The Dawn King (The Moon People, Book Five)

by Claudia King

  “Adel, he's as enthralled with you as I once was. Ask him for a sheep, and he'll give you a herd.”

  “All I want is for our people to be friends.”

  “You still want what others only dare to dream.” He shook his head in amusement. “Can you forget about it for one night? This is the first time I've seen you happy.”

  “I can try.”

  “Good. Can you still throw one of these?” He reached into his pouch and flipped out a smooth, flat stone. Perfect for skimming.

  “Never as well as you. Besides, there is no water up here.”

  “Aren't you supposed to be able to see the worlds beyond worlds, Seer?” he teased. “If there's no water then we must make it.” He moved to the edge of the platform and in one smooth motion cast the rock out into the night. Moonlight glimmered off the polished surface, making a bright streak of its motion as it caught the top of an earthen spur jutting out from the hillside. With a puff of dust it skipped, flipped over, and tumbled away into the darkness.

  Adel hid her surprise behind an appreciative nod. “You've had years of practise.”

  “I think we've a while before anyone finds us. Why don't we see if you can catch up?”

  Adel knew it was a pointless frivolity. It was a waste of time when she could have been down in the feasting hall ingratiating herself to the priests. Nothing more than a distraction. Yet it was her nagging sense of duty that felt like the distraction that evening. She was weary from the events of the afternoon, and skipping stones seemed like a fine way to unravel that weariness. Holding out her palm to Jarek, she took one of his stones and attempted a throw of her own. It bounced off the side of the spur and clonked loudly against one of the temple's wooden walls.

  “If there had been a window there you might have killed a man,” Jarek mused, stroking his chin thoughtfully. Adel felt laughter in her throat again, and she dug her elbow into Jarek's side when he made his next throw to send him off balance.

  Time escaped her as they skipped stones until Jarek's pouch was empty, just like the nights they had spent together as children. Back before they had been lovers, when all Jarek offered her was a place to escape from the world. How important it was to have that escape. How strong it made her feel, like a sleep outside of sleep that invigorated her spirit for the challenges ahead. She'd always told herself that these things had been the pastimes of a younger, more childish Adel, but what if she had been wrong? This was what she had been denying herself all these years by dedicating herself to the role of Den Mother. This was what Netya had been trying to reawaken her to.

  Once the pouch of stones was empty they watched the stars, staring directly upward and turning around on the spot until the heavens aligned in a way they recognised. It amused Adel to realise that Jarek and the Sun People looked at the stars upside down, counting their patterns in a way that was the reverse of what she had been taught. They turned back and forth as they looked at the stars from both perspectives, and their turning soon had them stumbling over one another in dizziness. Before they knew it they were circling in a jig again, their breathless laughter joining the creak of the boards beneath their feet. Jarek hefted her into the air, making her gown bloom like a flower as the wind caught it, then gripped her in his strong arms as she fell against him. Before she could think to stop him, he was kissing her.

  —26—

  Fate's Burden

  For a few special moments it felt right. Jarek himself had not even thought about it. He kissed Adel the same way he would have kissed any girl in such a moment. The joy of the jig was in his arms, the spirit of laughter swelling large within his chest. A kiss came as easily as the next step in the dance. Yet when their lips touched, something else took hold. He felt Adel respond with a need that overwhelmed his playfulness and pierced deep within him, touching feelings that had been lost to the void of time.

  They pulled away from each other at the same instant, the moment shattering around them. He tried to apologise, but the look of terrible, heart-wrenching anguish on Adel's face froze his lips.

  “Why?” she whispered, tears beginning to glisten in her eyes. “Why would you do that?”

  “I only—” He faltered foolishly, and the look of hurt on Adel's face became one of anger.

