by Sam Farren
“That… makes sense,” Castelle said, and almost didn’t hate saying it.
Hundreds filled the square before the castle. So many walked past it every day, on their way to work, on their way to market or to visit friends or family, and they never dwelt on what had once lurked within. They never spared a thought of the symbol of power it had stood as for centuries, or all that had unfolded within it. It was incredible to think that most people did not spend each hour of the day lingering on what had happened to the Greysers and everyone they held close.
It was a part of history, still sore but far from festering, there to keep them on the right path.
A memorial had been erected in front of the castle. A polished piece of marble stood fifteen feet high, catching what little sunlight there was to be found. Flowers were scattered across the stepped platform it stood upon, some bright, others withered.
Castelle stopped to read the words carved into the stone, set in gold.
In Memory Of Those Who Gave Their Lives In The Great Uprising
1303—1309
They Rest Now With The Gods, Taken By The Embracer Too Soon,
Lest We All Be Crushed By Tyranny
“Six years,” Castelle murmured. “To me, it lasted a day. It all ended as quickly as it began.”
Eos bowed her head and said, “It did not end there, in the same way it did not begin in 1303 and end in 1309. Those are clearest ways we can record what happened.”
The books she’d read in Reed’s cottage couldn’t encompass all that had unfolded. They couldn’t reach back to the first ripples of discontent or find a single law the Greysers passed that made the people decided that it was enough; they’d finally gone too far. It had started decades ago, centuries back. It had worn the people down bit by bit, but for so long, they hadn’t known what they could do. They hadn’t known how to fight back, for the Greysers had all the gold, all the resources, all the unquestioned power.
It wasn’t until 1303 that the people finally realised there were more of them than there were royals and nobles.
Castelle turned from the memorial with as much respect as she could hold in her chest. Fourteen years on and there were still flowers on the steps. How long would people keep laying them? Had Castelle been in the city, had she never escaped Torshval, some part of her would’ve been there every day, knelt beneath the colossal monument that was too small to begin listing a fraction of those lost to the whims of her mother’s rule.
“Come on. Let’s not keep Brackish waiting any longer,” Castelle said.
Eos fell into step next to her, and the pair walked without following one another. Brackish knew where she was, no matter how Torshval had changed, and she knew where she needed to be. The certainty ran through Castelle without controlling her. There was a gentle pull far from them, emanating from the other side of the city.
Something called to Brackish as it had on Fél, drawing her towards the coast and the spirits that lingered along it.
“Do you think this will be it?” Castelle asked as the streets grew quieter, the buildings further apart. “Do you think Brackish will find what she’s looking for here?”
“I cannot say. But you saw her on Fél. She could not remember herself, could not pull her own face from her memory. Ava Greyser was there, clear as any living person, but Brackish was a mess of shadows and light. I believe all she wants is to remember who she was. What her name was,” Eos said.
“History has certainly done a good job of erasing her. How is it that you see the spirits, Eos? I had to touch one to make sense of the blue lights, yet you don’t have to do a thing. They never draw close to you, either. Why is that?”
Eos walked a little faster, shoulders squared. There was an answer, deep down, even if Eos tried to forget it as Brackish had forgotten her true name.
“I do not know,” Eos said.
Nothing in her tone changed, but her fingers curled towards her palms.
“You’ve never lied to me before, Eos. Please don’t start now,” Castelle said, catching up with her.
“It is not a lie,” Eos said, hands as fists, now. “It is—I cannot—”
“You don’t want to talk about it?” Castelle asked.
Eos stopped in the middle of the street, eyes on the road ahead, then on Castelle. Something in her threatened to tremble but would never break, would never free itself in front of others.
“I cannot. It is not that I don’t wish to, but—I have been close to the spirits more times than I can count.”
Castelle touched Eos’ shoulder, gentle but far from tentative. She knew what she was doing, understood the path her fingers would take. Without rushing, she pressed her palm to the side of Eos’ neck, thumb on her jawline, fingers pressed to Eos’ deepest scar, running alongside her eye.
