by C. A. Sabol
For a moment, Aemon’s eyes glittered with what looked like success, but her hand found its way to her heart, not to his hand.
“Please,” she said in her softened tone, “Please, forgive me for what I am about to say. That was a very touching speech, and I’m sure that any girl in the world would love to hear it.” Her eyes lowered away from his as she continued. “But I cannot accept you, Aemon, as nice as you can be, or as young, as rich, as powerful you are. Despite all that you’ve tried, or may try, you can never give me the one thing I need.”
“Selene,” Dorian said, “Think about this carefully. Aemon can give you a comfortable home, a place to call your own. He could even give you an island, all the food you love, a family, wealth, what else do you need?”
“Love.” Her voice was barely over a whisper as the tears in her eyes began to cloud her vision. “I have a comfortable home here, and my very own place within it. I can eat what’s here. And I have you for my family, Dorian. But I need love - love in a different way from all the ways I’ve ever known. Friendship ... family ... those things I have, and I know ... but ... ” her voice trailed off, as she looked even further away from Aemon’s angry eyes.
“Your Highness!” Ronal finally managed to break out of the guards. The Princess had distracted everyone in the room as she’d given her answer, allowing for him to wriggle free. He pointed at Aemon. “It was all a trick! He doesn’t care about you at all—he was planning to marry you in order to become King!”
“You! Fighter! Be silent, or else!” Dorian jumped out of his seat.
“Ask him! I doubt he’ll deny it himself!” Ronal had apparently decided against Dorian’s warning.
Selene shot a glance at Aemon. Her eyes were wide with shock, and her hand rushed up to cover her opened mouth. “What?”
“He’s the leader of a rogue league of islands who want to overthrow the monarchy!” Ronal said angrily, still continuing to fight off with some of the guards while pointing at Aemon. He leapt into the air and slammed into a guard’s chest, effectively throwing the guard and the guards behind him into a wall.
“Oh my ... ” Selene felt the air rush out of her lungs as she tried to take in this news. Shock trembled down her body. Her gaze was wide with shock and her body seemed to move in limp manner as complete realization dawned on her. The implications of everything started to fall together. “I knew you didn’t love me,” she finally said, looking over at Aemon. “But ... why? Why be so deceitful about it?”
“Selene?” Dorian took a step closer to her. “Are you feeling well?”
“And you knew ... ” Selene’s gaze turned away from Aemon and found Dorian. “You knew ... and you were going to let this happen?”
There was no accusing tone in her voice, but still the guilt managed to worm its way into Dorian’s heart. “No, no, of course not!” the King took a step back. “I wanted to give him a fair chance to get you to like him, Selene, that was all. The Judges Council all agreed to the plan.”
“Princess,” Aemon spoke up. “I cannot believe that you are so surprised. Please, tell me you are not this naïve. Surely you must know the great advantages that Dorian has as long as he has you to barter away.”
“Enough,” she whispered softly. “Enough of this. I am no child, not any longer. I wish that the people around here would start treating me as more of a human than as a Princess.” She looked up at him. “I know as a princess I am supposed to do my duty, and leave my heart for the people. But ... ” Her voice trailed off as she found that she could not finish her sentence.
“I knew it!” Aemon yelled, his patience broken. He marched over to her, and stood menacingly over her. “I knew it! You and that so-called protector of yours!”
“Hey!” The princess was torn out from her thoughts as his hands lashed out and gripped her wrists, pulling her to face him. He was taller than she was, and he seemed to loom over her menacingly.
He looked her square in the eye. “Tell me you do not love him!” he demanded.
She pulled back, away from him. “You’re hurting me!” she tried to wriggle out of his grasp, but only succeeded in making him angrier.
“Aemon! Let her go!” Dorian thundered, his own anger starting to boil. When Aemon continued his hold on to the Princess, the king nodded to the guards.
As the guards took hold of their sword hilts, Aemon continued to glare at Selene. “Tell me you don’t love him!” When she just stared up at him with a pained look, he jerked his hands off of her. His hand whipped around and planted a slap right across her face.
