Crystal Warrior: Through All Eternity (Atlantean Crystal Saga Book 1)

by YatesNZ, Jen

  It required but the flutter of an eyelash to have him at her side. Almost before Gynevra had opened her mouth in greeting he'd launched into fulsome praise of how the color of the silk made her skin glow like a dewy rose, and how the style of her hair made her eyes seem bigger and yet more mysterious. On his arm she passed pointedly and haughtily by the King and his guests as if they'd been of less consequence than the wolf or the Qeggi servitor who dogged her heels.

  Taur, preparing to introduce the Poseidonian couple to his Queen as she approached, flushed a dull red, as she swept on by as if she'd not seen him. Swinging on his heel, with a flash of pure fury in his eye, he called, ‘Lord Maden, I require you to organize me a contract with Lady Pulina and Lord Danton—for mid-day tomorrow.’

  Gynevra faltered. Only momentarily, she assured herself. No one would've noticed. With a tilt of her chin and a stiffening of her spine she continued on through the Chamber to the outer courts. Here she politely disengaged herself from Lord Dimidon and called her bearers and personal guard. In moments she was being carried down the cliff road from the castle, Qerlim and the Qeggi Foab running at her side.

  Leaving the bearers tossing their managon discs and settling to betting and arguing, and knowing the guards would happily while away the time with the Temple delilahs, Gynevra walked along the path to the Garden of the Ancestors, Foab and Qerlim padding silently in her wake. Sinking onto a sunny seat by a softly singing fountain, she patted the space beside her indicating Foab should sit also. Knowing his place, Foab dropped to his haunches at her feet.

  Looking directly at her, he offered the thought, ‘Great Lady is deeply troubled.’

  ‘Aye Foab,’ Gynevra hissed between her teeth. ‘I long to cry and scream and beat something and it's so undignified to feel so!’

  ‘It is because the King desires the Lady Pulina?’

  Gynevra closed her eyes and ground her teeth together. She wouldn't cry.

  ‘He expects me to sit as witness. That's my expected role if he takes a contract. I've told him I can't do it. I won't do it!’

  Foab nodded and his eyes took on a faraway look as he gazed at the dance of the fountain against the sun. Qerlim sat on her haunches, her deep golden eyes flickering watchfully between the two.

  Foab looked back at Gynevra.

  ‘Great Lady needs to get away from the Castle, away from the city, a look at new scenes, maybe?’

  Gynevra felt the smile start somewhere inside her. It was as if a very cold place within her heart had suddenly been exposed to the warmth of the sun.

  ‘I've longed to visit the green fields across the harbor. In all the time I've been here I've scarcely left the city. Get a cart, Foab. Let's go sight-seeing. I don't want to see Varia. I don't want to see anyone. I want to run away. Just you and I and Qerlim. No guards. No bearers. Take this.’ She handed him a small leather bag from the pocket of her gown. ‘There should be more than enough gold in there to buy us some food and hire some sort of conveyance. Can you do it?’

  Nodding vigorously Foab was on his feet, eyes shining.

  ‘I only long to see Great Lady smile. I bring horse and cart. Lady, at bottom of garden is path to little used back entrance to Temple. Lady won't be seen there. Wait for me in shade of old igdrazil tree. I go quickly.’

  ‘I feel better already Foab. It will be an adventure.’

  Pointing his Lady towards the path he'd mentioned, he loped away through the garden and disappeared over the wall. Scarce able to keep a silly smile from spreading all over her face, Gynevra called Qerlim who was sniffing under a flowering cozon bush, and pulling her cloak about her face, set off to wait for Foab at the appointed place.

  Fuming from an encounter with his mother he desperately wanted to share with Gynevra but knew he wouldn't because she wasn't talking to him, Taur stormed into their apartments just on dusk. He'd timed it so she'd have had her evening bath and he'd have to hurry his and there'd be no time for talking, even had either of them been so inclined. He was still furious with her for disdainfully ignoring him before the whole court and he had no doubt she was furious with him for making the contract announcement in such a boorish fashion.