Eos didn’t flinch.
She stood as a statue, gaze fixed over Castelle’s shoulder.
“What happened to you, Eos?”
“These are not my only scars,” Eos said, fingers wrapping around Castelle’s wrist.
They didn’t run as deep as King Mykos’. They hadn’t been enough to sever Eos from this world, for once and for all. The words rattled around Castelle’s head, accusations turning to questions she had no right to ask, and died on her lips.
Eos guided Castelle’s hand from her face. Castelle splayed her hand across Eos’ stomach, fingertips digging into her side.
Eos held her gaze all the while, silently daring her to ask more, to push her. There were things she couldn’t speak of, things Castelle could not bear to hear, and they both knew it. Something had shifted between them, something that was not enough, something that was too much.
Castelle conjured the scar beneath her hand, beneath the fabric of Eos’ shirt, and prayed it was worse in her mind than it was on flesh. For all death had stalked her throughout her life, Castelle had no scars to show of it. The bear trap threatened her leg, not her life. She could walk through a crowd without having no choice but to show the world all she’d been through.
“I do not speak of these things because I do not wish to,” Eos said quietly, releasing Castelle’s hand. “I hear the way you speak of your past, the things you share, and I wish…”
Eos paused. Her eyes flickered away for a brief second and Castelle dropped her hand.
“I wish my thoughts did not stop dead. That they did not spend every waking moment surging through my head, only to fall silent as soon as I have the opportunity to speak them,” Eos said.
Castelle smiled in soft understanding and took Eos’ hand, hoping it wasn’t too much. She chastised herself as she let Eos’ words wash over her. She’d spent so much of their time together thinking her dull, head empty, personality void, all because she’d never been given a chance to voice her every thought.
Castelle had been taught nothing mattered so much as her words. As Queen, they would be more powerful than anything she ever did. They would send ripples across the archipelago that would become waves, once she took her rightful place upon Torshval’s throne.
But not everyone’s voices had been elevated so. There was so much to Eos, so much more than anyone could understand from a glance, from the silence that poured from her like blood from a wound that had never quite closed.
“You don’t have to say these things for my benefit, Eos. You don’t have to share what you can’t, what hurts to speak of, but if you ever want to, I’ll be here. I’ll listen,” Castelle assured her, squeezing her hand.
How powerful Eos’ voice would be, once she finally found it. It would drown out every thought that’d ever rattled around Castelle’s head.
Eos’ answer was nothing but a curt nod.
She freed her hand from Castelle’s, straightened her shirt, and said, “Brackish is beyond restless. We aren’t far, now.”
There was no sting in it. Castelle didn’t pull her hand back, embarrassed she’d ever reached for Eos.
She saw quiet gratitude, a relief she didn’t know she’d nee
ded, turn to hope in Eos’ eyes. She’d speak of these things, one day. It might not be soon, but she’d talk of the spirits that revealed themselves to her, the scars on her face and hidden beneath her clothing, and all that’d happened in Nor.
Castelle followed close behind. There was more to Eos, to this silent, contemplative woman, than she’d ever fathomed. Whatever had happened between her and the King was inconsequential. Castelle couldn’t begin to understand what had unfolded between them, or what had led Eos to that point.
Her curiosity dissolved. Eos’ past wasn’t hers to intrude upon, but her present was right there, open for Castelle to see, if only she took the time to look.
Chapter Twenty-Six
It was the shortest leg of their journey thus far. After months crossing land and sea, never knowing if rest would reach them before a swarm of bounty hunters did, moving from the centre of a city to its ancient outskirts was absurd.
They hadn’t travelled far enough to deserve resolution or progress. Castelle’s leg didn’t ache enough to bring anyone closure.
