible than any yet fell over the mob.

  “I am in pain, as you are,” said Fayr. “But this leads me to a new confession, for pain is not new to me.” Tears ran down her cheeks. She could no longer hide them. “My confession is this: unlike all of you, I have never been able to feel the effects of safra. Neither could my brother, nor my father, nor any of us with the Violenese blood in our veins. This was one condition of a pact my ancestors made with the gods centuries ago that enabled us to make safra in the first place.” She remembered the words of her father, and her heart skipped a beat. “We made safra to control people. Do you understand that, Dearens? My ancestors did. People will do anything to obtain happiness. And if they are happy, they will not oppose the will of those who wish to control them. This is how safra has protected Dearen. But it is also how it has harmed you. It has blinded you from understanding when you are in danger, or when you must protect yourself from harm. It has led you to believe in a perfect world which does not exist. It has also kept you from fully appreciating your blessings. How can you appreciate anything if you do not know what it means to live without it?”

  The silence continued to hang over her people. The shadow passed and sun rays poked back through the clouds, making the city glow golden.

  “We still have some safra left. Do not waste it by consuming it immediately. Collect it and give it to Dearen guards and reeves. I will collect all the safra left and use it to rebuild this kingdom. I promise you this. For our kingdom needs rebuilding, and it needs a new form of protection than what it knew before. We must build ourselves an army.”

  At this, a few people started shouting. They were too far away for Fayr to hear them. But their defiance must have given others courage, for soon more voices arose in anger.

  “You can’t take our safra!”

  “You’ll leave us with nothing!”

  The people yelled and shook their fists, growing louder and louder. Fayr’s blood roared in her ears. She had bared her heart to them, and she didn’t know what else to say. She had to do this. It was the only plan she could think of. She had to collect what safra she could and sell it to outsiders, or Dearen would have no source of revenue. She would do it for their own good. She would try to ensure that they had enough food and shelter, but just as importantly, that they worked for these things by equipping themselves for combat.

  The fury of the crowd built and multiplied from one group to the next, spreading across the landscape. Fayr didn’t know how to stop it.

  Then there came a scream.

  The scream was so shrill that it cut through the shouts of anger. Then more cries of panic waved from the same direction. One section of the mob roiled about, as if trying to escape something. People tripped and fell over each other in an attempt to gain refuge. Then the crowd split apart.

  A tiger walked amongst them.

  As the great beast walked through the Royal Square, the panic subsided into a reverent silence. They saw now that the tiger did not attack them. Instead, it walked steadily towards the princess.

  Fayr held her breath as the beautiful cat approached. Its shoulders rolled with tremendous muscle. Its golden coat undulated with its black stripes, shifting like the sunlight over the city as the clouds passed across it. Its slitted eyes fixed her from afar and, just for a moment, she wondered if it came to kill her, as the tigers had killed many people in the last few days.

  It jumped up to the platform on which she stood, and it took all of her willpower not to scream and run away. The effortlessness of its leap was but a small testament to the strength of its body. She had no desire to witness the relative power of its claws, which could probably rip her to tatters like so many knives. But she could not run away: she would have to stand and accept whatever fate it intended for her.

  The tiger stopped just a few feet away, staring at her. Fayr noticed something strange about its eyes. She had always thought tigers possessed golden eyes; she knew for a fact that she had seen some with such eyes in the past. But the gaze of this tiger was different. Its irises shifted with many colors, like a pool reflecting the spectrum of the rainbow. Not unlike her own.

  The beast walked a few steps closer, then rubbed its head against her leg. It was a miracle Fayr remained standing, considering that her legs felt like jelly.

  Then the tiger turned towards the people and roared.

  The sound rattled the marrow of her bones. Its volume carried across the horizon and shook the earth beneath her feet. Horses and small beasts on the distant hills bolted in fear, scattering all directions. Fayr wondered if the nations on both sides of Dearen heard her sound; for the moment she believed that they did.

  When the incredible roar faded, Fayr no longer felt afraid. She put her hand on the tiger’s head and wrapped her fingers in the thickness of its fur. A rumble of approval vibrated from the cat’s throat.

  “If you defy me,” said Princess Fayr, “it is not my wrath you will face, but the might of your enemies. Do as I say, Dearens, so that we might face this hardship together, and overcome those who wish to harm us. Are you with me, Dearens? Are you willing to face a life without safra? Are you willing to fight our enemies if they dare test our strength?”

  At last, a cheer burst out of the crowd. It began small, but eventually, more people yelled and clapped in agreement. When the tiger roared once more, the people erupted with applause.

  Fayr took a deep and shuddering breath. A good cheer would not be enough to protect them for long. But it was a very good start.