by Cheree Alsop
You are not the pain that you have born,
or the heartbreak that we mourn.
Instead the sun within you flows,
As you rise into the sky;
And the peace that fills us knows,
That now with the sunlight you fly.
We love you, father, brother, friend,
and you are with us without end;
We hold you dear and keep you near,
as the sunlight our hearts mend.
Now the joy within you flows,
As you lift into the skies;
And the love inside us knows,
That your light now fills our eyes.
At the end of the song, King Adexo rose from his seat on a small dais near the main pier. He rubbed and his eyes, then looked out at the audience of Luminos and Duskies. He met the gaze of his wife, Queen Midissa, and she gave him an encouraging nod, a lacy handkerchief held to her eyes. He took a deep breath, then said, “Citizens of Lumini, you have fought bravely and defended our kingdom against the Lysus threat. I deeply mourn those who have fallen, and we are taking steps to ensure that we are never put under such a threat again.” He looked at me with a grateful smile touching the edge of his sorrow, then his gaze swept across his people, taking them in as a whole. “We will honor the bravery of the fallen by living our lives in tribute to their memory. Lumini is a safer place because of their sacrifice and yours. May we always live with the knowledge of how precious life is, and remember the strength of love in defending what we hold dear.”
A sound that was half sob and half joy went up from the crowd and the pain of losing their loved ones shone on their faces even while they looked upon their King with approval and respect. That he cried with them told me more about Axon's father than any words, and Queen Midissa's eyes shone with her own sorrow, softening my judgment of her despite the disapproval I saw whenever she glanced in my direction.
At the King's nod, Commander Jashen struck flint and steel to a silver lantern worked with delicate flowers and vines along the sides; light danced in intricate shadows across the pier in front of him. He raised the lantern and five soldiers in full battle armor stepped forward bearing finely embossed sconces. Their silver armor contrasted smartly with green and gold tabards emblazoned with the Lumini crest of a white castle on a green hill.
The soldiers touched their candles to the flame of the lantern and the wicks flickered to life. Each soldier walked slowly to their designated position along the pier, then waited until the last soldier stood in front of the pier of the Duskies. Together they spoke soft words over the flames. The language was unfamiliar to me, and the words rang foreign to my ears, but they tangled softly around my heart, soothing the ache I felt.
As one, the soldiers put their flames to the piers. For a moment nothing happened, then bright fire danced down the white forms. I rubbed my eyes, wondering if exhaustion from the battle had finally caught up to me, but when I looked back the flames were still multi-colored. Each white flower the fire touched turned the flames a different color. Blue twisted around red and green, pink flames twirled amid orange and purple. The piers appeared as though someone had set a rainbow to dance among white clouds. The flames reflected off the water and the tips glowed with white-hot heat, combating the sun in brightness.
Eventually, the color faded from the flames and the fire turned so brightly white that we had to look away and step back from the waves of heat that pushed against us. The warmth died away before I expected it, and when I looked back, the fire was gone and so were the bodies and the white boxes dedicated to Axon's men. Only the bottom logs of the piers remained, glowing with deep red coals in their hearts and too hot to approach. A small breeze drifted from behind us and lifted ashes out to the ocean.
“Thank you,” King Adexo said. The gratitude was hushed and directed more toward the fallen soldiers than to the audience that watched, but it was as though his words released the Luminos and Duskies around him from a spell. They wiped the tears from their eyes, put arms around each other, and began the short walk back to Lumini.
I watched them leave, my thoughts on the six white boxes and the good men they symbolized. As beautiful as it had been, it still didn't feel like enough, but I don’t know if anything could.
“They'll be remembered.”
I turned to see Axon's eyes on the empty pier as well. “Being remembered isn't enough,” I said. I could barely force the words past the tightness of my throat. It was a beautiful funeral, but there shouldn't have been a funeral at all. They should be alive, celebrating their freedom with their loved ones, not as memories in a box with their bodies joining the circle of death in the ocean.
“We do what we can,” he said as though convincing himself. “What more is there to do?”
