“The mind is frail, Rafen,” King Robert said. “I understand what you are saying. After Thomas died, I forgot many of his characteristics. But the heart never forgets its loss completely. In the end, we are stronger because of it. It just takes…” he sighed, “…a very long time.” After a long moment of silence, King Robert said, “Tell me your story, Rafen. I feel remote from you, and I shouldn’t. I have loved you like a father.”
“It’s too painful to tell,” Rafen said.
“It will be like releasing venom from a snake bite,” King Robert insisted.
King Robert only interrupted Rafen’s tale to clarify details. When Rafen reached the part about Nazt, his voice broke entirely.
His tongue was thick enough to be suffocating.
King Robert’s arm crept around Rafen’s shoulder, and slowly Rafen resumed. The king breathed rapidly as he listened. The only thing Rafen didn’t tell King Robert about was Zion’s visit the night before. No one was likely to know, because Rafen’s room had been too distant from the others’ for anyone to hear the Phoenix’s song.
When Rafen finished, there was a long pause.
“Blood of the Phoenix,” King Robert whispered, his forehead furrowed. “Zion has preserved you. You have become a man.”
“I’m still a child.”
“Not in your spirit, Rafen.”
At the sound of King Robert’s rumbling voice saying that, Rafen felt reluctant pleasure.
“If Zion is good, why does life hurt so much?” he asked.
This question would never have come to him last night, when the Phoenix had been right there. Still, Rafen wanted words to clarify those feelings.
“That is the question, my boy,” King Robert said. “We don’t deserve to have good things happen to us, because none of us are truly good. This is the last thing we want to hear at the murder of a loved one – yet it is true. We are corrupt and in a corrupt world.”
Rafen shook his head. “But why did Zion let the world become corrupt in the first place?”
King Robert breathed deeply, ruminating. “Though Zion works
out His will through us, we still have free choice. In the beginning, someone must have chosen to create Nazt. Zion doesn’t create bad things, you see. No one knows how Nazt came about, but that is my theory. Man used his choice to dishonor Zion.”
“He could have stopped us.”
“And then we would have been slaves.”
Rafen shifted on the rock, fighting back weariness as he tried to understand. Zion was good then. It was he, Rafen, who was bad.
“Do you remember what I told you about the copper rod?”
“How could I forget?” King Robert answered.
“Why does it move by itself? How does Nazt talk through it? How could it take us there?”
“That’s a mystery no one knows,” King Robert said. “Yet, I have a theory for that too. If people created Nazt, perhaps the copper rod was the instrument they did it with. Supposing Nazt had its origins in the copper rod, that would explain its strange qualities.”
Rafen shivered. “You once told me Nazt only stayed at its eastern boundary because of the Secrai and Runi. Etana is the Secra, isn’t she? She’s only the sixth one, Queen Arlene told me.”
Sadness flickered behind King Robert’s eyes at his wife’s title. Rafen no longer called Queen Arlene “Mother”. The discovery of Rafen’s parents had not been a happy one for the king.
“So there is one more Secra after Etana, isn’t there? And the last Runi is Richard.”
“That’s correct. There are seven Secrai, and four Runi. The first four Secrai vanished – no one knows where – and the first three Runi, the Lashki, Fritz, and Thomas… well, you know what happened to them. There are only three Secrai left, Arlene’s mother included, yet Adelphia is in Zal Ricio helping old allies at present. And there is one Runi left. They are the reason Nazt cannot escape its boundary. They are the only pieces of Zion left on this world, and they are destined to save it. If they were destroyed, Nazt would wash over everything.”
“All right. So why did Nazt call for me instead of them? If they are the people stopping it, why did it call for me?”
“You are the Fledgling.”
“But the Fledgling is less important than the Runi and Secrai. I’m meant to fight for the Sianian people. They’re meant to fight for the world.”
