by Cat Bruno
There was too little time to tell him what had occurred.
“I will explain later. Please, Aldric, just do as I ask,” she begged.
The mage watched her, yet said nothing, and, after a moment, rushed to grab his boots. Pulling the scuffed and scratched leather onto his bare feet, Aldric neared her, stumbling.
“What of the King?” he asked, reaching for the door.
In a whisper, she cried, “I do this for him! I will not have my vow broken.”
She reached for him, locking her fingers into his, and told him, “I mean to take him from here.”
Beneath her hand, his lanky fingers stiffened, as if he finally understood her plan.
“Without any knowing, I presume.”
When Caryss nodded, her hair fell across her face, covering her gray gaze. If Aldric could have seen her eyes, he would have seen fear there.
“And we cannot wait until the sun rises? What of Crispin?”
Aldric was fully dresses now and standing by the door, with one hand raised, as if to undo the ward.
When she answered, Caryss realized the truth of her words, as if she now sensed her path changing. Her words cracked, as if lightning, shards of white sparkling the darkened room.
“I must trust no one, not even the prince. If he cares for his father, he will come to understand what it is that I must do.”
“This is madness,” Aldric mumbled, pressing his hand against the door.
Before the door opened, she told him, “We must get Sharron and then the King. His door is unwatched, but heavily warded. If you cannot unbind it, then I know not what to do next.”
“The ward can be undone. But what of Niko and Kurtis?”
“They were bought with coin. It was unwise to trust them as we did.”
As she spoke, Caryss looked up at his slate-blue eyes, and saw surprise there.
“If you leave them, they will be questioned and killed,” he told her, with little emotion.
For the first time since she had entered his room, Caryss hesitated.
Without looking to him she said, “What happens after we leave here is of little concern to me.”
She knew not what he thought as the mage watched her, but when he opened the door, she inspected the empty hall before rushing to Sharron’s room. Without turning, Caryss realized that Aldric was several doors down, outside the King’s room. Just steps inside Sharron’s room, Caryss nearly screamed, covering her gaping mouth with the back of her hand.
“I knew that you would come.”
Her hand fell as she pushed the door closed.
“You half-scared me to death, Sharron. I had not thought you’d be awake,” Caryss whimpered, holding a hand to her chest as if she could not breathe.
Sitting on her bed, the other healer was fully clothed in a pale riding suit, her long skirt twirling around finely made, supple boots. Her hair, faded lighter by their moons spent in travel, was braided, hanging across her shoulder. Sharron looked as if she had long been ready, and Caryss envied the woman’s ease.
Rising from the bed, Sharron murmured, “What of Crispin? I heard him enter your room.”
Leaning into the door as her legs began to tremble anew, Caryss gasped at Sharron’s admission.
Finally, she mouthed, “He will not wake, but we must hurry nonetheless.”
When the other healer was beside her, Caryss embraced her and whispered, “You could have warned me not to come here at all.”
“For others, that might be how it works, but, for me, the sight has never been so easily tamed,” Sharron softly explained.
When they opened the door, a low humming throbbed through the still-empty hallway.
*****
Placing his hands onto the center of the door, Aldric watched as his fingers, scarred and misshapen from moon years as a mercenary, pulsed, rising and falling as if drumming. The ward was strong, much stronger than he had imagined. For a moment he wondered who had bound it, thinking of his brother as he remembered how gifted he had once been. The Mage-Guild was well practiced in ward-work, yet Aldric knew that few could design a ward as complex as the one guarding the King’s door. And even fewer could dismantle it.
Closing his eyes, he let the pulsing fill his fingertips like a swift-moving river. As if riding the waves, he weaved and swayed, his hands never straying from the door. The current was fast, pulling at him until he dropped to his knees. Around him, Aldric discovered the flow, riding it, faster and faster until he sensed it settling.
Rising again, he fought to control the stream, just long enough to create a break in the current. With one hand on the door, his other hand pulled free, waving as if it was not his own, dancing with the air.