  Gossip had to be silenced. As King he had the people's expectation to live up to and many were questioning Gynevra's influence on this. He'd made as many friends as enemies by declaring Nyalda independent of Atlantis, and probably more of the latter by deposing Nudon for Gynevra who refused to join with him in sacred partnership. Allowing himself to be seen as more of a clod than an oaf at this point in time was very foolish. An oaf he must be, virile and rampant to satisfy every woman who came to him with a contract. His creative energies must be seen to be flowing. Gynevra would have to be made to accept that.

  She wasn't in the solar. Nor the bed-chamber. Nor was she in the bathing cavern. If she wanted to sulk, so be it. He yelled for Pog to come scrub his back.

  ‘Where's the Queen?’ he barked as soon as the little man appeared.

  Pog stopped in his tracks and stared hard at Taur. When the Master was in his bath he could look down on him and he made the most of the opportunity.

  ‘Master is angry with Pog? Or Pog is become dog?’ he asked haughtily.

  Taur seared the little man with a black stare which gradually lightened to an almost grin as he waggled one dripping finger at him.

  ‘Only you could get away with that—and you know it! Fortunately, you also know where you can get away with it. Try it in public and I'd have to punish you.’

  Pog did a little dance that brought him closer to the edge of the bath.

  ‘I think great King has been sitting on crown instead of wearing it, and horns—or horn—make him very uncomfortable! Ha! Ladies line up for little bull babies but King is suddenly content with wee bull baby growing in woman he holds in arms each night. But she, belly full of baby already, has no need of sire, which is what King does best. Oh dear! Oh dear! Puzzle it is, to be sure!’

  ‘Scrub my back, midget,’ Taur growled good-humoredly, ‘before I haul you in here and hold your scrawny little apology for a body under until it stops wriggling.’

  ‘Master-Sire! Master-Sire! It is too afraid I am to come near now!’ he cried, dancing up and down just out of reach and brandishing the long handled back-scrubber like a sword.

  As always the little man had teased him into a better humor. Taur sat up.

  ‘All right. All right. I apologize,’ he laughed. ‘I'm just a boorish oaf as I'm sure the Queen would agree—if she were here. D'you know where she is?’

  ‘No Master. Pog not seen Queen since she left Castle this morning—round about same time Bull of Nyalda, greatest contract sire of all time you understand, announced intention of scrogging ve-ery beautiful Lady of Poseidonia. You want I go ask Difleer?’

  ‘Yes,’ Taur answered gruffly. No doubt he deserved the dwarf's censure and in such a situation he understood Pog would be hard pressed for he'd come to love Gynevra almost as much as he loved his Master-Sire. Resting his head against the edge of the pool he relished the moment of stillness and quiet. Sometimes he longed for the simple, straight-forward life of a warrior, fighting by daylight and sleeping or whoring by dark, though the thought was fleeting, hustled out of his mind by the wry admission that the only woman he wanted in his arms was Gynevra of Poseidonia.

  ‘Difleer too has not seen Queen since this morning,’ Pog called above the slapping of his fiadi as he hurried back into the bathing cavern. ‘Difleer say Queen go Temple for healing with Archinus. Not returned yet.’

  A prickle of unease ran down Taur's spine. A chill autumn wind was rising and making its presence felt in open places. Rain-clouds were banking up in the north.

  ‘What in Cronos does she mean by staying out this late? Scrub my back so I can get out of here.’

  Dried and dressed Taur entered the sacred alcove carved into the mountainside off the Queen's solar. Quieting himself and focusing all his psychic energy he sought to telondem Gynevra but received no response.
She’d deliberately blocked him out. Fear curled its ugly tendrils through his belly. Cloaba! Where was she?

  Switching his concentration to Archinus Varia he strove to keep calm enough to hold the connection. Moments later he opened his eyes and stared blankly at the ornate gold glyphs painted on the wall before him.

