by Vela Roth
“I suppose you are right,” Lio said. “We should pursue our questions no further. Will you tell the Prisma I did not heed her request to keep silent with you?”
“Only if I must for her safety or mine. Until then, we shall all go on as we were.”
Would they really? Would fully armored Cassia return to her silent battle and give him a passing glance across the Summit pavilion tomorrow night as if nothing had changed? After a night of such confidences and risks on each other’s behalf, Lio felt that nothing could be the same. Least of all between him and Cassia.
23
Days Until
SPRING EQUINOX
The Drink
The moons had barely risen when Cassia arrived at the fountain. Although the Light Moon was still veiled, the Blood Moon shed enough light to reveal she was alone.
It had surprised all the Summit’s attendees when the recess had turned into the end of negotiations for the night. With the free lords bickering so amongst themselves, there was nothing else to be done. The king must let them have their squabbles so they could continue to believe they had a say and he could continue to appear faultless in the lack of progress toward the Oath.
Cassia should be troubled by the stalemate, but she welcomed the early escape to the grounds and the knowledge that the Summit would drag on for who knew how long.
She had yet to ask Lio the real question that had brought her to Solorum to seek out the Hesperines.
Cassia gazed into the dark trees and confronted the knowledge that the day, that day, was almost upon her. Her fingers closed reflexively upon her gardening satchel, at the thought of what she carried there.
Suddenly she felt alone. She had spent the day at the temple, swept up in the mages’ rejoicing over the wondrous appearance of the rimelace. Knight stood patiently beside her, and she knew Lio was here somewhere. But the sense crept over her that she was adrift without anchor. The storm would never end, and there was no one to guide her into harbor.
Cassia set out into the trees on the far side of the clearing. Lio must know she was on her way. It would not surprise her if he preferred meeting at the shrine from now on, in a haven where he could use his power more freely. He was probably waiting for her there.
The forest cut off the red moonlight, and darkness closed around her. She unhooded the small lantern she had brought with her, but the candlelight barely touched the shadows. Without Lio’s guidance, she had to pay very careful attention to find her way through the tall undergrowth and between the broad tree trunks. More than once, the deer path seemed to disappear from beneath her feet as if the ferns and darkness had swallowed it. The woods looked bigger than they had years ago when two girls, uninterested in ruins, had made forbidden excursions to a pond that seemed a much more appealing destination on a summer day.
The forest felt so much more vast when she was alone.
A glimmer of light off to her right caught her eye. A hint of red moonglow amid the trees. Another clearing, one she and Lio had passed the night before. She was going the right way.
A flicker of motion in the clearing arrested her gaze.
Cassia hooded her lantern. Careful where she put her feet, trying not to make a sound, she eased closer to Knight.
Another flash of motion. She fumbled in her cloak to douse the lantern entirely.
From the clearing up ahead spoke a voice she knew. “Come to me.”
Cassia caught her breath. Then she heard hooves in the grass. She let out her breath again, as quietly as she could.
She motioned a stay command to Knight, patting his chest with the flat of her hand. It was a testimony to his loyalty that, knowing what lay ahead, he obeyed.
She crept forward, although she knew what she would see. Because she knew what she would see. That call had not been for her. Yet she chose to answer it. She halted in a deep shadow at the edge of the moonlit clearing and watched.
Lio knelt at the center of the glade, awash in blood-red light, and before him stood a young doe. As he gazed at her in silence, she lowered herself to the ground, folding her hocks beneath her.
At the touch of his hand, she stretched out her neck and rested her head on his lap. He ran his slender fingers over her coat, and her sides rose and fell with a sigh. He lowered his head, as if to whisper in her ear.
The doe did not flinch, but Cassia did, the moment his mouth opened on the animal’s neck. The Blood Moon outlined the taut tendons in his jaw and the undulations of his throat. And yet his hands remained still and steady. He, the monster of the night, touched a beast with greater gentleness than humans touched their own kin.
Cassia stared, unmoving, until his throat stilled and his jaw relaxed. He paused a moment, then lifted his head. There was no blood on his lips. She did not even catch a glimpse of red moonlight on gleaming fangs.
The deer got to her feet, letting his hands slide off of her. With a shake of her head and a twitch of her ears, she strolled away into the trees.
His gaze did not follow the doe, but rested instead on his own hands. After a moment, he cleared his throat and looked at Cassia.
He had known she was there all along, of course. He had chosen to let her watch.
Cassia took a step forward into the reach of the moonlight. “She wasn’t even afraid.”
“She had no reason to be.” He held out a hand. “If you care to join me, I won’t bite.”
Cassia drifted farther into the clearing. “I know you don’t bite. Except the willing. She was, I take it?”
“Animals make their cooperation or disapproval clear, and we strive to respect that. There is never any excuse for causing them distress. The doe was friendly and curious.”
“You weren’t even using your mind magery on her?”
Lio shook his head. “Animals already know what so many humans don’t realize about Hesperines. We are harmless.”
“I wouldn’t call you that.”
