The Dawn King (The Moon People, Book Five)

by Claudia King

  “I choose not to choose,” Eral said. “I agree with Radeen-Na. It is too soon to make up our minds.”

  “You will have to side with one of us eventually,” Thakayn snapped.

  “But not today. I think the boy is right.” Hasham was already trying to win Eral's support through kindness while Thakayn sought to intimidate him.

  The matter of succession was set aside for the time being, though it was clear now that either Thakayn or Hasham would be the second Dawn King. Jarek wondered briefly whether he should have put himself forward, but that would not have amounted to anything. There had always been an unspoken implication among the others that he was not suitable for such status. He was not like them, dark-skinned as he was, with his unusual hair and subtly differing features. His uniqueness set him apart as an outsider in these lands. No doubt they thought that only a man born of the plains could be expected to rule over them.

  That was the lesser reason for Jarek's choice, though. Even with the conclave's support he knew he would never have made for a very good Dawn King. He was too flighty and too easily bored with the rigours of leadership. He was good at talking to the people and communicating their sentiments in a way that others could empathise with, but he could not commit himself to weighty decisions with the confidence of an alpha.

  As the conclave finished their meeting he wondered, dismally, whether he even deserved a place among them any more. A large part of his usefulness to Atalyn had been his knowledge of the Moon People, and he would not be able to share that with Hasham or Thakayn. The temple had irrevocably changed within the past two days, and it was set to change even more. Terrible though Atalyn's loss was, Jarek had to do all he could to ensure that Hasham became the next Dawn King, and that Adel and the others remained safe until they could leave.

  There should have been audiences for him to attend and offerings to be made to the Son that day, but life in the temple had all but frozen since Atalyn's death, and the thaw was only just now beginning. Having no stomach for his duties, he went instead to see Adel. She had been anxious to know what would happen to the Sun People's leadership, and he'd promised to tell her once he knew. So long as he had something important to discuss with her, there was an excuse for them to be close. He desperately wanted to reach out and touch her whenever they were together, but he was afraid of how she might react. She had grown so very stiff and distant with him, and he wondered whether she was now the one who could bury her feelings while he suffered in longing. What a twisted exchange of fortunes had befallen them. How cruel the spirits could be by holding their kindness just out of mortal reach. He feared the day of Adel's departure now, for it could only ever come too soon.

  The domicile Adel had been given was a sizeable chamber decorated with fur rugs and beautiful drapery woven from different coloured strands of wool, with an outer wall of solid stone that housed a hearth in the centre. It was far more grand than Jarek's own room, and it was usually reserved for visiting chieftains or personal friends of the high priests. Adel sat upon the edge of the feather-stuffed cot in the corner, Netya beside her, and Kiren kneeling on the floor. Like Atalyn's chamber this one had a heavy wooden screen that could be pulled across the doorway, and Jarek closed it behind him so that they would not be overheard.

  Dragging over a bench from beside the table, he joined the women and explained what had happened during the conclave's meeting.

  “Why doesn't Radeen-Na just challenge them for leadership?” Kiren asked. “He would win that fight easily.”

  “If that was how the Sun People solved all their problems there would be far fewer of them,” Jarek replied. “That's an old way, the way it was before the Dawn King. The high priests fight with a different kind of power now.”

  “It is the same way your mother and I vie for status at the gatherings,” Adel said to Kiren. “We cannot fight like the male warriors, so we exert our influence in other ways.”

  Netya looked to Jarek nervously. “What will happen if Thakayn becomes the Dawn King?”

  “I don't know, but you will all have to leave if he does. I've told the guards that none of you are to be harmed by anyone, not even the high priests. Thakayn can't tell them to disobey me at the moment, but with the Dawn King's power he could.”

  “And he will keep causing trouble for us in the meantime,” Adel said. “He forbade us from leaving, and the guards barely let us walk through the temple any more.”

  Kiren looked nonplussed. “We could still slip away if we wanted, the same way Caspian and Fern did.”

  After a brief pause Adel nodded. “I want you to do exactly that. You and Netya must leave. We'll find a place where you can climb down the hill, then Jarek will make sure there are no guards in your way.”

  “Not without you,” Netya said immediately.

  “Don't argue with me, girl. Without Atalyn you have no reason to stay here. I will do what I can with Hasham if he becomes Dawn King, even if it is only dissuading him from sending more warriors into our lands.” She sounded almost as hopeless as Jarek felt, and more than ever he felt the urge to move forward and embrace her. She was trying her best to remain strong for the other two, but he could sense how strained she was. It reminded him of the times she'd come to their hidden glade after being beaten by her father, when she'd barely been able to summon enough anger to conceal her misery. Atalyn's death must have left her feeling like all of her efforts had been for nothing, and Jarek cursed himself for the part he'd played in bringing her here. If only he'd listened to his own advice. If only he'd left Adel as a fond memory, far distant and long departed. Instead he'd been unable to resist the urge to send Liliac looking for her, and that had allowed Thakayn to set all of this in motion. His recklessness had led to Atalyn's death.

