The Heir of Ænæria

by Thom L Matthews

  “I’ll have orders to keep them all alive. The Rhion know not to disobey their legate, especially in battle.” Arynn paused a moment and grimaced, her nose and lips twisting as let out the next words. “As for the rest, they can all die. They turned their backs on us long ago.”

  Sera shook her head, the trail of tears tracking down her sharp cheekbones.

  Arynn tucked her hand under Sera’s chin. Their eyes met, frozen in time as they looked deep into one another. She brushed away the last of Sera’s tears and smiled. “I promise you that when all of this is over—the bloodshed and the politics—we’ll go off together. Far away from Ænæria, Vänalleato, and anywhere else where men rule with their iron fists and broken laws. We’ll find a new home. It’ll be the two of us, just like we always wanted.”

  Sera’s face remained flat, with only her big brown eyes to offer a glimpse into her heart. They quivered, but the tears had been stilled. Even after years of torture, nearly being broken by the whips of taskmasters and beatings of dissatisfied owners, Sera remained the most beautiful person Arynn had ever laid eyes upon. She never needed makeup or pretty clothes—all petty distractions from her beauty. The only thing that brightened her glowing beauty was her radiant smile.

  “Home. Together,” she said. “I like that.”

  They came in for a kiss. When their lips parted ways and eyes rejoined one another, Sera remained silent. She was quieter than Arynn remembered but still the same girl she had been when they were together in Vänalleato. Years ago, Sera had been the more outgoing of the two, more adventurous. Nearly every time they'd snuck out of town it had been her idea. Whenever they'd been caught and scolded, she screamed back while Arynn hid behind her shame with eyes fixed on the ground. It had taken a few weeks for Sera to speak to Arynn without first being spoken to. Around anyone else, she reverted to the docile nature she'd adapted after years of abuse.

  Arynn stopped and pulled Sera toward her. Those deep dark eyes with their rich beauty and profound sadness. And a little of something extra, glimmering underneath it all. Strength.

  “I never thanked you,” Arynn told Sera.

  Sera’s eyes narrowed. “For what?”

  “For waiting all those years for me. For never giving up hope.” Her lips pressed lightly against Sera’s warm dark cheek. “I know it wasn’t easy.”

  Her hand rubbed against Sera’s cloaked back, going over the raised scars from years of torment.

  “No, but I knew you’d come for me. Whenever I got in trouble, you always got me out of it. I only wish you didn’t…”

  “Didn’t what? Take so long? I know, I just couldn’t figure out—”

  Sera shook her head vigorously. “No, not that all. It’s that you’re working for the people who tore us apart. You’re in charge of a province that condones the things they did to me. And they’re still doing it to others.”

  Arynn crossed her arms and sighed, looking over at the fading blue sky. They’d been over this so many times, and Sera knew as well as Arynn that her hands were tied. “Do we have to do this again? Can’t we walk about First Hearth and enjoy our freedom, that fact that I can kiss you right here and now and no one will give it a second thought? Are you forgetting that it was Vänalleato who sold you to the Ænærians in the first place?”

  “But the Ænærians are the ones buying people! Just because the Elders did something wrong doesn’t make what the Ænærians did right. You have power here. Influence. You can make things better.”

  Arynn groaned and pulled back to an alleyway. She leaned back against a store’s wooden wall, dripping and wet like a sweating pig in midday’s heat. A storm was coming—one of those storms that rolled in like a vengeful spirit at the change of seasons. She hated this. Their reunion should have been perfect. She’d been thinking of it ever since Sera had been taken. It hadn’t become a reality until she finally set foot out of Vänalleato on her own adventure.

  Back when she was with Ben.

  She found herself twirling a small braid of her red hair around her finger with Sera’s chestnut eyes silently observing her nervous tic. Why did her mind suddenly turn to sap dripping through a clogged spigot whenever she thought of Ben? And even though she’d been reunited with Sera, a passionate rage still simmered within her at the thought of the boy from Freztad. She had everything she could ever want now with Sera. Freedom to be together, a home to share, and all the time in the world to catch up on all the years Vänalleato had taken from them.

