Griffin's Daughter

by Lelsie Ann Moore

“Ashi, do you think Mother and Father would consider Lord Dai’s son as a prospect for me?” Lani asked thoughtfully.

  “Do you like him?” Ashinji responded. “Have you even spoken to him?” He looked over to where Ibeji Dai sat beside his father, his quick, amber eyes darting around the room as if he were trying to memorize every detail.

  “He’s very handsome. He did look at me and smile, a little.”

  “You’re still too young, little Sister. Enjoy what’s left of your girlhood. There’ll be plenty of time to think of marriage.”

  Lani rolled her eyes. “I’m old enough to wonder what it’s like,” she said.

  “What what’s like?” Ashinji innocently inquired.

  Lani reached over and rapped him on the forehead with her knuckles.

  “What it’s like to be with a man!” she replied, rolling her eyes with exasperation. Ashinji sighed, suddenly feeling very old. Lani abruptly changed the subject. “Is it true what Sadaiyo says about you and the new messenger girl?”

  “I don’t know. What is he saying?” Ashinji kept his voice neutral.

  “That you’re in love with her, but you can’t ever have her because she’s a half-breed and she’s got no family.”

  “Has he said any of this to Father?” Ashinji asked, trying to remain calm.

  Lani shrugged. “I don’t know,” she replied.

  Ashinji pushed aside his plate and rose from his chair. “I have to go. I’ll be back in a little while.”

  Lani looked startled. “You can’t leave now! Father is about to make his speech,” she exclaimed.

  “I promised…I need to go.”

  He hurried toward the open doors of the great hall, hugging the wall and trying to be as unobtrusive as possible, but he caught the puzzled looks on Lord and Lady Dai’s faces and the annoyed expressions on his parents’ as he slipped out into the evening air.

  The upper yard had been set up as an outdoor overflow area for the feast. Those common people of the district that had come for the celebration, as well as the off-duty castle staff and their families sat at trestle tables under the stars, enjoying the magnificent repast. Ashinji found Jelena sitting at a table on the periphery, surrounded by her guard friends. He stood in the shadows for a while, content just to watch her laugh and talk. She seemed so happy. He thought his heart would burst with love.

  He approached and quietly called out her name.

  She turned around and their eyes met. Wordlessly, she rose to her feet and walked over to where he waited, her eyes never leaving his face.

  “Walk with me,” he murmured and held out his hand. A hush fell over the table. Jelena slipped her hand into his and allowed him to lead her away from her friends into the darkness. He could hear their voices start up behind him, like the buzz of excited bees.

  They walked side by side, hands clasped tightly, toward Lady Amara’s private garden, where Ashinji knew that they would not be disturbed. Having Jelena’s body so close was a torment. He wanted to sweep her up into his arms and cover her face and neck with kisses. He could sense the tense expectancy flowing from her, and it only inflamed his desire.

  They reached the garden, and he led her over to the sea-creature bench and sat her down beside him. The slivered moon, ensnared in the tree branches overhead, cast very little light; nevertheless, Ashinji could see Jelena’s face with perfect clarity.

  He still held her hand in his, and he squeezed it even tighter as he started to speak. “I want to tell you something,” he began. “You know that we elves have Talent…what humans call magic. My Talent manifests in dreams that tell me of things that may happen in my future. I’ve been dreaming of a girl with wild, dark hair and sad eyes…a hikui girl. The dreams started months ago, and I did not understand them until that day by the river.”

  “The day you found me,” Jelena whispered.

  “When I saw your face for the first time, I fell down in shock. I knew immediately that you were the girl... Jelena, in the dream, you were calling out to me to help you. You were in some kind of danger. There was a shadow...”

  Jelena shivered and drew closer to him. “What think you it means?” she asked, and he could hear the fear in her voice.

  “I don’t know yet, but I think it has to do with what’s inside you.”

  “Inside me?” she responded.

  Ashinji tugged at the service rings in his ear. How to explain without frightening her even more? “It’s hard to describe. There’s an…energy, a force of some kind inside of you, more like a part of you, really. I have no idea what it is, but the shadow seemed to know, and I think it wanted to take it from you.”