  Varia hadn't seen Gynevra at all but she would make inquiries and get back to him. The waiting was interminable, his mind a festering mire of thoughts he refused to entertain. When Varia reported there was no sign of Gynevra, Foab or Qerlim, and that the Queen's bearers and personal guard were gambling in the outer courtyard and had been waiting there for her since late morning, pain ripped through the core of him almost bringing him to his knees. Terror followed so swiftly it pinned him to the chair. He began pleading to Ist and Asar, to Great Ra and even Ancient Cronos in fear for his Golden One, and cursing the emptiness of his arms and whatever it was that made women want to bed him, and he them. In a massive leap of consciousness, Cadal Isidor II of Nyalda admitted to himself he didn't care if he could never physically join with her again or if his people jeered at him for a clod, he wanted, needed, to hold her in his arms, forever.

  The child was due to be birthed in a matter of days. Where was she if not in Hecanil? Where else would she go? Should he be grateful Qerlim and Foab were with her? What use were a mute Qeggi and a wolf if she went into labor?

  Cronos! Why was he sitting here babbling to the Gods when he should be out searching for her?

  In minutes he had the Castle in an uproar, with people darting in all directions at once, scouring every chamber, alcove, vault and adjunct to the massive cliff-side sprawl of Heceuda Castle. When this proved unproductive the entire Castle Guard was roused and sent down into the city to search every house and question every citizen. There was much muttering among the ranks, especially among those who'd just come off day duty and were looking forward to a night's relaxation. But the King's orders were succinct.

  ‘No one rests until the Queen is found.’

  Taur discovered that keeping people's eyes, ears and legs busy searching didn't still their tongues. Some were heard to comment they'd always thought the Queen strange and unstable—just like all foreigners. Many of the women took care the King should know he was at fault going against custom and agreeing to siring contracts while his partner was pregnant. He found himself beset on every side and often surprised at who supported Gynevra in what many were calling her protest against his decision to honor the contract.

  Even he couldn't pretend her disappearance was anything else, though at first he tried. Pog's snide little innuendoes and Difleer’s fuming black looks, he understood and accepted. His lovely Gyn'a had stolen both their hearts and if they had to choose between King and Queen, Pog at least would be sadly stretched. Over and over through the night there were incidents and comments Taur found himself wanting to share with Gynevra just to hear her droll observations and her laughter. She'd have been intrigued by the berating Maden gave him on her behalf, and quite startled to discover that ‘starchy, oily Maden’ as she was wont to call him, was oddly sensitive to her feelings in this matter.

  But it was Movuon's bitter invective he wanted most to share with her, for it had been directed against himself and not Gynevra as they both would have expected. He knew she'd been sorely troubled by Nudon's continued hostility and he'd privately considered his mother's attitude a contributing factor to her low spirits.

  The exchange between mother and son, the second for that evening, was dramatic and public. Taur was still smarting from it when day dawned with blustery winds and showers scudding across the harbor, a reminder that winter was but a breath away. Following his men from one ever more dingey Qeggi habitation to another in the lower city, despair edged into his heart as he waited outside yet another meagre hovel, while one of the men questioned the inhabitants. He'd not stop until they'd questioned every citizen and turned out every dark corner of every structure in the city. What he'd do after that if they hadn't found her he could scarcely begin to think.

  His only comfort was that she had to be in Fyr Heceuda somewhere for even without the Energy Web, she’d not have risked her unborn child to the intense energy of an apport.

  Dragging a hand through the beard stubble on his cheeks, he gazed about at this unfamiliar part of his city. The Qeggi might be dogs according to Paggi lore, and be content to live in one-roomed hovels like animal shelters, but they kept their surroundings impressively clean. Perhaps he should—

  ‘Sire! This man has news of the Queen!’

  The warrior who'd gone into the hovel at his back, emerged now, hauling a large, dark Qeggi after him whose features were disturbingly familiar. Taur was more interested in what the man could tell him than in who he was until the warrior introduced him as Goma, brother of Foab.

  Excitement fizzed through him and for the first time through that long night he felt a sliver of hope.

  ‘Foab, the mute, is your brother?’

  ‘Ta’a, Sire,’ the man whispered, eyes wide with apprehension.

  ‘There's naught to fear, man,’ the King said gruffly. ‘Would you know where Foab is?’

