by Vela Roth
“It feels that way,” Cassia agreed.
“Perhaps,” Apollon said, “you would feel able to talk about the Hesperines who saved you when you were a child. Lio’s Ritual father has some questions he would like to ask you when he joins us tonight. Any information you can give him will aid his search for our missing Hesperines errant.”
“Of course, I will do anything in my power to help the prince find them.” But Cassia looked down at Lio’s arms around her instead of meeting Apollon’s gaze. What a coward she was.
“Come into the Ritual hall,” Komnena invited, and there was indeed a ritualistic tone to her words.
Cassia got the feeling this was another part of the nightly routine of House Komnena, and once again, Lio and his family were sweeping her into it naturally and effortlessly. The easy rhythm took her breath away.
She followed Lio and his parents to the door of Zoe’s room. “Dockk, Knight.”
Her hound hesitated, watching Zoe sleep with his head resting on the edge of her bed.
Cassia patted her legs. “Dockk, dear one. Soor het. It is safe to leave the kaetlii to sleep here in her loma.”
He huffed a sigh and came to Cassia, but not without a glance over his shoulder at the sleeping suckling.
Lio put an arm around Cassia, and together they all left Zoe’s room and went along a couple of moonlit corridors, then upstairs to a grand chamber they had passed through earlier. Cassia couldn’t see any fountains, but the whisper of water made soothing echoes through the room. Pillars framed peaked archways that led into the chamber from all sides, and ribbed vaults criss-crossed the high ceiling, disappearing up into shadow. Light emanated from the mosaic in the center of the floor, and now she had the opportunity to get a better look at it.
“Hespera’s Rose,” she said in recognition. “And in the center, that is Anastasios’s constellation, the symbol of your house?”
“That’s right,” Lio answered. “This is the Ritual Circle, where we hold all family religious observances. Or just spend time together.”
Five chairs awaited at the edge of the circle. In what appeared to be the favored Hesperine style, they were silk and wrought iron. The gold and blue cushions were rather cheery. The matching table held a glass coffee service that must be another of Lio’s creations.
His parents sat down on one side of the table, and on the other, Lio pulled his and Cassia’s seats close together and put his arm over the back of her chair. Knight lay down on her feet. Relaxing on the comfortable cushions, Cassia realized how tired her whole body was. But her mind and heart raced like wild things. Perhaps coffee had its down sides after all.
“Would you like something more to drink, Cassia?” Komnena reached for a cup.
“No, thank you,” Cassia replied sheepishly. “I’m not sure I should have any more coffee.”
“Have you had enough to eat?” Komnena held out a tray of tiny pies.
“Oh, yes, but these smell so good, I can’t resist.” Tonight Cassia had already eaten far more than was her habit, but she wanted to be a good guest.
Before she knew it, Komnena had filled a cloth napkin with the morsels and given Cassia the handful. It seemed Lio and his mother were of one mind about making sure Cassia got enough to eat.
Cassia popped one of the pies in her mouth. As soon as she finished chewing, she spoke. “These must be Orthros’s famous meatless mincemeat pies that Lio told me about. They live up to their legend.”
Komnena smiled. “We use dates from the Empire, among other ingredients.”
“There is so much food everywhere in Orthros,” Cassia commented, “even though Hesperines don’t need it.”
“It is a matter of sacred principle,” Komnena explained. “We seek to reciprocate our human guests’ generosity to us.”
“And we do enjoy food.” Lio helped himself to one of the pies from Cassia’s napkin.
Now that she was no longer the only one eating, she felt much less awkward under the Hesperines’ gazes. As Lio had probably predicted. She smiled at him, and at the sight of a crumb at the corner of his mouth, she forgot what she was going to say.
Oh, yes. She was going to ask his mother a question. “Did you make these?”
“Definitely not.” Komnena laughed. “Many Hesperines do choose the culinary arts for their craft, and it falls to them to provision our human guests. They supply House Komnena with everything I need to fulfill my duties as the Queens’ Chamberlain. I, however, stopped trying to get along with the kitchen many years ago.”
