‘Lirah mentioned that you managed to smuggle the assassin out of the palace all those years ago, Sir Gargarin,’ she said at one point during the night when they were trying to get some sleep. ‘Rather than toss him into the gravina with my first mother, the Oracle.’
It took Froi a moment to realise he was the assassin she was referring to. There was an uneasy silence at the bluntness of her words.
‘Who was it?’ Arjuro asked Gargarin, when no one spoke. ‘The babe who died that day?’
‘Later,’ Gargarin muttered from his bedroll, turning away.
‘Now,’ Arjuro said. ‘It’s been too long. I need the truth. So does Lirah.’
‘Now you need the truth?’ Gargarin said bitterly. ‘Later, I said.’ He stole a look at Quintana.
‘Are you waiting for us to sleep before you speak of it, Sir Gargarin?’ she asked, indignantly. ‘Because we can’t, you know. Sleep that is. Not with the assassin here, threatening us and the little King.’
‘Us? The little King?’ Froi said, looking at the others with disbelief. ‘Are you all hearing this?’
Lirah closed her eyes as though she had heard it one too many times.
‘The Princess claims … believes,’ she corrected herself, ’that she carries the first.’
Quintana made a clicking sound of annoyance with her tongue. ‘I explained to you, Lirah. I’m actually the Queen of Charyn. I was wed to King Tariq in his compound before they slaughtered him. When one is wed to the King they are given the title of Queen regardless of how powerless they remain. I do love a title.’
There was another uncomfortable silence. This time her attention was on Gargarin.
‘Is it true you murdered my first mother, the Oracle?’ she persisted.
Answer her, Froi wanted to shout. So they didn’t have to hear her guileless voice speak of death and carnage.
When it was clear that there would be no sleep for any of them, Gargarin sat up.
‘I was handed a child that night said to have been birthed by the Oracle,’ he said.
‘It was the King who placed him in my arms. Told me that the babe would bring Charyn to its knees if he lived. That if I loved my king and believed in the gods, I would do as instructed. First, I was to toss the babe over the balconette into the gravina and then dispose of his dead mother in the same way. Better the people of the Citavita believe that the Oracle plunged to her own death than know she was defiled by the Serkers and died giving birth to an abomination.’
Froi could hardly breathe.
‘Of course we know now that the Oracle and the Priestlings were not attacked by the Serkers.’ Gargarin shook his head with bitterness. ‘To this day, I’ll never truly know what I would have done if fate had not stepped in.’
He looked at Lirah. ’You were my fate, Lirah. Firstly, because of your screams. I thought you were birthing your child, but now I know you were waking up with the Oracle’s daughter in your arms instead of the son you had seen. Your pain penetrated those walls and while the King and his guards left the chamber, I found myself alone with the child I was ordered to kill. Not a minute had passed when I heard a sound from the bed where the dead Oracle lay beneath the sheet. Dead from childbirth. Unbeknownst to the King and his men, between her thighs lay a second girl whose first breath had been her last.’
Froi saw a flash of pain cross his face.
‘There were three babes born in the palace that night. Lirah’s son and the Oracle’s twin daughters.’
Quintana rocked back and forth. Lirah was too stunned to offer her comfort and Arjuro looked so ill that Froi thought he’d throw up at any moment.
‘And as fate would have it again, strange lonely Rafuel came searching for one lost kitten to add to the litter in his basket. So I took my chance and placed the living child amongst them. Into the hands of an eight-year-old boy who had never known love except for those damned cats. Then I carried the Oracle and her dead child to the balconette and I gave the child a name. To my shame, I had no idea what the Oracle’s name was. All I prayed for was that you managed to call out her name to the gods, Arjuro, from where they had shackled you on the opposite balconette to watch. So that her spirit could find her child at the lake of the half-dead and take them both home.’
Arjuro shook his head. ‘Oracles didn’t have names. To call an Oracle by her name would make her human and we were never to see her as human.’
So the Oracle Queen and her dead child were to be separated for eternity.
Quintana’s face was transformed into an expression of sadness beyond belief. She shook her head. Froi couldn’t speak, could hardly breathe from knowing how close he had come to death the day he was born.
