The Lumatere Chronicles: The Complete Trilogy

by Melina Marchetta

“A double mercy! They’ve got something else to tell us.”

  “Finn, leave it,” Froi said. “It’s a long story.”

  “Then it’s a good thing we’re not leaving until morning.”

  Froi and Finnikin sat away from the others, talking half the day and night. The more Froi spoke of the events since he had left Lumatere, the more relentless Finnikin’s questions were, his reactions ranging from shock to horror to disbelief.

  “If I didn’t know you better, I’d swear you were lying to me, Froi.”

  “Yes, well, you know me better,” Froi said. “What are they doing now?”

  Finn peered over Froi’s shoulder to where the others were sitting in two separate pairs.

  “Same as what they were doing an hour ago. Staring at each other. She’s going to win, you know. I think she’ll outstare them all.”

  “No,” Froi said, shaking his head. “She can’t outstare him. No one can. Not even Perri.”

  Then it was silent between them, and Froi thought he wouldn’t be able to bear another moment of this. It was as if three years hadn’t existed and they didn’t know who he was anymore.

  “I . . .” Finnikin began.

  Froi looked up. Waited.

  “What?”

  “I almost slit your father’s throat,” Finnikin said.

  Froi swallowed. He didn’t want to think of what would have happened yesterday if he had come across them all too late.

  Finnikin moved in closer to whisper.

  “Do you want to know the truth? He actually intrigued me.”

  That was Gargarin’s gift and curse. To unintentionally intrigue people, even those who wanted to slit his throat. Finnikin peered over Froi’s shoulder again.

  “They’re obscenely attractive people,” Finnikin said politely. Froi couldn’t help but laugh.

  “And I’m not?” he asked.

  “Well, no . . . I didn’t say that. But really, Froi. Look at them.”

  Froi twisted around. Perri hadn’t stopped staring at Gargarin, and Gargarin chose to deal with it by returning the stare. Froi turned back to Finnikin and for the first time in hours, the truth registered.

  “You returned for me, Finn. After everything you said.”

  Finnikin’s eyes were fierce with emotion.

  “Do you honestly think I would have left you out here, knowing there was a small army in the vicinity?”

  “I’m surprised you were able to convince Perri and your father to return.”

  Finnikin laughed. “All I had to do was stop the horse and say, ‘I think . . .’ and they were racing back into the woods to you.”

  Froi laughed and it felt good. Real.

  “Can I tell you something without you beating me up?” he asked.

  Finnikin nodded.

  “Isaboe . . . she told me about her time as a slave because we were speaking of shame. She had seen awful things. What men did to their slaves and what some of the other girls had done to keep her safe. I told her worse things . . . what I’d done and what I’d allowed others to do to me.”

  Froi shook his head, wanting to clear his mind of it all.

  “She said that she couldn’t bear sharing more of her misery with you, Finn. She’ll never forget her curse and that you suffer everything she feels when she walks the sleep. She couldn’t add more suffering to someone she adores with every ounce of her being. Her words.”

  Froi looked up, feeling wonder. “You’re loved with every ounce of another’s being, Finn. How could you doubt her?”

  Finnikin grimaced, shook his head.

  “You have a strong bond with Isaboe, Froi,” he said uneasily. “Don’t deny it.”

  “I have an equally strong bond with you, my friend,” Froi said. “It’s not that I desire one of you over the other. It’s that I want what you have together. I know that despite everything . . . it must eat at your heart that you’re her consort and not her king. . . .”

  Finnikin shook his head again.

  “It’s not about having power over her,” Finnikin explained. “If I was the king, I could take care of her. I could keep her free from the troubles of Lumatere, which seem endless. And so trite. Honestly, Froi, ours are such ungrateful people at times. Despite our hard work, all we hear are complaints and woe and who suffered most and whose soil deserves more. Why can’t they just be happy with what we’ve got? We have our kingdom back, but no one seems truly happy, and I’m frightened that it’s now in our blood. That we’ll pass on that dissatisfaction to our children and our children’s children and that we’ll be the ancients one day and our descendants will say, ‘Ah, yes, a melancholy, dour lot.’”