She stumbled back, falling onto the floor in front of him, tears springing to her eyes as the shock faded away and the stinging sensation took a hold of her senses. She had never been hit, not once in her life, until just now. The palace guards surrounded her fallen figure, drawing their weapons.
“How dare you!” the King roared, coming to stand by his sister. “Get out! Get out I say! You are no longer a member of my court. No one treats the Princess with such vulgarity and disrespect.”
Aemon refused to show his fear or regret, if indeed he had any at all. He just looked with pity down at the Princess as she remained on the floor in front of him. It looked like for a long moment that he would stay.
Selene hesitated slightly before addressing him. “Aemon, I cannot accept you. I will not. Please take your men and leave immediately. You came for me, and I will not go. Therefore you have no more business to attend to. Good-bye.”
He looked over at Dorian as all the Palace guards suddenly drew their swords and held their tight defense around the Princess. She was still looking intently at him from her sprawled position on the ground. “Farewell, Your Majesties. I will see be seeing you again, mark my words.”
He did not bow, but simply turned on his heel and walked out the doors. Silence descended upon the room. Feeling slightly better, Selene started to move to get up. A hand reached out for help, and she took it. Looking up, she saw that the hand belonged to Ronal. She gave him an approving smile. “Thanks,” she whispered, giving his hand a friendly squeeze and letting go.
“Your Highness, are you hurt?” Ronal asked.
“No, it is not that bad,” Selene assured him. “It was more a shock than anything.” She turned to face Dorian.
He was looking past her, at the lieutenant guard. “Officer Crowell!” he called. When the guard turned and saluted to him, Dorian sighed. “Call the troops to ready. War is on the way.”
“Yes, Sire!” The lieutenant responded. He saluted once more, and then walked out of the room.
“Dorian?” Selene’s voice was full of uncertainty. “What do you mean, war? Surely you don’t think that Aemon would be so ... rash?”
The King sighed. “He’s threatened to rebel. If you did not marry him, he would take over the monarchy the ‘old-fashioned way’ as he so diplomatically put it.”
“But ... why? Why would he do such a thing?”
“He wants to be King, what else?” Dorian sighed. “Please, Selene. Do not bother me at the moment. I have to call in the diplomats. I have to see just who is on our side.”
Selene watched as the guards left the room. How strange, she thought, that just ten minutes ago breakfast had been on everyone’s mind. She sat down at the table, her head falling into her hands.
Ronal stayed behind as the guards all shuffled out of the room after the King. He shuffled over to her and said, “It’s going to be okay, Your Highness. Don’t worry about anything.”
“How I can I not?” she whispered before looking up at him with a curious glance. Remembering his part in the breakfast quarrel, she asked, “How in the world did you manage to find all that out, Ronal?”
He shrugged. “I have a couple of dependable contacts in the City,” he said. “Between what they’ve said and what I’ve figured from Etoileon, it wasn’t hard to see that this Aemon guy is bent on retribution all right.”
“What? Etoileon? He knew about this?”
“I guess
so ... I thought that was why he was out of the way.” Ronal’s face turned an unpleasant shade of scarlet. “I wasn’t going to say anything, until I learned that Aemon’s ship was heading out today, and it was all prepared to take you with them. One of the crew at the palace port told me about it. Etoileon would have killed me if I had done nothing to warn you. I know he’s been sick.”
Selene smiled at him. “Thank you, Ronal. I am very grateful for your concern. In return, I’ll have it arranged for you to go into the city whenever you like. How does that sound to you?”
Ronal’s face lit up with smile, and then it suddenly turned to a more thoughtful look. “Well, that is generous of you, Your Highness. But I was wondering, instead of that, could you possibly consider hiring a new maid? I have a friend in the city who would love to work here at the Palace.”
“A woman?” Selene asked. “Oh. I see. You like her.” A small, almost teasing smile flitted up to her face.
Ronal grinned. “Sure do.”
“Well, that sounds fine to me,” Selene agreed. “It would be nice to get some new handmaidens anyway. I’ll get Dorian to find me some more. Tell your friend to come tomorrow at dawn. We’ll find her a nice uniform and put her to work.”
