Flower's Curse
Page 2
“Oh,” Sels flushed and Arara could feel his frustration through the bond. “I’ve only ever started fires before...”
“You need training.” Sesay stated, holding up a hand to forestall the questions Arara could feel bubbling in his mind. “I know, there isn’t anyone else who can cast Moon magic, but a solid grounding in the foundations of Sun magic will-”
“Yes, there is.” Sels cut in.
“There is what?” Sesay refolded her hands, face puzzled.
“Another Moon magic caster. That lightning today wasn’t natural, it was a spell.” Sels was tensing up, so Arara reached over and sque-ezed his hand. He relaxed a fraction, took a deep breath.
Sesay pursed her lips. “I see. We rounded up the rioters. I’ll have them questioned and see if anyone remembers a Kin caster.”
“You believe me?” Surprise colored their bond.
Sesay sighed, shook her head. A few pink petals floated loose to fall on the floor.
“Yes, I do; for what it’s worth. I’ll check into it. Recka, let’s go.”
Sesay replied through her own mental bond with Recka. Arara cocked her head, trying to hear more, curious what ‘it’ was. An angry buzzing sound filled her head.
Sesay gave Arara an irritated look. “Stop eavesdropping, it’s rude.”
Arara blinked in surprise as Sesay swept back out with Recka at her heels. Sels let out a huff and collapsed in one of the plush chairs that had been pushed up against the walls.
“Glad that’s over,” Sels pushed his vines back from his face and began inspecting what remained of his under robe.
For the first time Arara realized that Sels was dirty, covered in soot and grime, and most of one of his sleeves had been burned away. She suddenly longed for the safety of her parent’s hut, missed their embraces. Adopted parents, Arara reminded herself.
“I can’t help being a Yaka. I didn’t even know until the Elder’s-” Arara hugged herself and closed her eyes.
She heard Sels shifting, felt his arms go around her. “I know.” His presence was comforting, but the touch of his skin sparked in her mind, opening the bond. She felt him reliving the experience of meeting her for the first time, his admiration of her when she’d saved his life. How fiercely he wanted to protect her.
“You can read thoughts so how did your parents hide the fact that you were adopted from you?” The bond went both ways, Sels had seen her mind’s eye just as she saw his.
Arara shrugged and pushed away from him.
“Since they're in town to see the sedyu ceremony why don’t you talk to them? You deserve to know the truth.”
“I guess,” Arara sighed. “I just... Perhaps Sesay is right. I did help the rebels get into the city, even if I didn’t mean to.”
“You mean the prophecy?” Sels made a rude noise in the back of his throat and Arara giggled. “My mother has the historians combing the archives. No one has been able to find evidence of the mysterious prophecy the Jegeran Elder’s mentioned.”
“I don’t care about the stupid prophecy,” Arara growled. “I mean how the Elders used me to get close to you.”
“They didn’t need you for that. Jeron was helping them,” Sels spat out his former bodyguard’s name, but Arara could feel the real pain behind it. Jeron had been his bodyguard since he was a sprout, had practically raised him. Jeron had been his best friend and he’d betrayed Sels to the rebels.
The sorrow that Sels felt twisted through the bond despite Arara’s best efforts to block it off. She didn’t want to feel bad about Jeron’s death, he’d deserved it. Arara growled and pushed away from Sels. “I wish I was normal and not a white-furred Yaka freak.”
“You aren’t a freak. As the people get to know you, they’ll see all Yaka aren’t like the ones that attacked the city.”
Sels rocked back to his heels and climbed back into the chair. More proof that she was a freak. She was so short that he’d had to kneel to hug her properly. A normal Jegera should be taller than a Kin, not shorter than them.
A green-robed Kin Healer stepped through the vines. “Ah, you’re awake.” She smiled down at Arara, who turned towards her.
“Did you drink?” Even as she asked that the Healer checked the bowl of broth and found it empty. “Good, good. How do you feel?”