I shook my head and turned away, too full of emotion to speak for fear that I would spill out my heart and never gain it back. I took a step away, but Axon caught my arm. He pulled me to his chest and held me without a word. The silence made my carefully guarded tears overflow. I sobbed into Axon's soft shirt; his fingers ran through my hair and his own tears fell onto the top of my head. He tipped his face down and his body shook with held-back sobs finally forcing their way free. I clung to him and we held each other up even though it felt like the world had fallen down around us.
We stood there long after our tears stopped and the crackling of coals faded away behind me. I wiped my eyes and glanced past Axon, then stood still.
“What is it?” he asked, his voice heavy with sorrow.
“Look,” I whispered.
He turned slowly and his hand reached for mine.
All of the Luminos and Duskies who had watched the funeral stood along the road that led back to Lumini. Husbands had their arms around their wives, and mothers held their little ones close. King Adexo and Queen Midissa stood near the center of the road, their arms entwined and cheeks wet. The King gave us a sad smile of approval, then turned with his wife and they walked slowly with Queen Midissa’s hand at King Adexo’s elbow up the road lined with their people.
Axon squeezed my fingers and we walked hand in hand after his parents. As we passed, Duskies and Luminos alike bowed their heads, then fell in behind us and together we walked as one people back to the palace.
Chapter 24
“Ready?”
Axon's simple question spoken through the door in his quiet, amused tone nearly sent me back to the corner where my pants and shirt lay crumpled in a pile. I smoothed down the dark material of the first dress I had ever worn and felt a wry smile touch my lips at the fact that I could lead a battalion into war, survive a sinking ship, and fight flesh-devouring Sathen, but my hands shook at the thought of wearing a dress to a formal palace dinner.
I took a deep breath. “I'm ready,” I said, pushing the door open. I stepped out of my room before my common sense could stop me.
Axon's eyes widened and his mouth opened; a paper he held in one hand fell unnoticed to the floor. His irises, normally the icy blue that held steel underneath for those who would challenge him, changed subtly to the blue of the sky reflected on the surface of the ocean. He took a small step back, but looked as if he didn't know he had done it.
My heart fell and I wondered if I looked as ridiculous as I felt. I turned to flee back to my room, my cheeks red with embarrassment, but he caught my hand.
“Where are you going?” he asked in a tone I didn't recognize.
“To change,” I said without looking at him.
“Don't ever change,” he said, surprise and dismay lacing his voice.
I frowned and turned, expecting to find him laughing at me. “I've never worn a dress before.”
But instead of laughing, he watched me intently as though afraid if he blinked that I would disappear. His brow was creased and he reached out with his free hand and touched the fabric that ran down my arm with the tips of his fingers. The cloth, a deep green that looked black unless I stood in bright lighting, covered my wrists eno
ugh that I had wondered if it was too big for me despite the seamstress' reassurances that it was a perfect fit.
She had taken in the waist, let it out a bit at the shoulders, and lengthened the hem so that the bottom of the dress brushed the floor when I walked. When she took the measurements, I thought there was no way she would have the work done in time, but the dress had arrived that afternoon with dark green silk slippers to match. At her insistence, I gave in to wearing the shoes because she said wearing a dress without shoes was worse than not wearing a dress at all; although I doubted not wearing shoes would make as much of a stir as if I showed up to the dinner naked.
Axon still held my right hand as though loath to let it go. I toyed with the fabric of the dress at my waist with my free hand, wanting Axon to say something and dreading it at the same time.
“Promise me one thing,” he finally said in a voice just above a whisper.
“What?” I asked warily.
“Promise me you'll wear a dress every day of your life from here on out.”
I studied his face to see if he was joking, but he looked more serious than I had ever seen him. I dropped my eyes and felt my cheeks turn red again. “I’m not really a dress kind of girl.”
“I would like to disagree,” he said in a voice that carried both humor and honesty.
I gave a tentative smile. “Let’s see how tonight goes.”
He nodded and slipped my hand into the crook of his elbow. “Deal.”