Again he rode the wave as it spiraled down, dropping him again to his knees.
When next he stood, Aldric’s breathing was shallow and loud. With both hands on the door, he pulled at the ward, twisting it, remaking it until it answered to none but him.
In words as old as earth, he sang, calling for the ward to fall. Around him, the hallway blackened and his head fell, heavy, against the door, slamming into it until he saw nothing but darkness.
*****
“Help me get him into the room,” Caryss cried, although her words were no more than a whisper.
Both women had arms under the mage, dragging him into Herron’s room, while the King slept, croaking snores echoing through the room.
Across Aldric’s forehead was a large cut, blood falling into his eye and down his cheek. His life pulse beat strong, and the gash was not a deep one, and the women dropped him near the edge of the bed as they hurried toward the King.
After quickly removing the blankets that lay atop the King, Caryss realized that he was unclothed. Working together, the women had him dressed swiftly in a simple sleeping robe and loose sandals. In one corner hung an ornately embroidered jacket, yet it would easily mark him as king.
When they had finished, Sharron asked, “How will we move him?”
“I had not thought on that,” Caryss confessed, staring at the still-sleeping king.
Aldric, awake now and holding a hand to his head, mumbled, “There was a cart in the garden that we passed through earlier. If we can get him there, it will do.”
His words were hoarse, as if he had not spoken in moons, but his solution was a good one, and both women nodded, pulling the King until he, too, was in a seated position.
“Can you walk?” Sharron called back to the mage.
Waving a blood-soaked hand, Aldric stated, “Think not of me and see to the King.”
Out of one of her pouches, Caryss pulled a small flask. Uncorking it sent a strong smell of fennel and cacao into the room. Just before she was about to drop the dark liquid into the King’s mouth, she paused.
“Perhaps it would be best if he did not yet wake,” she said to Sharron, who agreed as she slipped her arms beneath the King’s shoulders.
Herrin had once been a large man, and even in Litusia did they hear tales of his robust appetite. Yet his illness had stripped him of that, and, now, he was smaller than both women, little more than skin-covered bones. While Sharron grabbed his upper half, Caryss moved to the bottom of the bed, turning his legs until Herrin appeared to be awake, seated on the edge.
“King Herrin,” Caryss half-sung, rubbing at his legs.
“King Herrin,” she called again as Sharron struggled to lift him.
Aside from some grumbling, the King said nothing, and his eyes remained closed.
“He is heavy with poppy milk,” Sharron informed her, although Caryss, too, had known such was the case.
Aldric stood behind them, but when Caryss looked to him, he was pale, more so than usual, and still he seemed to sway, as if he was aboard a ship. The undoing of the warding had taken a heavy toll on him, she knew, as her own life pulse quickened.
With little choice, she told Sharron, “Until we reach the cart in the courtyard, we will have to drag him, for even in his state, he is too heavy
for either of us to carry. We will leave the way we came since few know of that passage.”
“Aldric is too weak to ward us, I fear,” Sharron whispered.
Dropping the King’s feet to the floor, Caryss said, “Then we must hurry. And hope none are awake at this hour.”
As Caryss and Sharron shifted, each one gripping the King’s upper back and arm, Aldric croaked, “I will do what I can.”
With a slip of cotton pressed to his head, the mage led the way from the room, into the dimly lit hall as the healers dragged the King along the lushly carpeted floor, which softened their steps. The path seemed much longer now, ten times as much as when last they walked it, and Caryss breathed heavy and her pulse beat hard against her tunic as they made their way to the exit.
A faint humming followed them, and she knew that Aldric had somehow warded them, her skin prickling at the thought.
When they reached the door, Sharron softly said, “I will fetch the cart,” and hurried off.
No one spoke, even once she returned.
