by David Estes
Fatemarked Origins
Book Four in The Fatemarked Epic
Short Stories from the Four Kingdoms
David Estes
Copyright 2017 David Estes
Kindle Edition, License Notes
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For the readers, like me, who always want to know more.
Map of the Four Kingdoms- Circa 532
1: Tarin Sheary
2: Cecilia (Thorne) Loren
3: Markin Swansea
4: Sabria Loren
5: Sir Jonius
6: Gwendolyn Storm
7: Bear Blackboots
8: The Beggar
9: Heinrich Gäric
10: Shanti Parthena Laude
11: Viper Sandes
12: Gareth Ironclad
13: Verner Gäric
14: Sonika Vaid
15: Sir Dietrich
Acknowledgments
A sample of SLIP, Book 1 in the Slip Trilogy by David Estes
Map of the Four Kingdoms- Circa 532
To view a downloadable map online: http://davidestesbooks.blogspot.com/p/fatemarked-map-of-four-kingdoms.html
1: Tarin Sheary
The Northern Kingdom- Circa 522
Eight-year-old Tarin Sheary knew he was dying.
It started with his legs. One day, he was simply unable to stand. His legs felt weak, like he’d been punched a dozen times in each muscle. They looked different too. Though he’d always been skinny and bony, they looked too skinny now, resembling the legs of a chicken. When he collapsed getting out of bed, his mother scooped him up and carried him to the castle healer. After inspecting Tarin using an oddly shaped circle of glass, the round-faced man broke the news with little compassion:
“The disease has already entered his bones. He will not last a fortnight.”
Tarin’s mother wept, which scared him quite a lot. He’d never seen her cry, not even when she was kicked in the chest by a stubborn mule and could scarcely breathe. Not even when his baby brother or sister passed on while still in her swollen belly. She was a northern woman through and through, as hard as iron.
But now she wept.
Tarin’s father comforted her, pushing back her hair, which was streaked with gray, like whispers of wind. He dried her cheeks with the corner of a blanket, which he wrapped around her shoulders. And then he approached his son, who was propped up in bed.
Tarin didn’t look at his father. He couldn’t look at him, not when he was so weak. He didn’t want to disappoint the man he’d always looked up to. His father had come from humble beginnings, the son of a pig farmer. He’d worked hard his entire life, apprenticing himself to a horsemaster, and eventually becoming one himself, the finest in the realm. Now he worked in the royal stables, breeding and training horses for King Gäric himself.
“Son,” his father said now.
Still Tarin didn’t look, his eyes trained firmly on his shrunken legs. He wondered whether he’d be remembered as Tarin the Maimed, the same way the king’s lost eldest brother was known as Helmuth the Maimed.
On the edge of his vision, he could see his father’s thick mustache, speckled with what his mother called “just the right amount of snow and ash.”
His father sighed. “This is a hard world, son, but only the strongest are chosen to face the hardest things. Someone is telling you that you are strong. That is all.”
Tarin swallowed. He reached down and touched his legs. He didn’t feel strong. He felt numb, almost like he was looking at someone else’s legs, which couldn’t possibly be attached to his body.
He didn’t want to prove his father wrong and cry, but the tears were like a flood bursting from a shattered dam, swamping his vision, streaking down his cheeks in hot streams.
“I don’t want to die,” he cried, and his father held him close.
Though his mother tried to muffle her own sobs, he could hear them from across the room.
Tarin’s best friend in all the Four Kingdoms, Princess Annise Gäric, came by to see him the next day. She sat on the edge of his bed and stared at his legs. “I don’t understand,” she said. “They said you were sick, but you don’t look sick. Are your legs broken?”
He shook his head, but it wasn’t an answer. “No. Just weak. Everything is weak.” His father’s words echoed in his head. Someone is telling you that you are strong. He wanted to punch the words, break them apart. He knew his letters, so he figured he could write the word “strong” on a sheet of parchment and then rip it to shreds. Then he could burn each piece in the fire. Maybe that would make him feel better.
“Frozen hell,” Annise swore, which almost made Tarin laugh. Annise was so different than all the other girls in the castle. She wrestled with the boys (and usually won), cursed like the soldiers, and didn’t seem to mind that her dresses were dirty most of the time. “When will you be able to play again? It’s summer.”
The thought of missing out on summer hurt Tarin so much he could feel an ache in his chest. “I’m—I’m—” He didn’t want to say the words, not because of his feelings, but because of hers. He didn’t want to see her sad. “I don’t know,” he finished lamely.
“Well, I won’t go outside to play until you can come with me,” Annise said. The earnestness of her promise was evident in the way she jutted out her broad Gäric jaw. Her brown eyes were coals of smoldering determination. Tarin knew all too well that once the young princess said something, she would do it.
But that’s not what he wanted.
“No,” he said, a lie coating his tongue. He’d never lied to his friend before, but he had to now. “I’ll be fine. I just need to rest for two or three days. Don’t wait for me. I’ll see you when I’m well again.”