“A handmaiden?” Ronal’s grin grew even wider. “That would be great! She’d love that! Thank you so much, Princess!”
“Good, it’s settled then. I’m going to take breakfast in my room, I think,” Selene murmured as she exited the room swiftly, determined not to think of how Etoileon had known about the rebel threat.
Ronal was no doubt surprised by the abrupt manner in which the princess excused herself. Had he not been so preoccupied with his own good fortune, he might’ve caught the hint of tears in the Princess’s eyes.
ETOILEON WAS GRATEFUL that the evening had come at last. He’d been pacing his floor for nearly the past two days. And when he was tired from pacing, he’d tried, without much success, to get some rest. All he could think about as he shut his eyelids was Selene, as she danced with him, Selene laughing at one of his stories, Selene as she was trying to escape that rotten man.
He’d been hoping with all of his being that Selene would not be conned into marrying that Aemon person from Jewel Island. Even if it was a good match for the princess, he did not want her to leave.
Right now, he was hoping that he would be allowed to go to his training session at least. Etoileon needed anything—anything at all—to get his mind off of his problems.
There was a knock at the door, and Etoileon looked over from the window just in time to see Garth come in.
“I have brought word from the King,” Garth said. “The Representative from Jewel Island is away now. You are free to leave your room. He highly recommends that you head to the Fighters’ training room, for their afternoon classes.”
“Where’s Selene?” Etoileon asked. “Is ... Is she ... is she going to be married?”
“His Majesty has informed me that you and the other Fighters are to suit up for extra training tonight,” Garth replied. “War is upon us.”
Etoileon had been holding his breath up until that point. When he released it, all of it flew out in a rush. He was relieved. He was about to ask what happened when the full impact of Garth’s words hit him. War was coming.
Etoileon had thought about going up to the High Tower to see if Selene would come, but he’d decided against it now. It was much too early in the evening for Selene to come anyway, despite the anticipation of the Lunar Storms. The festival would start at sundown, and he would meet up with her before that, he thought. Besides, he thought, I should really head for the training section of the palace; after all, if there was a war on the way, I had best start preparing for it.
ETOILEON HAD MISSED training the past two days. He was surprised to find how much he’d missed it, how he enjoyed practicing and refining his skills. He was not surprised to find out that he was hoping that Selene would come and get him.
“Hey,” Ronal greeted him. “Are you feeling better, Etoileon?”
Etoileon turned around at the sound of his friend’s voice. “Ronal,” he nodded, “Glad to see that you missed me.” Etoileon lowered his voice and said, “I wasn’t sick.”
“Oh ... Oh! I see,” Ronal smirked. He couldn’t resist teasing his friend a bit. “Been out practicing your social skills, or punished for something? Tell me all about it.”
Etoileon made sure no one could hear him as he told Ronal the whole story. “The King made a deal with that psycho Aemon representative. His Majesty told him that if he could convince Selene to marry him the right way, he would allow him to have her.” He filled in Ronal with all the details that he’d been able to get from the King.
“I know,” Ronal said back. “I was told. I thought that it had something to do with your timely sickness.”
“What? How? You were there when Dorian ordered me to stay away from Selene?”
“Huh? That’s what happened? His Majesty can be so –“ Ronal broke off, noticing the impatient look on his friend’s face. “Oh, right ... well, I only found out that Aemon is Cyerra’s twin. He was planning to take over the crown any way he could, and he saw Selene as his quickest route, I suppose. Actually, until I heard he was willing to wage a war, I thought it wouldn’t be that bad a match. Then he hit her.”
“He hit her? He hit Selene?” Etoileon suddenly felt as though someone had punched him in the stomach.
“Yeah. As soon as I heard about what he was planning on doing, and realized he was playing on her emotions, I hurried to warn her about him. With you out, I knew you would kill me if I didn’t.”
“You’re right about that,” Etoileon agreed, a small smile on his face at the joke. It quickly faded back into a frown. “But he hit her?” There was no getting past it.