His hands tensed in his lap. She was coming to recognize the almost imperceptible body language of Hesperines, which had seemed opaque to her at first. Or at least, she was learning how Lio’s body spoke. He was worried about what she thought of the scene she had just witnessed and its implications.
“Not harmless,” Cassia said. “Safe.”
Now his fingers relaxed. “Is that what you’d call us?”
She nodded. “You could enthrall any creature, couldn’t you? But you wouldn’t.”
“Indeed, that would be a grave violation. Hesperine law forbids us to abuse the insight the Blood Union affords us. Mind mages have a particular responsibility to understand and uphold these laws. The power and precision of thelemancy goes beyond even the Union. Because we can manipulate the Will, it is our duty to be its foremost defenders. Only in very rare, specific circumstances may we use magic to influence a human’s mind.”
“So there are occasions when it is permissible?”
“Only when there is no other way to save someone from harm.”
“Does that include saving yourself? Might you put an unwilling human into a trance and drink if you were starving?”
“Any Hesperine would seek sustenance from animals first. I hesitate to imagine a situation so desperate that option would not be available.”
“I fear my thoughts are trained to consider the worst eventualities,” she said by way of apology.
“We do everything possible to prevent such eventualities. Our laws do provide for situations in which we must use our power to neutralize an aggressor…or make someone answer for a crime. But I think you would find Hesperine justice quite different from what passes for justice in Tenebra.”
“That’s why you resort to the king’s negotiation table. It is, of course, a mockery to describe anything that goes on there as a negotiation. But I think the king is the butt of the joke. He plays with his soldiers and his mages, but you could take anything you wanted.”
“As you said, we wouldn’t.”
“No. You would petition the monster
on the throne to give it to you.” She let out a laugh that tasted bitter in her mouth.
Lio was not laughing. “Can you imagine the consequences, if we resorted to force? The only reason the Last War can be called that is because we keep ourselves a kingdom away from Cordium and only enter Tenebra peacefully and discreetly in small numbers. Think what would become of your people if we were less careful—or if the time comes when they once more force us to defend ourselves.”
“I guarantee I will ponder how different our fate would be at your hands than the king’s, the next time he sentences another one of his dependents to death.”
“You and I both know that the moment conflict erupts between mortals and Hesperines in Tenebra, Cordium will rush to your kingdom’s ‘assistance.’ I am not sure even Lucis would have the power to keep those hounds from their natural prey, and I know it is not only Tenebra’s sovereignty that would be a casualty. The Cordians would burn their way across Tenebra on a new crusade to destroy all Hesperines.”
“And your people would grieve because you would be the reason for our suffering at Cordium’s hands.”
“You must wonder why we do not simply give up on the Oath and withdraw from Tenebra so that there is no chance of conflict.”
“I have never wondered why you are so dedicated to your goddess’s mercies. If you never left Orthros, who would rescue infants from the wolves? Who would ease the pain of the dying?” Cassia would not let her voice waver. She would not. “Who would give the desecrated the dignity of their final sacred rites?”
Lio rose to his feet so fluidly she did not really see him move. “I am glad my uncouth display has not tarnished your opinion of us. As always, you see things as they are.”
She came nearer still. “I never trust what I see. I trust the evidence of bloodshed, however. That never lies and is seldom open to interpretation.”
“I’m sorry your truth requires such grisly proof.”
She halted in front of him. “If you were anyone but a Hesperine, I would tell you I do not want your pity.”
He appeared taken aback. “Cassia, it is not pity.”
“I know.” She turned away from Lio. What a coward she was. The gloom between the trees welcomed her gaze, much easier to face than him. The trees could not see the fear in her eyes.
The tension and sweat and pain that always waited to drown her now rose over her like a tide. Her belly quivered, threatening to sicken if she subjected herself to memory. If she looked at what she always carried inside her.
Cassia willed the words out, as she had willed herself to the Summit table. “The most generous deed ever done on my behalf was the work of your people, and it was not an act of pity.”
Trust
Lio knew he had passed the final test. He had proved himself trustworthy.
If he had not, Cassia would never make a confession that cost her this much. In the face of suffering so powerful, there was no such thing as controlling the Blood Union. Her nausea rose in his own belly, and her panic heated and chilled his skin by turns. Every muscle in his body strained with hers against the urge to flee or strike out blindly against any target at hand.
Her own words made her sick with horror. This went beyond their Oath of openness. But she had spoken, and even now she stood just out of reach, trying to go on. Lio listened to her take a breath to speak, then to the silence in which her words would not come. Still, she gasped another breath for a new attempt.
From the first night she had approached him, she had said things to him she told no one else. With him, she broke the silence that was often all that stood between her and her own mortality. Perhaps he was finally about to understand why.
He must not push her. He tried instead to encourage her, to offer her a path into what she was trying so desperately to say. “You have met a Hesperine before?”
It worked. Her breath hitched, her voice came out ragged, but she spoke. “Three of them. A flock of swans come to carry away the slain.”