Apollon pulled her close. “We burned down her kitchen when we left Tenebra.”
“Well,” Komnena conceded, “there was a decapitated mage in it.”
“We would have burned the place down just for you.”
“You showed that war mage some poetic justice,” Cassia marveled.
“So they did,” Lio agreed.
Cassia could think of some places at Solorum she would like to burn down. What must that feel like, to leave your personal prison in ashes behind you, literally?
“Speaking of when I left Tenebra…” Komnena picked up a small, thick book from the table and ran a hand over it. “Cassia, I would like you to have this as a welcome gift from me. It is the dictionary I learned with during my early nights in Orthros.”
Cassia knotted her hands. “That’s a treasure you can’t replace. Are you sure?”
“Knowledge is meant to be handed on. This book will be a good friend to you, and it will give me joy to see you together.”
The book must be a hundred years old. The immortals who had handcrafted it in their scriptorium were most likely walking around Selas this very night. The Hesperines had showered Cassia in luxuries since her arrival, but this was a book. She had never expected to possess more than the few hoarded volumes her sister had bequeathed her.
Komnena pressed the dictionary into Cassia’s hands. “I hope you enjoy it.”
There was no way Cassia could refuse. As soon as she opened the book, she didn’t want to. “It has all the words in Vulgus and Divine!”
“I couldn’t have gotten by without it in my early nights here.”
“Thank you so much,” said Cassia. “This is exactly what I needed. I was just saying to Lio tonight how much I want to learn Divine. Did he tell you?”
“I didn’t have a chance.” Lio smiled, reading over Cassia’s shoulder.
“You told me, Cassia.” Komnena tapped her heart. “I remember what it feels like.”
“Mind healers must always know how to choose the perfect gift,” said Cassia.
“I’m a mind healer now. I have studied under Queen Soteira, written treatises that sit on the shelves of my library next to the works that once taught me, and become a calligrapher by craft. But when I arrived here, I was illiterate.” Komnena nodded to the book in Cassia’s hands. “You only need two things to make something dangerous happen. A curious mind and one book to get you started.”
“Now I have both.”
“And I know you like living dangerously.”
She and Komnena exchanged a grin. Cassia held the book to her, letting it remind her of all she had to look forward to. That made the past easier to bear.
At that moment, the First Prince stepped into sight at the edge of the Ritual circle, his face drawn. “Sorry I’m late.”
Knight leapt to his feet. He bounded toward the prince. Cassia lunged for his ruff and missed. She was about to shout a command when she realized. His tail was wagging.
Her deadly liegehound ran to the warrior prince of the Hesperines and looked up at him with hopeful eyes that begged for attention.
The prince, his gray gaze fearsome, stared down at Knight. “I have never in all my many, many years seen a liegehound respond to me thus.”
Apollon had a good laugh at the spectacle.
The prince raised an eyebrow in Apollon’s direction. “I shall be disappointed if I discover my aura has grown less threatening with age.”
“If
it is any comfort,” Apollon replied, “the hound has yet to raise his hackles at me, either. I suspect I owe his tolerance to his devotion to my children.”
Cassia pressed a hand to her mouth to hide a smile. “Knight has recently become an abject devotee of the Queens. Do you suppose he senses them in you, First Prince?”
Lio chuckled. “Well, Rudhira, I think we can conclude Knight’s adoration extends to you as a member of the royal bloodline.”
The prince furrowed his brows at Knight. “He looks like he wants something from me.”
“Probably a pat on the head,” Lio suggested, “or a treat.”
The prince shook his head. “With all due respect to your faithful guardian, Cassia, I shall leave the demonstrations of affection to those who have not had my past experiences with liegehounds.”
Knight’s eyes grew larger and more pitiful.
The prince frowned at her hound for a moment. Then finally he said, “Good dog.”
Knight’s tail swished furiously.
