Love and Sacrifice: Book Two of the Prophecy Series

by Tove Foss Ford

  It was also said that The Revenants stole children. This was why they were feared and despised. Many a child had been frightened into good behavior with suggestions that The Revenants might just take a naughty boy or girl.

  The people coming up the road were led by a swaggering, smallish man who was wearing an improbable clash of colors – bright yellow trousers of very full cut, a brilliant green plaid waistcoat topped off with a scarlet frock coat and tattered black top hat with a blazing orange ribbon round it. He wore unmatched shoes. Each strutting step revealed similarly disparate socks.

  Menders abandoned his search of the grounds and positioned himself at the base of the front steps of Moresby, while the members of his family gathered behind him.

  The leader of The Revenants halted some ten paces from Menders.

  “I be Tellyn Fein, Magic In The Eyes,” the Revenant said, bowing slightly to Menders.

  Menders said nothing. Eiren and Hemmett exchanged a startled glance – only the residents of The Shadows and the Thrun knew Menders’ Thrun name. How could this peculiar tramp be aware of it?

  “Or should I speak of you as ‘Weaving Man’?” Tellyn Fein continued.

  Menders’ eyebrows went up.

  “What do you want here?” he asked brusquely.

  “One moment,” Tellyn Fein responded, turning toward Princess Dorlane. He bowed elegantly. “Madame, be you not the owner of this house? I would not slight you in this conversation.”

  “My nephew, Menders, is the head of our family,” she responded graciously. Tellyn Fein bowed to her again and turned back to Menders.

  “We stopped to offer a place with us to Reflection Of My Friend,” Tellyn Fein said, using Borsen’s Thrun name. “He has declined. He be not harmed – see, there he be, coming this way with your cousin.” He gestured gracefully toward Borsen and Kaymar, who were hurrying toward them across the sweeping, manicured grounds.

  “You tried to take him?” Varnia’s voice rang out stridently. She shook Ifor’s hands off her shoulders, stepping toward Tellyn Fein.

  “Miss, we do not steal children and Reflection Of My Friend be not a child,” Tellyn Fein answered gently, smiling at her with tenderness. “Sometimes a child who be not loved or who be neglected and abused, we will include in our family. Sometimes a child who be more than those around him, who does not fit in, wishes to travel with us. But we do not include children who are cherished, who are happy. Only those who be not.”

  “That sounds like taking a child to me,” Hemmett blurted.

  “Does it, Light Brighter Than The Sun?” Fein smiled. “A child neglected, starved, deprived of all that a child needs?”

  Menders had been watching the conversation silently, but as Hemmett began to argue with Tellyn Fein, he interrupted.

  “That’s enough for now, Hemmett.”

  Hemmett looked rebellious, but obeyed.

  “Tellyn Fein,” Menders began, but suddenly the Revenant leader looked over Menders’ shoulder toward the house.

  “Light Of The Winter Sun,” he said reverently. He and the other Revenants bowed low. The curtain of one of the wagons was drawn back by a thin white hand.

  Katrin had come out onto the steps. She had been asleep in her room; she found the heat in this southern portion of Mordania sapped her energy. The commotion must have wakened her. She wore her wrapper and her golden hair was loose, reaching almost to the ground, catching the sunlight like a glowing cascade.

  “How does he know our Thrun names?” she asked, coming down the steps and standing beside Menders.

  “That is something I would like to know,” Menders said, his voice steely, his eyes never leaving Tellyn Fein’s.

  “Perhaps we know the one who gave them to you?” Tellyn Fein smiled.

  After a moment, the corners of Menders’ mouth quirked upward slightly. The obvious, which in the heat of the moment, he had missed. Tharak Karak, High Chieftain of the Thrun had given all The Shadows family Thrun names – and surely these traveling people had run across Tharak.

  “But we didn’t know you were here until we were much closer. Petrahvah felt Reflection Of My Friend and led us his way.” Fein indicated a Revenant woman who stepped forward. Her clothing swirled and billowed around her, seemingly weightless – as she herself seemed to be. She didn’t seem to walk on the ground. Her hair stood out around her head and the air around her seemed to crackle. She curtseyed toward Menders, Katrin and Princess Dorlane.