  “I am trying to make this better, you know.”

  Sera lowered her face and averted Arynn’s gaze. Arynn gently placed her hand beneath Sera’s chin and lifted it. Sera looked back up with wide, terrified eyes, and Arynn winced and recoiled like she’d touched a hot iron. It pained her to see the way Sera had been reconditioned by the Ænærians. Touching her this way made Sera look submissive, the last bits of rebellion burned out of her by the cruel whips and flails of the enforcers. Arynn’s back still ached and stung from the time she’d been shot outside of Parvidom. The first time she’d seen the scars in the looking glass she’d been horrified. They hardly compared to the twisted knots and scratch post she’d seen on Sera’s back. Those were just the wounds that Arynn could see. The harshest scars ran deeper than skin.

  “I’ve told you the plan I made with the king. Slaves are being freed. Traitors are being discovered. It’s just…slower than I’d anticipated.” With half her forces training for the coming battles, Arynn had limited resources to enforce interrogations with potential traitors. People weren’t balking at her threats as she’d hoped. Enough jobs weren’t being opened for slaves to replace people of suspicion.

  Sera’s brow wrinkled. Though her eyes and lips were unchanged, Arynn knew Sera well enough to see this was her fighting a frown. “What?”

  “You have the power to make it faster. There are still slaves in Vestinia.”

  “I know, I know. I’m meeting with the nobles in a few days to discuss it.”

  “You said that a few days ago. If you have the power to push it back, then you can push it forward.”

  Arynn wiped her hand down her face, frustrated. She took Sera’s hands in her own and drew her close. Their lips touched, and the warm tickle in her belly reminded her of what was important. Not the politics and warfare. This: being herself with someone she loved. Arynn drew back and opened her eyes, smiling.

  “I’ll talk to Lady Estel and have the nobles over as soon as possible.”

  Sera wrapped her arms around Arynn and closed in the space between them. “Thank you.”

  22

  Rose

  Vänalleato, Penteric Alliance

  Rose had three days to do what felt like six days’ worth of work. And she was just so exhausted. She woke up in the middle of the night—screaming again, of course. Nightmares. They haunted her every night, but they didn’t always wake her.

  Last night’s was particularly terrible. It wasn’t a typical flashback; it was more detailed than the actual event. The memory of her father nearly bleeding her to death was so warped by the nightmares that she hardly remembered how it had actually happened. In some of the nightmares, he hung her upside down, cut her forearms, and squeezed out blood. In another, he changed into a demon with long, sharp teeth that dug into her neck and drained it out of her. Rose knew neither of those was true. She thought he’d cut her palm first, and when that didn’t work, he moved to the other. When the Vault still hadn’t opened, he went for the wrists. Then opposite her elbows, before finally moving to her neck. Though she couldn’t recall if he’d tied her down, pressed a gun to her head, or if he’d used a knife or a sword, even a shard of glass. Those details were lost to her. Not that she needed them.

  In the nightmare, she could see all the veins and arteries running underneath her skin. Each cut felt jagged and slow, like it had to wear down her skin to get to the juicy vessels hiding inside. When they were finally exposed, she watched in slow motion as each drop spilled from her body and into
buckets. Julius splashed the buckets against the Vault, and when the door didn’t open, he cut her again, and the whole process started over. The nightmare lasted until her dream-self lost consciousness from exsanguination, and Rose woke screaming and drenched in sweat. Her heart was racing, and she had no idea where she was. Her surroundings were unfamiliar. This wasn’t her bed with the green drapes hanging from the canopy. She panicked, thinking she’d never made it home in the first place, and that had all been a dream, that she was really still in one of Julius’s camps.

  A bright light crashed in from the side of the room like a wave. Someone rushed to Rose’s side, grabbed her by the arm, shushing and soothing her. “You’re in Vänalleato. With friends. You’re safe,” Trinity said in a low and calming tone. “Just breathe. Slowly. In through your nose, out through your mouth. Good, that’s it.”

