The Edict (The She Trilogy Book 1)

by P. J. Keyworth

  “And he’s the one who cannot even look at me in this clothing.”

  “The problem with the history of this Kingdom, is that different races are afraid of integrating with each other”

  “My people have forbidden it.”

  “Your people are afraid. The Spirit promotes good, He promotes peace - not evil. There is a difference between mixing the good between races and mixing the evil.”

  “You know a lot of this?”

  Zeb shrugged, his face solemn.

  “There won’t be a peaceful resolution.”

  “You think you failed, but you have not said what happened.”

  “It doesn’t matter.” But it did. The weight of what happened rested heavily upon her, tugging at her chest, a deep, unforgiving ache within her. If she gave voice to it, if she acknowledged the whole truth, it might fracture her in two. “The Prince refused his help. That is all anyone needs to know.”

  The conversation was at an end then. They rode on, but silence reigned between them. They had been following the stream westwards for some time when it meandered across their paths turning south bringing the group together again. Zeb explained in his off-hand manner, to no one in particular, that it would be tracking south to join the other tributaries of Lake Radial at Emrilion’s heart.

  Kiara liked the sound of Zeb’s voice - it was quiet and steady. He was clearly more knowledgeable than he let on, but he allowed small pieces of information to trickle through from time to time. If she hadn’t been so preoccupied she would have asked him about Lake Radial, about the Chieftain Lands and the Southern Forest.

  At the edge of the stream, they crossed two at a time through the least rocky part, the horses protesting as they splashed through the cold water. Zeb had gone first with the others, leaving Kiara to cross beside Fidel. They were the last to cross and Kiara’s horse, a sturdy little brown gelding, tripped on a loose stone on the streambed.

  Lurching forward, the horse’s forelegs scrambled to gain purchase. Kiara was taken by surprise, slipping sideways.

  A large, heavy hand caught her ankle just before she would have fallen off completely. It held her steady long enough for her to right herself, her little gelding swinging back up and stepping out of the stream with zeal.

  “Thank you.” She reached the bank, catching her breath back. She saw her rescuer avert his eyes. Her smile disappeared.

  “Have no fear, Fidel, it is not the leg of a whore you’ve touched.”

  He looked up suddenly, startled by her bitter words. The others had already disappeared behind the trees. He looked back to her, his soft brown eyes falling on hard ice.

  “I had no such fear.”

  “Did you not?” He saw the shadows darkening beneath her tired eyes. “For I am sure that’s why you all look at me like that – wondering if I’m the Reluwyn harlot you all fear I have become.”

  Fidel relaxed visibly. The furrow in his brow smoothed and the set of his large jaw firmed.

  “I would not assume anything about you - I have no idea what you have been through since you were taken.” He pushed his horse on until they rode abreast around the trees and on to the track again The others remained just out of earshot. “I can see that whatever it was gnaws at you.”

  She shot a sharp look at him but he just shrugged in response.

  “Maybe you should talk to someone about it.”

  Her jaw clenched. “It won’t be understood.”

  Fidel did not argue - he had grown used to this behaviour from women.

  “Why did you insist on coming to find me?” Her mind ran over what would have happened if they had not come. Would she have heard about the Edict condemning her race? Would she have known before it had happened? What if she hadn’t, what if she had been kept safe by Trevisian as he promised? Would she ever have forgiven herself for being blinded by her feelings for him? It didn’t matter. Her sight had been restored. “Did you hold that much faith in me?” She wouldn’t have, not if she could have read her own heart as someone else. She had made a decision but the breadth between that choice and another had been as fine as a strand of silk.

  “My faith is in the Great Spirit. Your presence at the palace was His doing.”

  A pained smile twisted her mouth. Afterall, what good had it done? The curse upon her people had not been broken. The only object that had been broken lay within her chest, and it still lay there, in sharp jagged pieces that dug in as she moved, as she carried on, as she continued to live. She shifted in the saddle, her legs and backside aching from the journey. She did not want to talk about the Great Spirit anymore. Before Fidel could speak again, as she was sure he intended, she cut in.

