Pragius stepped slowly towards his desk, his gaze fixed on the strange book. Never for a moment did he question where it had come from or why it was there. His eyes squinted and top lip curled in revulsion as he approached and set down his notebook on the corner of the desk farthest from the sickly-looking tome.
Pragius looked over the book for many heartbeats, tracing the outline of the hand with his eyes. The longer he stood there, the more a strange feeling of stress — or maybe excitement — bubbled up from his stomach. His face was a mask of disgust.
He made a decision. He resolved to deal with this thing in the morning. He turned abruptly and, pulling the candlelight from its games, strode out of the room. The door shut behind him, the latch clacking back into place.
The book was alone.
It didn’t want to be alone, and it wasn’t interested in playing with candlelight. It insisted — no, demanded — no, craved to bask in the ever-present light of magic at the edge of Pragius’ mind. Reaching out through doors and walls, it pulled on the bright pool of magic, releasing it into Pragius’ consciousness.
Pragius cried out. There was no one there to hear.
The latch popped back up with a clack, the door swung open and Pragius hurried in, closing then locking the door behind him. He stumbled over to the desk, the palm of his hand pressed to his temple in a desperate attempt to relieve the intense pain. Pushing back the chair, he sat at his desk placing the candle beside the book. The candlelight didn’t play with the book this time; it washed over the whole cover, revealing all its dark secrets.
Pragius opened the front cover, his trepidation diminishing as his head started to clear. He breathed a sigh of relief and relaxed.
The first page was a mass of black sweeping scrawls with no discernible pattern or purpose. There was no arrangement of symbols in lines or anything he could recognise as a form of writing. He wondered how he was supposed to read it. The thought of whether he should read it never occurred to him. But the book entered his mind again. Or was it someone beyond the book? Pragius ignored that fleeting thought and uttered a few words — if the sounds he made could be called words. They were like nothing a human voice alone could make. A subtle flow of magic pulled through his mind. His eyes blurred, then refocused.
Wonderment gripped him, closely followed by excitement. On the page, the sweeping scrawls became not writing, but ideas and concepts in symbolic form. A whole new world and more beyond started to be revealed. He came to understand for the first time what that sense of light and power at the edge of his mind really meant, what it was and where it came from. He now had a frame of reference in his mind to comprehend it. Was this what had been kept from him all these years when he could have remained on Breen and discovered it all? No, he could not have left duty behind. He had done the right thing.
A voice that was not his own said in his mind, You can have both; there is always the night.
‘I can have both; there is always the night…’ he muttered to himself.
Prince Pragius read on through the dark of night until the candle burnt out. Eventually, exhaustion claimed him and he lay upon the open book, his cheek against the pages like a baby sleeping on his father’s chest — except there was no comfort from a heartbeat.
Chapter 3
Princess of the Old Enemy
The Battle of Norvale, 1842.
Kingdom Army of Valendo led by King-Consort General Garon Allus Artifex-Dendra.
Deaths: approximately 230 before an orderly retreat from an indefensible position.
Kingdom Army of Nearhon led by King Klonag Ferand.
Deaths: approximately 400 before occupying Norvale.
— Excerpt from the War Histories of Valendo
Cory awoke, his mind refreshed and clear. Angry hunger launched an offensive. Sitting up, he felt sweat trying to glue his nightshirt to his skin.
Did I eat last night? he wondered. I certainly didn’t wash.
Now he thought about it, he couldn’t remember any details of the previous night. Had he really had that much wine? No, it wasn’t possible; his head felt fine and there was no tell-tale taste of stale alcohol in his mouth. He set aside the mystery to deal with his stomach attacking from within. He stripped and washed with water that could have been drawn from the edge of a mountain glacier only moments before. Then he made rapid use of the cloths and towel stacked by the jug and water bowl before quickly getting changed into whatever was at the top of his casual clothes trunk; the shirts, trousers and jackets were all much the same anyway. Locking the door to his room, he made his way to his favourite place in the palace: the kitchen.