  Rose reoriented herself. Yes, she was in Vänalleato. Now she remembered. They were marching off to Parvidom in a few days. There was a war going on. She was a queen.

  Her hands stilled, and her heart slowed after a few minutes of silence and deep breathing. Trinity did well with long pauses, and it never felt awkward waiting for someone to speak. Rose could take her time until her mind stopped racing, and she could finally bring herself to relax.

  “Thank you,” Rose whispered.

  Trinity rubbed Rose’s shoulder and patted her gently on the back. “Take all the time you need. Anyone tries summoning you will have to go through me first.”

  Rose chuckled. Her laugh was hollow, missing some secret ingredient that had once made laughter so sweet. She had lost that key piece ever since the incident. Some things still made her laugh, but they were all tainted. Most of the time she would fake her way through and put on a façade for all the others around to avoid scrutiny, to show everyone just what a strong queen she was. Few knew what she was struggling with. Kabedge and Vic and her mother—they were all dealing with their own problems. Even Ben didn’t know what she was going through. That left only Trinity. Rose lost count of how many times she’d internally thanked her cousin for not only saving her but bringing her a friend. One who didn’t care about a crown or fancy titles.

  “Trinity, may I ask you something?”

  “I’d say I’m an open book, but I don’t actually know how to read,” she said with a grin. “So it’s probably not an accurate statement.”

  She never ceases to amaze me. She’s probably the smartest person I know aside from Ben, and she can’t even read. How could she have learned both so much and so little?

  “I was only in Ignistad for a short time, when I first met Julius. I saw how they treated the slaves there. Beaten, humiliated, and forced to live in slums. You must have been through so much worse than me. How did you get through it all okay?”

  Trinity let out a deep breath. Her gaze shifted away from Rose and to the far wall where she stared without saying anything for some time. She rubbed the tattooed eye on her forehead.

  “I didn’t grow up thinking things were any different.” she finally said. “I can’t remember my parents or what it was like to have a family. I don’t even know how old I am. Most slaves are freed after a certain number of years, but it’s easy for nobles to trick children by making them think they’re younger so they can act as free labor for longer. I’m probably seventeen or eighteen. Blazes, I could’ve developed fast or slow and really be fifteen as easily as twenty. Truth is, there’s just a lot that I grew up without, and because of that, I don’t think I made it through ‘all okay.’ All I’ve really known is how to make myself useful. I never knew what ‘okay’ was like.”

  She cleared her throat and took another deep breath. Her voice started to tremble. “Until I met Darius. I think he was the first person to be kind to me. I was freed by then, but there isn’t much a young former slave can do. I developed feelings for him almost right away; I didn’t know any different. But he has his own demons—ones that make us incompatible. I gave him such grief for it and ended up driving him away.

  “After that, I did what all the other miserable healers did and smoked the poppy we used for patients. It does a lot more than numb the body. It works just as well on the mind and soul, too. Except that just makes it harder to feel anything at all, including joy. Since I’ve left Ænæria and been off it, I’ve been able to think clearer. What I understand now is that everyone has a darkness in them. Darius has his demons. Ben has his Enochian heritage. You have your father. I have my muddied past. No one gets out of it because it’s a part of who we are. Once we can accept that we can move on, stronger and ready to take on whatever hits us next.”

  Howling winds screeched on by, and small drops of water trickled down the old inn’s glass panes. A storm had passed early that morning while Rose fought her nightmares. The outside would be fresh with the scent of freshly watered grass and flowers. A walk would do her good, giving her time to absorb Trinity’s words. Ordinarily, she was the one giving advice. It was strange being on the other side. As a queen, she needed to tell so many people what to do and how to think. She was lucky to have Trinity around.

