Heroes of the Crystal Star (Valcoria Book 1)

by Jason James King

  Yuiv forced down a wave of rising emotion. Last night he had had another nightmare about the boy. In this one, Yuiv was earnestly explaining to Olan’s broken corpse, it set into one of Sulia’s plush sitting room chairs in a morbid mockery of life, why he had helped Leadren open the Sentinel Gate. Although the corpse remained as lifeless as it had in reality, the dead face seemed to ring terrible accusations in Yuiv’s ears, accompanied by a crying chorus from a pile of infant corpses. That was the eighth time in four weeks that Yuiv had awoke sobbing into his pillow.

  If only I could do something to help stop the enemy army like Sitrell., If only I could make up for what I did.

  “Perhaps young master Yuiv could recite for us Alnorn’s three key virtues of an Istran disciple?” Yuiv heard a voice of mock patience announce.

  He woke from his thoughts and looked up to see Brother Haleth glowering at him and the thirty or so other boys staring expectantly. “Uh, Yeah.”

  “Well?” Brother Haleth arched an eyebrow.

  Yuiv stood, remembering at the last moment to join his hands behind his back in a gentlemen’s posture as was proper when speaking before a crowd. “Charity.” He scrunched his nose as he worked to remember the second virtue, “Purity”―another long pause―“and Chastity?”

  Brother Haleth gave him a curt nod. “Correct. You may sit.”

  “Brother Haleth?” Yuiv asked, still standing.

  “Yes, child?” Haleth’s calm tone carried an undercurrent of irritation.

  “I knowed,” Yuiv paused to correct himself, “I know that charity means giving to the poor,” his cadence was slow as he worked to speak as Sulia and his comportment tutors expected, “and I know purity means not drinking or chewing Lettle, but what’s chastity mean? How do I show chastity?”

  Brother Haleth became uncomfortable. He reddened and worked his mouth before answering, “Chastity means to keep yourself sexually clean.”

  Yuiv nodded and then asked. “How does I―How do I keep myself sex-yul-lee clean?”

  Brother Haleth looked even more uncomfortable. He glared at a few giggling boys before answering, “By not playing with your privates or the privates of others.”

  The lecture hall of the Alarian Minster erupted with laughter.

  Yuiv glanced down at his crotch and said, “Oh,” before dropping into his seat and leaning forward to hide his blushing face.

  “That is enough!” Brother Haleth called for order and the laughing subsided. “Let us turn now to the Salia Kitha from which we will read the mourning of the Arch Sage Styda for the people of Talune.”

  The sound of opening books and leafing through pages echoed throughout the lecture hall. Yuiv opened his copy of the holy book, a present from Sulia, and leafed through it looking for the passage. Unable to find it, he glanced at the boy sitting closest to him, got the page number, and caught up just as Brother Haleth had another boy start reading.

  “And on the fifth day of Nalstik in the year 2263, I Jasada Styda heard the Creator’s call…” the boy began.

  Yuiv concentrated on the passage, trying to follow along but only understanding half of what was written. Until he had begun studying the Istran holy text, Yuiv had thought himself a capable reader, but these words hardly made any sense. After a few moments of frustrating effort, he let himself sink into passive listening, his thoughts involuntarily drifting to the minutia of the day. He stayed like that in his state of distracted stupor for several minutes, occasionally glancing at the large antique wall clock on the wall behind Brother Haleth. When will this be over?

  It was then that Yuiv half heard a word read that grabbed his attention. His head snapped up and he turned to look at the boy reading. He looked at his copy of the Silia Kitha, but he had long since stopped following along. Something inside Yuiv told him that he needed to know that word and what it meant. So, knowing full well the humiliation it would bring, he shot his hand up and began waving it to get Brother Haleth’s attention.

  After distracting half the room from the reading, Brother Haleth finally responded with a sigh. “Yes, Yuiv? Do you need to use the privy again?”

  Yuiv lowered his hand. “What’d he sayed?” he asked, slipping back into his street talk.

  “What did he say” Brother Haleth corrected.

  Shards of the Crystal Star! Was everyone going to try to teach him proper words?

