Liberate

by Krista D. Ball

  Paverly had no children of her own. Amber had asked Allric once about that. Paverly was nearly two hundred, so she was well old enough by elven and Elorian standards. However, since his family had rejected her, the group that arranged marriages struck her from their lists and she was left to fend for herself. Like most Elorians in her place, she spent most of her time in Ellentop. The former king knew her through Allric, and, well, that explained both the court manners and her lack of marriage.

  So Paverly was here now, to live out the length of Amber’s life and then take on the continued role of raising her daughter once the end came. It used to hurt, and admittedly it still sometimes hurt, but she needed to protect Opal. Wrapping her in cotton blankets might make Amber feel better, but it would not help an Elorian who would be going through the equivalent of her late teens when Amber would be an old woman. Opal would need a second mother eventually, and Paverly would be that woman.

  Thus, Amber embraced Paverly and kept her private grief inside. None of the women spoke often of Allric. Or, more accurately she amended in her mind, they never spoke of the grief of losing Allric. They all told the funny stories about Allric. Allric was a war hero in Taftlin. Many in Taftlin saw him in the same light as they did Arrago and Bethany —their saviour from Magic.

  As Allric’s widow, she herself was respected by many. She would have to argue with shopkeepers to let her pay for her own goods. And Opal? Well, thankfully she’d turned out to be a girl. For if she’d been a boy, that boy would have been expected to grow into another version of his father. Amber’s heart couldn’t have handled watching Bethany beat the living life out of her son to teach him how to be like his father. And Bethany would have. Merciful Rygous on the Wind, Bethany would have done that and expected the boy to be the hero. As it was, Amber sometimes worried that Opal would become entranced by the red-headed Elorian with her swords and demand to be her true daddy’s little girl.

  At least, she saw Edmund as her father now. His days of fighting were over.

  The women chatted on and off about the duchess’ pregnancy, along with the Dowager’s plans to tackle the excessive number of gowns they’d pulled out of just one of the closets.

  “Provided you think the queen won’t mind, I will arrange the gowns to the maids personally,” the Dowager said.

  “I’m sure Bethany won’t mind,” Amber said. She’d known Bethany a number of years now. She knew Bethany would be relieved to have someone else look after something as, in her words, petty as gowns to maids. “I haven’t told her yet about the expectation of clothing to her maids, though.”

  “Perhaps the queen could move in future to providing a monetary supplement. I’ve seen her clothing. No one will want that.”

  “She does like boots, though,” Amber said.

  “I have seen her boots. Barely serviceable. A disgrace for our queen. I will speak to Lord Stanley about her footwear. She must be dressed in appropriate clothing, even if she does not wish to wear a gown. I saw her in the courtyard when we approached. I didn’t speak to her because she was clearly busy, but her clothing doesn’t even fit. And it is worn. Shabby, even. Our queen cannot look like that. She is setting a bad example for little Opal.”

  “Opal will be fine,” Paverly said evenly, though she had a smile on her face. “Lady Bethany was raised amongst soldiers. She doesn’t know any other way.”

  “The queen has always had her own style,” the duchess added.

  “And that style is looking like a stableboy,” the Dowager said crossly.

  “Has mother told you her new scheme?” the duchess asked, trying to change the subject.

  “Oh dear, there is a new scheme?” Amber asked. “Should I inform Lord Rayner?”

  The Dowager waved her hand. “Rayner would just have a stroke. No, this is a scheme I think we will all agree upon.”

  The duchess rolled her eyes. “I am so sorry, Amber. Mother is in a mood.”

  “Stop talking about me like I’m not even here,” the Dowager snapped. “Now, does no one want to know my scheme? It will be the talk of the court.”

  Amber flashed the duchess a small smile before turning to the old woman. “What is your new scheme?”

  “I’m going to marry off Lord Edmund before the spring.”

  Amber managed to keep her mouth from dropping. “What?”

  “It is time that Lord Edmund married. Since his parents are both gone now, I have decided to take it upon myself to find him a wife.”