We walked along the hallway, down a flight of stairs lined with sharply dressed Luminos servants who bowed their heads in respect as we passed, then paused at the entrance to the grand dining hall. The doors were attended by a servant with golden gloves and two suns embroidered on the sleeve of his dark green jerkin.
“My Lord,” he said with a low bow, then he turned to me with a similar bow, “Lady Nexa.”
A nervous laugh escaped me before I could stop it. Axon glanced over and humor glowed in his eyes. “This way, my lady,” he said.
He led us through the doors and down two steps to the floor of the grand hall, a room that would dwarf even the dining hall at the Lysus castle. The floor was crafted of white and dark brown wood lacquered and scrubbed so that our reflection showed upon it as we walked. The cool temperature of the wood seeped through my slippered feet and I wondered what it would feel like to walk on it barefoot.
The table upon which everyone but the royalty sat was shaped like a giant horseshoe, curved so that guests sat on the outside facing the empty space in the middle, and all had a clear view of the King and Queen and royal family who sat at a long table on a raised dais at the mouth of the horseshoe.
The middle of the shoe was kept empty for servants to serve meals, and for the entertainment, currently a young woman dressed in mottled clothing with two small, flat, furry, multi-legged black and white animals that ran in circles around her, then curled into a ball and continued rolling when she gave a command. The animals then uncurled and prance about her like eager horses, their numerous feet creating a clicking staccato on the wooden floor as they waited for her next command. She praised them and laughed, petting the slinky creatures fondly.
As Axon and I walked past to join his family on the dais, the audience seemed to forget that there was a show. Everyone rose to their feet and bowed or curtsied when we walked by. Even the few small children dressed in the same elegant clothing as their parents dropped into sharp curtsies or bows as though they had been taught how to do so their whole lives. I met one young Luminos girl's bright gaze and smiled. She giggled, then her mother chided her and she dropped into a curtsy, her eyes lowered and bottom lip trembling.
Embarrassed that I had caused her to get into trouble, I tugged gently on Axon's arm. He stopped and I knelt in front of the little girl. “It's alright,” I said gently. I glanced up at her mother and the woman stared at me, her eyes wide. “She's beautiful,” I said. The mother's smile shone with gratitude and relief.
I realized everyone was watching us and rose quickly to my feet. “Sorry,” I whispered to Axon.
He shook his head and said in a normal voice that carried easily across the room, “If the Commander of our Duskie army wants to say hello to a child, I know better than to get in her way.”
Easy laughter and chuckles rose at his comment and I blushed, but couldn't help the smile that came to my lips when we continued across the great hall. A servant moved to pull out a chair for me so I could sit at the end of the long royalty table next to Commander Jashen, but Axon stopped him with a slight shake of his head and led me to the middle of the table where his parents sat. He pulled out the empty chair next to his own. I caught the stern, horrified, disapproving stare of his mother.
“I really can sit at the end,” I whispered, not wanting to cause a scene in front of the entire room.
“Then who would I talk to?” he asked slightly louder. He shot his mother a meaningful glance and she looked away with an irritated sigh.
I took the chair, wondering if I would regret it later.
A giant platter bearing a great round beast cooked golden-brown with an orange vegetable in its multi-fanged mouth was set in the middle of the royal table. King Adexo took a gold-handled knife that gleamed in the light glowing through the tall windows that lined two sides of the great hall, and cut a generous serving of meat off the haunch. A servant set it on his plate, then the King lifted a hand in a gesture that took in the entire room. “Enjoy,” he said simply.
On cue, several doors on the west wall opened and a swarm of servants flowed out carrying trays of fruits drizzled in a white honey sauce, birds roasted on spits with candied eyes and vegetables spread along the bodies like feathers, and more of the giant round creatures that Axon said were called barnon, animals that would eat anything and grew so fat that eventually they just sat in one spot and waited for food to be brought to them. They obviously weren't good at surviving in the wild, but made excellent stock animals because they never really went anywhere.