  “Why Borsen?” Katrin asked, fascinated by the woman’s moving garments.

  “Because of his talent and his will. But the time for him to join us has passed,” Tellyn Fein answered gently.

  “Where were you?”

  Varnia’s voice, breaking hoarsely with emotion, made even the completely composed Tellyn Fein start. Everyone turned to see that she was trembling and pale, her eyes shimmering.

  “If you take children who aren’t loved, who are neglected, where were you? Why didn’t you take us? Why didn’t you take him?”

  “We did not know in time for him,” Tellyn Fein answered. “You were on your journey to where you be now and where you be going. I be sorry, but that be not with us.”

  He stepped toward Varnia, his hands deliberately held in full sight of them all. Kaymar countered, moving toward Varnia as well, a knife held before him.

  “Put that away,” Fein murmured. He moved one hand so quickly it was a blur – and Kaymar’s knife was on the ground. Tellyn Fein had disarmed one of the world’s most accomplished knife fighters so quickly that it seemed like magic.

  He reached Varnia, whose head was up as she struggled with mighty emotions.

  “Anger has served you well,” Fein told her gently as Kaymar retrieved his knife and slid it into its sheath, never taking his eyes from the Revenant. “It has given you strength and sustained you. But now, dear girl, it be damaging you. It be time to let your anger go and learn other feelings. You be where you should, with the people you should be with.”

  Varnia almost retorted, then looked at the ground.

  “Head up, My Fierce Hawk,” Tellyn Fein suggested, using the Thrun name that Varnia had never accepted or acknowledged when the High Chieftain gave it to her. “Eyes ahead. Keep walking forward.”

  He turned back to his caravan of people and wagons. The curtains on the lead wagon moved again and the thin, white hand pointed down the road. Fein turned to Menders.

  “We will leave you now,” he said. “We will meet again while you make your journey – we will be watching, but we would never bring harm to you. It be for other reasons that we watch.”

  He bowed low to Katrin again, while The Revenants did the same. Then he strutted forward, leading his procession away.

  ***

  Borsen perched on the edge of the enormous desk where Menders was seated. Kaymar and Ifor, as well as Doctor Franz, Hemmett and Kaymar’s older brother, Dorsen Shvalz, were ranged about the luxurious study of Moresby. Borsen was recounting his encounter with Tellyn Fein and The Revenants.

  “They never seemed at all threatening,” Borsen said in answer to a question from Ifor. “Tellyn Fein spoke to me in Thrun. At first I was surprised – then I remembered it’s rather obvious that I might speak Thrun.”

  Menders smiled. Borsen was the son of his illegitimate half-sister, whose mother had been Thrun. Very little of Borsen’s Mordanian heritage showed. He was almond-eyed and raven-haired, with dark golden skin and a haughty nose. He wore a traditional Thrun-style jawline beard and thin moustache and let his hair grow as long as it could, as the Thrun – and for that matter, Menders, who was one-quarter Thrun himself – did.

  “It didn’t take much daring espionage to divine your heritage, that’s true,” he said. “What else did he say? Did any of the others speak to you?”

  “No. They just came close. The woman whose clothes float touched my hair. It crackled when she did. Fein introduced himself and said, ‘Would you like to come with us? We travel all over the world, looking f
or wonderful things – and sometimes we fly.’

  “And you said?” Menders prompted.

  Borsen smiled and looked at the floor.

  “I didn’t say anything. I thought of everyone and touched the watch-chain you gave me – and I saw that Tellyn Fein knew I didn’t want to go with them. Then Kaymar started screaming and that was the end of the conversation.”

  “You wouldn’t have been happy if they’d snatched you,” Kaymar replied waspishly.

  “There was no danger of that,” Borsen refuted him quietly. “They weren’t trying to force me to go with them. I believe Fein when he says they don’t take children. They just seemed sad that I wouldn’t go.”