Clearing the old city had been a passion-project of Castelle’s mother, a hobby of little consequence. So much had been knocked down, filled in, and built-over, but there were parts, sunken into the ground, the spirits would not release.
Over the decades Queen Marcella’s rule span, the Queen had sacrificed dozens of lives in the name of having more land to build upon.
The old city was surrounded by warning signs, with a low fence set around the perimeter. It was a sore on the landscape, but only because the living made it so. Beyond the fence Eos helped Castelle climb over, the dilapidated ruins entwined with the earth. Moss grew upon stone, and ivy tangled around fallen columns and solitary walls. Between the solemn structures, the grass grew high, wildflowers blooming, even now.
So much of the archipelago was grey, green, and brown, repeating itself over and over, but the ancient city held the lost colours: yellows and reds, flowers smaller than the tip of Castelle’s finger, surrounded by bluebells that blossomed nowhere else on Fenroe.
The spirits had loved their city, once upon a time. Whatever hurt they’d endured was enough to bind them to the earth, but not enough to erase all the joy that had filled their worlds.
Brackish shone in Eos’ hand, bringing new life to the flowers.
“Is this the right place?” Castelle asked.
Whispering was the respectful thing to do.
“Brackish seems to think so,” Eos said, voice just as low. “She says she was here a long time ago, when Torshval was still Torshval, yet nothing like the city behind us.”
“Ava Greyser kept the name, when the capital was founded,” Castelle said. For all she’d learnt of the city’s origins, she’d never once wandered the half-mile it took to reach the place it’d all started. “The original Torshval wasn’t much of a city. Two, maybe three thousand people lived here. Back then, Yarrin was considered the heart of Fenroe.”
Brackish flashed brightly. Eos patted the flat of the blade.
“There’s so much more than I imagined. My mother spoke of the old city as though there were a few crumbled buildings, foundations you could trace in the dirt, but people still live here, don’t they?” Castelle said, climbing atop a jagged wall to get a better look.
“In a sense,” Eos agreed.
There was more to it than any story could’ve prepared her for. Her mother had spoken of the ancient Torshval as something that’d fallen thousands of years ago, rather than a city built over throughout the last few centuries.
The damage was down to something other than time. The old city hadn’t been abandoned in favour of something better. Craters lined the remaining walls, terrible chunks missing from the corners of forgotten buildings, and the ground itself had cracked.
It was impossible to say whether it was the result of Queen Marcella’s campaign to clear the land or something much older.
For a time, Brackish was the only light that glowed. It wasn’t until they neared the centre of the ruins that other spirits let themselves be known. Blue light ran across the ruins like shapeless snakes, filling the cracks in the ground, wrapping around columns and swaying in the empty streets.
Brackish’s thoughts didn’t fill Castelle’s head. She hadn’t stolen fear and pain from Castelle and sent her charging through the spirits’ land. With every step Castelle took, the pounding of her boots reverberated through the spirits. They were beings without form, yet Castelle knew when they’d turned towards her, when what had once been eyes fixed on her.
She moved closer to Eos, stopping short of grabbing the back of her shirt.
It was only there, stood behind her, that Castelle realised the spirits weren’t ignoring Eos. They didn’t see through her; she wasn’t nothing to them. Eos didn’t see the spirits as nothing but blue light. To her, their old shapes lingered, memories sewn to the earth by anger and hurt.
She saw them, and they saw her.
They looked upon her as one of their own.
To them, she was little more than blue light.
Castelle placed her hand between Eos’ shoulder blades.
“It’s alright. They won’t harm you. We’re here, now,” Eos said.
There was nothing distinct about that part of the city. There were the ruins, there was the untimely destruction, and there were the spirits; there wasn’t much of a clearing to speak of.
Eos held out Brackish. Her light grew dim and settled. Eos knelt amongst the bluebells and pushed the sword into the ground.
She stepped back, standing at Castelle’s side as it began.