“Yeah. There was this whole incident at breakfast,” Ronal replied as he grabbed his practicing gear from his personal Fighter cabinet. “You should’ve been there. He was all ‘I’ll love you forever’ and ‘we’ll rule together until death parts us’ and all this other really emotional bull. Selene turned him down, and then he started yelling about how she loves you, and –“
“What? She said she loved me?” Etoileon felt something stir inside his heart.
“No, no. She didn’t say anything like that at all. He was convinced that she did, though, and kept nagging her about it. It was a little scary. Selene just kind of stood there. She didn’t seem to know what to do after that.”
“I see.” Etoileon felt his heart sink. So she hadn’t said that she loved him. It was nothing he shouldn’t expect. He cleared his throat. “What happened after that?”
“He slapped her and then the King finally broke him away from her, telling Aemon to get out of the Palace, and that he was removed from being a representative.”
“That’s good.”
“Yeah, I’ll say. I’d come to warn Selene just before, but I thought she’d come down to the Fighter’s room first, so I was running to catch her. Hey, and guess what? Because I did warn her though, I managed to get Cyerra a job as a handmaiden here.”
“That’s good,” Etoileon said once more, thinking more about how he was going to make this up to Selene. She’d been away from him for two days, and she’d been hit and used as a political gambling piece. He could not just stand by and let this happen again. He smirked despite his anger; he’d said it before, that girl was trouble. And this was just the first official marriage proposal, too, now that she was of age. He sincerely hoped that this wasn’t how it was going to be until the King finally married her off to someone. “That should make you happy.”
“You bet,” Ronal agreed. “Anyway, we’re going to get in trouble if we don’t start warming up soon. Let’s go.” He’d noticed the look on the Master’s face as he had been talking to Etoileon.
“Sure.” Etoileon followed his friend out of Fighter’s storage room and into the practice dojo.
They warmed up quickly enough, before they were once again o
rdered to fight for practice. This time, Etoileon was partnered up with another Fighter student, a twenty-two year old named Trion.
Trion smiled viciously at Etoileon. “Ready to fight, Orphan Boy?” he asked. Etoileon grimaced slightly. The King’s nickname for him was always used to taunt him, but it was a surprise that Trion was being this antagonistic today. Trion was an advanced Fighter like Etoileon, and was usually on good terms with him - despite losing before to Etoileon as the Princess’s protector. He was of medium build, with friendly light blue eyes and dark brown hair.
“Ready,” Etoileon nodded stoically as they prepared for battle. He had found out long ago that showing any pain or care in reaction to taunting helped no one, least of all himself. In fact, if he ignored it, usually the opponent would get more easily distracted and worried, leaving Etoileon an opening to attack them more effectively.
Trion and Etoileon stood three meters apart. They circled each other, like birds around their prey. Their eyes took into account all the subtlest of movements, looking for an opportune moment to strike.
Etoileon was just about to settle back into a waiting stance when Trion smirked and stood back in a neutral position. “Huh?” Etoileon gave him a questioning look. “What’re you doing?”
Trion raised an eyebrow. “If I told you, it wouldn’t be a real fight then,” he sneered. “I was just thinking about how your face is going to look when I beat you.”
“Daydreaming is dangerous when you’re fighting,” Etoileon warned, moving his arms up a bit higher in order to block his face more effectively. He was losing his patience.
Trion’s face contorted in anger. “Well, then, let’s get this over with then,” he muttered, and then jabbed out hard to the left, then the right, faked left, went back to the right. Etoileon blocked him, and lashed out with a kick. His leg met with nothing but air.
Trion jumped and somersaulted, landing on Etoileon’s far left. An outside crescent kick whirled around, landing on its target. Etoileon was knocked to the ground as the kick sent him flying back. Trion grinned and moved in for more. Etoileon rolled backwards, curling back up to his feet. All of his thoughts drained out of his mind as the determination to win replaced all concerns. His feet shuffled, his fists came out fighting. He slashed out, Trion blocking and dodging at every angle. “Give it up, you can’t beat me,” Trion boasted.
