“So this ‘accident’ Lodi was speaking of was actually directed by you?” I asked curiously.
“Indeed it was, daughter of Fanarion,” Pierina said, using my title. “It’s in my best interest to let him go on about it being some other miraculous creation by the mages.”
We paused for a bit as some people (I am not sure if they were servants) brought out food for the day. I noticed some more fish dishes. One fish was quite large with a long rod-like appendage coming from what should have been a nose. I was told it was a Zipheas fish. As they served us the Zipheas, I noticed the meat was grilled. In Midonia the fish I had ever seen were much too delicate for grilling. Usually they would put them on a plate and stick them in a wood fire.
“Would Theron and I be able to buy some of your fragrant soaps?” I asked Pierina when we had started to resume eating and I had washed down my first bite with a sip of wine.
“You don’t need to buy them, dear. We would be more than happy to give you some. Perhaps you can convince the Aelisonians to use them. I’ll give you a bundle and you can give that king in Slievenamon some. Don’t let him on that he smells - even though he does,” Pierina said. She was quite generous and I was impressed. I wondered though, how you would give soap to someone without implying that they needed it. I supposed I would find out soon enough.
I was surprised at how little time it took to reach Slievenamon. I came out of my coach, following after Theron. Since it was getting colder, I also grabbed a wrap to put around myself. I had a few pieces of clothing packed from my home of Feyris and I was so glad I had them. I planned to change after I entered the city.
The city of Slievenamon did look a bit similar to Lermeri. Since Lermeri was increasing fortifications with their concrete the colors differed. Slievenamon was all stone and looked partly encased in mountain. King Aeomon did not come to greet us when we arrived. Nor did anyone offer to help with our luggage. It was almost as though the entire city was unprepared for our arrival. It was not until about a half an hour later as we wandered aimlessly through the city that someone came up behind us, wildly yelling in a language I did not quite understand.
“Ayreni, friend,” Theron said, raising a hand to calm the man. I knew enough about the Fanarion language and geography to know ayreni meant peace (which was why the calm sea was named so).
“Seenomi, Theron.” The man glanced my way and noticed the confusion on my face and the color of my skin. “I didn’t realize Princess Muirenn was going to be with you. Your Highness, Muirenn, I am sorry I did not speak in the common tongue. Your clothes are so similar to the ones worn by women here so I thought you were one of the servants I sent to attend to your bags.”
“Why weren’t you using Common to begin with?” I asked him, ignoring the title he addressed me with and his confusing me with a servant.
“My apologies, I didn’t realize Theron could speak it. I have only conversed with the Lermeri people and they are so close.” The man paused and frustration and embarrassment spread across his face. He wasn’t that old, and he looked more like a scholar than anything else. Maybe he was one of the king’s advisors.
“King Aeomon sent me to find you. We had just received the note from the messenger you had sent in advance and we are, as you can see, completely unprepared,” the man explained, wrenching his hands together in nervousness.
“How did you not know Fanarions speak Common?” I asked him, probably a bit rudely.
“The only one I ever met, Your Highness, did not speak Common,” the man retorted.
“You speak it very well, sir,” Theron said calmly, trying to extinguish the tense situation. I was really annoyed more than angry. At least the people of Slievenamon looked more like me than Theron. Being cooped up in a mountain didn’t lend well to darkened skin from the solis.
“If you would accompany me, Prince Theron and Princess Muirenn, I will lead you to meet the king. You can leave your bags here and someone will attend to them. They should have come out before me, although I don’t see them,” the man said. “I’m called Brognan, if you would ever need me.”
We followed Brognan through the underground streets of Slievenamon. The whole place was so dark and dimly lit, with the smell of woodsmoke almost overpowering. I noticed there were pipes leading up through the ceiling, most likely to vent the smells like a chimney because otherwise in such a concentration I was sure it would be toxic.
“Have you heard the tale of the drakon?” Brognan asked me directly. I shook my head and he smiled. “King Aeomon has been hunting one. His breath fuels the mountain off the coast of Lermeri and sometimes he spits fire and smoke into the air. He has been sleeping we think. His Majesty is going to arrange an expedition to go to the fire mountain.”
“Wouldn’t that be dangerous?” I wondered. “Surely if it can spit fire, you wouldn’t have an adequate means of protection.”
“We have been guaranteed some mages from Lermeri. They want to know just as much as we do about this drakon,” Brognan explained. “I have only seen the drakon fly once in my life. It was massive with great wings that seemed to be the length of the whole of Slievenamon.”
We talked a bit more about the drakon until we finally arrived at the halls of King Aeomon. The paintings I wanted to see were on either side of the wall. While Brognan urged us forward, he said that I might stay behind a bit to look at them. The exquisite detail noted on each piece of canvas was truly amazing. It was the work of a visual genius. I wondered who had made each painting, but we didn’t have time for that.
Brognan opened the door and presented us to the king, “Your Majesty, this is Prince Theron and Princess Muirenn of Fanarion.” I cringed a little at the realization I could no longer identify with my homeland of Feyris or my clan.