‘What did you name her?’ Lirah asked. ‘The dead babe?’
‘Regina,’ Gargarin said quietly. ‘The babe was the daughter of the Oracle Queen so I felt she deserved the name of royalty.’
Froi heard Arjuro’s sharp intake of breath. The Priestling’s eyes were fixed on Quintana with a mixture of horror and intrigue.
‘You were born first,’ Arjuro said quietly.
‘My son was born first,’ Lirah said. Froi noticed that both Lirah and Gargarin spoke about their son as though it was someone other than Froi.
‘But not to the palace,’ Arjuro continued. ‘He may have been born in the palace, but not to it. The only children fathered by the King belonged to the Oracle, the woman he violated the night he and his men slaughtered the Priestlings and blamed it on the Serkers.’
Arjuro’s eyes were still fastened on Quintana.
‘Two children would be born to the palace,’ he said. ’And the one born first would end his reign.’
Froi recognised the soothsayer’s words. The King’s dream.
‘How did you kill him?’ Arjuro asked Quintana quietly.
Froi saw Gargarin and Lirah’s confusion and felt his own. But Quintana seemed to know exactly what the Priestling was asking, for she neither argued, nor feigned innocence.
‘The Provincari said that the Guard searched you thoroughly,’ Arjuro continued.
‘Arjuro?’ Gargarin barked. ‘What are you saying?’
They waited and waited. But Arjuro refused to respond.
‘The assassin taught us how to kill a man in five seconds,’ Quintana said. ‘And the circumstances demanded that I did.’
‘Sagra!’ Froi said, stunned.
‘Where did you conceal the dagger?’ Arjuro asked. He stood and walked to where she sat upright against the wall and crouched before her. ‘Where?’
She leaned forward whispering, ‘I don’t want Lirah to hear this, blessed Arjuro.’
‘Why not?’ he whispered back, fascinated.
‘It will upset her. We don’t want to upset Lirah. I believe that the last time Lirah became upset, her Serker blood helped curse the kingdom.’
‘Arjuro will tell me anyway, Quintana,’ Lirah said.
They waited, Arjuro still before Quintana. She looked past him to Lirah.
‘There’s little that can upset me now. You know that,’ Lirah prodded, but Froi could see she was lying. Lirah seemed frightened of what she was about to hear.
‘We never had a dagger,’ Quintana said. ‘But we knew where Bestiano kept his hidden.’
‘How?’ Gargarin asked.
‘Because when he came into my room those nights he would always remove the dagger before … but he would leave the scabbard. He never took it off. Never.’
There were tears in her eyes. ‘Never. And it chafed my skin each time and I’d say, Bestiano, it hurts.’
Quintana stared back at the only mother she had ever known and Froi saw on Lirah’s face a look of fierce anguish. It spoke of heartbreak and guilt and rage and Lirah shook her head, not wanting to believe, tears spilling down her cheeks. Her consolation for this strange daughter all these years was that the lastborn males hadn’t hurt her or taken her by force. But she had never imagined the King’s Advisor would believe he could father the first.
‘I in
sisted on the guards searching Bestiano, knowing they wouldn’t. He saw the King most days, so why search him now? But the damage was done because I’d put doubts in the heads of the Provincari who were witness to it all.
‘And so I walked into my father’s chamber, shut the door, and to Bestiano I did what the assassin told me to do. Render a man useless with a knee between the legs. And then I grabbed his dagger from its scabbard and I walked to my father and I plunged it into his side.’
Froi saw the vicious little teeth clench in victory as she remembered the moment. ‘ “That is for my mother!” I said, and then I twisted the blade, “And that is for Lirah of Serker.” Then in the third second I cut him from ear to ear, “And that is for the people of Charyn!” Only then did I cry bloody murder. “Bestiano has killed my father!” ’
They all stared at her, speechless. Quintana gripped Arjuro’s hand.
'My mother is lost, blessed Arjuro, never to be reunited with her daughters,’ she said. ‘The only place she’ll find us will be in our dreams.’
Arjuro pressed her hand to his lips. If there was one person he had adored in this world apart from his brother and De Lancey, it was the Oracle.