  “I can't stay here with you, and you won't come with me, so why?!” She pushed him in the chest with both hands, sending him stumbling back. “I felt like I was forgetting the past tonight. I felt like I could see beyond what we had together. You might have been letting go all these years, but I was not!” The raw emotion in her voice frightened him. She sounded as furious as she had on those nights when she'd come to him after suffering a beating. “You cannot play with me,” Adel all but sobbed through her anger. “Losing you, it made me cruel. It made me just like him. All these years, thinking you were...” Her eyes flashed fury again. “Were you even telling me the truth about how you felt the day I arrived?”

  “I'm sorry, Adel, I didn't think—”

  “You never think!” She struck him again. “Always the fool, always playing! You'll not play with me, Jarek, no. I can't. I don't have the strength for it. Not again.”

  “You've more strength than anyone I've ever known.” The instant Jarek said it he realised it had been a mistake. Compliments were not what Adel needed right now.

  “You don't know me. You knew a girl once, and I knew a boy. You won't trick me into thinking I'm still her.”

  “Do you think I'd try and trick you for something as meaningless as a kiss?”

  “It wasn't meaningless to me!” Adel cried out, her voice stinging the air. Cheeks glistening with tears, she stormed past him and ripped the drapes aside, disappearing into the darkness of the temple.

  Jarek put his elbows on the wall and ground his palms against his forehead. How could he have been so careless? Adel was not any other woman. He should have known. He had known. Any man could have understood why she'd been so uncomfortable around him. Yet in the joy of the moment he had lost himself, and he'd done something that neither of them wanted. His heart throbbed with the memories of old kisses, every wonderful memory of Adel burning anew in his mind's eye. For a fleeting moment he wanted to turn his back on everything Atalyn had given him, abandon the Sun People, and return to the woman he had once loved. The yearning was so intense that his fingers clawed at his forehead, raking the furrows between his tight braids. With a shuddering breath, he relaxed his muscles, and the yearning passed. In its wake a deep sadness lingered, more fresh now than it had been since the day they parted.

  Love was just one part of life. Sacrificing everything in its name made for a beautiful tale, but real lives were not made of beautiful tales. Even he knew that. In these lands he tended to the countless villages under the Dawn King's rule, but amongst the Moon People he would be no one but Adel's lover. He might even provoke bloodshed between the packs again if her father ever learned of his return. It was no sense of pride that bound Jarek to the Sun People, but love for the family who had taken him in. Atalyn was his father now, and the laypeople his children. If he abandoned them, who would the next priest of the Son be? Another man like Thakayn?

  The Dawn King had always told him that his willingness to listen to his feelings was his greatest strength, but he knew it was also his greatest weakness. That was why he had kissed Adel without thinking. Now he had reopened old wounds just as they had begun mending.

  He paced back and forth on the temple watch until the creaking boards sounded like splinters in his ears, then went inside and headed back toward his domicile. He knew it was a pointless endeavour. Sleep would not be visiting him that night, and the solitude of his plain chamber would only make his thoughts echo until they were deafeningly loud. Turning back around, he fumbled through the dark until he found a lamp left by one of the servants and carried it down with him into the central hall. The temple gates were shut, and the two guards watching them ceased their quiet conversation when he appeared. On any other night he would have spa
red a few friendly words for them, but he struggled to find any good cheer on his tongue that evening. In silence he walked through to the feasting hall, wondering whether he might find some drink to drown his mood. Upon entering he realised it was later in the night than he thought, though the silence of the temple should have told him that already. No lights burned in the great chamber save for the fire at the far end, and the tables had been dragged back into the middle of the room in preparation for next morning's meal. Even the wounded man and his family were gone, presumably moved to one of the domiciles while he recovered.

  A streak of shadow marked a lone figure sitting up by the hearth. As Jarek moved nearer he heard her humming to herself, and he realised it was Kiren. She stopped abruptly at the sound of his feet, her shadow shifting as she looked in his direction. Even without fur she had the predatory poise of a wolf about her.

  Raising a hand in greeting, Jarek stepped into the firelight and sat down on one of the padded mats beside her.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked, managing to phrase half of the question in the Sun People's tongue.