Cory grinned at the cook. ‘Mrs Samshaw, you see before you a man who thinks he might have missed dinner last night following an afternoon of vigorous training.’
Mrs Samshaw returned the grin and wasted no time with words. She whirled between pantry and kitchen dining table with the dexterity of a master swordsman. The enemy was empty table, which was soon vanquished with the leftover food from the feast Cory had missed the night before. Mrs Samshaw could scale up the feat she had just performed to feed soldiers by the thousand. There were stranger things she had also tried to feed. Like the night fifteen years ago when she received a visit from the general.
‘Mrs Samshaw, a challenge for you. I need a half dozen spit roasted pigs by dawn. Can you arrange it?’
Her reply was a withering but still kindly look that seemed to say ‘Foolish man, of course I can do it.’ The words from her mouth were: ‘Where do you want them?’
Garon had grinned and told her: ‘In Beldon Valley behind the army,’ and left planting a kiss on her forehead.
Cory dug into the meal and his stomach began to call off the attack. He spoke through a mouthful of… well, he wasn’t quite sure what, but he knew that it tasted better than anything he could remember.
‘Wonderful, Mrs Samshaw! Sorry I missed out last night — don’t know what came over me — had to sleep.’
‘Good. Enjoy it, Cory.’ It was half a wish, and half a command. ‘I must prepare for the day’s meals now. Suki!’ she called to summon her assistant. ‘Come and do the stores check with me.’
Belated feast cleaned from the plates, Cory considered his next move. It was Weekend Day, so there was no need to be up at the castle. It was time to sort out the horse ride his grandfather’s funeral arrangements had put on hold for the week. Had it really been a week already? It was a short walk out of the pale orange palace across a cobbled courtyard. The immaculate lawn was a little less out of bounds than usual as the groundskeeper was always absent on Weekend Day. Cory wanted to save time — time he then used pausing at the door to the lodge house where Julia and her companion were staying. He took a deep breath. Well, here we go. He knocked hard on the door several times. A short wait and a face appeared in the doorway — just not the one he was anticipating.
‘Oh, er, I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced,’ said Cory. The stranger held out her hand for a handshake. ‘I know you, Your Highness — you are Prince Corylus Allus Artifex-Dendra — I am Pico Siana.’
It was Julia’s companion. She combined a shake of the offered hand with a quick curtesy and a sweet little smile as she glanced down at their hands. The smile changed a little as she looked up again.
‘I’ve only ever gone by the name Cory, except when my mother is mad at me… which, come to think of it, hasn’t happened for years.’
‘Cory,’ she repeated. ‘I am sure you are looking for Julia, but she is not here. She was escorted to rehearsals with the orchestra today, and tonight they will perform one of her favourite pieces.’ Her words were selected with care and pronounced with perfection.
‘Oh, I must go.’
‘I am sorry, did I offend Your Majesty?’ She gave him a concerned look as she spoke with the heavy rolling ‘Rs’ of her accent coming through, especially on the ‘sorry’.
‘No, I mean I must go to the concert tonight
. You did not offend me at all.’ He smiled, realising he had started to mimic her perfect pronunciation. ‘Do you have everything you need?’ he added.
‘Yes, we are looking after by the palace housemaster, we have found the markets and we have Guardsman Blake Taviner to protect us. Though I think Julia is not so happy about having a shadow following her around everywhere.’
Her selection of words isn’t quite perfect, he thought. However, it seemed rude to correct her, so he didn’t. Instead, he simply said, ‘Good, I am always around to help if you need it. I’ll go now.’
With a landmark for the day firmly placed at the start of the evening concert, he needed to occupy himself. A talk with Sebastian seemed in order, and he knew he would be in the church hospital on the other side of the city. Cory hadn’t noticed before but the air was filled with the muted sounds of the orchestra: a combination of stringed instruments fighting for supremacy in a rise to a long held crescendo before descending into a more subtle and complex sequence of cooperation. If cities had souls, this was the sound of Tranmure’s.
