“A good description,” he said. “I don’t need an answer right now, but I will appreciate some help: to stop any discussion about land and castles. I know,” he laughed. “Aron started it at my request. Let’s say that I needed it to happen, but now we have to move on.”
It took a while to calm the spirits back on the terrace, but father, with his experience, guessed that something had happened and helped me stop the arguments, and as expected by Mohor too, things advanced fast afterwards.
“Mohor expressed some interest in you. I am not talking about politics,” father smiled, after we left the castle. “Maybe you should encourage him.”
“There were some signals,” I agreed. Thirty-four… I am still young. Mohor is not Malin, but not a bad choice either. I am three years older than Mohor. No, that is not the right choice of words. He is three years younger, I smiled. For some time now, Malin had morphed from my beloved husband into a dream coming from another life that had nothing in common with the new one. Only the children… Mohor can help them. In that moment Codrin’s image overshadowed Mohor’s and I shook my head in disbelief. He could be my son… “Mohor proposed an alliance, based on … our geographic proximity, to use his own words. He considers us the ones who decide the leader of the alliance.”
“So your walk in the garden was more than an agreement to stop the fight for land. Why did he start it?”
“He did not say, but it was not by mistake. He needs only Magura, but wants to keep some pressure on them. And we need to keep some pressure on him.” Both of us started to laugh, pushing the horses to a gallop.
We arrived home just in time for dinner, and afterward, in a succession of things that had already become routine, father and Veres left us, and we stayed, taking turns reading a book in Frankis: me, Saliné and Vio. Still not understanding everything, Codrin stayed too, just to improve his skills, or perhaps he was enjoying the calm of evening too; there was longing still burning in him, the desire to feel the warmth of a family. Unaware, this tough young man of sixteen and half years was, understandably, in some ways still a child in his heart and mind, and his untimely interactions with the adult world would provoke and test him further. Even when unable to fully understand Codrin, I had the feeling that his toughness, great fighting skills and titled past would be, at times, his weakness. My eyes tried to evaluate him again: how the tenderness in his brown eyes suppressed the hardness of the slight scar along his chin, how his self-confidence balanced the boyishness which made him seem naïve, yet he passed through so many ordeals and survived. For him, as for us, everything was complicated enough as it was.
“Tell me a story,” Vio asked Codrin in Livonian, after the reading session ended, and moved on the sofa close to him, raising her legs on to it, in parallel with the backrest, leaning back on Codrin.
Surprised, he put one arm around Vio’s shoulders, providing stability, then glanced at me with a touch of panic in his eyes, and I could not but smile, both to calm him, and in reaction to her outgoingness toward him. She needs support… Father is too old and busy. Veres too young and… Insensitive? I wished Veres were like Saliné, she was more mature, even when she was two years younger. Visibly pleased, Vio stretched a bit more, making herself comfortable in his arms. Can Codrin…?
His hand gently covered Vio’s head with spread fingers, turning it slowly until she faced him. “What kind of story do you have in mind?”
Unexpected, his gesture froze me. Like Malin was doing it. Even the question was the same. The corner of my eye caught Saliné, gripping the chair with her right hand. There were both a spirit and a young man filling her mind. She likes him...
“One about Arenia,” Vio answered, without being haunted by the same ghost as Saliné and me, a large smile spread on her face. She was in the middle of the action and too young to realize what had happened.
“Arenia,” Codrin accepted with a whisper, trying to control his emotions; she was so good at stirring everyone’s ghosts.
Codrin finished his story quickly; it was interesting as any story about a faraway place, yet fragmented and missing rich colors, because of his restricted vocabulary in Livonian. While he was moderately fluent, his knowledge was limited to practical, day-to-day things, and I remembered that he had learned it in a farm. The tutor said he is making good progress in Frankis. In that moment, I fully decided that he was now at home.