  “What did he say?” Yuiv asked again, this time slower and clearer.

  Brother Haleth’s scowl told Yuiv that his question had revealed to the priest that he hadn’t really been listening. For someone in charge of teaching young people, Brother Haleth sure didn’t seem to like children.

  The priest glanced at the boy who had been reading and ordered him to repeat the last passage, to which order the boy respectfully complied. “…and I saw not the people of Talune with eyes of Dyn, but with eyes of Jia. And lo, a voice said unto me…”

  “Stop!” Yuiv burst out. “What’as that word?”

  “Which one?” Brother Haleth asked in a tone of labored patience.

  “Jia?”

  To Yuiv’s surprise, that question seemed to erase Brother Haleth’s disapproving scowl. Yuiv knew that the man was an obsessive scholar, devoted to his studies with a zeal that bordered on fanaticism, and asking questions of religion, history, or etymology was a sure way to get on Haleth’s good side.

  “A fair question. Does anyone have an answer?”

  No one responded, although Brother Haleth didn’t give them much time, he obviously relishing the opportunity to launch into another lecture.

  “Jia is a term that is not found much in scripture. With various scribes and translators contributing to what we know as the Silia Kitha, some of the older texts that we now possess carry over words from long ago.” The priest closed his book, signaling that they were in for a lengthy one-sided discussion. Yuiv heard a few quiet groans and knew that his question would cost him any hopes he had of fitting in with the other boys, but he didn’t care. He had heard that word Jia before and he had to know what it meant. He searched his memories.

  “Both the words Jia and Dyn are from the old tongue, yet most scholars believe they may even pre-date the era leading up to the Great Destruction by thousands of years…” Haleth droned on.

  Jia, Yuiv mentally repeated, and then it struck him like a bolt of lightning. He had just delivered Sitrell to Doctor Valarious, who had taken him into the operating room. He was waiting outside in the hall, trying to sort through his experience of healing Sitrell. He had wondered what that feeling of fire was that had filled him. As he had been drifting off to sleep, he had heard a voice answer that question. “Jia,” the voice had whispered to his mind, Tyra’s voice.

  “Although some speculate that the root word for Dyn is Dynamortas, the old word for death, it cannot be confirmed as the word has also been used in the context of life.” Haleth seemed completely oblivious to the fact that only he was enjoying the lecture. “Scholars agree, however, that Jia is clearly a word associated with YaJiann, the name used by the Aelis for God.”

  Yuiv shot his hand up again, this time not waiting for Haleth’s permission to speak. “Who’as Aelis?”

  Haleth chuckled now seeming more a fond grandparent than a strict school master. “Yuiv, I think I may have been wrong about you. Clearly you have a scholar’s thirst for knowledge. Well, the Aelis, or Oath Bound, are a group of zealots who base their religion on a few obscure prophecies not found in the Salia Kitha.”

  “Where’as they?” Yuiv demanded.

  Brother Haleth looked confused. “Why, Aelis is an Aukasian religion of course.”

  Jalek is Aelic, Tyra’s voice whispered to his mind. With an effort, he pushed aside the questions that haunted him about who or what Tyra was and stood.

  “Thank you!” He called out as he began rushing out of the lecture hall.

  I need to talk with Jalek!

  “Yuiv?” he heard Brother Haleth call out, his voice sounding more stunned than
angry.

  Well, I guess I can’t go back there again, Yuiv thought as he sprinted out of the building and onto the street in front of the church. He fished in his breast pocket and pulled out a bronze watch attached to his vest by a small thin chain. Good, he still had over an hour before Sulia’s driver arrived with the carriage that would take him back to Sitrell’s house. He looked up at the spire of Aradell, it reaching above the nocturnal cloud cover signaling that he was in the center of the city. The Alarian Minster, a gigantic building in its own right, was fortunately neighbor to the royal palace, seeming to be built almost on its very grounds. Jalek will be in the dungeon. Yuiv made for a large arched gate leading into the palace courtyard.

  A brisk, ten minute jog put Yuiv inside the palace’s mammoth lobby, a chamber almost as large as the throne room itself, with rows of marble columns as thick and as tall as ancient redwoods running parallel toward a single wide staircase. Dozens of arched doorways lined both sides of the rectangular room, making it a bustling center of palace traffic.

