about them for protection. Nicholas called a halt at a crossroads
and gave her a hunk of bread and a flask of water.
When she was finished eating, he called to half the men.
“Take her to Montanyard.”
“You don’t understand,” Sera said. “I have to go east, to
my home. Is that so terrible a crime?”
“Not someday, when the world is a safe and decent place.
But you’ll never survive such a journey alone, and I can’t afford
the men it would take to guard you beyond my borders.
Especially now, when even the borders are no longer safe.” He
stared bleakly into the distance.
She hated the look on his face, the anger, and the weariness.
“Selonia was destroyed,” he said.
“Dear Heaven.” All that she had hoped, all that she had
been running to, now shattered.
“You’ve never seen Selonia, have you? It was a lively
summer town, full of theatres and assembly rooms and baths.
The buildings were put to the torch two days ago.”
“Who would do such a thing?” She thought of the people
who worked in Selonia, the attendants who helped the wealthy
take the waters, the maids and seamstresses and stonemasons
who lived in Selonia. “Oh, Nicholas, how many were hurt?”
Nicholas turned his head at the low break in her voice. His
expression softened at what he must have seen in her face.
“Perhaps there’s another way to convince you that your place
lies here, helping me keep my country safe. Come with me, and
you can see for yourself.”
The men fell in beside them again, and they cantered down
the eastern road.
***
Emmanuel Aestron walked through the Temple Square,
acknowledging the respectful bows of the young men and
women gathered to debate philosophy at the colonnade. He
inhaled the sweetness of the wisteria vines curling about the
Doric columns and festooning the marble trellis shading the
students as they resumed their logical arguments. He passed
the marketplace, nodding to the farmers whose stands brimmed
with jeweled fruits and vegetables piled in artistic patterns of
color and shape. The scent of fresh apples and autumn
strawberries followed him as he wound through streets lined
with perfectly proportioned marble buildings, their columns
topped with friezes of Arkadia’s heroes and Mages.
At the palaestra of Demosthenes, he turned in, pausing in a
small courtyard. Two lads, just bathed after wrestling by the
looks of their wet hair and fresh bruises, reclined on benches
beneath a tree, sipping water. Seeing him, they both sprang to
their feet and bowed.
“Hypocritas, how good to see you,” he said to one of them,
the son of a friend. “Is my grandson here?”
“Yes, my lord Emmanuel. He won his bout. Now he is in
the bath. Shall I fetch him for you?” At his nod, the boy ran off
and returned a moment later with Jacob Augustus, who
outstripped him as he quickly crossed the courtyard, his towel
hanging over one shoulder, a loincloth affixed to his hips for
decency’s sake.
Emmanuel could never look at Jacob Augustus without
pride welling up from some deep place inside him. His body, as
beautiful as it was, exemplified the perfection of his mind and
his spirit. Strength and harmony encompassed it, a result of the
work Emmanuel knew Jacob put into it. Tall and strong, his
specialty was the pankration, the no-holds-barred wrestling that,
for some reason, soothed Jacob’s soul while disciplining bone
and sinew. Since Sera had gone from Arkadia, Jacob had used
this outlet more often than in the past.
“Walk with me,” he told Jacob.
Jacob nodded and they strode into the bright sunlight of
the street. “What news?” he asked his grandfather.
“She tried to escape. The king has found her again. He takes
her to Selonia.”
“Where she’ll feel more sympathy for these Outlanders.
Rostov is clever. He ties her to him, and to his world.”
Hearing the bitterness in Jacob’s voice, Emmanuel sighed,
reaching within for forbearance. He knew he owed his grandson
an explanation and didn’t much relish the reaction he anticipated
from Jacob. The boy would doubtless hate him for days before
he understood the right reason that prompted his actions. Best
to get it over with, he thought.
By now, they had left the city center and walked through a
quiet neighborhood filled with houses. Emmanuel stopped at a
bench beneath a willow at the edge of a public park. He sat and
motioned for Jacob to do the same.
In the quiet, he could hear the buzzing of bees, and across
the green, a group of girls and boys sat, concentrating in the
stillness on brightly colored balls balanced in the air above them.
Some of them had gotten their balls to spin. A tutor watched
them carefully. In this way, the more gifted among them would
be chosen to attend the academy, learning to expand their powers
for the good of Arkadia’s citizens.
He wanted to weep for Sera, all alone in a strange world,
without the comfort of a mentor as the startling strength of her
power began to evidence itself.
Emmanuel turned his attention to his grandson, who sat on
the grass at his feet, plucking the blades one by one with his
restless fingers. “You have a right to be angry with me, Jacob,”
he said. “It is my fault that Sera has gone to the Outlanders.”
Jacob shrugged. “No Grandfather. You have reason to let
her stay for a while.”