Cassia called him back to her, and he returned to his post on her feet, drooling and sanguine.
At last the prince took his eyes off of Knight. Lio’s Ritual father glanced around their gathering. “I missed Zoe.”
Komnena clicked her tongue and poured him a cup of coffee. “Imagine starting your first night here in ages with an apology.”
“Nonsense,” Apollon agreed. “Sit down. Rest. Eat.”
With a sigh, the First Prince took the chair that awaited him. “If I keep on like this, Zoe will forget she has a Ritual father.”
“Impossible,” Lio scoffed. “Do you know how often she asks me to tell her Rudhira stories? It makes us feel you’re with us all the time.”
Komnena pressed coffee and mincemeat into the prince’s hands. It seemed Hesperines’ urge to show care through food was not actually limited to their mortal guests. “She’s so proud of her Ritual father. She knows you’re helping people like her in Tenebra.”
“Even Zoe understands.” There was something pointed in Apollon’s tone. “Your work is vital. She accepts we must honor your sacrifices by sacrificing our time with you.”
The prince turned to Cassia. “Good to see you here, Cassia. You met Zoe?”
“Yes.” A smile came over Cassia before she even thought about it.
An answering smile flickered on the prince’s face. “The Brave Gardener made her grand entrance, then. I am sure Zoe was too excited to regret my absence.”
That the First Prince of Orthros would deem Cassia a welcome substitute for his presence under any circumstances was not something her mind seemed ready to understand. That Zoe might be as happy to see Cassia as to receive a rare visit from her own Ritual father was just as startling a thought.
“I am sure she missed you terribly,” Cassia protested. Which would not reassure him, she realized. “But we did have a wonderful evening, and she was in excellent spirits when we put her to bed.”
The prince’s smile softened. “I’m glad to hear it. When I do see her next, I am sure she will tell me all about it.”
Cassia cleared her throat, thinking of all she had told Zoe about Solia. She should tell the prince she was ready for his questions.
Then he stretched his legs out before him, crossing his ankles, one Tenebran riding boot over the other. Balancing his cup and napkin on his knee, he devoted his attention to the coffee and mincemeat. This was as near to relaxed as Cassia had seen him all night. His body language was easier to read than other Hesperines’. Perhaps that was a result of all the time he spent around mortals in Tenebra, or perhaps concealing his emotions did not come naturally to him.
This was not just a conference between the commander of the Charge and a recent arrival from Tenebra who had information for him. This was time with Lio’s family. Cassia did not wish to be the one who disrupted it by pushing herself to attend to her cause. She found she was far more content to leave Tenebra outside the Ritual circle, at least for a little while longer.
The Hesperines spoke of the glass figurines Lio planned to cast as Winter Solstice gifts, of a discussion circle on mind healing that Komnena would soon host, and of what stone Apollon would choose for his next sculpture. The conversation flowed comfortably around Cassia, and she found it surprisingly easy to join in, as long as she did not try to meet Apollon’s gaze. No one seemed to mind her starry-eyed questions about their work and life in Orthros. In fact, everyone seemed to enjoy satisfying her curiosity.
After the prince finished his coffee and pie, he reached into a pocket of his short crimson robe and fished out a knot of wood, along with a knife. It was the sharpest implement Cassia had seen in Selas, although she supposed it qualified as a tool, not a weapon. While they all talked, the prince began to whittle.
“Is woodworking your craft?” Cassia asked.
“Yes,” the prince answered. “Wood is used sparingly in Orthros, but knowing how to work with it assists me in the field.”
Cassia felt the world beyond the Ritual circle pulling at them again. “The demands of living Abroad are very different from life here behind the ward.”
Shavings fell away from the palm-sized lump of mottled brown-and-beige wood. The prince’s gaze never left his work. “In the field, we live by Charge Law. It is an entirely separate body of laws from the canon that governs us here at home. Of course, the Equinox Oath is the backbone of Charge Law.”
“Are you the author of the Charge’s laws, First Prince?”
