Oh, I see, Speltus responded. I can’t imagine what that might have been, but I see what you’re getting at. It does seem a little… fishy.
“This is not the time for jokes, Speltus,” Hekla said, frowning.
I thought it was quite clever, he said, and Hekla was sure she heard him snort.
“Hey, Speltus… look. Can you see?” she asked, suddenly distracted by what appeared to be the sight of an oval garden area. Among the elegant vines and underwater flowers that grew, the King sat on a coral bench in front of a stone, with words etched on it. Throughout the garden area, various stones were scattered about, and Hekla realized it wasn’t a garden.
“A graveyard,” she whispered so low, she barely heard herself speak.
It would appear so, tread carefully Hekla, he can turn and kill you without warning.
Hekla nodded, curious as to what the king was doing in the castle graveyard. Perhaps mourning, an old king? I thought they sent their dead to float at sea.
Apparently not all of them, Speltus answered.
Hekla descended onto the ground, treading quietly through the garden until she was near the king. His shoulders trembled slightly, and tiny air bubbles rose from his eyes. He’s crying! She thought, touched by the gesture, but also curious as to what could make the angry man so emotional.
He stood up from the coral bench and placed the loveliest assortment of conch shells at the grave of the one he mourned.
“My King,” she said softly. “May I ask, whom are you grieving, and may I join you?”
He turned his attention to her, his face darkening, and the soft bubbles stopped.
“My queen,” he said, his voice trembling with emotion.
“I’m terribly sorry for your loss,” she said softly, her eyes downcast.
“Yes, well…” he trailed off, his focus back on the stone.
“May I ask how she died?” Hekla pushed, knowing that it might anger him.
She didn’t care, she had to know what his take was on the situation. Would he confess that he had murdered the queen?
“I don’t think that is information you need to know,” he snapped angrily, and when she looked up, his face had darkened, and his eyes had gone completely black. “Now, get back to training our soldiers, and destroy the Tellurians before it’s too late.”
Hekla backed away slowly, nodding her head, and feeling the darkness emanating off him.
“Hekla, if you fail me, you’ll find yourself in this graveyard.”
She nodded, and quickly took to the water swimming away from him, as fast as her arms and legs would carry her.
34
Astrid
In war, we do all things we’re not proud of. You cannot base someone’s character from how they survived during war, but what they’ve done after the war, and how they’ve tried to redeem themselves from the things they’ve done.
Reidlesiul, The Bravest, Seventh Dragon Elder, Eighth Age of Verdil
Astrid, you impossible female, Aronus’s voice was loud and clear inside her head.
Aronus, you promised you wouldn’t leave and you have, more than once. What is wrong with wanting to have someone that I can trust around? Aronus didn’t answer, but she could feel his simmering anger in her mind. Despite it though, she wanted to trust Cayden. Having an ally next to her on the battlefield could prove to be beneficial.
“So, where should I start? What do you want to know?” Cayden asked, unable to look her in the eyes.
Astrid wondered if he felt shame about the things he had to say, but only time would tell.
“Everything, Cayden. If I am to trust you, I need to know if you’re worth trusting.”
Cayden sucked in a deep breath, before he began speaking again. “Well, I never knew my mother. She died when I was born, so my siblings and I were raised by my father. He got sick when I was about eight, so my brothers and I turned to thieving to get by.”
“So your father died?”
Cayden nodded his head, looking off toward the tree-line.
“I’m so sorry,” she said, put off by how similar their childhoods were, though she would not have resorted to thieving in order to survive.
“Yes, well, don’t be too sorry. As a young man, I was caught and jailed, but King Armand took pity on me. I was strong and eager. He took me in, made me a soldier. As a skilled thief I could do runs with the army, and take back things his enemies had taken.”
“Among his own people, though?” Astrid asked, confused about what a young boy could have possibly taken back from Tellurian people.
Cayden paced slightly, unable to look her in the eyes. Should that worry me? Astrid wondered.
“Not from his own people, from the Caelestans and from the Aequorans,” Cayden admitted. “I didn’t mind though, I had no loyalty to anyone but myself. Self-preservation, that was all I cared about. Anything the king asked me to do, I did.”
In the distance, the Caelestans were still practicing, sword against sword. Arrows soaring through the air, toward the targets of the trees.
“Was he evil then? Did he ask you to do horrible things?”
Cayden looked put off by the question, but then he responded.
“No, not at first. It was just typical stuff, take back what was stolen. Nothing too over the top, it was fun for me. Then, over time, as I got older, the king’s requests became darker. Take back what was stolen, but take a life.”
“What do you mean?” Astrid was horrified by the idea. “Just kill whoever you deem necessary?”
His head held in shame. “Astrid, I’d been in his army for so long, and I’d done everything asked of me at the point. Taking back things that belonged to the king, which escalated to taking things that belonged to others. That escalated to taking lives.”
“You didn’t question him at all? You didn’t turn him down?” Her face had gone ashen, she could barely tolerate the idea of killing in defense, but it seemed that he had killed just for the sake of it.