  Froi let him speak. He knew Finnikin would never express these feelings to others.

  “And if I was the king, she could spend afternoons making friends and having them over for sweet cakes and hot brew. Do you know her greatest sadness? That she may have Beatriss and Lady Abian and Tesadora, but she would love friends her own age. She could have had Celie, but Isaboe made a sacrifice allowing Celie a life in Belegonia, and Isaboe hangs on every word of Celie’s adventures with the young people of the Belegonian court. She’s a queen and a mother, but I think she grieves the young girl she never got to be.”

  Froi couldn’t help thinking of Quintana. Of the girl she never got to be. Isaboe and Quintana had more in common than anyone chose to believe.

  Finnikin sighed and stood, looking over Froi’s shoulder at the others. “What are we going to do about them? Your Gargarin is going to provoke Perri into beating him to a pulp.”

  Froi looked back at Gargarin, who was still exchanging stares with Perri.

  “Could you just tell Perri to ignore him?” Froi said. He could protect Gargarin from the enemy, but not these men.

  Finnikin gave a short laugh.

  “You know what Perri’s like. He’s not going to stop until he works out where he knows him from.”

  “He doesn’t know him,” Froi insisted.

  Froi couldn’t bear an entire night of this silence.

  “Do something, Finn. Talk to them. You’re good at making conversation.”

  Finnikin stood, and Froi followed him back to the others. He stoked the fire, although it was fine as it was. An owl hooted, and Froi wished that everyone would just turn in.

  “Perhaps we can have a word, sir?” Finnikin said to Gargarin.

  Froi shook his head in warning. First mistake.

  “I’m not a sir,” Gargarin snapped.

  “Can I draw you something?” Finnikin said, retrieving parchment from his pack. “An idea I have for a drainage system I want to introduce to the Flatlands in my kingdom.”

  Gargarin didn’t respond. Finnikin glanced at Froi, who nodded. A lack of response from Gargarin was not a bad thing, all things considered. Especially when someone was speaking about drainage.

  Finnikin sketched for some time and then handed the parchment to Gargarin. Lirah looked over Gargarin’s shoulder to study what was there.

  “Where did you get the idea from?” Gargarin asked. Froi could see he was impressed.

  “The ancient Haladyans,” Finnikin replied.

  “Those goat swivers,” Lirah said.

  Gargarin chuckled. “I’ve never quite believed those tales. Remember, they were written by Aristos, Lirah. Not much of a fan of the Haladyans.”

  “Aristos was jealous,” Finnikin said, glaring at Lirah, and Froi could see he was bristling on behalf of the Haladyans.

  “I’ve always said that those who underestimate the worth of the Haladyans are fools indeed,” Gargarin said.

  Finnikin made a sound of satisfaction and looked at Trevanion. “Have I not always said that?”

  “Are they the ones who lost?” Trevanion asked.

  “Not quite lost. It was all about the surrender,” Gargarin said.

  “A surrender for a surrender,” Finnikin confirmed, and Gargarin nodded.

  They seemed to be the only two interested in a Haladyan battle that ended wh
en two sides surrendered to each other.

  “Ridiculous,” Perri muttered, walking away.

  Finnikin turned back to Gargarin. “My wife claims the Haladyans were a bunch of men in skirts who made too many mistakes,” he said. “And that the surrender-for-surrender battle is a myth made up by men who enjoy crying over campfires and telling battle stories.”

  Gargarin made a hissing sound of irritation. “Ah, yes, that wife.”

  But the conversation had broken the ice, and the two spoke well into the night while Froi penned a letter to the priest-king and to Lord August, laughing when Lirah said something to irritate Finnikin. Froi had always respected his king’s intelligence but had never appreciated it as much as on this night. He hadn’t seen Gargarin so relaxed in conversation before. There was nothing forced between these two men. In another life, they would have been friends.

  “Can you sketch something else, Finn? And take it back to the priest-king with this letter?” Froi asked.

  Finnikin nodded, quill poised to begin.

  “This,” Froi said, removing his cap and showing them the markings on his skull.

  He heard Lirah’s gasp, and suddenly they were all around him, tracing the lettering with inquisitive fingers.