  “I am a high priest. What are you doing awake so late?”

  Kiren rubbed her lower lip back and forth, glancing toward the dim light seeping in from the central hall. “Night's the only time I feel like I'm back in a den.”

  “Aren't you worried that Thakayn might stumble upon you?”

  She grimaced. “Let him dare try to take his knife to me.” The challenging note in her voice suggested that she might even want Thakayn to find her. Perhaps she was secretly hoping to encounter the high priest alone one night. Jarek knew he should have said something to caution her against such recklessness, but his thoughts were still on Adel. He stared at the fire, feeding a log from the wood pile into the stone hearth. What could he do to make this right? He feared he had just undone years of gradual healing with one stupid kiss. Adel was wise, but she was also fearsome in her emotions. Kiren, he knew, regarded her as a deeply cold woman, yet that could not have been further from the truth. Adel's coldness was nothing but a barrier, one that protected her like the bone scales worn by Atalyn's warriors. It was not her outward demeanour one had to fear, but the passionate heart smouldering within. Jarek had thrust his hand recklessly into the fire of her heart tonight, and he had burned both of them.

  “This is the longest I've ever seen you sit quiet.” Kiren's voice made him flinch with a start. He'd almost forgotten she was there.

  “Forgive me, Kiren,” he said with a forced smile. “My thoughts are scattered like the stars.”

  “What did she do to upset you?”

  “What?”

  Kiren nodded back in the direction of the central hall. “I saw you leave with her earlier. She was smiling then.”

  “Ah.” He looked back at the fire, watching the sparks rise and disappear into the stone opening that led out through the wall. “It wasn't her that did the upsetting. Have you had many lovers yet, Kiren?”

  She was silent for a moment, then said, “I used to. Some of the men from my pack. They were lovers to all the women, like the concubines are here.”

  “But not any more?”

  Kiren shrugged. “Why are you asking me questions when you want to talk about yourself?”

  Jarek voiced a bitter chuckle. “Am I so obvious?”

  “I can't peer into people's hearts like Netya, but she is teaching me.”

  “Then I suppose I should talk about myself. I always was better at talking than thinking.”

  She gave him a curious look. “Were you really Adel's lover?”

  “Who—nevermind.” Whether Adel or Netya had told her mattered little. She might even have guessed it from the way Jarek and Adel behaved around one another. “I was, and tonight I may have done something awful by reminding her of it.”

  “I never thought her capable of love.”

  “Oh no, no.” Jarek shook his head. “Adel loves so many things. Her family, her pack, her enemies.” He remembered more keenly than ever the day Adel had gone to Alpha Khelt's side willingly, making a sacrifice of herself to spare the blood of the two packs that had been responsible for so much misery in her life. That had not been the choice of a heartless woman, but he understood why she might have grown to appear heartless since then. “The greatest love invites the greatest loss. When you lose as much as Adel has, you have to find a way of keeping it from devouring you.” The space between his eyebrows wrinkled. “There is a reason I only ever tell Atalyn jokes when he asks me about my birth pack.”

  Kiren fell quiet for a long time after that. They watched the fire together until she began to fidget. “You asked me if I'd had many lovers,” she said. “I used to enjoy laying with men. It felt good, especially when we could laugh together afterwards. But...” She paused again. “It's been a full turn of the seasons since the last time.”

  “Why?”

  “I don't know.” Something fearful crossed the girl's face, the shadow of an old recollection.

  Jarek handed her a log to feed into the fire, and she gripped it tightly.

  “What happened the last time?” he asked.

  Kiren took a deep breath. “The last time I made love to a man he was killed that same night.”

  “Ah.”

  She glared at him. “You think I'm being like Adel, don't you? I'm not like her. I'm not hiding from anything.”

  “Would that be so bad?”

  Kiren scowled. “I don't want to be like her.”

  “Neither would I, but then again, I am not a woman.”