  “But...” Amber cleared her throat. “Is there someone he is interested in?”

  Amber knew the answer to that question. The person he was slowly growing interested in was her. She wasn’t blind, though she did pretend to be whenever possible. She even guarded herself from his thoughts and feelings as best as she could, but she still knew. Lately, he looked at her in the way Allric used to. That she was the cure for a life of loneliness.

  In another life, in another time...But she’d given her word to Allric. She had made that promise in front of Mother Aneese. To turn her eye to another...

  Amber gulped down the lump in her throat. “I thought Edmund meant to remain single.”

  “Pish,” the Dowager said. “A fine, strapping boy like him? With his lands? If he doesn’t marry soon, mothers will be throwing their daughters in front of his carriage. I mean that quite literally. He will be beating them back with sticks if he puts this off much longer.”

  “It is time he married,” the duchess said.

  “But...he doesn’t want to. You can’t force him.”

  “My dear,” the Dowager said. “No one is going to force him. His own natural need to not be alone at night will be enough. Mark my words. I shall have Lord Edmund married inside a year.”

  “A wedding!” the duchess said. “We haven’t had a proper wedding in ages.”

  Amber forced a smile. She hated change. Why did everyone want to change things? Why couldn’t life just stay the same?

  XXXX

  Sixteen days of excellent winds and increasingly warm weather later, Bethany arrived in elven waters. Bethany had supposed she’d feel homesick when the white rock face and stone came into view. Instead, as they anchored outside of the ring of anchored skiffs, Bethany realized that, no, this wasn’t her home anymore. Whatever ties she had to the Temple of Tranquil Mercies died sometime during the war.

  She watched as the other ships came in near them, all also dropping their anchors. She knew beyond those warning boats was endless stone rubble. Farther around the bend, there were a dozen more ships anchored, and she could already guess the rowboats were ferrying both supplies and people to and from the temple’s main wharf.

  Nostalgia hit her, and a longing for the old days washed over her. Oh, how she missed those days where the Tranquility Trio—herself, Jovan, Kiner—caused endless trouble. When Allric was alive to scold them into sense. When Torius was alive to bicker with Aneese: the surrogate parents of the elite knights. Wyllow politics hadn’t touched them in decades. All races lived in relative harmony within the borders of the temple and the neighbouring Orchard Park.

  The war changed all that, and Bethany had been the one to declare it. Even now, she did not regret her decision to abuse both her positions as a senior knight nor her heritage as Apexia’s daughter to circumvent the Elven Council’s lily-livered position of wait and see. What was there to wait for? Magic had attacked them in their heart. Only a fool would lay shivering under their beds in the dark, hoping for a rescuer to save them all.

  But that was what the elves had done. Lay scared shitless while innocents died. So, Bethany decided to be the hero they all damn well needed, even if they were too stupid to realize it. However, she admitted silently, and only ever to herself, that she might have acted differently if she’d known how it would all turn out. She could not have foreseen Arrago becoming a rebel and leading a civil war in Taftlin. She could not have foreseen that her own mother, the Gentle Goddess Apexia herself, was in fact the anchor for Magic to de
stroy the world.

  Though, she wondered if it would have mattered in the end if she’d acted more cautiously. Or didn’t act at all. A raw pain inside her whispered that, one way or another, she was going to end up in that abandoned castle with her sword through Apexia’s heart.

  She’d never been so full of anguish that day, when she slit Sarissa’s throat. Even now, she only remembered it all in still reflections and not as the unveiling motion of most memories. The pain she still remembered, and it clouded everything else. She remembered the blood. It was still on her hands whenever she closed her eyes.

  She never told anyone that. She wasn’t ready. A year had passed, and she still wasn’t ready. She knew Arrago would listen, but what could she say to him?

  A hand touched the small of her back and she jumped. “Oh. I didn’t see you.”

  Arrago gave her a smile and tugged her closer to him. “How are you doing? Being home and all?”