  “You’ve been injured,” Perri said, not the least bit interested in the lettering. Froi felt Perri’s fingers on the dent caused by the arrow.

  “I ran into a bit of trouble weeks ago. All good now,” Froi said.

  He watched Finnikin copy the lettering.

  “How did you possibly catch a bolt to the head?” Trevanion asked.

  “It was an ambush,” Gargarin said. Regardless of how little Lumateran Gargarin understood, it was clear what was being asked.

  Finnikin looked at Gargarin. “What’s he not telling us?” he demanded. “About this ambush?”

  “There’s more,” Gargarin said. Froi grimaced, shaking his head.

  “It’s finished,” Froi said. “I’m cured. Leave it.”

  “I told you,” Perri said to Trevanion. “He never favors his left from right, and there was no reason for him not to have held on to the branch.”

  The five waited, and Froi reluctantly removed his tunic and undershirt. They stared in horror.

  Gargarin reached over and traced his hand gently across the scar on Froi’s chest.

  “He sewed you.”

  “He thinks he’s a genius,” Froi said, and laughed reluctantly. There was a pained smile on Gargarin’s face.

  “Gargarin has a brother who is a physician,” Froi explained to the others. “They look the same, you know,” he couldn’t help adding. “Twins. I’d never seen twins before.”

  “We have a pair on the Rock,” Finnikin said.

  “You should never have trusted anyone,” Trevanion said.

  Froi covered up quickly, shivering. He noticed that Perri’s stare was back on Gargarin.

  “How is Lucian faring?” Froi asked, trying to take Perri’s attention away from whatever it was that seemed to irritate him about Gargarin.

  He noticed the uneasy look between Trevanion and Perri.

  “Finn?” Froi asked, praying that nothing had happened to Yata or any of Lucian’s lads.

  “Lucian lost Phaedra of Alonso,” Finnikin said. “They were close to reconciling, and he lost her.”

  “She went home to her father?” Froi asked.

  Finn shook his head, and suddenly Froi knew the truth.

  “Dead? Dead? How?”

  “The plague in the north. It’s been a bleak time in the valley for the Charynites.”

  And still Perri stared at Gargarin, and Froi knew that if Perri wanted to strike, there would be no stopping him.

  “He’s not a threat, Perri,” Froi said, a plea in his voice. “On my life, he’s not a threat!”

  Perri’s stare didn’t waver until he turned to Froi.

  “My Charyn is weak. Can you fill in my words?”

  Froi was confused by the request but nodded.

  “In the first days after we took back Lumatere,” Perri began, “I escorted the impostor king and his men to the dungeons. Inside one of the cells was a Charynite, half-starved and mad, and I thought nothing of it and locked them up together. Later it occurred to me that if the man was in the dungeons, the impostor king must have placed him there. So I returned to the dungeon and moved the Charynite into another cell, intending to come back the next day to find out why he was imprisoned.

  “But one morning, as we know, the impostor and his men were poisoned.”

  “By whom?” Gargarin asked, listening to the translation.

  “Not your concern,” Finnikin responded.

  There was an uncomfortable silence.

  “I discovered that the Charynite was innocent of any crime against Lumatere,” Perri said. “So thankfully he escaped death.”

  Froi couldn’t understand why Perri was telling this story, but he realized how much he missed the blunt way Perri spoke.

  “I sent for the priest-king, and he and this man spoke for hours. The Charynite had a strange tale to tell about a child long ago smuggled out of Charyn, and how this man had been traveling through Lumatere to Sarnak to retrieve the boy, who was then five.” Perri looked up. Suddenly, he had the audience he deserved. Gargarin and Lirah exchanged glances, and Froi’s heart was hammering.

  “The prisoner had taken that journey thirteen years ago.”

  Froi was beginning to understand. The Charynite was the messenger Simeon had spoken about, who had never arrived in Sarnak to retrieve Dafar of Abroi. Froi realized why.

  “He became trapped by the curse?” Froi asked.