‘If it’s the last thing I do in this mortal world, Your Highness,’ he said, his voice ragged, ‘I will find her spirit and call her home.’
Quintana leaned forward, her lips close to the Priestling’s ear. ‘If the assassin comes near us or the little King, will you help me cut out his heart, blessed Arjuro?’
Arjuro turned to meet Froi’s eyes. ‘Yes, I think I’d have to.’
The next day, Froi returned from his surveillance to find Arjuro and Gargarin waiting for him in the outer cave. Today it had been too dangerous to venture close to the stream and he had to be satisfied with berries as his pickings.
‘She believes she’s with child and that you’ve been sent to kill the heir to Charyn,’ Gargarin said tiredly.
‘Yes, we’ve already established that,’ Froi said. ‘Are you telling me you believe her?’
‘I don’t know what to believe, except that the most useless girl in Charyn has managed to do something that most men have failed at, including the both of us. So I’m going to have to be less sceptical about her ramblings in the future.’
Froi couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He turned to Arjuro.
‘So now you think she’s the answer to Charyn’s dreams as well?’
Arjuro shrugged. ‘There’s nothing like a bit of patricide and regicide to convince me of someone’s worth.’
‘I don’t care what any of you think,’ Froi muttered, preparing to crawl into the inner cave, ‘because the way I see it, when we get out of here, I’m taking her to the cloister of Lagrami in Sendecane. They’ll take care of her there for the rest of her life.’
Gargarin gripped Froi’s arm gently.
‘We thought it best if you sleep in a separate place until we work out her state of mind. Lirah says –’
‘Lirah?’ Froi said, bitterly. ‘Lirah would like me in a separate place? She weeps for her boy all her life, but the moment she’s faced with me as a son, it’s all too disappointing, isn’t it?’
Arjuro made a sound of annoyance.
‘That’s not what she said at all,’ Gargarin said. ‘Quintana is not of sound mind at the moment, Froi. Anyone can see that.’
Froi shoved him away and crawled into their cave.
Sitting up against the wall as she had since they arrived, Quintana stared up at him, her eyes swollen from the fatigue of keeping them open.
‘Tell her to sleep,’ he ordered Lirah.
Lirah stood and walked towards him.
‘She claims you will kill her and the child if she dares to sleep,’ Lirah said quietly. ‘It’s why she ran from you both times before.’
‘Her delusion about this child will get her killed, Lirah. Speak to her.’
Lirah shook her head. ‘I pledged to take her somewhere safe. When she came to me that day in the inn and told me you were in Charyn to assassinate her, she was inconsolable. Not just about the carnage in Tariq’s compound, but over fear of what you would do. ‘He’ll kill the little King,’ she cried, ‘and Charyn will be cursed for eternity.’
There was anguish in Lirah’s eyes. ‘I owe her this and regardless of whether I believe she is imagining this child, I need to be with her.’
‘Why is she so certain?’ Froi asked.
‘She claims the gods wrote it all over you. She is mad beyond reasoning and we did this to her. I did. The King. You. The whole of Charyn. We created that,’ she said, pointing to where Quintana stared from her corner.
Froi pushed past Lirah towards Quintana, but her savage hiss of fury and ragged breaths of fear filled the cave. Froi felt himself being dragged back by Arjuro and Gargarin while Lirah went to Quintana, murmuring words in the mad girl’s ears.
‘Tell her to sleep, Lirah,’ Froi begged, pulling away from the others.
But the sound of Froi’s voice was Quintana’s undoing and she cried out hoarsely, ‘Please, Lirah. Please, I’m begging you. Make him leave.’
Lirah turned and Froi saw it in her eyes. She wanted him gone, as well. Shaking free of Arjuro’s arms he walked away and crawled back into the outer cave.
He spent the week playing cat and mouse with Bestiano’s riders, watching them search the larger caves each morning. Some days, Froi made sure he left a false trail that had them whispering with feverish excitement. Most days he returned with food and placed it in the tunnel between the outer and inner cave for the others to eat.
They came to the outer cave often, except for Quintana, but Froi barely spoke.