  Once she settled down, Rose dressed and readied herself for the day. She all but begged Trinity to come with her. The healer preferred to stay back doing what she did best: healing. There was no shortage of invalids in Vänalleato where Elders preferred spiritual intervention to medicine. Teas and herbs were the most extreme measures they would take. If anyone wanted more advanced care they had to rely on outsiders.

  If Rose had it her way, she’d be allowed to walk around Vänalleato unsupervised. Kristos insisted that at least two sentinels or Vänaguards follow her. On more than one occasion, she considered making a sharp and sudden turn down an alleyway to make her escape to an afternoon walk in peace. It’s not that she wanted to be alone—quite the opposite in fact. She wished to roam the streets as she once had with her mother and those weeks she’d spent as a guest. It was far easier to chat with people without two armored soldiers in her shadow.

  Her first stop was just around the corner—a shop she didn’t think she had ever visited before. One with a sailboat and compass on its sign. Flocks of townspeople cheered for her as she walked by. She said her hellos, kissed some babies on their foreheads, and offered waves and smiles to all the rest. The two guards following her must’ve been steaming in their boots having to watch over such unmitigated chaos.

  “That’s too close, Your Majesty.”

  “Sir, take a step back.”

  “My Queen, do you really need to hold all the babies?”

  In fact, yes, she did need to hold them all. They were the future generation. The ones she was really fighting this war for. Plus, they were so cute and their cheeks so pudgy. It almost made her wish she could have one of her own. Almost.

  Arriving at the shop, Rose politely asked her guards to wait outside. They insisted they keep her in view. Rose decided against pulling rank on them. They were just doing their jobs. Quite well, in fact. It wouldn’t send a good message to treat loyal workers with disdain.

  “What a pleasant surprise!” the shopkeeper said. He was a bald man with a bushy red beard growing spots of gray.

  “Master Siegfried,” Rose uttered. She bowed her head as she knew was customary in Vänalleatian culture.

  He returned the bow and, on his way up, he asked, “My apologies, but am I to bow at the waist, at the knee, or…?”

  “Neither. We can do away with the formalities. If I’m being honest, I really don’t like it when people bow to me.”

  Rose perused the shop, intrigued by its contents. Navigational devices lay neatly arranged on shelves. Tools to view the sky and beyond. A great yellow sphere hung from the middle of the ceiling, with the seven others of varying sizes and colors surrounding it. Little white dots were drawn across the ceiling too, and whereas the spheres only took up a few square feet, the dots scattered across the entire ceiling.

  “Formalities aside, to what do I owe the pleasure of having you in my establishm
ent? I take it you’re not looking for maps or tools.”

  “I’m not. I’m here to ask you about Arynn.”

  Siegfried paused. There was a slight quiver under his eye. “I see. What do you want to know?”

  “I take it you know she’s Vestinia’s legate.”

  He turned away slightly and picked up a stack of maps, superfluously adjusting them into seemingly random piles. He nodded gravely.

  “Do you know why?” Rose asked.

  “Hundreds of possible explanations have crossed my mind. One of which I believed her to be working undercover. Since you’ve come to ask me, I assume this is not the case.”

  Rose sighed. This was harder than she’d expected. She was speaking with a man whose daughter she would soon send people to fight. To kill, if it came to that. Better get used to it now. She’d be ordering many people’s children to their deaths.

  “I’d thought the same thing. That Ben sent her there. But I can tell by how distraught he is by her disappearance that he didn’t. I don’t think he’d keep something like that from me. I haven’t even had the heart to tell him yet.”

  “When Benedict came to me after she went missing, I told him she needed time. And space. My daughter grew up dreaming to see the world. It was a tainted dream when she discovered the world to be as dangerous as it is. Her mother passed; her friend taken. Those things changed her. Turned her bitter. As did other things.”

  “What other things? Does she have some kind of grudge against Vänalleato?”

  Siegfried sighed and relinquished a solemn nod. “I’m afraid so. You see, my daughter had a secret. Very few people knew of it. It made life in our town rather difficult for her.”

  Rose scrunched her eyebrows together. This was the first she heard of this. “Did Ben know?”