  “Borsen, they were all around you…” Kaymar retorted.

  “Do you really think I couldn’t have held them off?” Borsen asked him. His voice was low and respectful, but it had a steely edge that made Kaymar stop fuming and look startled. “I had my gun and several knives and I’m sure they knew it. I would have liked to talk to them for a while.”

  “Sometimes we fly,” Ifor quoted, diverting the tension building between Borsen and Kaymar. “I wonder what Fein meant by that.”

  Menders raised his eyebrows, then removed his dark glasses and rubbed his eyes gently.

  “There are the lighter than air balloons being experimented with in Fambré,” he answered. “They usually fail. I can’t quite see The Revenants having one.”

  “Perhaps the fellow was speaking figuratively,” Doctor Franz suggested. “Or he could have even been mistaken. From his speech, it was obvious Mordanian isn’t his native language.”

  “Yes, his accent was very odd,” Dorsen Shvalz added. “I couldn’t place it.”

  “Perhaps from Chetkinkev.”

  The men immediately rose, turning toward the study doorway in surprise. All of them bowed to Princess Dorlane. Menders took her hand and settled her in the chair he’d vacated, then perched next to Borsen on the edge of the desk.

  “What do you mean, Mahmay?” Dorsen asked curiously.

  “When I was a girl in Fambré, many people from all over the world visited the Court,” she responded in the measured and captivating tones of an accomplished storyteller. “There was a man – we children called him The Mysterious Visitor – who spoke in the way Tellyn Fein does. Listening to Fein speaking brought back many memories of those days. I finally realized why.”

  “Did this man actually say he was from Chetkinkev?” Kaymar asked incredulously.

  “Indeed,” his mother answered with a smile. “He made no secret about it.”

  Menders looked pensive.

  “What language did he speak in Fambré?” he asked her.

  “Fambrian – and I anticipate where you’re going, Menders. He made the same odd use of the word ‘be’ when speaking of the present, but he did it in Fambrian, using the word ‘esta’. Our friend Mister Fein did the same thing in Mordanian.”

  “Only in present-tense,” Doctor Franz added. “When he spoke in past-tense, he used ‘was’.”

  “I’m hardly a linguist,” Kaymar said, his pique with Borsen and The Revenants forgotten as he became intrigued with the problem and his mother’s story. “I certainly haven’t heard every language in the world, but I’ve never heard anyone use ‘be’ that way.”

  Ifor shook his head. “I’m more of a linguist than Kip, but I have to agree,” he added quietly.

  “I thought that people who tried to go to Chetkinkev ended up being thrown into the sea in jars – their heads at least,” Borsen said incredulously.

  “Those are the ones who try to go in. From what we could tell in those days, Chetkinkev had no problem with their own people going out,” Dorlane smiled.

  Chetkinkev was a nation located in the far north, to the west of Artreya. It had been an enigma all through history. It was entirely closed and no-one knew what the nation or its people were like. Nature had supplied it with natural defences in the form of sheer, high cliffs around its coastline, which had been enhanced by monstrous battlements built by its citizens.

  No-one had ever traveled to Chetkinkev and come back to tell the tale. Ships were dashed to splinters on the cliffs if they ventured too close. Those who managed to swim to shore and scale the cliffs and battlements re-appeared in the legendary “jars” – waterproof containers holding the heads of the intrepid and curious. No-one had expressed an interest in exploring or invading Chetkinkev in a very long time.

  “Well, you know they say the only way to get into or out of Chetkinkev is to… fly.”

  Kaymar had spoken flippantly at first, but faltered at the end of his sentence.

  “Sometimes we fly,” Borsen said softly, quoting Tellyn Fein’s words. He looked at his uncle.

  Menders nodded and then rose, putting his hand on Borsen’s shoulder.

  “Son, I want you to keep an eye out for our friends while we travel,” he directed. “If they attempt to speak to you, go ahead and have a conversation. I don’t feel they are any danger to you or any of us – but be prepared.”

  “Always, Uncle,” Borsen said, patting the holster under his jacket where his pistol – small and bejeweled, but deadly – was at hand.

