The Elder Blood Chronicles Book 3 From the Ashes (30 page)

Jala blinked and looked past the forest, her
eyes searching for a river. Glancing back up at Valor she shook her
head faintly. “What river?” she asked stupidly.

Valor grinned and let out a slight chuckle.
“Honor has been dumping snow on this area for over a month. As it
turns out Blights do not hunt in heavy snowfall as they can be
detected by the patterns in the snow.” He paused and motioned to an
area beyond them with his hand. “The river is just beyond the trees
and covered with over four feet of snow but it is there. It’s
beautiful in the spring. The water is so clear you can see every
stone in it and sweet enough to get drunk on. It’s called the
Dawnfall in Arovan. In Glis I’m fairly certain they simply call it
the border river.”

Jala nodded in understanding and then looked
up at the longing expression on Valor’s face. “Why didn’t you ever
go home, Valor?” she asked gently.

Valor’s expression clouded and he let out a
sigh. “I suppose, given the circumstances at Merro, that it would
be best if I explained everything to you,” he said and let out a
breath as he leaned back against a tree and met her gaze. His eyes
dropped to his cloak and he began to unravel a loose thread from
its seams as he started to speak again. “You know about my early
knighthood and of my Arovanni so I’ll begin just past that. In
those days, I was the golden child of Arovan. I had already
attended the required years at the Academy and I was well on my way
to proving myself in battle. I had a reputation that shone brighter
than anything. Naturally, when I was forced to take a squire there
were several candidates and in the end I didn’t get to make the
choice. The one they assigned me was from a very powerful house in
Arovan and had an ego to rival my own, despite his age. At that
time I was sixteen and he was twelve. I was young for a knight and
he was old for a squire.” Valor paused in his words but continued
to work at the loose threads, keeping his eyes focused on his cloak
rather than looking at her.

Jala didn’t press him to continue and turned
her gaze instead to the pristine snow of the forest. She knew he
would continue when he had found the right words and it was clear
that the topic was not a pleasant one for him.

“As I said, I had my Arovanni then, but such
a mount isn’t suitable for everyday use. They are sacred and thus
they are reserved for quests or war. So I had acquired Vanguard. He
was young then, barely past three, and filled with spirit. We were
making our way back south from getting him and had stopped in a
small village for the night. I turned the horses over to my squire
and went into the inn to secure rooms for the two of us. I was
barely inside long enough to hail the innkeeper when the stable
yard erupted into chaos. Thinking the boy was under attack, I
rushed out to find Vanguard running hard for the open fields and my
squire sitting square on his ass in the middle of the stable yard.
There was a girl standing behind him, so thin it looked as though a
strong wind could carry her off and she was clutching a chunk of
firewood in both hands,” Valor shook his head and rubbed his
face.

“She walloped your squire?” Jala asked with a
raised eyebrow, the words forming a perfect picture in her mind of
the scene.

“With a vengeance. It took me close to ten
minutes to get the story from her. She was terrified of me and my
squire was too addled to speak. When I finally managed it however I
was furious. As it turns out Vanguard had been skittish about
entering the dark stables and my squire had taken to him with a
whip. That in itself is bad enough but the fool had been lashing
him in the face when the girl saw what was happening.” Valor shook
his head once more and glanced up at Jala. “There is barely a thing
worse than striking a horse in the face. It ruins them. When the
girl tried to stop him, my squire turned on her with the whip and
she showed me the lash marks on her arm to support her story. By
this time my squire was on his feet and hotly denying the girl’s
words, but I could see the lie on his face. In my anger I dismissed
him from my service and informed him quite clearly that the scrawny
girl he had struck was more deserving of the armor he wore. I saw
him loaded onto a coach that night before I went in search of my
runaway horse. It was later that night that the girl found me once
more as I took my evening meal, and asked me if I had meant what I
said. At first I was shocked, but after seeing the look of
desperation on her face, I simply nodded.” Valor pulled several
more strings from his cloak and then stood upright stretching his
back. Reaching into his cloak he pulled out a cigarette and lit
it.