  “Ashinji, you’ve seen it? It is like blue fire!” she exclaimed. “Do you think energy is part of my elf blood?”

  “It didn’t feel like any manifestation of Talent, not exactly. It felt more like…like a spell of some kind…Wait, you know about this?”

  Jelena nodded. “It came from before I arrived here. Blue fire from my hands. I want to learn about it. Aneko says Lady Amara can help me…I mean, will she help?”

  “Yes, yes, I think she will…We can talk about that later. What I have to say now is more important.” He paused to breathe deeply before taking the plunge. “I know in my heart that I was meant to find you that day. Whatever this shadow is that threatens you, I will protect you from it. We have a connection, Jelena, one that cannot be denied.” Gently, he drew her into his arms and pressed his lips to hers.

  For an instant only, she froze then melted sweetly into him. His head swam as if he had just taken a draught of strong wine. Her arms crept up around his waist, and he could feel the curve of her breasts through the thin cotton of his tunic. He embraced her more tightly, and she sighed against him, her lips as soft as rose petals. The heat of passion surged through him, and he knew that if he did not pull away now, he would be unable to stop.

  Gasping for breath, he broke their embrace.

  “I love you, Jelena,” he whispered.

  “I love you, too,” she breathed.

  “Come to my chamber. Stay with me tonight.”

  Jelena withdrew from him and dropped her head into her hands. “No, Ashinji. I cannot. We…cannot be,” she said in her imperfect Siri-dar.

  “What do you mean?” Ashinji whispered fiercely. “We love each other, we’ve just said so! Why can’t we be together?”

  Her hands fell away from her face, and he could see her cheeks were wet with tears. “Ashinji, my love, you are lord’s son. I am nobody, half-breed. I have no family. I live here because Lord Sen take pity on me, give me home and job. I think he likes me, but not enough to let me have you. He will never let us marry.” She shook her head emphatically. “I ran away from my home so I could live free, live with…honor. I will not be…less than your wife, even if you do love me.”

  “I want to make you my wife, Jelena,” Ashinji stated firmly. “We’ll find a way, somehow.”

  “No! I will not let you throw away everything for me. I know what family means to you. You go against father’s wishes, you lose place, position.”

  “I don’t care about that. All I want is to love and protect you!” Ashinji shivered with growing desperation. He could feel her slipping away from him.

  “No. One man already who I love gave up everything for me. I will not let another.” The note of finality in her voice stabbed his heart like a knife.

  “Jelena, please…don’t turn away from me,” he begged, grasping her shoulders.

  “I must go,” she sobbed quietly. “Let me go!”

  Slowly, he released her. She jumped up and fled.

  He sat very still for several heartbeats, his mind frozen in disbelief. Then, in an agony of perception, he threw his head back, face upturned to the cold, uncaring sky.

  “Jelenaaa!”he cried to the moon.

  Chapter 24

  The Temple Of Eskleipa

  Five days after fleeing Amsara, Magnes came upon a tiny monastery just outside of a hamlet called Gariglen.
As he guided his horse through the simple wooden palisade, he made a decision.

  He sheltered there a day and a night. When, at last, he emerged, Magnes Preseren, son and Heir of Duke Teodorus of Amsara, was no more. A lay brother named Tilo, dressed in a simple brown robe and armed with nothing more than a knife and a stout walking stick, left Gariglen Monastery that bright Uresday morning. A satchel, bulging with salves and remedies, hung across his right shoulder.

  The monks of Gariglen would have their new roof this fall and a stone byre to replace their old wooden one, for Magnes had traded them the horse from his father’s stable for the robe, medicines, and the small supply of food that he now carried. The gelding would fetch a handsome price, and a poor herbalist would never have been able to afford a horse in any case. The monks had asked no questions, and they’d accepted the lopsided trade happily.

