by Cheree Alsop
Tears filled my eyes at his words. I shook my head. “I'm not all that,” I denied.
He smiled, his eyes kind. “You are, truly.”
I blinked and a tear rolled down my cheek. He wiped it away with a finger and I leaned against his chest. The sound of his heart beating loud and strong soothed the ache that clutched at my heart. I took a deep breath of the summer wind and grassy hilltop scent of him mixed with the smell of a man confident in his bearing and bold in his step, then I stepped back and smiled at the softness in his light blue eyes. A lock of white-blond hair had swept across his forehead. I pushed it back gently and stood on my tiptoes to kiss him lightly on the lips. “To bed with you, Prince Axon.”
“Just Axon,” he replied, his gaze tumultuous and torn. “To you, just Axon.”
I stepped into my room, but turned with a song in my heart and smiled at him. “Of course, just Axon. Or should it be my Axon?”
My stomach twisted at the liberty of my words, but a light appeared in his eyes that took away all doubt. “Most definitely your Axon,” he said. “Above anything else, your Axon.”
I nodded with a grin. “My Axon, then.” I close the door softly so he would take the hint to go rest, but then I heard him lean against the door, his breath soft and light. I put a hand on the cool wood and pictured him on the other side. I wished I could see the expression on his face. He waited for a long while, then pushed off and walked slowly down the hall. I wondered what he felt, then a light, simple melody drifted under the door. I smiled that I had made him sing.
Chapter 25
My thoughts were too tangled and numerous for me to sleep, so I decided to wander the palace and see if it looked any different at night. I slipped on a black shirt decorated with silver thread and a pair of soft gray pants that the seamstress had left on my bed with the promise of more to follow. The cloth was cottony and comfortable. I felt at home wandering the halls in normal clothes and without shoes on so I could enjoy the depth and quality of the carpets that lined that floors.
I passed several Nathos servants with their pale skin and dark hair. A few stared after me and I started to wonder if someone might have a problem with a Duskie in the halls when a young man with searching dark eyes wearing the tunic of the kitchen staff passed me, then paused and turned.
“Lady Nexa?” he asked in an uncertain tone.
I turned to face him, surprised. He gave a charming grin and dropped into a formal bow. When he rose, he gestured with a flourish toward the kitchen. “Can I interest you in some midnight delicacies?”
A smile touched my lips at the excitement in his tone. “I had dinner not too long ago,” I said, hoping not to offend him.
He shook his head. “Those Luminos know nothing about food.” At my stare, he gave another bow. “Allow me to demonstrate.”
I hesitated, my stomach still full from the feast, but his eyes twinkled and I was curious about the Nathos who shared the Lumini palace. I followed him and he talked lightly of life at the palace at night and the things I hadn't had the chance to see by spending my time only with the Luminos.
“And the crathias open at midnight, their faces turn toward the moon, their petals basked in the green and gold that gave Lumini its royal colors.” He winked. “I'll bet you didn't know the Lumini colors originally came from the Nathos.”
I laughed. “I had no idea.”
He opened a door and gestured for me to enter the kitchen before him. I stepped into a low-ceilinged, wide room with four monstrous cooking ovens along one wall and enough tables to fill half of the great hall. Nathos cooks, assistants, and servants ran madly about with armfuls of wood to stoke the fires, baskets of flour, sacks of dried wheat still on the stalk, a wheelbarrow full of potatoes, several dead fowl with their heads cut off, and some strange creatures strung to a thick pole with twine around their six clawed feet and stingers discarded in a pile near one of the ovens. Piles and rows of every kind of fruit and vegetable imaginable and that I hadn't known existed were being used to flavor, decorate, spice up, and serve as main dishes on great plates where they were carefully arranged with consideration to color and texture, some even crafted into exotic animals and flowers.
One Nathos servant noticed us and stopped walking. Another servant ran into him, dropping the carefully balanced orange eggs he carried on a plate. A cook turned to yell at them, then her eyes fell on me and they widened. Word spread so quickly that before the servants had time to kneel and pick up the eggs, everyone was staring at me.
The first cook, a rotund Nathos with flour coating her dark hair and a spark that was not to be messed with in her dark eyes, cleared her throat. “Sampton, may I speak to you for a moment?” she asked in a carefully level tone.
“Of course,” the young man who had brought me to the kitchen said. He gave me a cheery smile. “Excuse me.” He bowed deeply and hurried to her side.
Their exchange was quiet, but punctuated with several gestures in my direction and the uplifting of voices on more than one occasion. I got the impression that the head cook didn't like Duskies and certainly didn't approve of one in her kitchen even if I was the guest of the Prince himself.
He was saved a reply when the door opened behind me and the kitchen workers fell even quieter than before. I turned to find a man with coal black eyes and black hair touched with gray at the temples standing in the doorway. He had a scar that ran from the corner of his left eye down to his jaw; it pulled his eye downward and made him look extremely upset at the world in general. He wore the Nathos green and gold, but the three solid stripes at his shoulders marked him a commander.