  “They still haven’t fixed the north tower. I can tell, even from here,” she said idly. She didn’t want the sadness of her reflections to cast an extra layer of worry on an already tense situation. “Looks like they added other docks along the coast, too, if the sails I see further on are any indication. There’s so much rubble around here that it’s changed the shoreline.”

  “If you want, we can declare war on the temple itself, steal it back from the elves, and then you can build the docks however you want.”

  “Don’t tempt me,” Bethany said. “I just want to find Erem and get out of here before I have to kill Jud.”

  Arrago looked back out at the tower. “Well, there’s something to be said for killing Jud.”

  “Don’t encourage me, Arrago. You’re the sensible one.”

  “I’m finding that sense isn’t always the best course,” Arrago said. He eyed the helmet in her hands. “You should put that on. They’ll see your hair long before they notice anything else.”

  “I’m not the only redhead in the world,” Bethany mumbled, but she added the metal bucket to her ceremonial outfit.

  Her braided hair made the sides of the helmet snugger than her preference. It was wrapped tightly in a black silk scarf that Amber had found in the closets, most likely a part of some outdated mourning outfit. The knot at the base of her neck ached from the pressure of the helmet, but at least it guaranteed not a strand of her hair would show. She’d suggested shaving her head, but Arrago had balked at the notion so severely that she didn’t have the heart to do it this time.

  She helped Arrago attach his purple cloak to his own chestplate’s front loops, and he did the same for her. The ceremonial armour from the palace placed looks over function, but at least it was clean. A wolf was engraved in the centre of the chestpiece, symbolizing Taftlin’s isolation and territorial aggression. Or so she assumed. Arrago’s vision of a new Taftlin was very different than the armour of old.

  Assuming she survived the next few days, she knew she’d been shaving her hair soon enough. If they didn’t kill her here, they would not rest until they found her. Either way, this was only going to end when the ground was soaked in elven blood.

  Chapter 9

  BETHANY AND ARRAGO had been gone for weeks and now trouble was crawling from the woodwork. Edmund tugged down his jacket to ensure there were no wrinkles. He slowed his steps approaching the throne room so that he did not arrive panting. He refused to show up short of breath, sweating, and clammy. Instead, he pushed back his shoulders, the way his mother always said a real man should stand. Chin up. Back straight as a fencepost. He would not let Rutherford see him fragile, even if just fragile in spirit.

  No, especially not that way. A weak body could still have a knife-sharp mind attached to it. A weak mind, though...Edmund did not want Rutherford to see the cracks inside Edmund’s soul. He didn’t know what the old man wanted, but it sure as Apexia’s tits wasn’t peace.

  He’d sent servants to fetch Rayner and Stanley, but he knew he’d arrive first. He could have waited in the hallway for them. They probably all expected it. But he was the fucking Lord Chancellor and he was going to act like it. He was going to go in there, make the small talk, smile politely, and keep Rutherford on a leash until the real masters showed up to work their magic.

  Damn Arrago for going with Bethany, and damn Bethany for letting him go. This was not his job, nor his fight.

  Edmund sucked in a breath. No, it was his fight. Why was he behaving like this? He couldn’t blame it on his hand. That had been a year ago. More than a year now. Amber was wrong. She was convinced this was just a side effect of the trauma. Trauma! How strange that one word was being used to sum up everything that had happened to him, like a neat little bow.

  He refocused on his chin, shoving it high in the air. His back, shoulder blades, shoulders, and neck all shouted at him that he’d been sporting atrocious posture as of late and they did not appreciate being forced into court stance without any work. Well, fuck his shoulders. And fuck his back, too. And fuck his hand and his damn eye, too, while he was at it.

  He marched into the throne room. It was a massive room, ornately decorated and had enough gold filigree to pay the servants’ wages for years. Arrago rarely used the gilded throne on the raised platform at the far end of the room, preferring to instead mingle and chat with the nobles and petitioners who came to seek an audience or a favour.