  As Magnes continued to make his way south, guilt haunted his every step. At night, he feared to close his eyes, for the evil dream that plagued him allowed him no rest. His father would appear before him, face like a thundercloud, his life’s blood gushing in a scarlet stream from his head. He would raise an accusatory finger, aimed at Magnes’s heart.

  Why did you murder me, Son? Why?

  He would awake, his skin clammy with sweat, fighting for breath.

  For a time, he feared he would go insane.

  Three weeks of steady travel brought Magnes at last to the city of the Emperors. Darguinia quickly proved itself to be two cities, existing on two very different levels. One was a place of stunning beauty, filled with gardens, fountains, and buildings made of the whitest marble.

  The other city was not.

  Magnes, as a poor monk with little money, soon found himself in the other Darguinia. He entered a place of narrow, twisting streets and dark alleys, of fetid, open sewers and ramshackle buildings, of crime and disease—a place where hollow-eyed beggars sat in doorways, women and children sold their bodies on the streets to survive, and murder evoked barely an eyeblink.

  Magnes had landed squarely in Hell, and he felt that he deserved the place he had made for himself. Even in Hell, though, things cost money, and he was fast running out of what little he had.

  First, I need to find shelter,he thought. Then, I’ve got to figure out what sort of living I can make.Hitching his satchel a little higher on his shoulder, he looked around, picked a street at random, and plunged into the crowd.

  ~~~

  The whore lifted her skirts and straddled Magnes where he sat on the shabby room’s only chair. Settling her bare rump firmly on his knees, she slid forward and pushed herself onto him. He sighed and shuddered a little. With professional efficiency, she began pumping her hips. Magnes shut his eyes so he wouldn’t have to look at her face and gripped the sides of the chair, riding each successive wave of sensation, higher and higher, to a final spasm of release.

  It was all quite impersonal and unsurprisingly brief.

  “There, told you so, sweet’eart,” the woman said. She stood up and carefully pulled herself free, casually wiping between her legs with a corner of her skirt. “Told you I was ten times better ‘n that tired old cunt Lorola. Worth th’ extra three coppers, right, luv?”

  Magnes glanced up, then away. All of the whores in this dangerous neighborhood of tenements and warehouses were well past their primes, but this one, with her cheap red dye-job and heavy make-up, had looked a little fresher than the rest. Still…

  “I’m not your love,” he said roughly, tucking himself back into his breeches and standing. Almost immediately, he felt a stab of guilt at his harsh tone. He could in no way blame the mess of his life on this woman. “Please,” he amended more gently. “Don’t call me that.” The whore simply shrugged.

  His thoughts turned to Livie. The memory of their last time together, of how they had made love and then had clung to each other as if their final night on earth had come, set up such an ache in his heart that he thought he might choke on his despair.

  “You have your money,” he said quietly. She had insisted on her half-sol fee before coming up to his room. “You need to leave now.”

  “When you need another ride, you know where t’find me, luv…oops, sorry!” She smirked and left without another word.

  Magnes sat down on the edge of the narrow, musty cot and rested his head in his hands. A single tear slid from the corner of his eye, and slowly, he wiped it away with a forefinger. He chided himself, again, for wasting what little money he had left on something so tawdry, but the pain of his loneliness had been so great that the prospect of the touch of another person, anyperson, had proved to be impossible to resist. When this particular whore had propositioned him for the third time, he’d given in.

  He then thought of his father.

  The image of Duke Teodorus’s death-pale face, a constant, lurking presence in his mind’s eye, seemed always ready to glide into full view at any unguarded moment. He could still see the crimson of his father’s blood, leaking onto the stones from his shattered skull. The memory had lost none of its vivid horror. Magnes moaned aloud and lay down, covering his face with his hands. The little candle on the shelf by the door, the room’s only source of light, guttered and went out. He lay, sleepless and unmoving, until sunrise.

  Magnes rose at first light and donned his monk’s robe. He gathered up his meager possessions—knife, satchel, a waterskin, his walking stick—and left his small room, as he had each morning since arriving in the city four days ago. This morning, though, he had a feeling he would not be returning.