  “You disobeyed your Commander. Will you be in trouble?”

  She watched a shadow pass over his face.

  “I am no longer a Captain in the Resistance.”

  Kiara felt the stirring of feelings in her numb depths as she registered his words. “Why?”

  “Perhaps.” Fidel turned his head towards her, his eyes catching hers and surprising her with the pain they so clearly held. “You will not understand either.” His open, handsome face broke into a forced smile. “Maybe we shall have to not understand each other together.”

  She turned back to the forest road ahead, her eyes tracing the pattern of a falling leaf.

  “Autumn is coming,” said Fidel, following the same leaf’s descent and then casting his eyes upwards through the thick canopy above them. “We’ll see the first of the rains today.”

  She saw for the first time the heavy thunderheads that had rolled in over the forest canopy, and heard a light pattering on the canopy above. A heavy drop of rain fell on her hand, the next on her head. She pulled up the hood of her cloak. The leaves dipped with the increasing weight, water spilling to the forest floor. Emrilion’s seasons were changing: the weather had already turned.

  “I’ve been watching her. She grieves you know.”

  Fidel turned to Zeb, a little surprised by the honour of the monosyllabic elf starting a conversation with him.

  “She has not told me what about.”

  “Do not panic yourself.” Zeb almost smiled. “She tells me she thinks of her friend who died. It is not the whole story.”

  Zeb picked up the spoon that rested in the cooking pot and stirred the bubbling mixture of vegetables and rabbit. He pulled a dagger from his boot and stabbed a piece of meat watching the steam rise from it in the night air before eating.

  They were enjoying a brief respite from the rain, enough time to get warm food in their stomachs. They had passed by a small community as they had come out of the forest. Zeb had spoken to the owner of a small, run-down inn, and the bearded man had told him that previous travellers knew of a Reluwyn force moving west. They were a day, maybe two, behind Zeb and the others. They couldn’t afford any long breaks.

  “Do you think the Prince and his councillors have sent out the army to aid the Edict?”

  Zeb chewed for a while before answering, his eyes never stirring from the restless form of Kiara. In sleep she was haunted as in wakefulness, her body twitched and small murmurs escaped her. Zeb swallowed, the warm meat tracking heat down his chest to his stomach, he looked at Fidel, the firelight making his eyes seem bright, almost feverish.

  “I think the Prince has sent his troops out to find her.”

  They both stopped talking when Zephenesh and Djeck came over to fill their bowls with stew. When they were safely over the other side of the fire again, Zeb resumed the conversation.

  “Kiara does not blush when she sees the bare chest of a man,” he said it simply, as though it wasn’t abnormal to discuss such things. Fidel and the twins had removed their shirts and coats to dry them by the fire after they had been soaked. Zephenesh and Djeck had changed discreetly elsewhere. Only Zeb had continued wearing his wet clothes - and no one questioned the elf’s choice. “And she wears the same look on her face as you do on yours. The look of someone who’s love is out of reach.”
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br />   “Zeb!” Fidel’s harsh whisper was not enough to attract the attention of the others. “You shouldn’t spread such rumours. Do not compound what we have no evidence for.”

  Zeb’s eyes suddenly turned cold, his face implacable. “I did not call her a whore.” His teeth ground together and a muscle in his jaw jerked. When he saw a widening of Fidel’s eyes he relented. “And I do not spread rumours. Do you not think I tell you because I trust you?”

  Fidel leant back on a tree stump in exasperation.

  “I have no idea what you think Zeb.”

  The corners of the elf’s eyes creased. It was the closest he came to smiling. Fidel knew that after spending the last few years with him.

  “I think you love Ikara. I think that woman,” he nodded to Kiara, “loves someone at the palace, I think she loves the Prince. Do you not see? If she does we may still have a chance to avoid this war? If he is coming after her, there is hope.”

  “We don’t know that.”