“Everything aches.” Arara growled, scratching at the burned fur on her elbow.
“That’s to be expected. You were hit by lightning. Now, you’ll need another healing tomorrow, to help with the surface burns.”
“Why can’t you just do it now?” Arara was tired, hungry and thirsty, and she didn’t want to have to come back.
“You need time to recover, eat and drink. Healing takes a lot out of you,” the Healer took the empty bowl and moved to leave. “Oh, yes. The Queen has requested your presence in the parlor.” She spread her arms wide in respect as she addressed the Prince.
Sels pressed his lips together and Arara could feel him mentally cataloging their bedeviled appearance. “Did she say when?”
“No, Your Highness.” When Sels didn’t respond the healer offered Arara a cursory tilt of her head and left.
“Feeling well enough to verbally spar with my mother?” Sels offered her a wry smile.
Her joints ached and her stomach felt like it was going to eat through to the other side, but she could feel Sels’s anxiety about the meeting and his desire to get it over and done with. Arara nodded.
SELS PUSHED HIMSELF up, already missing the soft embrace of the plush chair. His face and arms still tingled from where he’d been burned by the heat of the fire, despite the excellent work done by the magic of the Healers. His under-robes and breeches were torn, soot-stained, and singed, but he still looked better than Arara. Her brand new leather armor was cracked across the front and big patches of fur were burnt off her arms, legs, and tail.
When he stood some of his vines swung loose from their braids and fell across his face. He grimaced to see his beautiful purple petals curling dry-brown on the edges. Only time could restore his petals to their former glory.
He led Arara out into the hallway, limping slightly as a not-quite healed burn on his leg rubbed his breeches. As they made their way across the swinging walkway to the Palace’s main tree, Sels rubbed his face and debated what he was going to say to his mother.
Servants and guards bustled past on errands. A few guards trailed along behind the pair, Sels did his best to ignore them. Many of the Kin walking past, upon seeing him, lowered their gaze and hurried on their way. The stares bothered him more, although there too he practiced pretending not to care.
Sels first led Arara to their own rooms, where they quickly changed and did their best to scrub off the worst of the soot and grime from skin and fur. Nothing they could do for the lingering smell of smoke and burned hair.
Arara hadn’t been in the Queen’s chambers before, so when they entered she craned her head back and forth, trying to take in everything at once. Vines grew up from holes in the polished wood floor, twining around painted portraits of previous Queens and their sedyu-bonded.
At the end of the hall a ramp twisted up to the next level, but Sels led Arara to a doorway hidden in the ramp’s shadow. The vines covering it blended in with the ones growing up the walls, hiding the door from casual inspection.
Inside, a crystal chandelier reflected the light of a sunflower growing in the corner. The doors to the balcony were shut tight against the pounding wind and rain of the summer thunderstorm raging outside. Two oversized armchairs sat side-by-side, a small table between them. Twin couches sat perpendicular to the chairs.
His mother sat in one of the two chairs, Sesay in the other. Tukura was pouring them both tea from a steaming kettle. Sels too
k a seat on the couch end closest to his mother. Arara, silent for once, settled in next to him. Tukura offered them cups of tea, which they both took with thanks.
His mother and Sesay were still wearing their court gowns, although their vines and petals had been let down. The warm tea soothed his aching throat. Honey and lemon. Tukura always seemed to know exactly what everyone needed, a trait he wasn’t sure if she’d gotten from his mother or if his mother had gotten from her.
His mother broke the silence. “Arara, would you please wait outside with Tukura?”
He got a twinge through the bond from Arara at that, although he wasn’t sure why. He also wasn’t sure why she was asking Arara to leave; bonded mind and soul, they had no secrets from each other, at least in theory. The Queen waited until Tukura ushered Arara out of the door before she spoke.
“Sels, Sesay, I called you both here to speak about your futures.”
“Not about the riots?” Sels blurted out, unable to help himself. Arara was still bristling about Sesay blaming her for the attacks, and the irritation was coming through the bond, coloring his own views.
