Griffin's Destiny (12 page)

“How can you say that?” Magnes’ voice rose to a near shout. “First, they’ll never surrender. Second, you know what the average human believes about them. You believed all of that rubbish yourself!”

“Brother, I…” Thessalina began, but Magnes cut her off.

“The empress doesn’t want the elves as subjects. She wants them all removed and Alasiri repopulated with humans. This isn’t a simple war of conquest, Sister. It’s a campaign of extermination!”

Thessalina leaned back in her chair, jaw set. “What would you have me do?”

“Damn it…I don’t know!” Magnes cried. Immediately, he regretted his outburst and the anger within him trickled away, leaving a dark stain of sadness in its wake. He cursed the powerlessness that threatened to drown him in despair. In truth, there was nothing either of them could do to stop any of it, just as Thessalina had said.

“I can’t come with you,” he murmured. “I won’t bear arms against the elves.”

“I’d be lying if I said I’m surprised,” Thessalina sighed. “You’ll stay, then, and run Amsara while I’m gone.” Her words, for all their softness, still fell upon Magnes with the unmistakable force of command.

“Thank you,” he replied. An enormous yawn threatened to break apart his jaw. “Gods, I’m so tired. I’ve been on the road for over two weeks. I need to go to bed.”

Thessalina nodded. “Your old rooms aren’t too dusty, I hope. I had standing orders to keep them clean just in case you returned, but two of the chambermaids left service so we’ve been short-staffed.”

“They aren’t bad. A little musty, is all,” Magnes replied.

“I doubt I’ll see my bed much before sunrise,” Thessalina said. “There’s still so much to do.” She reached over and laid a hand atop his. Her fingertips and palm felt as callused as any peasant’s. “I’m glad you’ll be here to look after Amsara while I’m gone, Brother. Our people have always loved you. They’ll feel safe with you here.”

“Our people have nothing to fear,” Magnes replied quietly.

***

Magnes woke later that night with the sour taste of nightmares on his tongue. Afraid to go back to sleep, he rose, pulled on a tunic and trousers then slipped his feet into a pair of old sandals. A shadow among shadows, he made his way out of the keep and headed across the yard toward the chapel. He paused outside the door, then looked up at the glittering vault of the night sky.

Are Jelena and Ashi reunited yet
, he wondered. Did they sleep within the comfort of each other’s arms beneath this very same sky, their baby cradled between them?

He pushed the heavy wooden door inward and entered the silent chapel. Two brass lamps burned on the altar, filling the room with dim golden light and flickering shadows. A sweet residue of incense hung in the air. With faltering footsteps, Magnes made his way down the center aisle, past the front of the altar painted with representations of the gods, to the staircase leading down to the crypt. An unlocked iron gate barred the entrance. Realizing he had no light, Magnes stepped over to the altar and grabbed a lamp. He thought of the last time he had come here, on that long ago night he and Jelena had fled Amsara.

Now, guilt pricked him as, trembling, he descended to the crypt. In the cool darkness, the departed generations of Preserens, rulers of Amsara for over three hundred years, rested in silence. The tiny pool of light cast by the altar lamp allowed Magnes to find his way through the rows of sarcophagi without stumbling. As the most recent internment, he knew his father’s sarcophagus would lie near the front.

He found it alongside the slightly smaller one containing his mother’s remains. Both were fashioned of gray marble, topped with lifelike effigies of their respective occupants. Magnes paused to gaze at the carved stone likeness of his mother. The blank eyes stared, unseeing, at the ceiling. The face bore little resemblance to the woman he only barely recalled from childhood memories.

Magnes raised the small lamp higher to illuminate his father’s tomb. The unknown artist had done a superb job of coaxing Duke Teodorus’ plain, blunt features from the dark stone; it seemed at any moment, the father would awaken from his cold slumber to arise and denounce his treacherous son.

A strangled sob clawed its way past Magnes’ clenched teeth; he collapsed to his knees beside the tomb. With shaking hands, he set the lamp atop the carved folds of the effigy’s gown.