“So you took the girl as your squire,” Jala
surmised, still not understanding why any of this would disgrace
him in his homeland.

“She was young and common born and had no
skill with a blade but was a natural hand with horses. I suffered a
blow to my reputation by dismissing such a well-born son of a
powerful house in favor of the scrawny little common girl, but I
thought nothing of it. For the next year she traveled with me and
began to learn the trade with a speed that amazed me. It wasn’t
until we traveled to Glis with my family and I began to show an
unreasonable amount of interest in Blue that things began to spiral
downward. My father decided that day that I needed a betrothal to
keep my mind and certain other parts of me from wandering and so he
set about it at once. I ignored his efforts, of course, and
continued my travels and met Finn that summer.” He paused again and
gave her a look of regret. “I hated him with every breath of my
body from the moment the first words left his mouth. He was as
arrogant as I was proud, and he spat upon everything that I held
dear. More to the point, he had acquired certain friends during his
time in Arovan that had more than enough reason to dislike me. My
former squire was in his company along with another knight that I
knew by reputation alone. His name isn’t important to the story and
I won’t sully his reputation should you ever meet him, but he had a
reputation almost as dark as Finn’s. I spent several weeks in
constant clashes with the three of them before I received word from
my father that a betrothal had been arranged. There were certain
matters on that account that I had to attend to, so I was forced to
leave the city. In my absence, Finn left for Sanctuary. Several
weeks passed before I saw the other two and unfortunately it was at
my betrothal dinner. I didn’t drink much at that point of my life,
but I was nervous that night and was drinking more than I should
have.” His words trailed off once more and he stared out over the
snowy landscape in silence as he gathered his words once more.

Jala watched him and pulled her coat tighter
around herself wondering if she shouldn’t have simply left the
matter alone. It was in the past, after all. It had been that look
of longing that had prompted her to ask. From everything she had
seen so far from Valor she couldn’t imagine him doing something so
terrible that he couldn’t even set foot in his country again.

“It was about an hour into the dinner that I
began to feel the effects of my excess. Thinking myself simply
drunk, I politely excused myself from the company and went in
search of air outside. Nesra powder takes a while to work on the
system but by the time I made it to the courtyard it was coursing
through my blood.” Valor gave her a meaningful look. “That’s part
of why I hate Madren as much as I do. I know full-well what he put
in the chocolates he gave you. I didn’t realize I had been drugged
at the time, any more than I realized that the wine I had been
drinking had been far stronger than the normal variety. All I knew
at that time was that I was at my betrothal dinner with raging lust
and if I didn’t get out of sight I would shame my entire family. I
chose the stable as my refuge until I could sort through my issues
and set to pacing an empty stall trying desperately to clear my
head,” He sighed heavily and rubbed his face then cleared his
throat. “The bastards sent my squire out to check on me. She had
been scrawny when I found her but good food and travel suited her
and in my care she had blossomed into a beauty. She found me pacing
the stall and I tried to send her away but she refused. Being
raised roughly in the lower quarters of town, it didn’t take her
long to see my difficulty and all it took was a kiss. I knew she
admired me and I knew she cared for me but by all the gods I wish
she would have listened to me and simply left me alone.” His voice
broke and he let out a ragged breath, his eyes staring off over the
fields of Arovan once more. “They found us shortly after and I was
arrested for rape,” he said quietly.

“But she kissed you first didn’t she?” Jala
broke in.

“She was willing. It wasn’t rape. I was deep
in my cups and filled with enough Nesra powder to lift a eunuch’s
flag, however, so it wasn’t gentle. She was considered a child by
Arovan laws as well, given that she was fifteen at the time. I
fought during the arrest but all thoughts of self-defense fled as I
sobered. I hated myself for what I had done and when they named it
rape on the charges I didn’t deny it. I had dishonored her as well
as my family with my lack of will and I was more than ready to face
my punishment,” Valor said with disgust.

