"But I am a Minstrel," he said, suddenly, "so I shouldn't take all of those thoughts of mine seriously. Should it be though, that my aim was to make the princess happy, I should like to be the one to tell her, that this Minstrel's tale was true."
I swallowed. In the whole of the plains, even with its wind, and rolling grass, all was still for me. I heard a short snort, and looked beside me to see that Tosch was standing there, not feet away. I was not sure whether Minstrel knew that I'd once owned an ivoronsu as Cyric; I guessed that he did, since he'd brought this all up only afterwards—or had he intended to all along?
"And if I'm not that man you speak of?" I asked of Minstrel. Not only to dissuade him, but because I wasn't sure how close I was to who I had been. Certainly, I was not sure how close I was to being Shaundakul's king or protector, or even Ellia's lover.
Minstrel let out a whimsy sigh, reaching absently for his lyre, where it sat on his back—not taking it down, only grazing the strings, then letting his hand fall. "Then I shall write a tale of Cole of Kanth, but it shall be one as melancholy as the feeling which wars create, for he should have wanted something very badly, but never had it. For the Lady will have none but her beloved friend."
I narrowed. Not liking to hear this, to think that Ellia wouldn't accept Cole. Sure, that had been how it had seemed before the battle, but I had hopes that had to do with the fear she'd been experiencing. It was just so much better, so much simpler: something I could envision, to imagine that Ellia would love me first as Cole, then would see me, then would know me, then would have to love me still.
It seemed pointless now, with Tosch standing beside me, and Fauna there, given but not given by Amalia, and Minstrel watching me so earnestly, to pretend that I couldn't tell what he spoke of. That it was ludicrous. So I said again, very simply, "Will you tell her this?"
His head shook almost right away. "This Minstrel knows the better tale. The princess should be happier to hear it from her friend."
"You're her friend," I pointed out.
Minstrel smiled. He paused like that for a moment, his light hair blowing, his hands in his pockets, then he let his head bob up and down. "So, I would tell her one day..."
My throat got thick. I swallowed it down. Tosch nudged his head to me. Let's go to the ocean, master, he said. Let's go to the ocean.
"Would you give me time?" I put to Minstrel.
He thought about it. Glancing at the fields, then back to me. If he'd ever once been a silly gnomish minstrel, writing tales about popping fire, none would have known it then. "Not very long."
I nodded sharp, my throat still tight. In my mind, ran a dozen scenarios, a dozen sentences, for Ellia, but then I also saw her shouting how I'd ruined everything in Karatel, and disappearing in front of me. This versus her attitude in Akadia, just last night, "You don't have to come if you don't mean to, Cole." Yet assuming that I would, and not refusing that I could.
I didn't want her to disappear. I only wanted her.
Tosch nudged me again. I looked back at him, smiling a little, to my surprise. There was something like a relief, a sort of numbness that came to hearing Minstrel had guessed something about me. He was Ellia's dear friend. So if he knew, and he didn't hate me, and thought I should tell her, then it seemed she knew, somehow it part.
I rubbed Tosch's head, then I looked back at Minstrel—who had that look of a gnome who knew too much as any gnome must have ever had.
"Can I ask you one favor then, in this case, Minstrel?" I said.
The gnome watched me blinking. I waited for him to point out that he was already the one doing me a favor. But he didn't. I took Tosch's reign, then I held it out towards the gnome. "Would you like to take an ivoronsu home with you to Yanartas?"
Minstrel looked from me to Tosch. I thought he grasped that I meant for Tosch to come with, but couldn't very well bring him myself. Fauna threw her neck off towards the fields, watching them astutely again. Minstrel reached his hand out with a smile.
"I've always wanted a steed of my own."
EPILOGUE
Now that we're here, now that we've come this far
Just hold on
There is nothing to fear, for I am right beside you
For all my life, I am yours
CYRIC:
It was all those weeks we'd spent together, repeated, but only better since there were even less others there to take her time, or mine, or to take our attention with duties. In Kanth, Silos had told me before, that it was customary for a man and woman who'd been just married to spend their first year together, the two of them—without the husband going off to hunt and work. Instead, their family members, or village members helped to support them, so that they could spend that year learning about each other.
I supposed, in truth, that Ellia and I had gotten more years to learn about each other than I could ever be thankful enough for. But this time, this time? I loved. This time, I thought was like that time those men and women had in Kanth. Perhaps, we did not touch, or kiss, or sleep together, so much as those were able. But we spent endless hours talking, and we spent endless hours doing endless nothings. We returned to the hot springs, and Ellia swam, while I dipped my feet and watched and splashed her. She took me up to the mountain summit, to see the chimera's home, and there we slept out beside a Yanartian fire, and she spoke of stars and I pretended I could see them just as well. We went into the ocean for the first time, or the first time, at least, not by accident. And there, I'd almost told her who I was, for what better excuse than refusing to wear foolishly cumbersome wet robes into the sea. But I hadn't, and that had been about as close as I'd ever gotten. We stayed up in her cabin, speaking of the battles passed, and the news from Akadia. I did not have to return all the way to the base of the complex any longer to sleep. The Isle was so emptied of people now, not only those foreigners, but even Warriors and regular Yanartians, which were slowly trickling back in groups—It was this empty, so that I was given my own cabin in the middle-complex. Not so high as Ellia, but near enough.