“But it preys on you, that you must trust this Nicholas
Rostov to keep her safe. I have to tell you why Jacob, and that
I had more to do with Sera’s flight than you believe.”
Jacob sprang up before him, his blue eyes, so like Sera’s
narrowed. “What do you mean?”
Emmanuel remained seated, wishing calm, watching his
grandson’s face soften a bit, feeling his mind open again to him.
“You know that Sera is not only Arkadian. She is the daughter
of an Outlander king, and thus, the lawful heir to the throne of
a troubled nation, should she wish to choose her heritage.”
Jacob nodded, his gaze on Emmanuel’s face.
“Your love for me has kept you from realizing the truth. Do
you believe that I did not look into the soul of the Outlander
Sera saved and asked us to heal? Do you think I did not know
he lusted for riches, that he held honor cheap and would easily
sacrifice it to get what he wanted? Do you really suppose that
any thief could have stolen the Heart of Fire from its resting
place if I had not wished it free?”
Jacob’s burning gaze seared Emmanuel. “You arranged for
her exile in the Outlander world, for her captivity, for the
brutality and shame she has suffered and seen?”
Emmanuel’s heart cracked beneath the weight of his
grandson’s outrage. “I did not foresee the Nantal burning her
Hill cloak. But I knew that Nicholas Rostov would visit Hadar’s
<
br /> palace.” He stood and reached out for his grandson.
At the touch of Emmanuel’s hand on his shoulder, Jacob
flung himself away, staring at him in fury. “You wished her to
go to him as a hetaera?
“Jacob.” Although his power was strong, Jacob could not
withstand the compulsion of Emmanuel’s voice. “It is in the
worst of circumstances that the true nature of a man reveals
itself. I wished to see what Nicholas Rostov was made of. And
I wished for Sera to see it and choose her destiny freely.”
“You cannot keep her safe. You cannot watch her every
minute.”
Emmanuel slowly sat again on the bench. “You know the
Outlander tale of the Garden?” He motioned, and Jacob dropped
to the bench beside him.
“From their holy book?”
“I was thinking of the story by their John Milton, that
Paradise Lost,” Emmanuel said. “You remember?”
Jacob nodded.
“Sera, like Adam and Eve, is gone from the Garden now.
Danger is all around her, and greed and hatred. But she has
something she never had here. She has free will. She has the
right to grow up, like Adam and Eve, and the right to choose
her destiny.”
“ ‘And the world was all before them, where to choose
Their place of rest, and Providence their guide,’” Jacob
said slowly.
“Yes. Do you understand?”
Jacob gave Emmanuel a reluctant nod. “I understand. But I
do not like it.” He looked at Emmanuel, his face filled with
misery. “Grandfather, if the time comes when I think I must, I
shall challenge you on this and bring her back, myself.”
***
Selonia was a charred ruin. From what Nicholas could see
as he and Sera rode into the little city, the ravagers had burst
upon the spa town and destroyed everything. This was a crime
of madmen who used their foggy religious rationalizations as
an excuse to terrorize the country and sap it of its will to resist.
They had not only torched the Georgian assembly rooms and
the beautiful villas of the wealthy. They had systematically razed
the workers’ small row houses.
People were everywhere, dull-eyed with shock, muttering
or crying out amidst the blackened timbers of houses. The smell
of charred wood and stone and the nauseating odor of burnt
flesh clung to the air. Nicholas wanted to tear apart the men
who had done this to his people, to slice each one of them into
shreds. But they had disappeared into the terrain like vipers
after a satanic feast. And he was left to pick up the pieces.
“Weakling. Unfit to be king,” his father’s voice whispered
to him. Nicholas had no answer to the damning doubts. But fit
or not, he was all Laurentia had.
So he left Sera at his temporary headquarters while he and
Andre met with the mayor of Selonia and his council. Late into
the night, the leaders of the town sat with him, giving their
reports of the damage in property and human lives. He gave
orders to a group of soldiers to scavenge the countryside for
supplies and food. He delegated authority, requisitioned
supplies, and made countless other decisions for hours. By the
time he had finished all he could do for the evening, he was
bone weary and still fighting his outrage against the
Brotherhood.
He and Andre walked back to his headquarters through the
empty streets of the city. He could smell the acrid smoke still
smoldering from the ruins, see an occasional scavenger picking
through the rubble that remained of his home.
“I don’t know whether I can control the rage, Andre. I want
to find them and kill each one of them—slowly. But someone
is giving them the money for arms, someone who wants to
weaken us and then conquer. If we don’t find the man backing
these terrorists soon, the country will suffer more of the same.”
“Napoleon?” Andre asked.