We bowed as we faced the king. It was interesting to see how he dressed and how the room looked. It was like a mix of our architecture and that of Fanarion. If this was truly a twin city of Lermeri, they had sure done some work to it to make it look unique. There were large columns that reached up and fanned out over the ceiling with large wooden beams webbing across. The throne was all wood atop a stone platform. King Aeomon rose and came down to greet us. He was rather tall compared to Theron and was surprisingly skinny. He had peppered hair and wore a thick fur coat which he clasped over his chest. I wasn’t cold at all in the room but it looked like he was. He offered an arm of greeting to Theron and subtly bowed his head towards me. He turned up an eyebrow to Brognan who rushed up to my side.
“Your Highness, the king wishes to speak privately to the prince. If you wouldn’t mind, I could take you to your quarters and you could wait for your husband there.” I nodded hesitantly as Brogran rattled on. “You can look at the artwork in the hall again as we go.”
We left the throne room and I stopped to stare at the previous kings. There were no illustrations of their wives or children in the background, I noticed. I hadn’t even heard of there being a queen here.
“What are the roles of women here?” I asked Brognan. “Remember, I am the niece of the Chief Dame of Feyris and I am not accustomed to being treated as an unequal. It seems strange how I’ve been treated lately.” I didn’t expect the man to understand how I felt considering he was a man.
He smiled though, and answered me. “We do not treat our women anything at all like they do in Fanarion. I have heard what they do and I consider it to be barbaric. It’s only because of Theron being from Fanarion that King Aeomon wanted to talk to him privately. He didn’t want Theron feeling as an equal while you were there because he didn’t think he would be used to it.”
“Theron has been living in Feyris for quite some time and he’s more than adapted to treating me well,” I told Brognan. I took off my wrap and held it in my hands as we proceeded through the hall.
“The message didn’t say you were coming but we were prepared either way. If you would like, I could find Queen Morawen to provide you with some company. She usually serves at her husband’s side, but a
s I already explained, we thought the situation dictated otherwise.” He scratched his head for a moment. “If I could remember where she said she’d be.”
“That would be quite lovely Brognan,” I told him. “If you can’t find her I am sure I can provide some entertainment for myself. All you would need to is point me to your apothecary shop. I’m always interested in learning more about the medicinal and healing properties of various herbs. Perhaps there are some that grow here that I do not know and I could take them back with me.” Brognan nodded. He told me where the apothecary shop was anyway, and led me through the carved tunnels of the city. The tunnels were actually very nice. Whoever had crafted them also carved elaborately into the ceilings so it seemed more artwork than a mountain we were walking through. It was not long until we were at a vast lake with glowing white things floating in the air and a woman sitting on a bench, swirling the water with a naked toe.
“Your Majesty?” Brognan asked timidly. The woman turned slowly and her face warmed at the sight of me. She ushered Brognan forward as he continued his introduction as she stood. “This is Pri- I mean Muirenn, daughter of Fanarion. She is Chief Dame Angharad’s niece.”
“One of the peaceful clans, then?” Queen Morawen asked with a smile. “It is such a pleasure to meet you.” She offered me a hand which I took. “Come and sit with me.” She dismissed Brognan who scurried off—most likely back to where King Aeomon and Theron were.
The queen looked much younger than Aeomon, probably by at least fifteen years. I realized that she could easily have been an older sister to me. She had brown hair and hazel eyes. She was wearing a simple dress, probably because she didn’t want it to get dirty near the lake. If one didn’t know better, she could have passed as any woman in the city.
“Thank you for your hospitality, Queen Morawen,” I said to her.
“Hospitality?” the queen said with a light laugh. “That is utter nonsense and you know it. I am well aware of the late message from Lermeri. I fully expect it to have been on purpose.”
“On purpose?” I quietly wondered. “They seemed so nice, in general.”
“They also gave you soaps, no doubt,” she said to me, looking around for what I had conveniently left in my bag. There was no reason to bring soap up to the first meeting with the king. “My husband does not smell bad. He smells like a man.”
“Why would they try to harm your relationship with us?” I asked her. She sighed and brushed a finger through her hair.
“We have no idea. It would be in our best interest to be friendly. They put on a façade but I can see right through it. I think when Orinda separated it started. They have always tried to distance themselves from us. They think they are better than we are. They are no different. We are still people!” The queen was getting worked up and I tried to calm her down with some soft words about how I was not from Fanarion and I didn’t see any reason why we had to have hostilities. I said we had come to help mend whatever differences we had.
“Lodi did give me soap,” I said, not wanting to flare her up anymore. I felt the need to be honest now. Who knew whether she would have had someone look through my baggage. As much as lying was against everything in the Text, I felt I needed to. “It’s for me, to take home. We don’t have anything that smells like that in Feyris.”
“It does smell good, I will give the Lermeri people credit for that,” Queen Morawen conceded. “Why they have to go all the way to the fire mountain to get it is far beyond my comprehension. Did you hear about the expedition we were planning?” I nodded. “Brognan says something about looking for a drakon. I haven’t ever seen one.”