She did not go to the cave of dreams and nightmares, or if she tried to (I was never sure whether she might just be walking) I was always there to join her and ask where she was going. So that began our games of prey and hunter. This game, which was a Yanartian one, had to do with practicing for true hunting, and not only hunting, but tracking. One would run off and hide, given a period of time's start, and the other would be set to track them. We spent hours doing that, and before long, it had become popular to be joined by those Yanartian children of the Isle. So, first, we became tracking trainers for groups of children, and then also, Ellia returned to some work of Warrior's training.
News of Akadia, was always well, thought it seemed I thought to both her and I, as if it were another world and time which we had lived in, fighting those wars. If she thought of Shaundakul, or being a princess, I did not know it. She asked after her people, but things were still not even sorted enough for anyone to be doing anything but helping to repair the city. Nain and Selkie came to visit once, and once the Democedian princes, and then the first-order Warriors were all returned, and then Amalia came, bearing news of Lucian and Estrid's impending arrival—not to stay for good, since Taiper was still much too young to run the country on his own—but so they might have a proper Yanartian wedding, with their chimera present, and those Warrior's which Lucian had grown up with, and Estrid's family, which had already set up permanent residency on Yanartas.
That was a beautiful event, since it was held in the Warrior's Chamber, with its dim glowing golden lights, and then afterwards, out on the southern platform over the water. Estrid wore flowers in her hair, which was the fashion of Yanartian weddings, and a cream dress. Lucian kept his sword, even for the ceremony, which was also the tradition. Minstrel sang endless songs, both humorous and solemn about their romance, and Ellia sang one which she had written as well.
She did wear a dress, but it was nothing like those ones she had worn in the past. It was simpl
e enough to resemble more her nightgown, then the red dress I'd picked out for her in Echren, or the pink one she'd worn as a child, or the turquoise one she'd worn both that last party we'd attended before the destruction of Uldin Keep, and the golden party at the top of the Akadian palace, where we'd danced for the first time.
I meant to dance with her, only... I couldn't bring myself to ask. There were others that she danced with. Sometimes I thought I saw her glance my way—though it was more a fearful glance than a longing one. Estrid even took my arm to dance with me once, seeming set to arrange a dance meeting between Ellia and I among the throng, but we somehow avoided it. Minstrel watched me more than once that night. But the fact of that was, the reason that I did not ask to dance with her, was since I did not think it would be right, when there was nothing reasonable left to stop me from telling her simply, the reason she should dance with me and only me for all her days, and not be upsetted when it reminded her of dancing with Cyric.
It wasn't until days after this, past that time where Estrid and Lucian had stayed on the Isle in bliss and celebration, going often up to the mountain to meet with their chimera, and then finally departing back to Akadia. It wasn't until this time, a morning, while I had gone down to the base of the complex to visit with "Minstrel's" ivoronsu, which he sometimes let me ride, that Ellia came down as well to visit Fauna. And upon seeing me, brushing Fauna as I did Tosch, with me there thinking, as I'd thought since the wedding: I will tell her once Estrid and Lucian have gone. I will tell her then. So, I was thinking of asking her out to ride, and then telling her then. (she wouldn't be able to leave me as well, if we were alone, I thought). But it was then, watching Fauna, that she said to me. "I've been thinking.... of returning to Shaundakul, Cole."
And so I looked up at her.
She was watching down. Her hair was braided loose and to the side, as she'd begun to do since the war's end. She wore her Warrior's Uniform as always, but now without the leather armor over it.
Her turquoise eyes came up to meet mine. "Not with my people yet," she clarified, "Only alone. To tell it, and then perhaps.... well, I only think that it is time I should go. Lucian says that a band of Shaundakulians has begun to form, even within so many people together as a whole. In their freedom, they've found each other."
What I wanted to say: are you ready to be a queen, Ellia? I didn't say that, though it was always what I wanted to ask her when we spoke of endless nothings. How can I help? I will help. You can be a queen, but you don't have to be, if you're not ready. But here, wasn't she saying about her people. Maybe, she did have to be ready—wasn't that what it meant to be a ruler.
Instead of this, I said tentatively, "Do you ever think of wanting your crown back, Ellia?"
She ducked her head. There was a little smile, then blushing cheeks. Then she said, "It's the least of what I deserve, to have lost it... anyways it's not what will make me a queen or not."
You won't be a queen until you're married, I heard myself telling her. And as for her response, though her crown was there against my arm (and I never minded it there, since it could always tell me when she was close or wasn't, so I would never lose her really) —though I had her crown, well and sound, and not lost, I did not understand what her answer meant. So I did not give it back. I'd meant to ask it, anyways, in place of asking whether she was ready to be queen. If she told me just once that she wished she had it back, then I would give it to her and take it as a sign that she was ready to lead her people back to their homeland.