The servants brought steaming goblets of red liquid called vinish; it tasted like pastries and sunlight, dew, and clear, fresh spring water sprinkled with tiny brown flakes that melted on my tongue. They also carried in tiny crystal bowls with ice-cold scoops of green paste. I tasted it at Axon's urging and found the favor tart and delightful, chilled green fruit crushed and mixed with nuts and half-ripe berries, then dipped in a cane and honey glaze with such a strong taste I could only take a few bites.
King Adexo leaned forward so he could see me past his wife and held out his spoon which contained a scoop of a white, salty grain laced with cheese, and a bit of the green paste at the tip. “If you eat it like this, it compliments the flavor of the corsa and gives a pleasant counterbalance to the salt. You might like it.”
Queen Midissa rolled her eyes, but I tried it and found the combination much more palatable. The servant behind me smiled with approval when I finished the bowl and brought another. By the time the stewards carried in steaming bowls laden with hot rags that smelled gently of perfumes and a tangy scent that left my hands clean and soft, I felt like someone would have to carry me back to my rooms.
I rose gingerly and stood beside Axon who laughed, “Too much good food?”
“You can't expect a half-starved waif from the Caves to turn away from a challenge like that,” I replied, rubbing my stomach to ease its soreness.
He shook his head, “No, but I can make sure you're fed until you're actually used to eating.”
I grinned. “That's a challenge I can accept.”
Fireflies fluttered in my stomach when I walked back to my room with a hand at Axon's elbow, though I wondered how they had found room in there after all of the elegant food. The King and Queen had left us at the foot of the stairs up to the royal quarters, King Adexo with a pleasant smile and wishes for a good night, and Queen Midissa with a calculating gaze and tight lips as she said she hoped I had a good evening and found my accommodations comfortable.
Axon
opened my door, but his hand covered mine on his arm as though reluctant to let me go despite the weariness in his eyes and the shadows underneath that told of the setting sun. “Did you have a nice time?”
I nodded. “It was better than I could ever have hoped for. I really don't belong there, you know,” I admitted.
A slight curiosity formed between his eyebrows. “Why not?” he asked, his blue eyes searching mine.
“It's more for people who like to wear shoes.” His gaze followed mine to my feet. The dark green slippers made my toes feel cramped and confined. I longed to run through soft desert sand with nothing between my bare feet and the dirt.
Axon smiled in understanding, his eyes bright. “This is the first time I've seen you wear shoes.”
I took the slippers off with one hand, using the other one on his arm for balance. “That's because it's the first time I've ever worn them. And the last. So it'll probably be the last dinner because I doubt your mother would allow me at the table in bare feet.”
Axon shrugged nonchalantly. “Not if I command everyone to leave their shoes by the door.”
I stared at him. “You have way too much power.”
He laughed. “Hey, it's worth it to have the girl I love eat with me.”
I stared at him and he met my eyes with such sincerity and so much of his heart in his gaze that my breath caught in my throat. He took a step forward and closed the space between us. “It's true,” he whispered, his voice tight. “I can't help it. Everything you do endears you to me even more, like talking to that little girl and-”
“I shouldn't have done that,” I cut him off. “I embarrassed her and her mother, and I'm just a Duskie that doesn't really have any right to be there in the first place.”
His gaze darkened intensely, his icy blue eyes taking on the lightning-edged ferocity of a storm. “You do belong there, and don't ever let anyone tell you differently.” He put his hands on my arms, his face inches from mine. “You look so beautiful that you stole every heart in the room. It doesn't matter that you're a Duskie or from Firen Caves, it doesn't matter that you fight in wars or defeat Sathen or survived a cage on a sinking ship. They don't know any of that. All they know is that the most beautiful girl in the world walked into the great hall tonight and she took the time to smile at a young girl and calm her mother, and that she kept the attention of every person in the room as she tried a million different foods for the first time, thanked the servants for everything they brought out, and laughed and talked and charmed us all. You won them more just being yourself than if they had seen you fight on the battlefield a hundred times over.”