“That plays into what I have to say, yes,” the Queen sipped her tea, arching a red-petalled eyebrow at Sels. “Politics is a delicate balance, which was upset earlier this year by the Yaka attacks and Jegeran led rebels. The city is still rife with unrest. I hadn’t thought it was simmering so close to the surface, or I would have had more security at today’s ceremony.”
Sels nodded. The riot had caught them all by surprise. “Did Sesay tell you about the spell lightning?”
The Queen tipped a head. “Yes, which is why I called for Speaker Elric to join us.”
The door clicked open and the Speaker limped in.
The Speaker’s foot had been hurt in a magic accident in his youth and he leaned on a can for support as he walked. His vines hung down past his feet and would have dragged on the ground if they hadn’t been wrapped around his neck like a scarf. His brilliant purple petals were almost of a shade with Sels's only, except Sels were darker.
The Queen rose to greet him and assisted him in sitting down on the couch across from Sels. Her hands lingered on Elric’s arm before she pulled back with a sigh and returned to her own seat.
The Speaker stared at Sels, hands absent-mindedly running along his cane’s grip. “Your news is indeed unfortunate, young Prince. Can you tell us more about the mage?”
“No, I’m sorry Speaker. I only felt the magic right before the lightning hit, and after I was too busy trying to save Arara.” Sels leaned back into the pillows, struggling to stay awake. The healing had left him tired. His eyelids felt heavy.
Elric nodded, dry vines whispering across each other. Sels glanced between the Elder and his vital, animated Mother. He knew at one point that Elric had been her consort, one of many, and wondered again what had inspired the relationship.
“I’ve been doing magic for over a century and I’ve never heard of such a spell. But then I’d never heard or seen anything like what you can do, Prince Sels.” Elric tilted his cane at Sels. “I teach at the Sunspire University. I’ll have my students report to me any cases they hear of regarding unusual magic.”
The Queen set her cup down with a tinkle of china. “In the meantime, you know about the Eclipse that the scholars say will happen at the end of summer.”
Sels and Sesay both nodded. For a few brief moments over Sebaine City, the sun would be eclipsed by the moon. Partial eclipses happened from time to time, but it had been hundreds of years since a full eclipse. It was a bad omen, and couldn’t be happening at a worse time.
“The Speaker and I have talked. After this riot today and the unrest still present in the city, we feel that the people need something good to celebrate.”
Sels’s brow furrowed and he lowered his cup, glancing at Sesay. He’d prayed silently to the Sun God that his mother wasn’t going to say what he suspected she would, as he’d hoped to put this off for another few years at least if not permanently.
Sesay’s face twisted, an expression Sels knew mirrored his own. He’d had a fantasy of getting out of the arranged marriage. Perhaps twinning roots with Roel, the pretty white-petalled girl who’d saved his life earlier that spring and whose face he couldn’t get out of his dreams.
“Sels, Sesay, your wedding will happen at the end of summer,” the Queen’s words fell with the weight of a thousand boulders, crushing his dreams to dust.
ARARA DUTIFULLY FOLLOWED Sels as they wound their way back through the maze to the palace living quarters. They made the trip in silence, each lost in their own thoughts. Guilt gnawed at Arara. If only she hadn’t been born, Sels would be with a nice Jegera sedyu-bonded, who wouldn’t be attacked just for existing.
“Don’t think like that.” Sels broke the silence; obviously he’d been eavesdropping on her. “I don’t regret having you around.”
Arara hung her head and didn’t respond. When they reached Sels quarters, Arara turned to him.
“I...” Arara paused, torn between her duty to Sels and the questions that gnawed at her about her past. “Will you be alright here alone? I want to go see my parents.”
“I’ll be fine.” Sels frowned at her. “Are you sure you don’t want me to come with you?”
“This is something I need to do by myself.”