Annise squinted. “Is this a trick? Because if this is a trick…” She held up a fist. Tarin finally laughed for real, and Annise joined him.
When she left, Tarin lifted his legs over the side of the bed. He was shocked at how light they were, like his bones and muscles and skin were turning into air. He set his bare feet on the stone floor, which was cool under his heels. Then, gritting his teeth until his jaw ached, Tarin pushed off from the bed with his hands;
and stood.
He wobbled for a few moments, trying to maintain his balance. Took a deep breath. Steadied himself. Gathered all his strength—strong, strong, strong, the word echoed, not broken, not burned, still a part of him—and stepped forward.
His legs crumpled like a wooden soldier under the force of a hammer blow. His knees cracked against the stone, sending shards of pain through his bones. His hands slammed down next, and then his jaw, which made an awful cracking sound.
He lay there for a long time, groaning, unable to move.
That’s how his mother found him when she returned from her duties tending to the mules.
Tarin was used to seeing the queen in their humble dwellings. After all, Queen Sabria Loren Gäric had been friends with his mother for as long as he could remember, visiting her once a fortnight, always during the dim twilight of evening, arriving cloaked and quiet at their backdoor. Tarin had never told Annise, because the queen had asked him not to. “Your mother and I are secret friends, and no one can know. Not even my daughter. Especially not my daughter.” Tarin suspected it w
as because his mother was also from the west, though her features were not as fair or as soft as the queen’s. He knew that was why they were friends—the queen had said it herself. “You are my taste of home,” she often said of Tarin’s mother. When Annise had confided in Tarin that she didn’t think her mother loved her, it had taken all of Tarin’s inner strength to bite his tongue and say nothing regarding what he knew about the queen. Usually Tarin’s mother and the queen talked about light things, like their children, the castle gossip, the weather, and whether they’d heard any news from the west.
But not tonight. Tonight Tarin knew they were talking about the disease eating him from the inside. He knew because his mother wouldn’t look at him, and they spoke in hushed voices so he couldn’t hear. Every once in a while, however, he caught a word or two.
…days left…
…so scared…
…second healer…
…rumors…
…a woman…
…dark magic…
Tarin’s ear perked up. Magic? He’d never heard his mother or the queen speak of magic, except for the rare slip of his mother’s tongue when she’d condemn the brutal actions of the Ice Lord, a skinmarked man who worked for the king and was capable of freezing the hair off a goat’s chin. Why would they mention magic now? What did that have to do with his legs? Was his condition caused by something more sinister, like a dark sorcerer who was casting spells across the land? Tarin’s mind raced with the possibilities.
Now his mother and the queen seemed to be arguing, which Tarin had never seen them do. The argument swiftly changed, however, when all the fight went out of Tarin’s mother, and she collapsed into the queen’s arms. The queen held her for a long time by the fire. She glanced at Tarin, and though he felt as if he should look away, he couldn’t, her crystal blue gaze locked on his. She smiled at him, and he managed a thin smile back. Her hair fell to her shoulders like a beautiful waterfall made golden by the sun’s reflection.
And then she kissed both of his mother’s cheeks and swept from the room, pulling her cloak over her head before slipping through the backdoor and into the night.
According to Tarin’s mother, the new healer had been arranged by the queen.
But Tarin knew there was more to it than that. He’d seen their argument, seen his mother’s fear, heard that whispered word:
Magic.
Whatever they were planning, he knew it involved more than a standard healer’s ointments, herbs, and tonics. Yet, Tarin couldn’t help his excitement, and he clung to the idea like a starving dog to a bone. Magic can save me, he thought, as he waited for the healer to arrive. And when I’m well, I can surprise Annise. His father wasn’t home yet, and his mother had just started boiling a pot of hot water.
Tarin’s jaw was still sore from his fall, and his hands were scraped raw. His knees were bruised and swollen, but they didn’t hurt too much.
Every time he heard footsteps outside their house he tensed in anticipation. And when there was finally a knock on the door, his heart practically jumped out of his chest. “Mother!” he called, but she was already racing for the door, yanking it open so hard it slammed against the wall.
Someone entered, their face shrouded by a dark hood. Tarin’s mother said, “Thank you for coming. I’ve boiled water, just as you instructed.”
“Leave,” a strange voice said. It was harsh, almost mannish, but clearly that of a woman. She sounded old, like her voice hadn’t been used recently.
“What? No. I need to be here for my son.”
The woman threw back her hood and Tarin gasped. She was completely bald, not even a wisp of hair on her scalp. And her skin was as dark as night. He’d heard tales about some places in the southern kingdom—Calyp, for one—where the people had skin like obsidian, but he’d never met someone from there before.
“The best way for you to help your son is to leave,” the hairless woman said.
Tarin’s mother didn’t move, frozen in a moment of indecision. But then Tarin said, “Mother, I’m fine.” He knew they both had to be strong.
She moved over to him, and took his hand. “No matter what happens,” she said. “I love you. I’ll return soon.”