  Perri nodded. “In the early days of the curse, the Charynite prisoner had hidden in the forest between the borders of Sendecane and Sarnak. He even made Tesadora’s acquaintance and was one of two men who hid the novices of Lagrami. Remember, the novices were smuggled out of the palace village one night and Tesadora hid them with the novices of Sagrami. The prisoner was found by the impostor king’s men and arrested, mistaken for a traitor back in Charyn. They placed him in the palace dungeon, and he stayed there for ten years. The second man, a young soldier named John, who helped the prisoner save the novices, was hanged.”

  Finnikin was intrigued. “I remember this. The priest-king petitioned Isaboe to have a prisoner released on religious grounds. He was the first Charynite we sent home.”

  Froi remembered Tesadora telling him the story.

  Perri pointed at Gargarin. “He had your face.”

  Froi stared at Gargarin, speechless.

  “What did he say, Froi?” Gargarin demanded. “What?”

  Froi couldn’t respond. He thought of the fury Gargarin and De Lancey had felt for all those years they were unable to find Arjuro. He thought of the Charyn word for traitor scorched on Arjuro’s back.

  “Froi!” Gargarin asked. “What did he say?”

  “Arjuro,” Froi whispered. “Arjuro was trapped in Lumatere for ten years in a bid to bring me home, and the impostor king and his men imprisoned him for all of that time . . . because they thought he was you.”

  Lirah covered her face with her hands. Gargarin stumbled to his feet, staring at Perri, stunned. Then he turned and walked away. Moments later, they heard the roar of fury and the sound of Gargarin’s staff striking the tree. Froi turned to see the splintered pieces and heard Gargarin’s grunt of rage with every blow. Froi started to stand but felt Lirah’s firm grip on his wrist.

  “Leave him.”

  Finnikin watched Gargarin. “Well, that makes better sense. Now I see the resemblance.”

  The next morning, Perri handed Froi the reins of his horse, Beast.

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Perri. He’s yours.”

  “I’ll be home in three days. You won’t.” Perri said. “I’ll ride with Finn.”

  “No, you’ll —”

  “Take it,” Lirah said, and when Froi didn’t, she reached for the reins. “It’s a Serker horse — did you know that?
The king ordered the slaughter of the Serker people, and the army took the horses. The king’s army invaded Lumatere on these horses as a show of strength.”

  Froi stared at the reins, and before he could speak, Perri walked away and mounted Finn’s horse.

  Overwhelmed and unable to speak, Froi handed Finn three letters. They embraced quickly. Finn held out a straight hand to Gargarin, and Froi wanted to laugh at how rigid it seemed.

  “Sir Topher of the Flatlands is the smartest man I know,” Finnikin said. “And Froi seems to think you’re a smart one yourself. One would like to think that a collection of smart people can put their heads together and do something right for once in this cursed land. Not just for their own kingdom but for the whole of Skuldenore.”

  Gargarin was silent. He had said very little since the news of Arjuro, but Froi could see the strength of the handshake between the two men.

  “Walk with us, Froi,” Trevanion said, and Froi obeyed, feeling the captain’s hand on his shoulder. At first he believed the captain wanted to speak, but as always with Trevanion, his silence spoke loudly. At his horse, Trevanion handed him a quiver of arrows.

  “You know where your home is,” the captain said, mounting his horse, and then they were gone.

  Yet Froi didn’t know where home was anymore. He wanted to return to Lumatere, and he wanted to stay in Charyn. What strangeness was that? To belong in two kingdoms. He felt a sob rise within him that he swallowed hard the moment he felt Lirah and Gargarin at his shoulders.

  “They think they own you,” Lirah said.

  They do, he wanted to shout. Half of his heart.

  “Where to?” he asked instead.

  “We go to the priests of Trist,” Gargarin said. “I need to see my brother.”

  They reached Sebastabol two days later, and Froi felt as if he had been gone for an eternity rather than merely a week. Although he had a fair idea where he and Arjuro had exited the underground community of Trist, it was Gargarin who led them to the entrance on the outskirts of the province, knowing the exact words to speak to the Sebastabolian who lived in a cottage above it. The woman signaled for them to follow with their horses to the stable outside. When the horses were settled, she showed them back inside wordlessly and led them down into the basement.