Sels nodded and Arara watched as he brushed through the vine door to his sleeping soil before she left. On the way out she asked the watchful guards stationed outside the door to take good care of him while she was gone. Of course, her bond with him meant she would know right away if he were in trouble, but after what had happened earlier she felt better knowing the guards were close by and on alert.
Down in the garden everything was quiet. From the outside her parent’s guest den looked empty, but inside she could feel their comforting presence, along with one other. Yegra?
Growing up, Yegra had been one of the few Jegera in their small town to not look down on her for her differences. Now that they were adults Arara felt comfortable around her in a way she never had with anyone else. One of her best memories was when they’d shared a den during her first night in Sebaine City, splashing around in the bathing pool together like best friends. Memories of being close to naked Yegra still sent chills down through the base of her tail and little flutters of anticipation twittering in her stomach.
“Mom, Dad?” Arara bounded down the brick path. The clouds had cleared out and the moonlight was bright enough to light her way. She pushed through the vines over the entrance, tail wagging.
“Arara!” Athura exclaimed. “I’m so relieved to see you on four paws. We’d heard you’d been hurt.”
Athura lay reclined on a few plush pillows that Arara had brought down from Sels’s rooms - he hadn’t even missed them. Arara’s father looked up from beside Athura. He held a stiff hukra spine brush that he continued to lazily run down Athura’s side with one paw as he waved to her. Yegra sat on her haunches across from them, idly flipping through a book. She didn’t look up as Arara came over and settled down onto a pillow next to her.
“Yes, but Sels pulled me out of the fire and the Healers patched me up.”
“Too bad they couldn’t do anything about your burned fur,” Eraka said.
Yegra pulled her nose out of her book and looked Arara over with a critical eye. “When we’re done here I can give you a trim and a brushing.”
“Thank you. I’d like that.” Arara couldn’t stop the thrill of anticipation that went through her at the thought of Yegra running a brush over her like her father was doing to her mother.
“I’m surprised to see you here though,” Arara said, glancing curiously down at her book. A picture from an old camp-fire tale stared back at her, a group of Jerlings running in fear from a huge red-eyed mist monster. A classic Yaka-monster tale meant to scare little puppies into minding their parents.
“I had some questions for your parents.” Yegra shrugged and slammed the book closed. “Plus, I was feeling a l
ittle homesick and wanted to see some familiar faces.” Yegra’s haunch scooted closer to hers.
Yegra’s musky sweetness so close to her made Arara’s insides clench. She knew her own burned fur must have stunk, but she could no longer smell it and appreciated that none of them made a big deal about it.
“Questions...about Yaka?” Arara looked back and forth between her parents and Yegra.
“Yes.” Yegra used one paw to push the book over to Arara. “It’s been gnawing at me ever since I found out.”
“Me, too.” Arara sighed and focused her gaze on her mother. Athura gave Arara a weak smile then rolled over onto her back so Eraka could brush her stomach. Arara wished it were just coincidence that it meant Athura could no longer see Arara. “Mother, where did I come from?”
“Why does it matter, snow flower?” Athura sighed with pleasure as Eraka gently stroked the underside of her neck with the brush. Neither of them looked up.
“Because...because...” Arara whimpered, flopped to the floor and put her paws over her eyes. “Because the fact that I’m a Yaka just got us attacked!” Arara wailed. “It’s not my fault! I didn’t know! Why didn’t you ever tell me I was adopted? In fact, how did you hide it from me? I accidentally picked up the memory of the day I was born, but how is that possible?”
Athura, Eraka, and Yegra sat in stunned silence as Arara trailed off into pitiful puppy cries. Arara knew she was making a fool of herself, but she couldn’t seem to stop the noise.
“Arara,” Yegra touched her paw to Arara’s, prying them away from her face. “Remember what the Elders showed you? How you could relive someone’s memories? I have a theory.”
“I remember.” Arara shook off Yegra’s touch and sat up, the wailing trailed off into hiccupped yelps for a moment before Arara gulped even those down. “What theory?”