“Well, yes, that’s right,” King Robert said, rubbing the rock beneath him with a spread hand as he thought. “I think Nazt calls all of our names at one time. From what I’ve heard, the copper rod left the Lashki when he was after Etana, to come to Annette because she was hunting you. In which case, you are right in saying Nazt prioritized you above the Secra. I can’t explain that.”
“Could you try guessing?” Rafen said.
“I’m afraid not, my boy. Not in this case.”
Rafen had really wanted that explanation. Disappointed, he stood up near the edge of the stream, where Etana had taken him last night. Another thing had occurred to him, and the thought was sucking him down like a vortex.
“When I was seven,” he said, “I was taken from the mines for what I thought was a private meeting with Talmon. At that time, Talmon was the biggest enemy in my world.”
He looked over his shoulder at King Robert, who had also risen, puzzled.
“I thought there was nothing worse than Talmon,” Rafen went on. “After Talmon blindfolded me and left, and the Lashki spoke – I knew in a second I had been wrong. There was someone even worse. Up until last night, I would have told you that the Lashki was the worst enemy we face. Then I saw Nazt, and I realized—” He couldn’t finish. “So is there always something worse?” he said, breathing quickly. “Will more years pass, and then I’ll discover something worse than Nazt? Is there—”
“Rafen,” King Robert said, laying a hand on his shoulder. At his touch, Rafen felt calmer. “Nazt does not have a master. People created it, and it mastered them. It owes its allegiance to no one. It draws its motivations from us.”
“What? No!” Rafen said, whirling around to face him. Somehow this made him more desperate than before.
“It is true,” King Robert said. “The evil within the hearts of men created Nazt. At the worst times in our lives, we hate Zion, we hate this world, we hate our lives, and our only desire is to destroy or be destroyed. Nazt takes that and makes it real.” He locked eyes with Rafen. “Rafen, the greatest enemy you ever face will be yourself.”
Rafen couldn’t think of anything to say. It was true. It was abominably, terribly true.
King Robert’s face softened. “There is a limit to evil, Rafen,” he said. “When we are pure, then the world will be pure.” He sighed, staring at the stone wall across the stream from them. “I was thinking the other day, Rafen, about why my brother gave up learning to fight and chose instead to work in academia. I think it was because he stared at Nazt and thought there was no hope. But if we all looked at Zion more, we wouldn’t be so frightened. After all, Zion is stronger than Nazt. He brought you back last night. And He will continue to protect us all down here.”
Rafen’s eyes misted.
“Now, I have a question for you,” King Robert said.
Rafen looked into King Robert’s searching eyes.
“My daughter tried to kill you last night,” he said gravely. “She tried several times. And you saved her life by bringing her back to Siana. Why?”
Rafen stared back at King Robert. He hadn’t consciously thought about what he had done for Annette last night. But then, the answer was on his tongue, and he could hear Bambi all over again: “Be a good brother.”
“She’s a Selson,” he choked. “I couldn’t… ”
King Robert wrapped his arms around him, and Rafen cried like a child.
Chapter Forty-Three
The
Riddings Reunited
Francisco winced as he tried flexing his fingers. A minuscule movement was the response to a lot of effort. Sighing,
Francisco slumped back against his wooden chair. He glanced across his dark little earthen room, dimly lit by two torches and furnished with a bed and the chair he occupied. Seeing Rafen at the open doorframe, Francisco started.
“How long have you been there?”
“A minute,” Rafen replied.
“Oh,” Francisco said. He glanced at his left arm hanging lifelessly over the armrest of his chair.
Rafen walked into the room.
“You can have my chair,” Francisco said, hastening to rise.
“Don’t worry, really,” Rafen said. “How is your arm?”
“It is feeling better.”
Rafen knew this was a lie because as he had watched Francisco, his own arm had started to feel odd.
“It hurts, doesn’t it?” he said.
Francisco’s feigned composure disappeared. He lowered his gaze, whispering, “The pain was much worse than I ever thought it would be.” He raised his eyes, glistening with tears, to Rafen. “Etana says it will get better. I am not worried about that. I just cannot forget it. Like… you cannot forget Nazt.”