“I did question him at first, but the truth was that by that point, I was a soldier. Trained, and well versed in following the king’s orders. My father and mother were dead, and I had no idea where my brothers were. I had no one, the king became like a father figure to me.”
“Really?” Astrid’s mouth was partially open. “I find it hard to imagine the king, much less King Armand being a father figure to anyone.”
“I suppose I was being too generous with that statement. It’s true though, he looked after me. Taught me things. He even had other people teach me things. I became skilled at fighting, combat, swordsmanship, archery—all of it. So, Jaques the archer wasn’t a complete lie,” Cayden continued.
Astrid began to walk away from him, following the tree line and away from sight of the Caelestans who were practicing.
“Where are you going?” he asked.
“I just need to move, I need to walk, to think,” she admitted.
“Does it bother you that I’ve killed?”
“Not so much that you did, but more so why you did. I understand, I vowed I would never take a life. My sisters and I each agreed to that. War changes that, even peace changes that.” She stopped walking and turned to face him. “We all make decisions for self-preservation, no matter how selfless we pretend to be.” She crossed her arms casually across her chest, her eyes drawn to the sky.
“What do you mean by that?” He tilted his head, raising his brows.
“No, this is not about me, this is about you. Finish your story,” she pushed him.
“All right, all right,” he said. “I won’t press you, but at some point, I need more from you than just your proverbial wisdom and hints at things you mean but won’t actually say.”
“Fine, but not right now,” Astrid finished. “Now, continue… you said you would tell me everything. What happened next?”
“Well, we we came across a Toverak one day. I’d never seen one, and I was terrified. The soldiers I was with, one was the Captain of the Tellurian army. A big burly
guy. He intimidated me more than anyone I’d ever met. He went after that beast without a care in the world. Chased him down, ran him straight him through with a sword.
That beast though, he didn’t go down without a fight. He clawed the captain to death. Took down a few men in the process, and all I could do was stand by and watch. When I came back to the castle and told the king what had happened. I embellished a few details. Told the king I fought for my life, and that I tried to save the captain. It was a lie, but the king… he believed me. Made me the new captain of the army.”
“After that day, the men who knew the truth, they wouldn’t let it rest. They rubbed it in my face day and night. It got to me—you know. It got to me, because I knew I wasn’t the man that King Armand thought me to be. Then, the soldiers, at the king’s behest, they got more violent. There was nothing holding them back then. We were commanded to take and kill. Anything that was needed to be done to further the Tellurian kingdom. We did. I did.”
Astrid couldn’t even look at him, for the pain in his face was too much.
“I didn’t want to be who I was; I didn’t like who I was becoming at the behest of the king,” he continued. “So, I took off one day. I couldn’t kill anymore; I couldn’t do it. It was too much. So, I ran, and I never looked back.”
“When I met you?”
“I had been on the run for a fortnight. You found me at my lowest. I didn’t feel like I deserved to live. That mountain was where the last Captain had died, and I hoped that a wild Toverak would find me, and kill me too,” he admitted.
Astrid gasped. “How could you think such a thing?”
“Astrid, I had no one. No one until I met you, and suddenly, I didn’t want to die anymore. I wanted to know you, to follow you. To go with you wherever you went. You had the look of a quest about you. Like you had something important to do… something to make a difference. And for once in my life, I wanted to make a difference too. I was desperate to feel human again,” he answered.
She couldn’t believe her ears, to think that she had deemed him so untrustworthy that night. How was I to know who he truly was? I had never been outside of the volcano. Astrid pulled the dagger out of her pouch, and stared at it, knowing that had if it not been for Cayden, she would not be alive.
“So, when I joined you on that mountain, I won’t lie, I had been tracking you for a few days. I knew you were there, I worried about your safety, as the Tellurian soldiers can be ruthless. I would know, I used to be one of them. I had to hide my identity though, so when I was discovered by the soldiers, I gave them the story of Jaques the archer…. showed them my skill and was welcomed in with open arms.”
“You followed me?” She hated and loved the thought, but now it only brought to question if he had been following her the whole time.
“So, where did you go? Did you fight in the battlefield? Were you there when King Armand went after the Caelestans and Aequorans?”
“I had some unfinished business back in Telluris to take care of, and then I went back out to the wilderness to figure some things out. I missed the battle, because by the time word had traveled, it was already over. I watched you that day on the battlefield when you and your sisters dealt with the bodies. I wanted to come to you, to comfort you, all of you,” he admitted, and the look on his face was one of genuine concern.
“I knew it wouldn’t be welcome, so I stayed away. I’m so sorry,” he said gently.
Astrid slid the dagger back in the pouch, watching him. She wondered if she should be angry, knowing that he had followed her. Had he heard her talking to her dragon, even arguing with her dragon?
“I don’t know what to say, Cayden. Part of me is angry that you’ve been following me around. That makes me feel like you’re not to be trusted. What happened to your brothers? Why are you following me around?”
Cayden looked away from her and couldn’t answer.
“I care about you, Astrid, it’s that simple, and that hard. And I really can’t explain it,” he answered, avoiding the question about his brother, and looking away from Astrid’s gaze.