“Nor have I,” I stated plainly. I wondered if perhaps someone had just imagined the drakon … or maybe the Guardian of the Wood set it there to try to keep the peace between the Lermeri and Slievenamon people. I had seen her do miraculous things before. Maybe it was conjured by a follower of the Destroyer to do just the opposite. Who knew.
“It’s getting late. Have you eaten anything?” she asked me after I tried to hide a yawn.
“We had some in the coach. If you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to see my room,” I told her. She nodded and got up, leading me to my quarters. I was pleasantly surprised to see Theron there when she arrived. After Morawen and Theron were introduced, she took leave of us and I was left alone with my husband.
“How did your talks go?” I asked him quietly.
“Well,” he said. “If you don’t mind, there is something I’d rather do besides talk. I’ve missed your company.” I smiled as he gave me a flirtatious wink. We worked our way to the bed, enjoyed ourselves, and fell asleep peacefully in each other’s arms.
Theron was hovering over me when I woke up. He was smiling as I opened my eyes. I yawned and stretched and sat up.
“What is the matter with you?” I asked him. I was hoping he would let me be as I was tired.
“Pitter-patter,” he said, his eyes sparkling.
“Pitter-patter?” I asked him. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“Baby feet,” Theron replied wryly. He brushed his hand over my face and moved it down till it rested on my belly. “I can sense it.”
“You feel something there?” I wondered. If conception had taken place over the course of the night there wasn’t any anything more than a tiny … I don’t know. Whatever it was had to be very, very small.
“You do realize I have the ability to tell when something is different with a person regarding their health,” he told me sarcastically.
“Yes. I thought it might take longer… when it was bigger,” I told him. He embraced me and whispered into my ear,
“There are more changes happening to you than what’s in your womb.”
“Really?” I said, almost excited with the thought. It was like learning about a new herb.
“It’s hard to explain but it’s kind of like a complex recipe. You have all these ingredients inside of you and it’s like a new one sprung up out of the blue. I felt it as soon as I woke up,” he clarified, letting me go. He got up to get dressed and I did the same. “We probably should cut our visit here short. I can come back later. We need to get you back in Feyris where your family is. I know you would be stressed in Midonia. I can’t have you here, being pregnant, in the middle of winter. It’s too dangerous. Even though you wouldn’t deliver until around Joyai, traveling at four months pregnant would not be advisable.”
“How long do we have here, then?” I asked him, with concern in my voice. I stuck a knuckle in my mouth to teethe on. “I think the situation between Lermeri and Slievenamon is rather tense at best. I don’t want to jeopardize anything by leaving.”
“It’s fine, Muirenn,” Theron assured me, pulling a shirt over his head. “I said I can come back.” He began tying the laced fittings as I responded.
“I like being involved,” I whined, finishing up the side stays on my dress. I put my shoes on and started working on my hair which was quite messy thanks to the previous night.
“You are going to have to adapt to taking a subdued role when it comes to politics. We really need to figure out where we are going to live and what we are going to do together. My mother has been insisting that we stay in Midonia in the home I have set for me, and I know you don’t want to,” he told me softly, coming over to stand by me and run his fingers through my just-brushed hair. I decided to leave it rather than do any fancy plaiting.
“I don’t like how Fanarion treats women,” I stated, my arms crossed defiantly over my chest. “What if we had a girl?”
“Perhaps we can live closer to Feyris, if it would make you feel better. At any rate, we should take you to Feyris now,” he said to me, rubbing my shoulders.
“What about Eclipse?” I asked, concerned. Surely he hadn’t forgotten my cat that was being cared for in Midonia.
“I’ll see to his travel. I’m going to make sure you are thoroughly pampered with anything you could ask for,” he said to me. I turned to view a warm smile spreading across h
is face.
“Thank you,” I said. I closed my eyes, imagining my homeland and wondering if anything had changed.
Chapter 13
He Returns
I was in my third month of pregnancy, just developing my baby bump, when we received word of an emissary coming from Kyrie. It seemed only yesterday that the chief dame had released the prisoners, not over a year. This time, the chief dame made it quite obvious that the person would be received with open arms.
I was sitting with Theron in our house the chief dame had commissioned immediately after our return. Eclipse was with us, and as soon as he had saw me after his transport, he ran and meowed for petting and cat cuddles. He was now quite settled down in his new home. We were constantly bombarded with “presents” he had caught for us.
Lunamae came into the house as soon as I started petting Eclipse, asking if we had heard anything further about the emissary.
“No I haven’t,” I told her honestly. Even though we were considered to be the same level as Angharad, because Theron was from Fanarion, I had been kept out of political discussions.
“I’m so tired of waiting,” the chief dame’s daughter whined as Eclipse ran off. It was typical behavior for her at her age. At fifteen she was becoming the beauty that her mother was, but ever so stubborn and defiant.
“It’s only been a day since we heard of it. The emissary would need at least a week to get here. There is no use worrying over it. You should attend to something constructive,” I said to her, knowing full well she had Marcus on her mind.
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