Rafen flinched.
“You should know we cannot lie to each other,” Francisco said. “I had known you for some time before we met. Some things… cannot be explained.” He absentmindedly picked at a dried sticky patch on his coat.
“Do they not have clean clothes for you?” Rafen asked.
“They have to find them in some chests somewhere, I think,” Francisco said. “I can wait.”
“Really?”
Francisco looked down at himself. “I cannot stand the sight of this coat,” he said. “He was on top of me, Rafen. His touch…” He trailed off, rubbing his chin hard with his healthy hand.
“Did he do it because you helped in the marketplace?”
“No,” Francisco said. “He was going to kill me anyway. Then he found out somehow that I had seen you. He kept asking me to tell him where you were. That is how I got these…” He rolled up his sleeve and indicated three swollen blue stains from kesmal.
Rafen’s stomach clenched. They had ballooned so large that the upper part of his arm appeared entirely blue. The skin looked transparent; Rafen could see the veins beneath.
“You never told him,” Rafen said.
“No.”
A dead weight settled in Rafen’s stomach. “He found out anyway. He saw—”
“I don’t care,” Francisco said. “For my part, I would never give you away. I am not like Talmon.”
Rafen stared at Francisco as if seeing him for the first time.
“I have changed,” Francisco said, rising. “Now I am worthy to be your brother, Rafen.”
There was a sharp pain in Rafen’s throat. “I… doubted you,” he croaked. “I don’t know why.”
Francisco was already hugging him.
“And how is Francisco?” a voice said from the doorway.
They parted, and Rafen turned. Roger stood there with Elizabeth supporting him. Apart from the thick bandage visible through his white shirt, Roger looked healthy again. He had a wondering smile on his face as his eyes met Rafen’s. Rafen supposed he had never anticipated his two sons meeting again.
“I am well,” Francisco said, a watchful expression leaping to his face.
Among the Tarhians, he had probably heard bad reports about his father. In contrast, his face became childishly happy when he met Elizabeth’s gaze.
“And you, Rafen?” Roger said, trying unconvincingly to ignore Francisco’s suspicion.
“Well,” Rafen said.
It had been two days since they had arrived in Fritz’s Hideout. Until this afternoon, Rafen had spent most of the time sleeping. He still sometimes felt like his body didn’t belong to him, and his dreams were terrible. Before Rafen went to bed, King Robert would give him some old ale from the cellars of the Hideout, where the majority of their stale food (raisins, dried fruit, dried meat, and so on) came from. The ale was extremely strong. It made Rafen sleep beautifully.
“You both look well,” Elizabeth said, smiling so that light suffused her eyes. “It is wonderful to see you two together.”
Roger stepped forward, and Elizabeth helped him into Francisco’s chair. Elizabeth seated herself cross-legged on the ground next to him. Rafen did likewise, not sure what else to do. Francisco remained standing.
“I honestly never thought I would see you again,” Roger said to Francisco.
“So I understand,” Francisco said without inflection. Some of his princely airs had returned.
Silence stretched between them. After years apart, they had very little to say.
“Did they tell you how long we will be down here, Rafen?” Elizabeth asked abruptly. “Do they have plans?”
“No,” Rafen said. “No plans.”
That was when he decided that Erasmus’ message had never reached Alexander.
The admiral was the only person Rafen knew who had enough fire in him to fight the Lashki and his supporters. They needed him. However, King Robert was adamant that Rafen did not leave the Hideout. And his promised message would likely go astray as well.
The hunt for Rafen and the Selsons would only intensify. If they did not move soon, all would be lost.
“They may not need plans yet,” Roger said. “I heard Rafen wounded the Lashki.”
“I only heard a crunch,” Rafen said. “I don’t know what I broke.”
“Yet he did not catch up with you,” Francisco pointed out.
“No. But one bite on the leg is not going to stop the Lashki forever.”