It was Fél all over again. The spirits understood what was being asked of them and not a single one hesitated to help. Blue light spread across the old city, gathering in the centre, a swirl of bright shadows.
There were more than two people, this time. It wasn’t just Brackish and Ava. Dozens of human-shaped spirits walked the streets, passing the two central figures without eavesdropping.
Eos’ eyes darted between the lights, seeing people, not spirits. Hands curled into fists, Castelle held her breath and waited for a spirit to pass. It was contact with the dead that’d cleared her eyes, last time. Reaching out, she brushed her fingers against the arm of a faded memory.
The city grew around her. The architecture was not strange, was not primitive and foreign. Torshval had been built in its image; it had not replaced the scattered structures the Fenronians called home, before Ava Greyser came to the archipelago. The sky was clear, the air warm. Castelle’s cloak was misplaced. She squinted, contending with sunlight hundreds of years old.
It was gone in a flash. She’d seen next to nothing of the people who walked the streets, of Ava and Brackish at the centre.
She reached for another spirit, but Eos caught her from the corner of her eye.
“They are still spirits,” Eos whispered, knocking Castelle’s hand away. “They could still take you over.”
“How am I supposed to understand what’s happened?” Castelle asked, having missed long seconds of it.
“Here,” Eos said, taking Castelle’s hand in her own.
Castelle stared at their joined hands. Beneath them, the ground changed. Roads spread out, and wildflowers had yet to bloom.
It makes perfect sense, came Ava’s voice. Yarrin is a wonderful island, but Caelfal is the true capital. Once trade routes are established between here and Nor, none will doubt that.
Ava was as her paintings portrayed her: long red hair falling down her back, pulled into a braid, green eyes flashing as she spoke.
There was something truer in seeing her formed by a mismatch of spirits and Brackish’s faded memory than there was in seeing her in the flesh. This was not Ava presenting herself to the world, but Ava being presented as she had secured herself in Brackish’s mind. So often, how someone was remembered was more important than how they truly were.
Every other person that walked the streets, attending to business concluded hundreds of yea
rs ago, had a face. They were not the shapes of the spirits that lingered in the old city, merely recreations of what Brackish’ mind had clung to, but they were real. One hurried down the road Castelle stood upon and clipped her shoulder.
Castelle took a step back, pressing her hand to the point of contact.
We didn’t come here to make decisions of the sort, Brackish said. She was the only one without a face, without form. She was not made of shadow, nor light or darkness. Castelle saw clearly, this time. There was an absence where she ought to have stood. How can you speak of alliances with Nor on behalf of these people? Do you not remember what we escaped?
Yes! Ava declared. I remember it each time I try to sleep and can’t. You know of the nightmares that plague me. But we are free of that, now. Trade can only help both nations. If we can convince Nor to open its borders, perhaps minds and hearts will open, too.
Ava held out her arms, imploring Brackish to listen. Eos pulled Castelle to the side. The memory of two children ran down the road, too caught up in their game to dodge obstacles.
We have no authority! We came to Fenroe to live freely, not to impose our ideas on others, Brackish argued.
We aren’t imposing anything on anyone, Ava said, stepping closer to Brackish. This land is a mess. The islanders have divided themselves in a way the sea never could. Think of all we could do to help these people! How the nation could grow! We need not erase anything, only build on what already stands. The city would keep the name Torshval. We would not do anything that wasn’t in the people’s benefit. Please. Think about it, won’t you?
Ava placed her hands on Brackish’s shoulders. The void flinched, sending a harrowing cry through the old city. For a second, everything jolted forward hundreds of years, and only ruins stood.
The memory returned, but the faces of those moving through the city had changed.
No. No, I didn’t come all this way to recreate Nor, Brackish said. I brought my people here, you included, in search of a better life. A quiet life, where we do not live in unending fear. The population may be small, trade may not flourish, but Fenroe knows peace. There is enough to feed everyone. Corruption cannot spread if we do not chain the islands together under one unified rule.