Weekend Day meant most people were home, so the streets were busy with people heading to the market, hanging washing out to dry or adding cheer to houses by refreshing brightly coloured shutters and doors with new paint. The wet clothes and vivid paint added a sense of life to otherwise gloomy homes built from the grey rock of the foothills in the valley. The sunny disposition of the residents rounded off the job.
Cory narrowly avoided a collision with a small girl sprinting around a corner, screaming, but was less lucky with the terrifying eight-year-old Ripper pursuing her; fingers bent into claws and giving off his most fearsome growl.
Dashing through a doorway after his sister, the boy received a slap to the head from his stressed mother. ‘How many times do I have to tell you not to play Ripper Chase with your sister? You know it gives her nightmares. I’ll be getting you up too if she wakes tonight.’ Cory heard her continue to yell as he walked passed the doorway.
On the opposite side of the road, a middle-aged man perched on a low wall observed the scene, his eyes glazed over and his expression blank. In his mind, one of those memories that stays with you for a lifetime jumped out to greet him: the cruel swipes of Ripper claws snatching the lives of all other soldiers in his unit. Why not him too? Why had he survived? These were questions he still asked himself all these years later when happier memories, like the first meeting with his wife and the birth of his children, drifted to the back of his mind.
The clanging percussion of blacksmith’s tools joined the fading music from the orchestra as the road descended towards the river bank. Cobbles gave way to the smooth, compacted surface cambered for drainage and designed for carrying cargo and wheeled traffic. Cory had fished in the river here and taken part in swimming races in his teens. It was a fast, downstream sprint to the bridge where young girls would wait, hoping to bait the victor into a kiss. The top prize went to the girl that could steal a kiss with a prince. Cory had enjoyed it for a while but the girls never seemed interested in coming back for more once content with their bragging rights. It seemed pointless after that. The older Prince Sebastian wasn’t really one for swimming, and too shy to put himself in a position to play the same games.
Cory passed Waters Meet where the two rivers joined and flowed south under the largest bridge on the two rivers. In the distance, it flowed past the warehouses and barge docks. Standing guard at the exit from the bridge was the centrepiece of a plaza; an impressive obelisk topped by a ball of rock carved with swirls to represent the sun. This white soldier stood out amid the darker stone of other buildings. On his four sides were carved the names of as many of his fallen comrades as people could remember after ‘the battle’.
Cory walked on through the plaza and up the road to the church. Entering the churchyard, he made his way down the line of statues for the royal family and stood before a stone plinth that was waiting for a statue of his grandfather to be sculpted. There was a new inscription on the plinth that read ‘King-Consort Garon Allus Artifex-Dendra 1792 to 1867’. Behind a small stone panel, there would be a jar of ashes taken from the funeral pyre. A dull ache of grief awoke in Cory’s chest. He took several deep breaths and put it back to sleep. There was a sense of peace, of moving on here. So move on he did, to the hospital building behind the church. It was made of the same grey stone as the rest of the city but very different from the black rock that was the church.
As predicted, Sebastian was there conversing with Pete and a couple of patients. Pete wore the black robes of a priest. The hood was down, showing his pale sandy hair combed with a neat side-parting above friendly blue eyes. The conversation Pete was having was unusual and remarkably effective, considering the patients were deaf and everyone communicated only using their hands. It was like watching a small flock of over excited birds battling for nuts and seed in the dead of winter. Cory recognised some of the hand signs, but the conversation was too fast for him to follow completely. Pete had devised the sign language to help deaf people and it had quickly spread throughout the kingdom and the outlying islands. Once such a wonderful invention is out there, anybody can use it when and how they want; it cannot be controlled. Before long, anyone with a need to speak quietly or maybe secretly had learnt it. Investigators in city guards now had to learn it if they expected to keep one step ahead of the criminals who found it so useful. Many scouts learned it. Cory signed ‘hello’ as he approached and excited hands signed something in his direction that didn’t look like hello, but smiles on faces delivered the intended message anyway.