With one final tug, the King was half-thrown into the waiting cart, exposed and gaunt in his dressing gown under a fully-mooned sky. The cart was not large, and the King’s legs hung over the edge, but Caryss nearly wept when they rushed off, undetected, into the quiet night, the throbbing of the ward now gone as Aldric’s strength left him completely.
At some point, Aldric had placed his torn and graying coat over the King, draping him with it, and again they hurried on, the sky beginning to lighten. Soon, she worried, the King’s disappearance would be noted, and she forced herself to run faster, pushing the cart as she did so.
When the wheels of the gardening cart first found paver, Caryss stumbled, and Sharron took over. The outlying Lower Streets were dim, small orb-lights hanging from rusty poles. Jogging beside the cart, she noticed dirt and mud clinging to the edges of it and falling from its wheels.
None would think him to be their king, she thought, nearly laughing as she ran.
*****
8
Her job here was done, she knew, looking at the King once more.
Soon, it would be time to leave Rexterra, and, with each step away from the palace, Caryss had felt the noose of snakes about her neck loosening. The Lower Streets all seemed the same to her, even though they had long ago been designed in a neat grid. Slowing her step, she looked around, as if lost in a never-ending maze.
“I have lost my way,” she called to Aldric, who had slowed as well. Soon, all three stopped, the moon overhead silver and rounded, casting her watchful eye upon them.
With a snort that was akin to a laugh, Aldric told her, “You are not a child of the city, Caryss. Follow me.”
He continued on for several blocks before turning down a narrow street that led them away from the docks. The bricks became uneven, causing the cart to rattle and shake and the King to nearly tumble from it. Sharron lunged forward once as Herrin lurched, reaching for him and pushing him back into the cart.
“Tread carefully,” Aldric hissed in warning, before turning back to guide.
She said nothing in reply, finally recognizing where they were. Just ahead was Nahla’s door, and they paused just above the steps leading down to it. Sharron nodded at her, and Caryss nearly leaped down, half-falling into the brightly-painted door, banging her fist on it until her knuckles reddened.
Finally, the sound of a chain being unhooked on the other side could be heard, and Caryss dropped her hand to her side and waited.
When the door opened Nahla stood, wearing only a copper-colored skirt. Even her jewelry had been removed.
Caryss knew not what to say and was only able to mumble, “I need your help, Nahla.”
Nahla’s deep brown eyes scanned her and then looked past her, toward the others. When her gaze reached the King, she slowly shook her head.
“Do any know that you are here?” she whispered with words edged in disapproval.
“None know,” Caryss promised.
“Were you followed?”
“No. We escaped without any notice, but we have little time,” Caryss answered, knowing that Nahla recognized the King.
“Child, I had not thought to see you again, but I am not surprised that I was wrong.” Her words were softer now, and Caryss felt her eyes fill with tears, yet she fought to keep them unshed, ill at ease with such emotion.
“Come in, and make haste with it,” the woman scolded when she hesitated.
Aldric helped Sharron maneuver the cart down the steps, and, although it was loud, none were around to hear. When they were all inside, and the door closed, Nahla asked why they had come, yet she made no mention of the King.
“I need a ship,” Caryss explained. “We will not be able to leave through the gates. If we did manage to get the King through unnoticed, we would not be far gone before they tracked us down.”
“Which tells me that none know that you seek to leave Rexterra. Or that you have the King with you.”
Caryss’s cheeks burned red, but she stated, “The palace no longer seemed safe. For any of us.”
Nahla nodded. “You feared for the babe. You are wiser than when last I saw you, even though it was but days ago.”
Why does everyone think me a fool? Her thoughts were sharp, yet Caryss bit the words, tasting their bitterness on her tongue.
“Where do you wish to go?” the Islander asked.
Caryss looked around the room, noticing that nothing had changed since last they were there. Aldric was seated on Nahla’s only chair, and Sharron tended to his head. Strips of cotton rimmed his forehead, but the bleeding had ceased. His hood would cover much of it, Caryss thought. He was still weak with fatigue, yet she knew that he listened.