“What is the punishment in Arovan for that?”
Jala asked softly, wondering exactly what he had been about to face
so willingly.

“Castration for rape, and drawing and
quartering for the violation of a child,” Valor explained
calmly.

Jala blanched and stared at Valor with wide
eyes. “You were willing to face that when it wasn’t truly rape?”
she gasped.

“I dishonored her and my family,” Valor
repeated. “I had no intent to marry her when I took her and I was
not compassionate in the act. You don’t understand, Jala, she
barely had enough Elder Blood to cast the magic required to become
a knight. Had I gotten her with child it would have killed her. I
am pure Elder Blood without a drop of common blood in my veins.
Simply the power of a child of my blood would have drained her. I
risked her life and took her virtue all because I was fool enough
to drink too much and didn’t have the fucking willpower to tell her
no, twice. I should have shown more wisdom than to drink that much
around enemies.” He let out a long sigh and glanced back toward the
town. “Had it not been for Sebastian and Micah I would have died
for those crimes. It was Sebastian stepping forward that halted the
trial and Micah’s insistence of a full investigation that saved me.
That and Bridgette’s full confession on the stand and her admitting
to a room filled with people that she instigated the act with a
kiss and refused to leave my side when I directly ordered her
to.”

“Bridgette?” Jala broken in. “As in the
knight in Merro, Bridgette?” she pressed her eyes widening once
more.

“The very same. Now I’m sure you understand
my shock at her appearance. I hadn’t seen her since the trial. At
any rate after her confession and Micah’s investigation the charges
of rape were dropped. There was still the matter of her being under
age but Sebastian cleared that by pointing out that she was very
near the correct age and no one could sincerely prove her actual
date of birth so she might have very well been sixteen on that day.
So I was spared death and dismemberment, but my reputation was
shattered, as was my career. My father intervened on that account
and rather than allow me to be stripped of all rank and honors he
insisted I be placed on probation. It was decided between him and
Lord Elijah that my probation would be spent in Sanctuary at the
Academy so that I would be out of sight of everyone in Arovan. The
condition was that my actions in Sanctuary would speak for me in
Arovan. If I comported myself with honor and integrity while in the
city, I would retain my rank in Arovan. Technically I had already
passed the required study at the Academy before all of this
started, but given the situation it was deemed that higher learning
was in order.” He sighed and glanced at her. “And well, you saw how
I comported myself in Sanctuary. So if I return home I lose
everything including the name Hai’dia. I won’t shame my family by
holding the name after I have been stripped of everything else,”
Valor finished with another heavy sigh and kept his gaze on the
distant fields refusing to look back at her.

“I barely remember the man in Sanctuary. My
memories are clouded by the knight who braved hell to help me
retrieve my husband, by images of a man that doesn’t flinch from
anything, no matter how terrifying, by the multiple times you have
risked your life to save mine, and by the fact that you gave me
everything you had when I most needed it so that I could save my
child and live,” Jala said softly and tugged on his cloak until he
turned to face her. “I don’t care about your past, Valor, and I
won’t judge you by it. The only thing that matters to me is what
you have shown me, and that is compassion, loyalty, and trust. To
hell with Arovan if they don’t want you, Merro does, and you will
always have a place of honor at my table.”

Valor smiled faintly and looked up at the
lightening sky. “Neph will give me an honored grave if I don’t get
you back home and out of this cold,” he said quietly.

“I’m sorry you can’t go home,” Jala offered
with a frown and looked over the fields one last time.

“Ahh. I’m about to, Jala, if you have enough
strength left to take us. Arovan was my home. Merro is my home
now,” Valor replied with a faint smile.

“May that never change. I think I would be
lost without you, Valor. I love all of my friends but after what we
have faced together there is no one I rely on more than you,” Jala
said as she drew on her magic once more and began the casting that
would return them to Merro.