“Commander Thursten,” the head cook said, gaining her composure before the others. “How pleasant of you to join us.”
The Commander glanced at me, his eyes taking in my attire, my hair that I could never quite get to look normal, and my bare feet before he turned back to the cook. “Yes, thank you. There's a bit of a nip in the air and my boys have just returned from rounds. Vinish would do them well while they wait for dinner.”
“Yes, Commander,” the head cook replied. The other servants set to preparing the drinks before the command left her mouth.
Commander Thursten turned his attention back to me. “Decided to see what the rest of the world does when the Luminos sleep?”
He said it as more of a statement than a question, and I didn't know how to reply. There was a hint of disapproval in his gaze, but I didn't fidget when he looked at me. Instead, I studied him as carefully as he did me, knowing full well that with the Luminos asleep, I was at his mercy. My plan was to make sure he knew I wouldn't be taken lightly.
“I owe you my gratitude for rallying the Duskies so I could speak to them,” I said levelly.
He tipped his head in assent. “It was a good plan, but I wasn't sure if anyone could pull it off. Needless to say, I went to sleep a bit uncertain of what the next nightfall would bring.”
“Me, too,” I admitted honestly.
His eyebrows rose slightly. He glanced once around the kitchen, then motioned toward the door. “Let's take a turn about the palace and get to know one another, shall we?”
I fought back a wry smile. “Is this getting to know your enemy, or hoping to turn an acquaintance into a valuable asset?”
He held open the door and glanced at me. “The second one, mostly.”
I nodded and stepped through. The Commander shut the door and talking exploded in the kitchen beyond it. He gave the door a thoughtful look, then turned and led the way down the hall. “You haven't been around here much at night, have you?”
I shook my head. “Too tired for the most part.”
“And for the other part?” he pressed.
I shrugged and tried to sound casual. “I don't know any Nathos and didn't want to press my presence on anyone unwilling to receive it.”
He nodded and motioned for a servant to open a side door. Night flooded into the palace, making dark shadows of the unlit torches along the wall. We stepped
out into the brisk night air and I regretted not grabbing the cloak in my bedroom. Bushes rose on either side of the path effectively limiting the view and leaving a channel next to the palace wall. Moonlight pooled at our feet, lighting the cobblestone path. Several varieties of plants crept along the stonework. One vine glowed with the luminescence of the moon the way the mortar of the palace had with the light of the sun. I traced it with my eyes from its origin near the doorway all the way to the far corner where the path turned out of sight.
“I heard some tales about you from several of the Duskies that fought in the last battle.”
I glanced at him. “Do you confer with Duskies often?”
He shrugged lightly, his eyes on the end of the path where it disappeared around the corner. “When I must.”
I bit back a smile. “Me, too.”
He laughed, then looked surprised at his laughter. He glanced at me again. “How do you like it here?”
“Lumini is amazing. Far beyond anything I could have imagined,” I said honestly.
He shook his head and indicated the palace. “I mean here.”
I looked back at the moon-washed walls. The Nathos Commander wasn't looking for an easy answer. He wanted an honest one. I debated whether I could trust him, then realized I wouldn't be out alone at night with him if I didn't. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, my eyes on soft, tiny yellow flowers that swayed gently in the midnight breeze. Their vines wrapped around the trunks of the carefully pruned trees that lined the path. During the day, I hadn't noticed the tiny buds closed to the bright light, but at night under the softer light of the moon and stars, the delicate flowers danced slowly as if in time to a song they shared.
“Politics are strange,” I said. “I guess I've never understood why the races don't trust each other when we need each other to survive.”
A slight smile touched the corners of his lips. “Are you familiar with the Reathe powder? Being from the Caves, I assume you know why they were originally created.”
I nodded. “Nathos and Luminos used to take Reathe because it gave them the ability to stay up during the time of day or night when they are normally weak. But the supply ran out long ago.”
He plucked a leaf from a bush and turned it over in his hand. It was dark green with a serrated, burnt orange edge that reminded me of the poisonous lizards that inhabited the lower, cooler caves. “Yes, but for a while there were hoards of Reathe, carefully guarded and valued at ridiculous amounts. The Nathos began to fear that the Luminos had more hidden away, and would use the powder to overwhelm them and kill them, and vice versa. So the races separated. The Nathos moved to the forests, and the Luminos to the plains and desert. It wasn't until the Sathen began to appear that we were forced to move back together.”
I had heard most of what he said in bits and pieces when I was younger. I thought the Sathen had come back centuries ago; yet there was a hint of longing in his voice that said he knew of the forest he described, and missed it. Confused, I asked, “How long ago did the Sathen appear?”
He held the leaf loosely in his hand, forgotten; his eyes took on a distant look. “Seventy years ago, give or take. At the beginning they were manageable, but as time passed they grew stronger until our fortifications couldn't keep them out. I remember waking up from a sun sleep to find my family in pieces around me. The Sathen left Destere when the sun set and they knew we would be strong again, but there was such a trail of destruction and death in their wake that the few of us who remained had no choice but to join the others in fleeing our forest cities where the force of the Sathen had become the strongest.” He fell silent and I could see the remembered horror in his eyes at memories long suppressed.