After a while, Vio fell asleep in his arms, and Codrin glanced at me, unsure what to do. “You made her sleep, you carry her to bed,” I said, laughing quietly, and we walked upstairs together, into the girls’ bedroom, then he went back, leaving me to change Vio’s clothes. When I returned, Saliné had taken Vio’s place in his arms. Many women will like you, I smiled, staring at him – his face was still that of a child, younger than his age, but soon he would become a handsome man. I like him too, I laughed again, quietly.
There was no other storytelling, yet the dialogue flowed, as if we had been together for a long time. Then Saliné became sleepy too, yawning more and more often.
“I am so tired,” she complained, and I bit my lip to stop my laugh; it was just a ruse to receive the same free ride in Codrin’s arms as Vio. She got it.
After a month, that night, Malin appeared again in my dreams. He was warm, gentle and merry. He was Malin, and Fate seemed to grant me sometimes in my dreams what was seized from me in the real life.
Is Codrin the sign of better times to come?
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Chapter 9 - Codrin
“What are you doing?” Vio asked, a strange intensity filling her worried voice, and she moved fast, closer to me, her right hand extended, ready to provide help.
I turned my head: behind her, all the family and Milene, staring at me with various facial expressions. Vio had alerted everybody that something strange was happening to me in the garden, and that I may need help.
Problems… I was standing in one foot, the other one raised almost vertically, half flexed. My hands spread wide, at different angles to my body, all my parts contorted in strange ways – the Assassin’s Dance in its full splendor. For the uninitiated, everything seems bizarre or wicked. It is not really a dance, not in the generally accepted sense of dancing, yet some steps look that way, with their fluidity and grace. Others make you look like a deranged crane, which is how I looked now. In the end, it is training, hard and strenuous.
“Training,” I said, and forced myself to keep moving like a deranged crane, just to enforce an impression of normality. “The Warrior’s Dance,” I added, inventing a new name; assassins would have added a new layer of oddity. Then I moved again, this time with fluid and elegant dancing-like steps, hoping to convince them.
“You look like a tumbler,” Veres sneered.
“Veres!” Jara reproached him with a nervous inflection in her voice. At first, I thought that she was nervous just because of his rude reaction, but her nervousness did not disappear when she turned to watching me again.
It’s the dance... They think I am crazy. Mostly Veres. He never liked me. Why? I am not competing with him. I checked them all; only Cernat retained a studied calm. Vio and Saliné were worried. Milene too. Jara was undecided. I need something...
“Can a tumbler do this?” I asked, jumping to a height of a normal man, almost horizontally. Twisting my body, I hit an imaginary enemy with my right foot, and landed on both feet. Eh? I proudly looked around.
“Tumbler!” Veres shouted and clapped ironically, and this time Jara said nothing.
I failed. And there is no way to put stupid Veres in his place without escalating things. In silence, I continued my training with slow moves, hoping that at least they would ignore me.
“You are wrong,” Vio scoffed at Veres, moving between us, her angry eyes facing him.
“That was not nice, Veres,” Saliné said, gentle and firm at the same time, stepping closer to Vio. “Codrin is our friend. And it doesn’t look to me like tumbling at all. It’s just … a different type of training.
Some steps were indeed like dancing,” she encouraged me.
Veres looked suddenly uncomfortable, and his face reddened. “Girls,” he snapped derisively, and kicked a pebble toward Vio that passed closed to her left foot, and I laid a hand on her tense shoulder to calm her. Jara stared at me, nodding slightly, and Veres stepped back, his eyes moving fast from one girl to another.
Veres is afraid of them. It can’t be.
“He is too slow for a jump,” Vio scolded him, glancing at me at the same time.
“You are wrong, Veres,” Cernat said thoughtfully, before Vio could mock Veres again, trying to anchor my moves to his fighting knowledge. “That kick would have put a man down.”