  Magnes had found that the brown homespun garment of a holy brother and healer afforded him a small bit of protection when he walked abroad in the squalid streets of Darguinia’s slums. Thieves and cutthroats were less likely to come after him, unless, of course, they needed a remedy; he kept several common ones on him at all times for such eventualities. Not that he really needed protection. He still carried his knife, and his training at arms would serve him well in any fight.

  He took one last look around, then headed out into the street, intending to make his way to the temple district. Once there, he would inquire at as many establishments as it took for him to find one that would take him in as a novice.

  The morning air already shimmered with heat. The coarse fabric of his robe chafed at neck and chest. Sweat beaded on his forehead and trickled in little rivulets from his underarms and down his back. His stomach rumbled. He thought of the half-sol he had spent on the red-dyed whore last night and winced in regret. A half-sol could have bought him a decent breakfast and a tankard of mead in one of the many alehouses that operated in the neighborhood.

  He walked steadily, taking an occasional swig from the tepid contents of his waterskin. After a while, the dirt beneath his sandals became cobbles. The buildings transformed from shabby mud brick to sturdy wood, then stone. Another few blocks and he turned a corner and entered the temple district.

  A plan had crystallized in Magnes’s mind. He would continue to call himself Tilo and try to get work as an herbalist in one of the temples dedicated to healing, or failing that, he would seek employment as a gardener. It didn’t matter, so long as he could work with growing things.

  The Green Brothers were not accepting novices at this time, nor was the Temple of Balnath. The elderly priest who came to the door to politely turn him away suggested that he try the Temple of Eskleipa, over at the east end of the district near the Grand Arena. Magnes sat awhile in the shade of the temple porch, mustering his energy for the hot trudge to come. His mouth ached for a drink of something other than warm water; he thought about retreating from the day’s heat into a nearby tavern, but then he reminded himself of his dwindling finances.

  With a weary sigh, he rose to his feet and set off.

  Eskleipa was a foreign god, brought up from the far south of the Empire by a wave of immigration from the conquered lands of the Eenui people. His clergy had proven themselves to be skilled healers; worship of the god had become quite popular,
especially among poor immigrants and slaves.

  The Temple of Eskleipa looked far less grand than the gleaming marble house of Balnath. Magnes walked up to the plain wooden door of the modest brick building and pulled on a rope dangling from the doorjamb. Somewhere within, he heard the tinkling of a bell.

  Time passed, and the door remained firmly shut. Magnes hauled on the bell rope a second time and followed that up with a firm rap with the end of his walking stick. A third and fourth try were equally fruitless, and Magnes had decided to give up when, just as he was turning to leave, the door swung open, and a man poked his head out.

  “Yes?”

  Magnes blinked in surprise.

  He had never before seen a man so old.

  “Are you in need of healing, my son? Well, speak up! I’m hard of hearing!” The old man cupped his hand to his ear and peered up at Magnes owlishly.

  “No, I don’t need healing, Father,” Magnes finally managed to answer. “I’m looking for a position as an herbalist. I was told over at the Temple of Balnath that you might accept me as a novice.”

  “Balnath! Balnath, bah! No Balls-nath, more like. Those quacks wouldn’t know their ears from their arseholes. They think tree lizard dung is a cure for warts! Hah!” The old man cackled with derision. “Well, then, young sir, I guess you’d better come in.”

  His skin was as brown as old wood, and it had been many years since his scalp had last sprouted hair, but the old man’s back remained unbent, and the hand that held the door looked untouched by the joint ill. He stood at least a head shorter than Magnes, a twig of a man attired in a gauzy grey garment he had wrapped partly around his waist and draped the rest over his left shoulder. An enormous beak of a nose dominated his oval face.

  “I am Brother Wambo,” the old cleric said as he led the way into the temple.

  “I am Tilo,” Magnes replied, following his host through a receiving chamber and out another door into a courtyard.

  The courtyard was an inviting oasis of shade trees and flowering shrubs. A tiled fountain stood at its center, the cheerfully splashing water throwing off myriads of bright reflections. The air, so much cooler here than out on the street, hung thick with the perfume of growing things.