  The elf shrugged and then lay down beside the fire as if that ended the conversation. He closed his eyes, his clothes steaming beside the heat, and fell asleep in seconds.

  Fidel rested his head on the top of the tree-trunk, ignoring the hardness against his skull. He caught sight of a lone star throwing its icy light rebelliously down through a tiny gap in the still heavy clouds.

  He thought of Ikara then. He had failed in his mission - a mission he had believed in enough to give over his sword. What would she say when he returned? She would not say anything. Anyway, he was not going to go back to claim his sword - the Spirit must have a plan, some way to lessen the blood that would be spilled, a way to save His people.

  He turned his head and watched the restless sleep of Kiara. Maybe she was in love. Was that why she did not believe that anyone would understand? If it was true, she was in love with a Reluwyn –no Laowyn would accept that easily. Zeb’s words, she grieves you know, circled in Fidel’s mind. He had thought she had suffered abuse at the hands of the Reluwyn, that she carried shame for something she could not have controlled - but perhaps that shame was because of something else.

  “I’ll take first watch, Fidel.” Calev rested a hand on the ex-Captain’s shoulder making him jump a little.

  “I didn’t even realise you weren’t here with us.”

  Calev grinned “I’d make a good spy I reckon.” He winked. “We’ve been out scouting. Jaik’s still at it. Sleep.” He rested a hand on the low bow of a tree and swung himself nimbly up into the branches. “I’ll wake you all in half an hour.”

  “Not an hour?”

  Calev shook his head, his face solemn. “Jaik’s positioned himself further east. He’ll alert us when we need to move off. We passed a band of Meir Elves on one of the forest roads north of here, they’ve heard talk of an army moving our way.”

  Fidel nodded and closed his eyes against that lone star that continued to glare down at them. The Meir Elves had also been persecuted and it was no wonder they were moving away from the advancing Reluwyn army. His mind became drowsy but it still travelled slowly over his thoughts.

  What if Zeb was right about Kiara? What if the army was coming for her? More importantly, it was only three days until the rest of the nation would rise up against the Laowyn and suppress them on behalf of their Reluwyn ruler. They needed to get back.

  This was the first Kiara had seen of Ishtalia. She knew her parents had died here, but Zephenesh had never seen fit to bring her. The travellers left the forest behind yesterday evening and camped out on the plain which would lead to the final hills of the western coastline.

  She couldn’t even see the sea yet. Ishtalia was built upon a large outcrop of rocks and rose up high above the way they had been travelling for the last day and a half. She had watched the city grow as they drew closer, and now the tall white turrets soared above them into the heavens, high enough to spear the clouds. She knew from stories that Ishtalia had a large port on its western side. That was how the Reluwyn had won, by surrounding them land and sea. The Laowyn had been in control of the Western Sea for decades and the Reluwyn had allied with the peoples of the Western Isle, which lay off the coast to the west of the Tao desert in the south, to surround the final Laowyn stronghold. Perhaps it was those same sailors who were sailing across the globe to the supposed lands across the Western Sea, the ones Trevisian had told her about in the library. She shook her head, the hood of her cloak falling down to her shoulders.

  The rain that had dogged their every step since that day in the forest had only let up for the last hour. Down on the plain there was a gathering warmth, oppressive and sticky. Kiara undid the clasp of her cloak and bundled the material into a saddle-bag. She heard Zephenesh making a disapproving noise and looked across, catching his eyes just before he averted them.

  “The heat will abate when we climb into Ishtalia. The wind coming off the sea runs through the streets.”

  “Good,” Kiara said. She noticed that Fidel could look at her without turning away now. “You’ve been here before then? I thought the others left from the forest base.”

  “They did, I joined them later.”

  A fine brow rose. She allowed her horse more rein as it negotiated the uneven tufted grass of the plains.

  “You decided later.”

  “I wasn’t sure it was the right decision at first.”

  She pushed a strand of hair off her face, drops of perspiration bordering her hairline. “But you did eventually. Did that right decision cost you your Captainship?”