“I am one crafter of them. Charge Law is a living thing, shaped by Hespera’s tenets, errant deeds and raw necessity. Its foremost purpose is to protect. When someone is harmed, the law failed them.”
Cassia could almost hear the words the prince wasn’t saying. I failed them.
“Tenebra has failed everyone,” Cassia said. “The lapse of the Oath puts everyone in danger.”
“But you have done more than any mortal to shield my people from the consequences.” The prince’s hands went still, and he met her gaze. “In gratitude for your help, especially with my search for Nike, I swear I will personally help you find your three Hesperine rescuers. I do not take oaths lightly. You can rely on me to keep this promise, no matter the cost.”
“You have Rudhira on your side now,” Lio said gravely. “You have won yourself the most relentless ally you could ask for.”
“Such is my respect for you, Cassia,” the prince said.
She put a hand on her heart. “I treasure your respect, and I am grateful for your aid. With your help, I have no doubt the Hesperines who saved me can be found.”
“Together, we will see them safely home.”
“Lio’s father said you had some questions for me. How can I help?”
“I’m afraid I must ask you to think back on difficult memories. I inherited my mother Soteira’s affinities; as a mind healer, I know how it can harm a person to relive painful events at the wrong time or in the wrong way. But as the leader of the Charge, it is my responsibility to make use of every possible scrap of information to find my missing people.”
“You know I will do anything for them.”
“I know. But I am hesitant to ask this of you. Do not mistake me; I do not mean to imply you are fragile. You bear your burdens with great strength. But at what cost to your spirit?” The prince shook his head. “I do not push my patients or my warriors past their breaking points.”
Komnena put in, “It is Cassia’s decision how much she wishes to say, but I am confident her mind will not suffer from recalling those events for you. In fact, it could do her good.”
The prince had yet to return to his carving. “Thank you for your opinion, Komnena. You would deem it safe, then?”
“Cassia told me only tonight that speaking of her sister is now a greater solace than pain.”
Now the prince’s steel gaze rested on Cassia. “Is that how you feel?”
She nodded. “I never told anyone about that night. Until I told Lio.”
Lio
rubbed her back, and she felt his reassuring presence on the edges of her mind, within reach, but never intruding.
She went on. “Telling him changed…everything. He helped me through the worst. It only gets easier to be open about what happened. When I talked with Zoe about my sister tonight…it gave me joy.”
Lio smiled. “Zoe has a way of healing us without even trying.”
“Very well,” the prince said. “It sounds as if I can, in good conscience, make this request of you, Cassia. It will by no means be easy, but I believe you are equal to it.”
“It doesn’t matter how difficult it is,” she replied. “I will honor my bond of gratitude with my rescuers.”
“I thought that would be your answer.” His smile appeared briefly again, and there seemed to be approval in it. Then his gaze settled on Lio. “We will need the assistance of your light magic and mind magic. I trust you are comfortable with an expense of power tonight.”
Lio answered immediately. “I will help in any way I can.”
He didn’t hesitate. It seemed he had left his mistrust of his own power behind on the other side of the sea. Cassia leaned into him, offering her thanks and her support, if he needed it. His arm came around her again, his body relaxed.
The prince turned his carving-in-progress over and over in his palm, studying what was taking shape. “Cassia, may I ask if you are comfortable with Lio’s presence in your mind?”
She was sure her face turned as red as Lio’s rose window, but she declared, “Entirely.”
Lio grinned.
The prince set his knife to the carving again. “In that case, with your permission, I would like Lio to walk through your memories of your rescuers with you. Try to recall every single detail you can, while Lio is present in your thoughts. Then I would like for him to cast an illusion so I can see what you two are seeing. I want to know if I recognize the three Hesperines you met that night. Even if I do not, we may discover details that will help me identify and ultimately locate them.”
Lio leaned forward. “Brilliant.”
“Ah,” said Apollon, “Nike and Methu’s old strategy. She would delve into the mind’s eye, and he would craft the illusions.”