“Put down or killed,” I bragged.” It depends on the speed, force and my foot’s position against his neck vertebrae,” I gave the most detailed explanation I could find. “I can do the same with my hands. Look.” I demonstrated another set of moves, hitting my imaginary enemy with the edge of my palm, as I had with the huge, drunken man in the Caravans’ Inn in Hateg.
“What’s a ‘vertebrae’,” Vio asked, and I bit my lip, not knowing how to react.
It must have another name in Frankis... The name was the same in Livonian and Arenian, all four main languages were derived from some colloquial dialects spoke in the old Empire that vanished a long time ago. “Did you see Milene taking the meat from a rabbit? There are some small bones in the spine, linked together by cartilage: vertebrae. You have them too. Where the marrow is,” I suddenly remembered.
“Aha!” Vio exclaimed, the marrow finally told her something that she could understand, and moreover taste.
“These moves are useful when fighting weaponless, even when the enemy is armed, and help your balance and speed with the sword, too,” I addressed Cernat, convinced that an old hand like him would understand.
“The speed,” Cernat agreed. “I never saw anyone moving with your speed and body coordination.”
At that moment, Veres chose to leave, and Jara tried to say something to him. She stopped for a moment, then addressed me: “Codrin, lunch is ready in one turn.” A neutral remark that said nothing about her real feelings.
“Mother, I will stay with Codrin,” Saliné said, in a way that explained her purpose, rather than asking for permission. Again, I observed again that depth in her green eyes, unusual for a child.
“Me too,” Vio added quickly, grabbing my hand, yet something was bothering her a little.
“Just don’t be late,” Jara agreed, leaving us, and this time there was a slight amusement in her tone.
I lowered my head, and whispered to both girls: “Thank you.”
“Are our vertebrae like the rabbit’s?” Vio let out her worries regarding my explanation about the spine, and I nodded, smiling at her. “I am not a rabbit!” she exclaimed, half-amused.
“Yes, you are,” I laughed, catching her in my arms. “A little rabbit. See?” I moved my fingers on her ribs, like playing a flute, and she started laughing too in outbursts stirred by my fingers, while my hands moved faster and faster, up and down. Her laughter got louder, and she tried to fight back doing the same thing to me.
“Saliné, help!” she cried through her laughter.
Saliné jumped in to help her, and both attacked me until I surrendered and begged for mercy. When they were finally satisfied with my torture, we lay down on the grass, my arms spread wide, their heads leaning on them, close to my shoulders. As we lay there, I observed Jara turning back to the house, laughing hard. Life is all about moments. Somewhere in a tree, unknown birds were singing, a melodious trill. Another group answered, farther away. There was humming in the air and a blue sky. It’s good. It’s so good. It’s so good. And after so many years, tears filled my eyes, and I forget everything.
A finger moved slowly over my face, tracing the tears. The touch was slight, as if the finger was afraid to hurt me. “Why are you crying?” Saliné asked.
The question felt rhetorical to me, she had guessed why, yet I had to play a different game; I could not explain in words, neither to me nor to them, and I could not look weak either. “A fly went into my eye. I took it out,” I assured her; there was certainly no fly in my eye.
“In both eyes?” she asked, with a thin smile.
“It happens sometimes that my eyes cry together. They are brothers, you know? One of them was hit in a past fight,” I tried to instill a shadow of mystery and courage. “This one,” I pointed to my left eye.
“It hurt,” Vio said, gently touching my eyelid as if to take the pain away from me.
“Yes,” I said, content that things were going in the right direction.
“You know, I liked some parts of your dance,” Saliné moved things even further in the right direction. “I would like to learn it. We were attacked a month ago.”
“I will teach you. And don’t worry, I will always protect you.”
“Always,” she agreed, and placed her small hand over mine.
“How many people have you killed?” Cernat asked me after lunch, in a casual tone – only he and Jara were still in the room, but the question itself was not casual.
It’s related to my dance. They still think I am deranged man. “I don’t like to kill or talk about it.”