‘I’m going to the concert tonight,’ Cory announced to Sebastian — not that concert attendance was out of the ordinary for either of them.
‘You all right, Cory?’ Sebastian asked. ‘We were worried about you when you didn’t turn up for dinner last night.’
‘I feel fine. Yesterday was a really rough day. I’m all right now though.’
‘Yes, I am.’
Cory blinked. ‘What?’
‘Going to the concert. Your unasked question.’ There was something about communicating in sign language that sped up Sebastian’s thinking and Cory needed his wits about him to keep up. ‘There is a new piece on the schedule, one of Julia’s — and she’s soloist,’ Sebastian said. He had a neutral expression on most of his face, but Cory caught the glint of mischief in his eyes.
‘Still can’t work out why she came here if she is playing soloist already,’ Cory said casually.
‘You’ll have to ask her then.’
‘I’ll get around to it.’
‘Don’t take too long,’ Sebastian warned, ‘otherwise half the single people in the orchestra will beat you to it. That’s the half that doesn't wear dresses.’
‘How do you know so much?’
‘I have a scout in the orchestra.’ Sebastian winked, then handed Cory a wax sealed letter. ‘From Grandfather, a parting message left to you in his will.’
A momentary twang of sadness struck Cory as he turned the letter over in his hands. On the outside it just read: ‘Cory, if there comes a day you face a battle you don’t know how to win, do what great generals do and get help. This letter will tell you how.’
‘Sounds ominous,’ Sebastian observed.
‘Not really. Grandfather always spoke like this during training.’ Cory slipped the letter into his jacket pocket.
***
Sebastian and Cory sat next to each other, enjoying one of the perks royalty brings in the form of a nearly private balcony in the orchestra house. It was almost private because there were quite a few seats, one of them occupied by an older gentleman with a slightly hunched appearance under a black jacket and misplaced, fashionable shirt. If Pragius had been there, he might have introduced his brothers to Carn, the representative from Ostenza. He had not missed a performance during his term in office when he was in the city. In any case, the brothers’ attention was rooted on the players on stage. Julia was there, dre
ssed in that blue shoulderless dress Cory thought he might like to see her in — and now there was no ‘thought’ about it. It was nothing like the dresses other women in the orchestra wore but it didn’t seem to bother her. She wore her hair up, which was different.
Julia turned and smiled at a new arrival, Greta, who bounced up to her like a welcome and overly excitable puppy. Greta almost always bounced with apparently limitless enthusiasm. Her shoulder-length, tightly curled auburn hair exaggerated the whole effect. Even when standing still, there was something spirited about her. For those that looked carefully, a few leftover freckles from teenage years decorated her nose and cheekbones. After a brief exchange in which the two appeared as thick as a marketplace full of thieves, the women took seats and Julia proceeded to rub some strange little block down the hairs of her now-tightened violin bow.
Pre-performance rituals over, Julia took up her treasured violin, stood and walked to the centre of the stage. If an artist wanted to paint a picture of seriousness and composure, her face was the perfect subject. Far from home in a foreign country with a language and customs she was only just becoming acquainted with, she still managed to own the stage and the audience before it. A hush fell as she chinned her violin, readying the bow. Her eyes looked up at the conductor as she nodded her command to begin.
It was subtle to start with and backed by Greta sitting with her cello. The advantage of the shoulderless dress was beginning to become apparent; it allowed her greater freedom of movement, and the instrument became the focus of attention, becoming one with the arms and shoulders of the player. The music raised its game with a deft dance between violin and cello, then reached a new frenzied height with the whole orchestra joining in before descending into its breathtaking finale. Sebastian was captivated, and Carn, sitting a few seats away, rubbed a tear away before joining the rest of the audience in a standing ovation. The performance left Cory even more confused as to what a talent like this had to learn in the academy here.
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