Rafen had risen and started kicking little clouds of dirt up from the floor. What would Erasmus think of this apathy? Worse still, what would Zion think? Rafen was made to fight, and in all likelihood, he would be sitting underground instead. Elizabeth smiled faintly, as if her question had aroused exactly the response she had desired.
“We will not be here forever, Rafen,” Roger said, with the patience of a man speaking to a toddler. “And please don’t kick that dirt.”
“We might be here for weeks,” Rafen said, deliberately kicking a little stone across the room.
“Months, most likely,” Roger said. “We couldn’t hope for a better place either. It’s very safe for—”
“Months underground,” Rafen interrupted.
“Yes,” Elizabeth said.
The thought reminded Rafen of working in the Tarhian coal mines. “I’m not staying underground for months,” he stated.
“What if your father says you must?” Roger said in an irritating tone.
Rafen flashed him a dirty look. “I’m not anyone’s slave,” he said sharply. “I will fight. The Lashki is not going to win.”
Roger sank lower in his chair, his dubious eyes on Rafen. Rafen wondered how Roger had ever had the courage to fight Talmon when he couldn’t even face his own son.
“If you leave,” Francisco said, facing him, “I will come with you, my brother.”
“Then both of you must be careful,” Elizabeth cautioned.
“You don’t know what you are saying,” Roger said to her. He made to rise, but fell back into his chair, his face twisted with pain. Elizabeth leapt up, placing her hand on his shoulder.
“You must not be afraid.”
“We only just found them,” Roger panted. “We thought they were dead – and now they’re leaving.”
“We won’t leave for some time,” Rafen said, with a spasm of guilt.
“How long do we have?” Roger said hoarsely.
Francisco looked at Rafen for instruction. It was a look Sherwin gave Rafen frequently, and it made him nervous. However, this time he wasn’t going to do something rash. This had to be planned, and King Robert needed to have time to believe that Rafen intended to stay. Besides which, Rafen had only just seen the Selsons again – and his mother, after a decade.
“A month and a half,” he said.
“See?” Elizabeth said quietly to Roger. “They will stay for some time yet.”
“A month and a half,” Roger murmured.
Elizabeth looked back at Rafen, her gaze steadfast though her eyes glistened.
She is a strong woman, Rafen thought.
*
“I had to get away from them,” Rafen confessed. “I somehow… can’t do it.”
He had said this to Etana, who was sitting on a smooth rock near the underground creek. She turned to him as he picked his way over the rocks toward her.
“Your parents?” she asked.
He sat down heavily next to her.
“Do you like them much?”
“I care for them,” Rafen said, which was an understatement. There was no way to express the tangled feelings that tied him to his parents. “I… I can’t be around them long. I don’t know why. Elizabeth… I love her, but…”
“I suppose it is awkward,” Etana commented.
She was looking at him in concern, assessing his health. When he turned to her, she looked away quickly. He suddenly felt cold.
“Does it matter to you? That I’m human?”
“What? No,” she said swiftly. “Although I believe it matters greatly to Mother. I’ve never seen her so disappointed… even angry. My brother Robert is also shocked and thinks it is a terrible thing.”
Rafen bowed his head. He had known his adopted mother despised him now. Yet finding this out about Prince Robert, who had once been his brother, was a sore blow too.
“I feel like I don’t know you anymore,” he said. “I feel like I don’t know anyone anymore.”
“Oh, Rafen, you mustn’t,” she said, her eyes on his again. They were such a brilliant blue, and they reminded him of many sounds, sensations, and colors from long, long ago. He always thought of the Phoenix when he saw her.
“I have missed you,” Etana said.
“I hope so,” he said, “because I missed you so badly I thought I would die.”
Etana stared at him, transfixed, a very warm glow in her cheeks.
“What happened that day?’ he asked.
She stiffened and rose abruptly. “I can’t tell you, Rafen.”
“Etana, please,” he said. “I need to know.”
“Rafen, you did all you could,” she said in a tight voice. “You warned us; we didn’t listen. You don’t need to punish yourself by finding out what—”
The Sianian Wolf Page 32