  “Yes.”

  She watched a muscle contract in his square jaw.

  “Do you blame me for failing you?”

  He turned to look at her, his eyes gentle.

  “You don’t know you’ve failed yet.”

  She laughed bitterly. “I overheard the report you tried to hide from me at the inn. The Reluwyn army have marched out of Emril City. I don’t know why you all assume I am too fragile for the truth.”

  “Are you not?”

  Her expression became earnest. “Not anymore.” She turned her eyes back to the track. She had come to a decision last night, she would not allow her blindness to stop her from helping her people again. Isn’t that why she had protected those children from the Reluwyn patrol who would have taken them as slaves? Isn’t that why she had started to attack the Imperial coaches that carried Reluwyn Edicts? She decided to change the subject. “Aren’t you worried about what the Commander will say when you return?”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “You were close. I saw it when I was at the base in the forest. Are you?” It was easy to talk about someone other than herself. Since he had saved her from her fall in the forest she had talked to him more than the others. He didn’t have the same darkness about him that Zeb did.

  “Not worried.” His shoulders were broad and his height considerable, even on that huge beast he was riding. “It’s just I didn’t leave…on the best of terms.”

  “We need to push on if we are to get there before nightfall!” Zeb called, cantering a circle around the other two, making their horses throw their heads up in protest.

  “I think the elf wants to race!” shouted Jaik, his little pony snorting as he gathered his reins. “Don’t you Calev?”

  “I think that’s exactly what he’s after.”

  “Are you crazy? On this terrain?” Fidel cautioned, reining his huge horse back a little, checking the energy that was building up in the creature.

  “The track over there looks flat enough – haven’t you seen the sure foot of a Laowyn pony before?”

  Not many Laowyn in the forest had ponies or horses. Kiara had only learned to ride because Zephenesh had taken her to the edge of the plains when she was young. She had never been far enough in to see Ishtalia, but she had learned to ride on this ground.

  “I never said anything about a race.”

  “Ah, Zeb,” Jaik, his grin twice the size of his brother’s, circled next to the elf and punch
ed Zeb’s arm playfully. “Forgetting what you’ve said in your old age?”

  The elf’s grey eyes narrowed. “You want a race?”

  “Oh, by the Great Spirit!” Fidel rolled his eyes.

  “The first home gets Ria’s stew!” Jaik called.

  “That’ll be me then!” Calev tore after his brother, whose smaller pony had already bounded over the tufts and onto the dirt track which threaded its way through the grassland.

  The others followed at their own pace once they reached the track, and before long, the party was cantering past the outer markers of the old city, the shadow of the broken towers welcoming them home.

  Chapter 24

  She was refusing to look at him although they had been in the same vicinity for some minutes waiting for food.

  “Smells delicious,” Fidel said, his face breaking into a broad smile as he saw Ria. Her warm rosy face had been bent over a second pot which she was stirring and smelling when she looked up. Her eyes lit the minute she saw him.

  “Fidel!” She cried, dropping the spoon and splashing the stew over her apron. She threw her arms open and disappeared into him as he hugged her. He caught sight of the ice-white eyes that had begun to watch them.

  “Oh, you scoundrel! I have missed you and you left without so much as a word.” She swatted him in rebuke. As she did so she took in the lack of uniform. His forest garb - the Laowyn Resistance camouflage - was replaced by leather breeches, a jerkin, and a worn beige shirt. He had picked them up near Emril City and now they were his only clothes. The only part of his former clothing he had kept was the Laowyn sigil, which was fastened to the breast of his jerkin.

  “I see you have become a civilian,” Ria’s soft brown eyes drifted over to where Ikara stood conversing with Hendra.

  “A civilian who will still fights with the rest in two days’ time.”

  Ria nodded, her face thoughtful for a few moments before she smiled again, breaking the spell. “Well, you must eat then! It has been a full-time job cooking for this many people - have you heard? Many of the Meir elves are on their way to us.”