“To the Southern Cove Islands,” she finally confessed.
From across the room, Aldric cried, “What of Eirrannia?”
It was not unexpected, and Caryss stuttered, “Despite what some think, I am no fool. Crispin will look to the north first to find us. Eirrannia will wait for the girl.”
Ignoring the argument between mage and healer, Nahla chimed, “You seek the diauxie.”
They were all standing now, in a half-circle, although the King was dozing in the cart near the door. Nahla walked over to Herrin, removed Aldric’s coat, and tucked a thick, plush cream-colored blanket around him. When she finished, she ran her thumbs across his closed lids, whispering, as if in prayer.
“Why has he not woken?” Nahla questioned, her hands hovering near the King’s face.
Sharron, as if she did not fully trust the woman, stepped to the King, laying her own hand over him, as if she sought to protect him.
It was she who told Nahla, “His body has become dependent on poppy milk. Without it, he would likely not survive, yet, with it, he is as you see him now.”
“A drugged king is an easy one to control,” Nahla mused, cradling her hands against her chest, which was now covered in a nearly translucent scarf.
To Caryss, she asked, “Do all healers from the North collect broken men as you do?”
Her words, spoken in clear Common with the ringing lilt of the Islands, silenced the room. Not even Aldric responded.
“I know, child, I know,” Nahla finally interjected. “Your heart is a pure one, and your intentions good ones. But I fear that you do not understand men, especially the diauxie. He is not one who simply follows.”
Raising her hands, as if they were shield, Caryss told her, “It is not me whom he must follow.”
With a laugh that was as pretty as a song, Nahla called to Aldric, “And you warned her that I would be the one speaking in riddle.”
Growing annoyed, and with little time for jesting, Caryss stammered, “I will find him, and he will come to Cordisia with me. If you will not help me, be quick with your refusal so we can be gone.”
Nahla stopped laughing then, and her words became etched in stone, “None make demands of a diauxie, girl! With a look from him, you would be unable to move, as if you had b
ecome a marble statue. With a whisper from his lips, you would cry tears of blood. With a touch, you would burn as if aflame, your skin hot as if melting.”
“Will you offer us aid or not?” Caryss asked, her words nearly empty, as if she grew weary of such warnings.
Sighing deeply, Nahla said, “There is a man leaving for the Cove when the sun rises. As it is, I happened to see him earlier today and know this to be true. With the right amount of coin, he will offer you passage and say nothing of it. Unlike others, he prefers to sleep aboard his boat and will be there now. I will go now to speak with him while you wait here.”
“Aldric, give her the coin,” Caryss instructed.
As the mage handed her a bag heavy with silver, a gift from Willem, Caryss watched. Her eyes flashed white as she stared, and the room seemed to waver. There, just before her, stood Nahla still, but in place of the coin, she now held a dark-eyed, light-skinned babe with shining hair.
Before Nahla could leave, Caryss cried out to her, “He did not tell me of you. Or of your son.”
Gasping, her large white teeth almost in a scowl, Nahla hissed, “You are surely mad. I have no son, and no child has been born from my hips.”
Caryss looked to Aldric, who gently shook his head at her, as if to beg her to say no more.
Yet, she could not stop. Not now, not once she saw what would come of her meeting Nahla. Like most things, she knew once again, their meeting was more than just chance.
“I have seen you cradle him, at your breast. You will have a son.”
Walking, as if in a daze, the few steps to where Nahla stood, Caryss gripped her shoulders when she neared, and pleaded, “We met because we walk a similar path. Half a day ago, those paths crossed. Your son and my daughter will be kin. And kin to the darkness.”
“My path is my own, as it has always been. I will walk no other,” Nahla sharply replied, moving her fingers rapidly from heart to womb in what Caryss recognized as a protection spell.
She knew that she had not been wrong, yet Caryss asked the mage, “Will it be this way until the babe is born?”