  He glanced at the row of doors, first at his right and then to the ones on his left. “Stairs on the right lead up to the light, but stairs on the left lead down out of sight.” He recited the limerick taught to him by an older boy named Calid, one of his first “teachers” in the thief’s art.

  The rhyme had proven useful as it was virtually, universally true of all multistory buildings with only an occasional exception. Yuiv headed for the farthest, arched door on his left, crossing through a thin crowd of nobles and passing a sentry of the Royal Guard as he made his way through the lobby. As he had guessed, the door in the far corner opened to a descending staircase. It disturbed him how easily his old instincts reasserted themselves. Did that mean he was still a thief? Did that mean he was still bad?

  With one last furtive glance at the guard in the white uniform to make sure he was looking the other way, Yuiv slipped into the stairwell and descended the stairs. It looked as though there were three basement levels, the first landing opening through an arched doorway into a long corridor lit by rows of candelabra. The hallway was empty of people but filled with the enticing aroma of roasting chicken and baking bread. The kitchens! Sure enough, as soon as the realization dawned on him, a man dressed in a white and black livery entered the corridor from a connecting hallway. He bore a covered platter in his arms and hurried with the urgency of a summoned servant. Yuiv descended the next staircase quickly, breathing a sigh of a relief as he glimpsed the servant ascending to the main floor and not down to where he was skulking.

  Yuiv continued down the cold stone steps until arriving at the next landing. He peeked through another arched doorway into a hall that was completely black. A minute of intense listening without so much as the sound of scampering rats told him that this floor was probably some unfrequented storage area. He continued down to the bottom floor, but had to quickly retreat back up the stairs upon glimpsing a man in a white uniform standing guard at a thick, metal door with a small, barred window set above the latch.

  The dungeon. He had hoped that the bottom floor would have been open like the others, allowing him corridors to hide in until he had an opportunity to sneak to where they kept the prisoners. It looked like his instincts had been wrong this time. After his experience in Lisidra’s dungeon, he should’ve been expecting this, its dungeon having been sealed by an outer door like this one.

  “Shards!” Yuiv swore to himself.

  How was he going to get inside? He considered waiting for his audience with the Alderman and chancing asking for the favor of seeing Jalek, but even if his request were granted, his meeting was sure to be supervised, therefore not allowing him to talk openly about what had happened between him and the Aukasian soldier. What else could he do though? There was no way he could get to Jalek.

  He began ascending the staircase to return to the lobby in defeat when the smell of cooking food again tickled his nose. He stopped short and pulled his pocket watch out again. It was still suppertime. A plan took shape in Yuiv’s mind, and with renewed determination, he jogged back up the stairs to the first landing and its kitchens.

  The corridor of the first basement floor was again empty, allowing Yuiv to locate the servant’s dressing chamber. He waited until the room was clear of servants, slipped in and rifled through a series of small closets before finding his size of the livery worn by the platter bearing servant he had spied earlier. Yuiv quickly disrobed, hiding his suit in an empty closet before donning the loose white shirt and black hose. For the most part the uniform fit, excepting the hose, which pulled something awful at his crotch. He spent a moment adjusting himself before accepting that he would just have to bear the discomfort. With a grimace, Yuiv strode out of the dressing room and made his way toward the kitchens proper.

  He entered through a set of swinging, double-doors and was greeted by the mealtime pandemonium one would expect in a kitchen that serviced an entire palace. Servants of all ages and genders crisscrossed the room, scooping up covered platters or depositing dirty dishes into washbasins. Fires crackled in the dozen or so brick ovens and several whole pigs rotated over the flames on spits. Yuiv’s stomach grumbled at the sights, smells, and sounds of so much food. He located the master of the kitchens, a fat man wearing a white smock spattered with a collage of flour, sauces, and other culinary remnants. The man was shouting at a group of chefs, his back fortunately to the kitchen’s entrance.