  ‘Nay—but—’

  ‘Just tell the King what you told me,’ the warrior coaxed him. ‘Likely there'll be a reward in it for you.’

  Taur immediately dug into the small pouch secreted in the belt of his kirt and produced a handful of gold.

  Never taking his eyes from the gleam of the gold, Goma said, ‘He came—yesterday—to Fabo the Ostler's—where I work—he had a bag of money—to hire a horse and cart—he showed me two fingers—could be he wanted it for two hours or two days—he can't talk no more—but he gave me enough money to buy the horse—so I don't worry! I understood it was for the Queen.’

  ‘What color horse?’

  ‘Black with white nose and one white front hoof.’

  ‘The cart?’

  Goma shrugged.

  ‘Small—two-wheeled—with a couple of sacks of chaff in it to sit on.’

  Taur winced. The picture of his Gyn'a in such a conveyance was too vivid. Where the hell was she? Where would she go?

  He tossed the coins to Goma and with a gruff word of thanks, strode back along the street to where they'd left their own horses. At least he now knew where to look. If she wasn't in the city and she wasn't in the Castle and she'd hired a horse and cart, the only place she could be was out along the inner harbor road somewhere. The more he thought on that, the more sense it made. How often had she talked of visiting the far green fields and farms at the head of the harbor? How often had he promised to take her there, one day?

  Dismissing all but the Captain and two volunteer warriors, Taur set out at a steady pace along the harbor road questioning at every house they passed. Several reported seeing the cart and had recognized the mute Qeggi driving it, but not the woman passenger concealed by her cloak. Always the cart had been moving towards the head of the harbor.

  Where in Hyades were they? He'd make the Qeggi arabo wish he'd received the death sentence at Lomy's hands. And in the next breath he knew he wouldn't. His Golden One would never forgive him. More than anything he wanted her forgiveness—after he found her safe. A clod he was for sure, which thought only added to the grimness of his silence.

  The rain had eased with the deepening of night over the land but the wind sliced down from the mountains with an edge bitter enough to chap skin and numb fingers. Cold, hunger and weariness was starting to take its toll when they approached Randa’s goat farm in the hills above the south end of the harbor. Elbow on his knee and head propped on his hand Taur sat and waited for the Captain to make enquiries of old Randa. His heart was a great raw lump in his chest and he was finding it more and more difficult to breathe. He was aware many of the men, especially other Sons of the Dragon, had looked askance at him for making such a fuss, believing if one woman didn't want him there were many more who did. Just so would he have felt himself had it been any woman other than Gyn
evra.

  He was just thinking about sending the men home ahead so he could follow and not be seen if a tear should slither down his cheeks, when the Captain came running from the house, grinning and shouting, ‘They're here, Sire! They're here!’

  Heart leaping in his chest with a great thud, he started upright, the horse prancing beneath him.

  ‘Where?’

  The Captain pointed to a group of goat-herder's huts above the track around the distant hillside.

  ‘The farmer says a woman with a mute servant came looking for somewhere to stay late yesterday. He rented them the hut at the top end.’

  For a moment Taur grinned stupidly back at the Captain in the dim light of their crystal lantern, savoring the moment of relief. Then jabbing the horse with his heels before the depth of his emotion became evident, he galloped into the darkness towards the hut.

  The animals at the Castle were housed better, he thought with dismay. Either Gynevra had lost her mind to come to such a place, or she really did have strong feelings about him taking other women. He could see a rush light burning through the small, unglazed window as he approached and could hear the peculiar rasping, vibration of Foab humming.

  Leaping from the horse, hunger and cold forgotten, he flung aside the hessian door curtain and stooped into the room to stare around the interior. Stirring something in a small blackened pot over the tiny hearth, Foab looked up and his hand stilled. If Taur had been in a mood to notice, there was relief in the black depths of the Qeggi's eyes. But in that moment the great Paggi King had eyes only for the woman on the squalid little sling bed in the corner with the wolf curled up beside her. Tiny fire devils danced in her hair from the flickering rush light and her eyes were wide with a gamut of emotions from truculent fear to tremulous delight.