Tears wet his cheeks as Magnes laid his hands over his father’s chilly marble fingers. “I’m sorry Father,” he sobbed. “I have no right to ask for your forgiveness. I was always a disappointment to you! I wish with all my heart I could have been the son you wanted. I just couldn’t. It was never in me.”

He stared into the empty eyes of the effigy, as if by sheer force of will, he could draw a response from the stone. Duke Teodorus remained frozen, implacable, unreachable.

How long he sat slumped beside his father’s tomb Magnes didn’t know, for he had lost all sense of time in the dark and stillness. Shadows crowded around the tiny pool of light cast by the altar lamp like the spectral presences of his departed progenitors. They surrounded him, accusing, his father’s angry spirit standing at the fore.

Staggering to his feet, Magnes snatched the lamp and fled. He slipped on the slick stairs, cracking his left knee on the brutal stone. Groaning, he stumbled up and out of the crypt, then paused just beyond the gate. Breath ragged with agony, he massaged his knee, trying to get some sense of how badly he had injured it. His probing fingers told him nothing.

The chapel’s narrow windows glimmered like pearl rectangles within the blackness of the surrounding walls. Dawn was fast approaching. Magnes had been down in the crypt for most of the night. Wearily, he limped toward the front of the chapel, pausing to replace the altar lamp in its rightful spot, then he slipped out through the door to the yard.

Already, he could feel his knee stiffening as he made his way back to the keep. As he passed the kitchen, he heard sounds of activity within. Cook and her staff were always the first ones up and working well before sunrise; the bread had to go into the ovens before anything else.

When Magnes came at last to his rooms, his knee throbbed with such fierceness, he feared he had torn something loose. As bad as it hurt, though, it felt as nothing compared to the pain in his soul. By visiting his father’s tomb, he had hoped to ease some of the guilt tormenting him since his return home; instead, he had accomplished the opposite. What peace he had found while living and working with the Eskleipans had been shattered like a dropped mirror into a thousand jagged shards.

You have to find a way to forgive yourself.

Thessalina’s words rang mockingly in his head. Magnes groaned aloud.

How can I, when what I’ve done is so heinous?

Who, in all of Amsara, could help him?

He returned to his bed, but sleep refused to come.

Four days later, beneath the banner of the Duchy of Amsara—three black lions rampant on an azure field—Thessalina rode out of Amsara Castle at the head of a force numbering some four hundred foot soldiers and a hundred light cavalry.

The ruddy early morning light painted helmets and spearheads with crimson. High atop the castle walls where Magnes stood, the sound of marching boots rumbled like distant thunder. He watched Thessalina’s army until it had dwindled to a dark smudge on the horizon, then limped back down the stairs and headed across the yard toward the kitchen. He wasn’t really hungry but the part of his mind which could still think rationally reminded him he must eat.

He allowed Cook to serve him a bowl of hot oatmeal, accompanied by a thick slice of bread, fresh from the oven. The look and aroma of the food elicited no response from his body. Each bite became a monumental struggle. Just as he decided to give up and leave his meal unfinished, Claudia appeared at his side, her own breakfast in her hands.

“Are ye leavin’ already, young master? Why, ye’ve hardly touched yer breakfast! Are ye ill?”

Claudia looked a little more stooped, a little less stout, than when he had last seen her, just before his world fell apart on that terrible night all those months ago. Her pale blue eyes had lost none of their sparkle or motherly concern, however. Magnes had not spoken with his old nurse since returning home. He realized upon seeing her now that she knew nothing of Jelena’s fate.

“No, Claudia. I’m not ill,” he lied. “I hurt my knee and it aches, is all.”

Claudia cocked an eyebrow. “Now, young master Magnes, ye never could fib t’me!” She set her bowl and cup on the table and sank to the bench beside him. “Tell yer ol’ Claudia what really ails ye.” Her voice, so gentle and full of affection nearly caused Magnes to break down and tell her the truth, but he stopped himself.

How can I burden this dear, sweet woman with the poison that festers in my soul? She couldn’t possibly understand.

Instead, he changed the subject. “I’ve news of Jelena.”