  Yuiv snuck through the kitchen, keeping as best he could in the Kitchen Master’s blind spot. He found a basket of freshly baked rolls which he scooped up and held tight as he began walking back toward the door. It would make a believable prisoner’s meal. Bread was all he was given when incarcerated in Lisidra. Bread and water. Yuiv swiped a tin pitcher from a counter as he hurried out of the kitchen. This would work. At least he hoped it would.

  He hurried down to the third basement, but hesitated a moment on the stairs before stepping into view of the guard. Knowing that he would be going through the forbidding dungeon door ignited a litany of fears. What if he was caught? Would they lock him up too? What would Sitrell or Sulia think? Would he ever be welcome back into their home? Would this change the Alderman’s mind about pardoning his crimes? Yuiv drew in a deep breath and steeled his nerves. It didn’t matter. Something inside him told him that it was vital that he speak to Jalek alone, let what would be, be.

  The guard snapped to attention as Yuiv marched down the stairs. He was about to present his rehearsed introduction when he distinctly heard Tyra’s voice whisper, Servants here don’t speak until spoken to. Wait for him to ask you your business. Yuiv closed his mouth and walked to stand just in front of the guard before stopping. Keep your eyes down! Tyra advised. Yuiv complied.

  “What’s this?” the guard barked in a gruff voice. “These whore spawn get bread too?”

  Fear surged inside of Yuiv as he registered the guard’s words. The prisoners must have already been served their dinner. Leftovers, Tyra whispered.

  “These’as leftovers”

  Master Hikane is in charge of the kitchens, Tyra coached.

  “Master Hikane sayed to give em to the prisoners.”

  The guard grunted, grabbing a ring of keys from his belt. Yuiv worked to suppress a panic attack as the familiar screeching of the hinges reminded him of Lisidra’s dungeon.

  “Go on,” the guard motioned nonchalantly.

  Yuiv dipped his head in a bow and then held his breath as he passed into the dungeon.

  “Wait!” the guard commanded.

  Yuiv halted, his blood freezing. He looked back, clenching his teeth together as the guard took a step toward him. The guard reached for Yuiv, and then to his surprise, stole a roll from his basket.

  “I haven’t had supper yet,” the guard said just before he tore a bite. “Knock when you’re done.” He turned, walked out, and closed the dungeon door.

  Yuiv released a deep sigh of relief. It worked! Now he needed to find Jalek’s cell. His heart sank as he t
ook in the sheer enormity of the dungeon. There were at least fifty rows of cells, and cells lining the outer block, all filled with prisoners. How am I going to find Jalek here?

  He’s in the outer block, Tyra whispered.

  Yuiv nodded to her, realizing afterwards the oddity of his action. He shook off the strangeness of being guided by a disembodied voice inside his head, moved off to his left, and walked at a brisk pace around the dungeon’s perimeter as he peered into each cell.

  A few of the prisoners heckled Yuiv as he jogged passed them. Others begged for bread, to which he complied in order to keep them quiet as much as to maintain the appearance of being an actual servant. Most of the kenneled men, however, just stared at him with broken, empty eyes.

  I can’t go back to prison! I can’t end up like them!

  Another rise of panic threatened to take him, but Yuiv forced it down. He needed to talk to Jalek alone. All other concerns were secondary.

  A full ten minutes elapsed before Yuiv finally found Jalek. The man was in a corner of the outer cellblock, kept alone and isolated from the other prisoners by several empty cells on his left and right. He was sitting cross-legged on the ground, his torso bare, muscled back facing the door of iron bars. Yuiv put down the now half empty basket of bread and carefully approached.

  “I told you I will not eat,” the man pre-empted in his sharp, choppy, Aukasian accent.

  Yuiv glanced at the cell floor and found old, spoiled meals, untouched by human hands. From the number of them, it looked to have been almost a week since Jalek had eaten.

  “Is me, Jalek,” Yuiv half whispered.

  The Aukasian man shifted so he was looking at Yuiv. If he was surprised to see him, he didn’t show it.

  “Why you’as not eatin?” Yuiv asked. “Trying to starve yerself to dead?”

  “Suicide?” Jalek snapped turning back to stare at the wall. “That is the way of a coward.” He shook his bald head. “I fast.”