I didn't know what to say, and so waited with my chest tight and a knot in my throat.
After a few heartbeats, Commander Thursten took a rattling breath, then glanced at me. “There is a prophecy that a Duskie with royal blood will lead the races to defeat the Sathen, and that he'll be stronger than both the Nathos and the Luminos at their full strength.”
My mouth fell open. “Where did the prophecy come from?”
He shook his head. “There are many such prophecies, but they are older than any of our people. They get passed down at gatherings and from grandparents to grandchildren, but no one knows where they started.”
I toyed with a thread that had come loose from my shirtsleeve. “Than why give them any consideration?”
His eyebrows lifted slightly when he looked back at me, his coal black eyes serious. “They predicted the Sathen.”
A cold chill ran through my body. I pushed it away with my next question. “Where did the Sathen come from?”
His eyes darkened slightly. “From the south past the Nathian forest and the Tarnosh Mountains. Their origin is a bit,” he paused, searching for a word, “Cloudy. There are several different stories, but I don't think any of them are the truth. I believe the key to their defeat is in their origin.” He let out a small, grim sigh. “But one battle at a time. I've only just sent my brethren along their path. It's too soon to talk about more bloodshed.”
I agreed completely. I felt bold after Commander Thursten's honesty, so I asked another question that rose to my mind. “If there were no more Sathen, would you go back to the forest?”
“Definitely,” he answered without hesitation. At my searching look, his eyes creased slightly at the corners. “But I wouldn't mind if a few Luminos visited once in a while, with Duskies, of course.” He let out his breath in a small rush. “It was easier when there was Reathe. Our energy runs out before morning, and the Luminos are asleep before nightfall. For the few moments we have to speak, one race is exhausted and the other is just waking up. It doesn't make for very riveting conversation, and trust is based on knowledge. If we don't know each other, it's hard to completely let go of our suspicions of the other race.”
I frowned; I had never given much thought to the situation. ”If Reathe is so important, can't it be found somewhere else?”
His eyes tightened thoughtfully. “You're full of questions.”
I shrugged, embarrassed. “I guess I haven't found anyone so willing to answer them.”
“Fair enough. Follow me.” He tossed the orange-edged leaf to the ground and continued down the path. I fell into step beside him. He followed the path along the edge of the wall until it turned a corner to the side of the palace facing the ocean.
My breath caught in my throat at the sight below us. Tears I thought I had cried out in Axon's arms stung my eyes.
Commander Thursten crossed his arms in front of his chest, he shoulders bowed and head turned away from the probing light of the moon. Below us, the piers on which the Luminos and Duskies had been burned were now lined with the bodies of the fallen Nathos. Their still forms had also been wrapped in white, but the flowers spread across their bodies were the green and purple crathias Sampton had told me about.
“Shouldn't you be down there?” I asked gently.
Commander Thursten kept his eyes on the people below, his expression unreadable. “My second, Captain Sared, has orders to carry out the burning of the bodies. I choose not to be there.” His voice tightened with pain. “My son is one of the bodies.” He turned his face away, but not before I saw tears catch moonlight in gems of sorrow before falling to the ground at his feet.
I pushed down my restraint and touched his elbow. “A parent should never outlive his child,” he said. A soundless sob wracked his body.
I put an arm around him. There were no words to ease his pain, so I simply stood there, my eyes on the purple and green flames that rose when they touched the gilded candles to the piers, and my memories racing through the bloody battle, wondering which fallen comrade draped in white cloth seeping red had been the Commander's son. I wondered if I had acted quicker, if I could have saved him. Maybe I could have rallied the Duskies faster, or perhaps we should have burned the ships. My heart grew heavier at the thought that some of the bodies down there would
still be alive, fathers, brothers, mothers, and sisters saved instead of burning, their loved ones' hearts broken.
“I'm sorry,” I whispered, the words painful past my tight throat.
The Commander shook his head. “Neither of us could have saved him.”
“But what if-”
He turned and cut me off, his eyes boring intently into mine. “No. Accept now what is past or you will destroy your life regretting something you cannot change. It happened, and while it is beyond horrible,” his voice caught, but his forced himself to continue, “We have to live for the living and do so in a way that honors those that died.”
I thought of Axon's men and my heart rang true with his words. But I couldn't shake off the heaviness I felt. “It's not easy to be the one alive while those who died might deserve to be living instead.”
He nodded without speaking and put an arm around my shoulder. We watched long after the fires had died on the piers and the attending Nathos had gone back to their homes. I felt the Commander sigh just as the first hint of gold brushed the horizon. I risked one more question. “Where's your wife, Commander?”
He looked at me, a depth of sorrow to his eyes that made my own tears feel paltry. He gave a sad smile. “With Trist; she left along her path the day he was born.”