They both stood in silence for a long moment, with nothing more to say, and yet still so many things left unspoken.
35
Svana
The greatest tragedy is a heart that knows love but can never act on that emotion. That heart always lingers in the shadows, forever questioning the what-ifs, without an answer ever in sight.
Pavrusion, The Infamous, The Eighth Dragon Elder, Ninth Age of Verdil
Svana followed the guard along the hallway and down the stairs, away from the king’s chambers. The unease she felt from the man in the black robes seemed to latch onto her, and no matter what she told herself, she couldn’t shake it away.
“She’s here,” the guard said when they reached the end of the steps.
He opened a large door, and Svana was relieved to see a familiar face.
“Tristan! You look well!” Svana called out to him, looking from the man to Emmeline. Tristan smiled weakly from his slight reclining position on the bed.
“He’s doing better, but not by much,” Emmeline responded.
Svana nodded, noting the peaceful look on Tristan’s face, as he admired the crystal-eyed beauty who sat next to him on the bed. Her heart panged, as she watched the exchange between the two, and it only made her miss Jakobe even more, but the sword at her side was the reminder of who she was above all else. Telluris was meant to be protected, and she could think of nothing else until her duty was complete.
“Here,” Svana pulled more of the aquaberry plant out of her pouch. “I saved some.” She winked.
At the sight of the plant, Emmeline’s face glowed with gratitude. “Oh, thank you, Svana!”
Svana nodded her head, happy to see a genuine smile on the kind woman’s face.
“If you don’t mind my asking, Emmeline. May I ask a few questions?” Svana wrung her hands nervously, worried that her new friend would be defensive about anything related to the questionable man who had gone to visit the king, but she had to know the truth. Some things just weren’t adding up for Svana, and her gut was telling her that there was more to the aging character than met the eye. Even if the guard didn’t flinch at his presence.
“Of course, Svana, ask anything you like.” The woman rested one caring hand on Tristan’s covered leg, her other hand lay freely in her own lap.
For just a moment it flickered across Svana’s mind, that she should be tending to Jakobe in such a way, sitting at his side, her hand there to show him that she would stay by his side no matter what. After all, he had almost died because of his allegiance to her.
You’re thinking like a child, Svana, stay focused on the task at hand, Lingaria scolded her.
She nodded her head, not saying a word aloud to him.
“Emmeline, there was a man with a long beard, and floor reaching robes that tended to the King just now. How long has he been here?” Svana’s voice wavered a bit, as she wanted to share the darkness she felt at his presence, but knew it wasn’t time.
“You must be speaking of his advisor,” Emmeline said with her nose slightly in the air. “I cannot stand the man, but my uncle idolizes him.”
“Your excellence,” Svana cleared her throat. “Did you say you can’t stand him?” Her voice raised in slight quizzical accusation.
“Well, that’s a bit extensive I suppose. He does give me a chill that I’ve not been able to get rid of the entire time he’s been here.”
“How long has that been?” Svana asked.
“Well, quite a while.” Emmeline’s eyes glazed over a bit, as she searched her memories.
“He’s been here for nearly as long as Armand has been king,” Tristan interrupted, his voice quiet but sure.
“Oh, I suppose that’s true,” Emmeline remarked, stroking the gentle angle of her elegant chin.
“Your excellence, your presence is requested,” the guard had returned, peeking his head in.
Emmeline nod
ded, her pale hair bobbing fluidly with the movement of her head. Standing, she gave Tristan a loving glance. “I’ll be back as soon as I can,” she promised.
“It is fine, my dear.” Tristan half-smiled.
As she left, Svana approached Tristan. “So, it seems that you know more about him than Emmeline?”
“No, not really, but as Captain of the Tellurian army, I learned to pay attention. I didn’t start out as captain; my role was elevated once the king trusted me and his former captain left without warning.”
“Left or was killed?” she asked, assuming the worst.
“No, he left.” Then Tristan went quiet.
“So, tell me of your relationship with Emmeline?” Her eyebrows raised. “It’s obvious you two care for each other.”
Tristan became as guarded as he’d always been when it came to Emmeline, turning his gaze away from Svana. “She knows that I care for her.”
Svana half-smiled, her tone melancholy, unable to meet his eyes as well. “That is obvious. What bothers me, is why the two of you do nothing about it. It’s so very clear that you both are quite fond of each other.”
Tristan straightened himself in bed, giving her a look she didn’t recognize, before he spoke. “That may be so, but it’s not proper for us to say or do anything.”
“I understand that, but don’t go too long without saying how you truly feel. You don’t know how long you have. You don’t want to have regrets,” she urged him.
“Svana, if I were to reveal my true intentions, the king would surely have me hanged,” he admitted.
“Why?” she asked.
“I cannot say.”
Svana wrinkled her nose. “I suppose that is an understandable reason not to say something, I apologize. I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“Duly noted, is there something you wish to ask of me? Aside from questioning my relationship with her?” His tone was curt.
Have I offended him? She hadn’t meant to, best to steer away from more personal matters.
Dragon Bow Page 23