‘We can’t stay here,’ Gargarin said, a week after Froi had been banished from Quintana’s presence.
Froi practised some weapon drills, ignoring him.
‘Either we find a way out past their camp or give her up to Bestiano’s men,’ Arjuro said.
Froi stumbled a moment, his short sword falling out of his hand.
‘If they believe she is with child, it buys her time,’ Arjuro said. ‘What did you say about buying time? Each moment provides … blah, blah, blah.’
If Froi chose to speak to them he’d say it was a bad idea. And what would Bestiano and the riders do after they discovered Quintana had been telling lies when her belly failed to swell. But he didn’t choose to speak and soon they left.
Later, Lirah came to visit.
‘Gargarin says you’re sulking,’ she said, coolly. ‘And Quintana’s still not sleeping, so perhaps you should return and sit in a corner away from her.’
‘I don’t sit in corners, Lirah.’
‘This is not helping anyone.’
‘Is there food in her belly?’ he snapped, pointing a finger to her face. ‘In all your bellies? If not, get out of my cave!’
With a hand she shoved him back. ‘You listen to me, you little Serker savage –’
‘Your Serker savage, Lirah,’ he mocked viciously, stepping closer. ‘His.’
She shoved him again and he felt fury in the push. ‘You were sent to assassinate her, Froi. What do you expect? Regardless of everything, everything,’ she spat, ‘Quintana was placed in my care, and for so long I was the only one she trusted when cowards tried to kill her time and time again. Do you want to know the first time it happened? Have you ever seen a four-year-old child retch over and over again, trying to purge herself of the poison they put in her food, begging me to stop the pain?’
He thought of all those times Quintana tried to eat from his plate and from the plates of those around her.
‘I would never have done it,’ he argued.
‘Why not? It’s part of that wretched bond of yours to those revenge-seeking Lumaterans. It’s the code you live by. Why would I think any different?’
Because you’re my mother, he wanted to shout.
‘I stay here,’ he said, turning his back to her. ‘Go back to your cave and don’t bother me again.’
Ar
juro accompanied him outside one day, regardless of whether Froi wanted the company or not. The stream was the best source of food, but it was guarded day and night, all the way to the northern wall of the gravina. After a good bout of rain the day before, Froi watched one of the riders collect a bounty of fish and eel, placing them in a sack that writhed with life.
‘If you could get that stash it would last us days,’ Arjuro whispered from where they hid in a small ditch behind a cluster of reeds.
They waited for most of the morning and when the rider was satisfied with his catch, he picked up the sack and walked away, disappearing into the copse of poplar trees that led to the Charynites’ camp.
‘Stay here and whatever you do, don’t move until I return,’ Froi ordered.
He followed the rider, leaping across stepping stones to avoid using the dirt track that could easily alert the others to him. The Charynite stopped soon after and placed the sack on the ground, standing against a tree to relieve himself. Perri always said that there was an advantage in attacking a man with his pants down. Most men went to protect their private parts before anything else and if a pursuer was to give chase, it would also take a moment for the victim to pull up his trousers. So Froi came up from behind and knocked the man across the temple with the handle of his short sword before grabbing the sack of writhing fish and eels, and then he bolted.
‘He’s here!’ he heard the rider bellow. ‘This way.’
At the stream where Arjuro was hidden, Froi forced the sack into the Priestling’s hands.
‘Run!’ Froi hissed. ‘I’ll lead them away.’
Without waiting for Arjuro’s response, Froi raced back the way he had come and found himself face to face with the first of the riders. He leapt up and gripped the tree limb above, one boot each pounding in both men’s faces. Jumping back onto the ground he took the path that circled the riders’ camp, knowing it would draw them away from Arjuro and their cave.
He reached the wall of the gravina heading north and saw the tunnel through the thick stone that he had travelled through Zabat on their journey to meet Gargarin. It would take Froi to the road leading him to Alonso and then Lumatere. Home, he thought. Home. And the fury he had felt in the caves towards Quintana and Lirah and Gargarin and Arjuro, and the knowledge that they would be left with a small bounty of food, steered him to take the path home.
Froi of the Exiles: The Lumatere Chronicles Page 34