  “Same for the rest of you,” Menders added, looking at the men around him. “And Princess Dorlane, if you should remember more, or hear something of interest – you know where to find me.”

  “I will bring you all the tea party gossip,” she smiled.

  “Very often a serious and valuable source of information,” Menders responded, only half-jokingly.

  ***

  “Who do you think Varnia was talking about?” Katrin asked, looking from Hemmett to Borsen.

  “Cuz, I don’t know,” Borsen responded. “I would know if anyone does, she’s become like a big sister to me.”

  “Varnia is very closed in,” Hemmett added. “I don’t think she wants us to know. Since I’ve been working with her on Surelian, she’s been a little more forthcoming, but for the most part, she’s a fortress.”

  “Aren’t you curious?” Katrin asked in frustration.

  Both young men looked startled.

  “Not really,” Hemmett replied. “Men don’t analyze as much as women do.”

  “If she wanted me to know, she would tell me.” Borsen pulled out his watch and made a point of looking at it. When Katrin began to speak again, he frowned.

  “Katrin, have some sensitivity,” he cut her off brusquely, his Thrun accent thickening, as it always did when he was upset. “You know what that farm she came from is like! You’ve seen her father and those pigs-turned-to-men that are her half-brothers. Use your imagination and understand why she doesn’t want to play true confessions about it!”

  “But she said something about ‘him’ – who?” Katrin protested.

  “We don’t know.” Borsen said with finality. “Leave it!”

  Katrin was about to flare up at him. She and Borsen usually got along very well, but they could clash. Some of their confrontations had become legendary.

  “The Captain of your Guard says we will leave this topic, Your Highness,” Hemmett interjected, respectfully but with force. “We will wait for Varnia to tell us in her own way – or not.”

  Katrin felt a prickle of tears in her eyes. She turned and started to walk away.

  Hemmett took several quick strides and put his hand on her arm, stopping her.

  “I know you mean well, Willow,” he said gently. “But you always want to rush in and sometimes – sometimes that’s the last thing you should do. Just be a friend to her.”

  “She’s difficult to be a friend to,” Katrin answered.

  “I’ll grant you that. But you’re equal to it. We’ve got three years. I imagine you’ll be able to get through her prickles by the time we get home. Now come on, let’s talk about what we’re going to do in Surelia.”

  He put an arm around her shoulders and led her back to Borsen.

  ***

  Kaymar, Baronet Shvalz, Prince of Mo
rdania and Fambré, lounged on a divan in his mother’s solarium at Moresby, leisurely lighting a brandy-cured cigar. They were slender, elegant and unbelievably fragrant and potent.

  Kaymar knew if he waited long enough, the person he needed to speak with would find him.

  He was sorting through the itinerary before him and the rest of his family. They would be embarking for Surelia within days. He, Ifor and Menders had gone over every detail minutely, but Kaymar’s mind never rested – not even in sleep.

  This made him an excellent security man. He had been Katrin’s personal bodyguard since she was four years old. Prior to that, he was the second most lethal assassin in the Queen of Mordania’s service. Only Menders, during his own career with Special Services, had bested him.

  Menders, however, had managed to eliminate over two hundred enemies of Mordania in an explosion. Kaymar had dispatched all his marks individually. This had pushed him over the edge of sanity. He had never truly recovered and coped with his personal demons as a matter of daily routine.

  At times, he went mad, unable to sleep for days on end, talking to trees, walls, people and things only he could see. Most of the time, his madness was under the influence of his considerable will and he functioned normally, ignoring the voices in his head and the hallucinations lurking in the corners of his eyes.

  Now thirty, Kaymar was comfortable in his own skin. He had been bonded with Ifor for almost a decade and their union was happy. He was content with his position in Menders’ household – second in command, official escort and guard for Katrin, liaison between The Shadows and the Mordanian Royal Court, spy and assassin who could be dispatched anywhere at any time. This journey abroad was a new challenge. He was waiting for someone who had valuable information to come and talk to him.