“Not too soon,” the woman said.
Tarin nodded, and watched his mother leave. Then he was alone with the woman, who unslung a leather pouch from her shoulder and began to pluck contents out, placing them on the wooden table next to his bed.
Tarin watched her, dimly aware that he was being rude by staring, but she didn’t seem to notice or mind. Her skin was as smooth as glass, her eyes as dark as her skin. The contrast to her teeth was stark, and they seemed to glow bright white between her lips, which were dark pink.
The items she set on the small table were strange: some kind of a bone, bleached white by the sun; what appeared to be a tooth from some beast, sharp and pointed; a vial of a dark liquid that might’ve been blood, stoppered with a small bit of cork; twelve tiny blue eggs; an iron capsule; and, finally, several pink flower petals, which she crushed between her fingers.
Tarin murmured under his breath. “Hope flowers,” he said.
The woman smiled, displaying her white teeth. “True. But hope is a funny thing, it comes to us in ways we cannot predict.”
Tarin wasn’t sure what she meant exactly, but it made him feel cold inside. Based on the items she’d laid out, what he’d overheard his mother and the queen talking about, and the way she looked, he knew she wasn’t a normal healer. “You’re a witch,” he said.
She turned her back on him, but didn’t respond. Frozen hell, he thought. The queen has sent us a witch. And yet, as much as it should scare him, it didn’t. He was already looking death in the eye—everything else seemed small in comparison.
The woman—witch—removed the boiling water from where it hung over the fire. She went about her business, dropping each ingredient into the bubbles. She uncorked the vial and poured the liquid in, drop by drop. The eggs she cracked individually, removing only the yolks and dropping the broken shells on the floor. His mother was going to have a mess to clean up when she returned.
Lastly, she sprinkled the crushed hope flowers into the mixture. Tarin watched as they floated on top for a few seconds before slowly sinking into the amber liquid. When she was finished, she said, “Drink,” and used a ladle to gather a portion of the concoction.
“It’s still hot,” Tarin said, shrinking back. Steam was wafting from the pot, warming the air. The liquid would scald his tongue and throat. At least that’s what he told himself. In truth, he was scared to drink it for other reasons.
“Drink or die,” the witch said.
He didn’t want to die. Tarin steeled himself, trying to remember what his father had said about strength. Took a deep breath. And drank.
He gagged, the burning, foul potion threatening to spill back out, but the witch sealed his lips with one hand while pinching his nose with the other. Bit by bit, he choked it down.
She gave him more, and with each spoonful it became easier to swallow. As he drank, she spoke in a whispery voice. “What is weak is made strong. What is broken is made whole. What is lost is found. Turn his bones to iron and his muscles to stone and his flesh to glass and his blood to ash.”
By the time Tarin had consumed the last drop, he was feeling full and warm.
And tingly, like he’d just come out of the wintry cold and was slowly being warmed by the fire.
The witch hooked her pouch around her neck, pulled her dark hood over her face, and left as quickly as she’d come, without a word.
Tarin blinked, surprised. What happened? Is she embarrassed that her spell didn’t work, that she’d failed? He didn’t feel any different. His legs were still weak and shriveled, his hands still trembling from fatigue. The only difference was that his belly was full of a vile concoction that would likely make him ill.
He bit his lip, sorrow pressing in once more. No one could save him now—not even the dark magic of a witch.
He slumped back into his pillow and closed his eyes.
The pain came so fast and so strong that his eyes flashed opened and he shrieked. His head cracked against the wall and his arms flailed, his entire body convulsing from the agony rippling through him like a dark tide. He felt like vomiting, his stomach heaving, his mouth gaping open again and again, but nothing came up, just dry air and bitter drool.
Somewhere in the back of his mind he was aware of what was happening—his mother bursting through the door, then his father; strong arms holding him down, protecting him from himself; soothing voices comforting him; and then darkness, blessed darkness, and nothing.
When Tarin awoke he felt different. He wasn’t sure exactly how, not even when he opened his eyes, blinked, and looked down at his legs, which were covered by a woolen blanket. He was warm—hot, even—but he wasn’t sweating. His arms were tucked under the blanket, too, and when he tried to move, he found himself quite stuck.
Oh, no, he thought. I’m worse. Much worse.
And yet something wasn’t quite right. Though he still couldn’t move his arms or legs, he didn’t feel weak anymore. He tried to sit up, but found himself pinned by something, a restraint of some kind. That’s when he realized he was tied to the bed.
“Mother!” he called, yet it wasn’t his voice he heard, but the voice of a stranger. It was deeper, gruffer, like the voices of the soldiers who roamed the castle. What’s happening to me?
And then his mother was there, by his side, her face awash with concern but something else too. Relief maybe? Yes, relief, but also…
Fear.
The moment he saw the fear in her eyes, Tarin felt sick to his stomach. Why would she be scared if he was truly cured?
“I’m still dying,” he said.
“No,” his mother said quickly. “You’re not.”