"But I don't think... at least until I go, that..." Ellia spoke out, not in a mutter; confidently, but in a paced way. "I thought of riding there," she said. "I thought of riding Fauna, so that Luffie wouldn't have to be away from Yurei, and I've heard that there's a path around the south, from Byako to Shaundakul, I thought of testing that, so to connect these lands, not only by flight... And I thought... not to go completely alone, in case there were wild animals. Or in case Uldin Keep were somehow inhabited."
Do you mean to take Minstrel? That's what went through my mind to say. But I knew that wasn't what she meant; it was just foolish deflection, wasn't it? Not to break down, hearing this, that she wanted me to go. Hearing this, that we were to go to Shaundakul, the two of us.
"Do you think that Minstrel would let me take his horse?" I asked, which wasn't much of a stretch of the mind, since Ellia and I had already taken Fauna and him out riding into the forest.
For a moment, her gaze flicked to Tosch. I saw in it, that thing which said she was thinking of Cyric, a slight hesitation. Tosch was put, on a strict, no laughing rule, since reaching the Isle, but even then, I'd thought, maybe, when we'd first shown up, even with Minstrel claiming to have won him on his own, when all those others in Akadia had been parceled out the surviving ones of them, I'd thought, she might guess it all in a flash. She turned her gaze back to me. "I'm sure, he would. So... perhaps tomorrow, or the next day, then... or the next, and we will go?"
I nodded.
She went back to brushing Fauna; slow and methodic, then mentioning Lucian and Estrid's wedding, and something about one of those days of celebration afterwards, and so we began to talk of that laughing like we hadn't just spoken of going off to Shaundakul at all.
And I thought in my mind, Oh, well, then, I'll just have to wait that much longer to tell her. I couldn't tell her while she's meaning to go to Shaundakul, on the way there or during, and if she's committed afterward, to going to fetch her people from Akadia, I couldn't tell her rightly then either. Minstrel might not be present then, so... there wouldn't be any dances to feel guilty for in the near future. It could be a while. Yes, I didn't mind that it should be a while.
ELLIA:
As fast, as I had ever ridden on a horse, that's how swiftly Cole and I raced through the forests. Not the whole journey of the trip, or course. We'd begun in Byako. And there, we'd stayed a night to visit with Cheng and the others of the Tigers, even to accept their guidance on what might be the best trek through the uncharted spaces between their land and Shaundakul, coming round from the south, south of the sea. It was a much longer thing than I had anticipated, for the sea stretched out far even south past the Isle, and then connected only in one place well enough to pass to the woods before lapsing out again, into an even greater body of water.
This pass, was not so thin or small as the land which connected Yanartas to Byako. It was so wide, even, and crowded with trees, so that you couldn't well tell while you were crossing it, that there was ocean on either side of you.
But now, days since, Cole and I had left that ocean behind us. Now it was endless trees, and only his climbing, and measuring of the sun to tell us which direction we should be headed to reach the forests of Shaundakul. We wanted to avoid the mountains of course, and for that reason it was important that we turn north at the right time.
Cole shouted something to me from his horse beside, over the sweeping wind of our heightened pace. But I couldn't hear it. I could only tell that it was happy, and I did not stop to ask him what he'd said. These times of racing were too enjoyable, like the whole of the world might be left behind if Fauna would only go on fast enough. I wanted sometimes, to switch steeds with Cole, so that I might try out the ivoronsu, and go so quick as to blur the world around. Flying Luffie was not the same as this. There was something, always, about moving through the air, which had a peacefulness, a stillness, as if you might not be moving at all. Even now, on Fauna, moving half the speed of Luffie, on the ground: the leaves and earth cracked in her passing. Branches stretching too far out, broke away. The leaves and bits of sunlight overhead moved endlessly, in flashes that made it impossible to think you might be still, and every bit of my clothes, and even braided hair, moved with the wind, telling of the furious pace.
I was elsewhere in mind, for all this, even as it began to rain. Then Cole called that we should stop, but I did not want to.
But he won out in the end, when we passed, a well-shaded grove of leafy trees, and moss
underfoot.
"The horses shouldn't mind the water, so neither should I," I said, stopped but not dismounting, still holding out that we should go on. There was a single large tree, around the base of which was almost completely dry, and Cole was unloading our things into this place.
"That's fine by me, but ask about it with Minstrel's horse," Cole replied. "He's been badgering me since the first drop of water struck his coat. So much for hailing from the springlands."
"Oh, did Minstrel tell you about that?"
Cole dragged the ivoronsu's reign, closer to the tree. Then in a gesture, I wasn't sure I'd seen him make before, he ducked his head forward, then shook it out. It was the strangest thing—since he didn't have any hair that might have gotten wet to shake clear—though, now that I thought of it, I wasn't sure whether he had hair or not. Surely, though, it couldn't have done much good to shake it inside the robes.
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