  Edmund waited for Rutherford to come to his feet. He was an old man, older than either Stanley or Rayner, and had taken one of the embroidered chairs for support. Edmund considered taking a seat upon the throne. As the king’s representative, it was his right to take the seat and act as Arrago would. If it had been anyone else, he might have, but he wasn’t here to play Rutherford’s games.

  Many of the slavers hated Sir Eli, and Edmund refused to allow that hatred of his own father to seep into the present day. Rutherford would not want to see the son of Sir Eli sit upon that throne to dictate to them. It would be a threat. Edmund was sure his own father would counsel diplomacy in this matter first, so he could try that tactic. Rayner and Stanley could always adjust as needed.

  After Rutherford bowed, not very deeply Edmund noted, he said, “Your Lordship.”

  “Edmund is fine, Lord Rutherford. It is a surprise to see you, sir. The king’s secretary didn’t mention you were coming.”

  Rutherford scowled. He was always old, but he did have more lines in his face than last Edmund remembered. His grey hair was now long enough to tie at the nape of his neck and it was wrapped tightly with a long piece of leather that hung down his shoulders. He was richly dressed. Rutherford had never been poor, and Arrago had given him another estate as payment for his years of service to the crown.

  “What happened to your arm, boy?” Rutherford demanded.

  “A Magi decided he wanted it,” Edmund said calmly. He was used to people asking about it, so the answer had been developed over the months. Just the right amount of glibness and truthfulness to slow additional questions.

  “I’m not sure I can look at you with that eye patch. You look even more untrustworthy than ever.”

  Edmund drew in a deep breath and held it for a count, which made Rutherford’s mouth curl upward just a notch. Oh, he needed to get his temper and whatever the fuck was wrong with him under control and now.

  “How has the weather in the east been treating you? I assume, of course, you’ve been in Westwood for the summer months.”

  “The weather is miserable, as you’d know if you bothered to leave the palace and see the mess the country is in.”

  Edmund glanced at the three men who stood farther back. They were dressed like scholars, but he wasn’t fooled. They were most likely Rutherford’s armed protection.

  “I am planning a trip to Winter’s End myself,” Edmund said. At the mention of his father’s eastern estate, Rutherford scowled. “Isn’t that near your estate?” When the old man gave no reply, Edmund asked, “What brings you to the capital?”

  “Your king brings me to the c
apital,” Rutherford said.

  “Our king?” Edmund corrected.

  “Where is he? I would like to extend my congratulations on his marriage. I only just heard of it.”

  “It was a secret affair, to root out conspirators. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”

  “I heard they used my good name to place the blame at my door,” Rutherford said.

  “I had heard that,” Edmund said. “Of course, no one at court truly believed it. Not with your decades of service, and the kindness the king granted you as a retirement gift.” Edmund pushed as much sarcasm as he dared into his voice, to make it clear they were all aware.

  “Yes, well, it hasn’t been an easy retirement.”

  Edmund held his tongue because he wasn’t sure he could hold his anger back. Rutherford most likely was involved in the attack on the Winter Palace weeks ago, along with possibly elven backing.

  The sound of shuffling feet rescued him from needing to reply. Lord Stanley and Lord Rayner stormed into the room.

  Stanley pointed an accusatory finger and said, “You have some nerve showing your face here.”

  Rutherford bowed to his old colleagues and said, “I am here merely to petition the king. Where might he be?”

  “None of your business,” Rayner said. “Have you paid your taxes on your slaves yet? I noticed you were behind.”

  Edmund clamped his lips shut, knowing that there was nothing he could offer to this exchange that would help.

  “I hear the king is planning to replace me with a woman,” Rutherford said.

  “A ferret would be a better choice in the role than you, sir,” Stanley said.

  “So this is the new court, is it? Glibness and insults.”

  “That’s how the court has always been,” Rayner said. “Boy! Fetch me a chair.”

  Even though there were plenty of footmen and servants about, Edmund knew he was the boy in question. He dutifully picked up a chair with his good hand and brought it over to Lord Rayner, who took a seat with a huff and expelled breath of air.