“Never be ashamed when you defend yourself or other people. How did it feel when you made your first kill?” Cernat tried to calm me and push further at the same time.
“I felt nothing. We were running from fifty soldiers. I killed many people that day, with the bow, with the sword, with knives. Does that satisfy you?” I asked, nervously. “It doesn’t mean that I have a sick mind, just that you don’t understand my way of training. And I am not a tumbler.”
“For sure you are a soldier, not a tumbler. One of the best I’ve seen. Ignore Veres; he is young and a bit jealous of your skills. I am just trying to understand your way of training.”
“You think that I like to kill.”
“No, I don’t think so, but I had to ask that question. In time, you will understand why. Can you train other people?”
“Yes, I’ve already agreed with Saliné and Vio to train them. I understand you were attacked some time ago. If you allow it,” I added quickly, glancing at both Jara and Cernat.
“It’s very kind of you to offer this,” Jara said, yet she did not signal any approval.
“Would you mind starting with me first?” Cernat asked.
“It’s too late for you,” I said, without thinking; I was right, but I should have expressed my thoughts in a more diplomatic way. “I apologize. I mean no offense.”
“None taken. Why?” He was genuinely surprised; the Warrior Dance was obviously meant for warriors.
“Your body is no longer flexible enough. The younger you begin, the better. My training started when I was seven years old. Jara can try the dance first, if you… If you think that I might harm the girls.”
“Codrin,” she said gently. “I am sure that you will not harm my girls. Apart from making them laugh too much.”
The next day we started the training: I worked with Jara and the girls, and it was soon clear that Jara was well trained and that Saliné had learned some things too while Vio moved with puzzling speed and body coordination. Veres refused categorically to be a tumbler, and not even Cernat could convince him. A week later, Cernat came with another soldier, Vlaicu – the Chief of the Guards of Mohor – and we crossed swords together. I was able to fight both Vlaicu and Cernat at the same time, and no one said anything about my training anymore. At least, nothing bad.
We had fish that evening, a gift from Mohor. Last time I ate fish… In Arenia. I have to stop this. This is my home now. Isn’t it?
“I can’t,” Vio cried, obviously upset at not being able to separate the bones. It was an unknown fish to me, very good in taste, but filled with too many small bones, hard to avoid even for me.
“Vio,” Jara said gently, “I know what you want, but you are no longer a little girl. You have to do it your
self.”
“I tried,” Vio hit the plate with the knife. “Sorry,” she swiftly added, then jumped from her chair, taking her plate and coming to me. “Help me. Like my father used to do.”
Undecided what to do in a small familial dispute that was outside my competence, I glanced at Jara, who nodded, a bit annoyed, and I stretched out my arm to take the knife. Before I could do so, Vio passed under my hand with her unusual speed and sat in my lap.
“Take the knife,” I said, and she frowned, disappointed. “We will do it together,” I encouraged her. It was not easy, but slowly, her hand guided by me, we took out a good chunk that disappeared at once into her mouth.
“Do you want to be my father?” Vio turned her head, staring innocently at me.
Father? I glanced at her, then at Jara, and some peculiar associations occurred inside my mind.
In the sudden silence, the faces gathered around the table seemed very similar in their reactions: startled. I probably look the same. It was just a spontaneous question from a young girl who missed her father, yet something was bothering everybody. Avoiding any reaction, I probed under their facial masks, feeling the differences. There was distaste in Veres’s eyes, and I understood him. Cernat’s thoughtful reflection was like the wheels of the clock, running and calculating. Saliné surprised me by being slightly distraught. And Jara, Jara was the mirror of someone trying to hide her own thoughts.
“What?” Vio asked again, not understanding the silence, and I agreed with her; she was just a child asking innocent questions.
“I think that Codrin is a bit too young to be a father,” Jara said softly. “Would you consider a brother?” she smiled at Vio.
“Mm … yes,” Vio smiled back. “Can I have another piece of fish, brother?” she pointed to her plate.
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