“Goddess bless. Cassia. I am so sorry.” Lio struggled to respect the distance between them and not go to her side. “Now I understand. When you talk of the Mercy, you are speaking of someone you lost.”
She cast a quick glance over her shoulder, not quite meeting his eyes. “Not a remarkable story, of course. Humans died, your folk came to clean up my folk’s mess.” She shrugged, once more trying to wield the sharp edge of indifference. But she barely had hold of her weapon, and she brandished it in shaking hands.
Lio took just one step closer. She tensed, but did not move away from him. So he dared try to comfort her. “My people have eternal memories. We never forget the fallen. I don’t know what happened, but I can say with certainty that the Hesperines who were there still remember the face and name of each person to whom they gave the Mercy.”
Her hands rested at her sides, but they curled into fists in the folds of her skirt. He smelled salty moisture in the air.
She was crying.
Knight appeared at the edge of the clearing and strode to her side. Lio had never seen the hound disobey a stay order. But now Cassia’s beast pressed himself against her skirts, nudging her fist until she uncurled it and buried her fingers in his fur.
Watching Cassia’s shoulders quiver, Lio had never felt so frustrated and powerless. He prayed she would understand his words for what they were. Not a demand to know more of her secret pain, but an offer of sympathy. “Would you tell me your loved one’s name, so that I may remember as well?”
He listened to her soft, quick breaths. Not sobs to anyone’s ears but his. “It is still a mystery to me, your concern for the dead. The ones beyond your reach. But I learned long ago you are their kindest keepers.”
“To honor them is a sacred trust.”
“Nothing is sacred here.” Her heart thundered as she confessed her private heresy to him. “For that reason, I am glad your people persuaded me to leave her in their hands. Much better that she be borne away in a Hesperine’s arms than subjected to the mockery of a funeral rite in that pile of stone my father calls a temple. The only god who dwells there is his own ambition.”
“You’re speaking of your sister.”
“Solia. My kind, gentle sister, who belonged on the throne. She was the answer to all our prayers. The light that awaited at the end of the king’s cruelty. I was living evidence of his betrayal of her mother, and yet Solia cared for me as if I were her own child. She never laid others’ transgressions at my door. I loved her.”
Everything in Lio demanded that he reach out and offer Cassia the solace of touch. It was the right thing to do, to give her a simple, physical assurance that another shared her pain. He could not. The bounds of his role as a diplomat, the standards of modesty her people imposed on her, and Cassia’s own pride stood in his way. In all his struggle to understand human strictures, he had never hated them as he did in this moment.
As always, all Lio was permitted to offer Cassia were words. He gave her the best ones he had, speaking them in Vulgus, so they would mean something to her. “I carry your grief in my veins.”
She swiveled to face him. The tears quivering in her eyes made those windows on her soul seem enormous. “The Hesperines I met that night said those very words to me.”
“Those are our sacred ritual words, an invocation of empathy.” Indeed, words were the best gift he had to offer. Not just his words, but the opportunity for her to speak her own. “Would you like to tell me about her?”
“You know our history.”
He knew the date in the scrolls. But now he understood it. “The day after tomorrow is the anniversary of the Siege of Sovereigns. It will mark fourteen years since Solia fell at the hands of free lords who rebelled against royal authority. The king gave in to every ransom demand, but the traitors were not satisfied. In their lust for power, they resolved to remove Lucis from the throne and destroy his line, beginning with their captive, the seventeen-year-old princess. The king avenged her and brought her remains back to
Solorum…but they were damaged, and her body was kept covered during the funerary rites in the Sun Temple. So says history. Would you like to tell me the truth, Cassia?”
The Blood Moon’s light glinted in the fullness of her gaze. “Yes.”
What would the night of the siege look like, feel like, taste like if Lio could use his thelemancy to relive the memory with her and truly share in her past? He could not know. He could only experience the flashes her mind and heart cast into the Blood Union. He must rely on her words to understand what she had endured.
Cassia began to walk. This seemed her only concession to how desperately she wished to run away from the past into which she was about to lead Lio. He stayed by her side and prowled with her around the boundaries of her cage.
Once the trees were thick around them, she began. “In those days, Solia was the king’s only legitimate child, his rightful heir. For that reason, he needed her. I thought she was the only person in the world who was safe from him.”
Anointing
Cassia peered out from under the dressing table. “Is this it, Soli? Does this mean you’re really getting married?”
“Of course not, Pup.” Solia smiled down from her perch on the dressing stool. Her golden hair shone like the auras around goddesses in temple stories.
Cassia scooted closer to her sister’s shins. “But you’re doing the fall dance with Lord Bellator today. Everyone says that means you’re supposed to marry him.”
“When a lady dances the Autumn Greeting with a suitor, that does usually mean their fathers will begin talks to arrange a betrothal. But it’s different for me.”
“Why?”
“Because I am the king’s daughter.”
At that moment, Lady Iris returned to the dressing table. “There now, My Princess. I have sent all your other attendants away, so it will be just the three of us.” The handmaiden smiled at Cassia, then looked at Solia in the mirror, resting a hand on her shoulder.