Claudia’s seamed face lit up as bright as a solstice candle. “Oh, Master Magnes, if’n ye mean the news about my baby bein’ a princess, then I already know!”

“How did you find out?” Magnes replied, startled.

“Jelena’s man told me. Her husband.”

“Ashinji was
here
?” Magnes exclaimed. “Here at Amsara? Are you sure, Claudia?”

“Sure I’m sure, young master. I saw him, I did. Spoke to him, even! He told me who he was. He had such a pretty name, but so strange and hard t’ get the tongue ’round. Ashee, it was. He told me my baby was expectin’ her first baby, theirs t’gether. Oh, Master, I cried, I was so happy!”

“Did my sister’s soldiers bring Ashi here?” Magnes asked.

Claudia frowned. “No, sir. They weren’t no soldiers! Hard lookin’ they was, an’ they kept poor Ashee chained to their wagon like a dog.” Claudia’s voice quivered with sorrow.

The slavers. Of course
, Magnes thought.

“I think he was hurt, too, ’cause it looked like his arm was all bound up,” Claudia continued. “I prayed every night fer a week, askin’ the gods to protect him, even though he weren’t human. He was my Jelena’s man, an’ the father of her child.”

“Those men who had Ashi were slavers, Claudia,” Magnes explained. “They took him all the way to Darguinia where they sold him to a very wealthy woman. That’s where I found him. His mistress used him as a gladiator.”

Claudia gasped and pressed her hand to her mouth. “Is he…” Her voice died in her throat before she could finish.

Magnes smiled as he squeezed her forearm. “No. I helped him to escape. He’s probably back home with Jelena by now.”

“Praise the gods!” the old woman whispered.

“Ashi told you about Jelena’s father, then?” Magnes asked.

“Aye, he did, Master. The king of the elves! I always knew my baby was special, an’ that her dad was noble-born, but a princess? That I never s’spected.” She dabbed her eyes on the hem of her apron. “I guess I’ll not see my lamb again, leastways not in this life.”

“You never know what fate has in store, Claudia,” Magnes replied.

The old nurse nodded, then murmured, “My girl is where she truly belongs now.”

Magnes sat with Claudia while she ate her breakfast, answering her questions about Alasiri and the elves. For a time, he managed to forget his pain.

When she had finished her oatmeal and tea, the old nurse said, “Now, if’n you’ll excuse me, I must be getting’ this old carcass to the laundry.” She rose to her feet, pausing for a few heartbeats with hand pressed to her chest. Her breath rattled alarmingly, then she bent over in a fit of coughing.

Magnes tried to slip his hands beneath her elbows, but she waved him off.

“Claudia, how long have you had that nasty cough?” he inquired after she had recovered enough to stand upright again.

“Ai, ’tis nothing, young master, just a bit ’o the lung fever, is all. I’ll be all right. I’m very strong, you know,” the old woman insisted.

“That’s not what I asked you,” Magnes responded patiently. “How long have you been sick?”

She shrugged. “Don’t rightly know. Not long, though. I drink me some coltsfoot and licorice tea sweetened with honey and at night I lay a nice onion an’ mustard poultice on my chest. Right as rain I am by mornin’!”

Magnes frowned, knowing Claudia made light of her condition.

“When I was in Darguinia, I learned a thing or two about healing,” he said. “I trained with the Eskleipans, a very learned order. I’ll make you some of their remedies.”

“Ach, beggin’ yer pardon, young master, but them Esk, Ekslepans sound too foreign t’ me,” Claudia complained.

“They might not be Soldaran, but they were the only healing order in all of Darguinia who weren’t a bunch of charlatans. Do you trust me, Claudia?”

Claudia’s eyes widened and her mouth formed an
O
of dismay. “My lord, o’course I trust you! I didna’ mean…”

Magnes squeezed her shoulder. “I’ll send the medicines up to the servants’ hall as soon as I’ve made them,” he said.

Claudia offered a crooked smile. “Thank ye, young master.”

She turned to go but Magnes stopped her with a hand upon her forearm. “Claudia, I don’t think you should be working so hard,” he said gently. “You need to rest so you can get your health back.”