“Perhaps. If he takes us first, he can easily plough through
Jehanna. Beaureve will hold out for a while, but he’ll have all
the harvest from Laurentia and Jehanna to feed to his army.”
Nicholas rubbed his tired eyes. “If I could get close to that
devil and kill him in cold blood, I would in a minute, and sleep
like a baby afterward. It would be justice,” he said. “I wish I
were one of the Hill folk. I could foist all of this baggage off on
the Mage and go find a woman.”
Sera, he thought. To go as deeply into her body as she could
take him. To hide from this horror in the scent and heat of her.
Some time in the night, he had fallen asleep, only to awaken
on top of her in the morning’s gray dawn. His hands had been
all over her, his mouth following. And he had wanted closer,
wanted deep, wanted with an urgency that hit him like a wall of
flame. He had rolled away from her to stand with his body
clenched in heat and desire. Fight as he might against it, the
never-ending lust simply grew stronger.
“You’re too tired to do any more. Hell, I’m too tired to
think, period.” Andre rubbed his hands through his hair until
the blond curls flew in total disarray.
They had reached the large tent set up for Nicholas. Andre
gave him a rough squeeze on the shoulder and propelled him
inside.
“Get something decent to eat and go to sleep. We’ll know
more what to do in the morning.”
Nicholas had just entered when an aide rushed into the tent,
followed by a breathless messenger, his face sweat streaked
and dirty with dust from the road. The messenger knelt on one
knee.
“Lieutenant Mirovsky, Sire,” he gasped. “I come from
Count Vorchov.”
Vorchov—Laurentian Ambassador to Russia!
The messenger’s face was a mask of fright. “Bonaparte has
taken Moscow. The Russian troops under the command of Prince
Kutuzov have retreated to the Kaluga road. What shall we do,
Sire?” Mirovsky’s gaze clung to Nicholas, as though he could
magically halt Bonaparte’s inexorable march toward Laurentia.
Well. One more nail in the coffin, he thought wearily.
“Thank you, Lieutenant. First you will rest and bathe. In the
morning, I’ll send you back to Count Vorchov with instructions.
You have my gratitude.”
The lieutenant pressed his hand to his heart and rose.
Bowing smartly, he followed the aide de camp out of the tent.
Napoleon would winter in Moscow. By spring, he would
be on the road south. How would Nicholas protect his people
against an overwhelming army when he couldn’t save Selonia
from a band of terrorists?
He sat down on a camp chair set up before his traveling
desk and leaned on his elbows, his head in his hands. He sat
there for what seemed a long time, dead and empty. He heard a
shift of canvas, and then felt the breeze on the back of his neck.
Attempting to obliterate the impression of weakness he must
have made when thus caught unaware, he straightened his back
/> and looked over his shoulders, expecting his young aide de camp
to be standing in the doorway.
Sera stood there with a tray. The lantern light formed a
nimbus around her hair. Her eyes were a deep, soft blue as she
looked at him. All of the life in her seemed to surge toward him
in that look. It made him want to go to her and hold her without
having to speak, forever. But he was frozen in shame.
She walked to the desk and set down the tray. Without a
word, she pulled the other camp chair close to his and sat down.
He could feel her shoulder, a light, warm solidity against his
arm. He fisted his hands in his lap, digging his nails into the
flesh of his palms. He would not break down in front of her
now. He would not reveal what a fraud he was.
Out of the corner of his eye, he could see her profile as she
stared straight ahead. Her hand settled on one of his, soothing
it. It hurt to swallow. He shut his eyes, his teeth bared like an
animal, fighting the need to let her see how much he needed
this. Her fingers stroked, gentle, relentless against the resistance
of his fist. His own hand betrayed him. With a sigh of defeat, he
felt it tremble and open. She turned it, palm up. He squeezed
his eyes tighter, only feeling the softness of her fingers as she
laced them through his.
He shook his head, stiffening, mouth tight. He wouldn’t
crack. He wouldn’t.
But he couldn’t control the break in his voice. “A better
king would have kept them safe.”
Her voice was soft in the still air of the tent, her fingers
magic, melting the frozen musculature as she lifted his hand
and, turning it over, traced a gentle circle on the palm. “I saw a
woman today at the children’s center. She had lost two of her
own children and was there to find her sister’s babe. She had
seen me ride in with you, Nicholas. She asked me to tell you,
from all of them, how much hope your coming has brought
with it. She said as long as you are their king, nothing will defeat
them. She called you the hope of Laurentia. Nicholas, they love
you here. They know what you do for them.”
So. They talked to Sera. While he hid from the people, sick
with what his lack of foresight had wrought on Selonia. And
she had spoken to his people, and they had trusted her.
And because of her, they trusted him.
Lennox, Mary - Heart of Fire.txt Page 13