  “She was right about you being a fool, though.”

  “I'll not disagree with that.”

  Kiren's glower held. She looked quite charming this way, Jarek thought. He could see why past lovers might have taken an interest in the dirty-haired girl. What she lacked in beauty she made up for in spirit.

  “What did you do to her, Jarek?” she finally asked.

  “I kissed her.”

  “You shouldn't have done that if she didn't want it.”

  “I truly, truly wish it were so simple. We might both have wanted something from that kiss that neither of us can have.”

  “Do you love her, then? Does she love you?”

  “Oh, I don't know, Kiren.” Jarek rested his chin upon the heels of his palms. “If our fates were different we would, I know that much. Should I pray to the spirits to change fate?”

  “Netya says the spirits only give us guidance to change fate for ourselves.”

  “Then I don't see how I can change anything. I can't turn my back on my people just to be with her.”

  Kiren's expression softened. “You really wish you could, don't you?”

  “I just wish fate had been different.”

  “I suppose we all wish that about some things.” Kiren pushed her log into the fire until the flames began to lick up the bark toward her fingers. “I don't like Adel. She was cruel to someone I care about. But she has tried to protect me since then.”

  “She cares about you. When I first met her she had nothing but insults for me, yet she still kept coming back to our meeting spot. Tell me, how did it end between her and this friend of yours?”

  There was another pause. “She tormented her for a long time, but in the end she let her go free.”

  “I don't believe in holding on to anger, Kiren. That was always Adel's greatest weakness. If you don't want to be like her, perhaps you should let go of yours.”

  “I am not angry with her, but I have trusted the wrong people before.”

  “Do you trust me?”

  She eyed him for a moment. “I suppose. A little.”

  “Well I trust Adel, and I think your friend Netya does as well.”

  “You are just in love with her.”

  “No I—am I?” He groaned, rubbing his fingertips into his eyes. “Love is so much more complicated than being in or out of it. I'd take one seer who understands love over ten who speak with the spirits.”

  “You
are very strange, Jarek. You remind me of Netya's mate, but... stranger still.”

  “More handsome?” he murmured offhandedly, still watching the fire. The flames had begun to absorb his thoughts again.

  He lost track of their conversation as it wore on, meandering back and forth between talk of Adel, Netya, love, and the past. Soon they were talking in circles, as weary minds tended to do, but the distraction was a welcome one all the same. Kiren's worries and doubts made his own seem more bearable, and he listened to them as readily as she listened to his. Toes of sunlight peeking in beneath the drapes finally brought an end to their night talk, and Jarek stumbled upright on stiff legs with an arm on Kiren's shoulder.

  “Thank you,” he said wearily. “It's been a long time since anyone listened to me spill so many words with such little meaning.”

  “You're the only one of the Sun People who will talk to me.”

  “Such compliments. You humble me, Kiren.”

  “Go and sleep. You sound like you've been drinking fire water.” Kiren squinted, searching for some more meaningful parting words to offer. “And stop chasing Adel if you know you can't be with her.”

  “Only if you will stop hating her.”

  “I told you, I don't hate her.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  Kiren gave him a begrudging nod. “If you hadn't spent all night being sad about love I might've kissed you, you know.”

  “A woman after my own heart. Not quite so foolish, though.” He blinked the ghost of the firelight from his eyes, rubbing the back of his neck. “I'm glad you did not, but I'm happy you thought you could.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it means you're ready to find love again. Maybe a year alone was all you needed.”

  Kiren looked away, then a small smile touched the corner of her mouth. “Maybe so. Sleep well, Jarek.”

  “Sleep well, Kiren.”

  Though his thoughts were still heavy with old memories, the ache had subsided and was giving way to tiredness. Perhaps now he would sleep. Then, if he could gather enough wits for it, he might be able to make a meaningful apology to Adel. Yet in his heart he knew that no apology could make those tender memories go away. He had opened an old wound before it could heal, and years might pass before it mended again.