  “If we go and you stay, Thakayn will be angrier than ever,” Netya argued. “What if even Jarek cannot protect you?”

  “I'll die before I let him hurt her.” He said it without thinking, the same way he'd kissed Adel on the temple watch. For an instant a look of anguish crossed her face, then she turned her gaze forcibly back toward Netya.

  “Don't you want to find Caspian? He may need you, especially if he is wounded.”

  “If the temple warriors have not already found them then they never will,” Netya replied. She looked pale, but something about the girl reflected her mentor's unassailable determination. Jarek was beginning to see why Adel had chosen her as her apprentice. “Caspian and Fern know how to stay hidden. And even if we found them, what then? We couldn't leave you to make the journey back home by yourself. When we go it must be all together.”

  Adel turned to Kiren. “Tell her how foolish she is being.”

  Kiren shook her head. “You are just like Vaya, you know. You think you have to carry a mountain on your back because no one else will help you.”

  “She has always been that way,” Jarek said.

  Adel stood up indignantly. “Because I care for what happens to you! I am your den mother, and I am telling you to leave.”

  “Not in these lands,” Kiren replied. Adel gave her an angry look. Netya touched her hand and pulled her gently back down to the cot.

  “When we are ready, we will all leave together,” Netya said. “I've not taken any of those herbs since Atalyn died. My wound is healing faster, and I can call my wolf when I need it.”

  “You're fools, all of you,” Adel muttered. She did not protest any further after that.

  Jarek sat with the three women listening to them talk, feeling momentarily warmed by the company of their conversation. Adel's pack cared about her a great deal. He was glad she'd been able to inspire such compassion in her followers, unlike her father who had abused his people's loyalty. Adel could have easily become a leader just like him, but the goodness in her heart had never completely gone out. She still carried Ulric's anger, though, and it saddened Jarek to see her still bearing that burden after all these years. He'd managed to chase that anger out of her once, during the happy years they'd sp
ent together, but in his absence it had returned. What was she still protecting herself from? Was it the threat of the other packs? Did she fear losing the respect of her people the same way she'd lost respect for her father? Jarek wondered whether it was all because of him, but that was a selfish thought. Adel was an infinitely more complex woman than that.

  He did not realise he'd been sitting there in silence until Adel fixed him with a stern look and asked, “Is that all?”

  His chest tightened painfully. She was right, of course. He should leave. But that did not make her coldness any easier to bear. He should not have been thinking these thoughts, tangling himself further into a web of inevitable misery. She was here now, but eventually she would be gone. Only Adel could be so cruel in the pursuit of kindness.

  “Unless you have any stones you want me to skip,” he tried to jest, but the attempt felt flat and tired. He left Adel's chamber feeling worse than ever, unable to think about the other duties he'd been supposed to attend to that day. He should have gone to speak with Eral or Radeen-Na, to convince them to give Hasham their support, but all he could think about was Adel. When he tried to tear his thoughts away from her they returned to Atalyn, and that made him even more miserable.

  Listless, he found himself heading toward the concubines' domicile. The foolish, desperate hope for love had taken hold of him. There were many beautiful, kind, intelligent women here in the temple. What if he had been blind to them all these years, stubbornly coveting his memories of Adel when there were others who might have made him just as happy? Perhaps if he could find someone like that, someone who did not feel the need to keep him at such a distance, he might be able to forget about Adel and Atalyn and everything else.

  When he stepped into the domicile he suddenly felt foolish, not knowing what to do. The crimson-clad women around him looked surprised, for he never came here looking for company like the other high priests. The only lovers Jarek ever took were women he could spend an evening laughing with, usually when the temple held a great celebration, and most of those were not even concubines.

  Eventually Arunae approached him, gliding expertly to the high priest's side in a wave of perfumed beauty. “Don't let them see you like this, High Priest,” she whispered, and he realised he must have looked even more distraught than he felt.

  He allowed the concubine to lead him outside and into one of the smaller domiciles. Her lips traced kisses gently along his cheek, but to no avail. Despite her best efforts he could muster no passion for the love, and Arunae soon stopped.

  “Who is she, Jarek?” she said softly. Arunae was one of the few who dared to call him by his name, usually in jest, but there was no mirth in her eyes that day.

  “Why must it be a she?” he said. “Why not Atalyn?”

  “Because I've seen you like this before. I know a lovelorn man when I see one. Every time I try to make you take me to your bed something always stops you. Who is she?”

  He shook his head, swallowing deeply. Arunae had always been a good friend to him. She'd been a novice concubine back when he arrived at the temple, and both of them had grown into their new lives alongside one another.

  “The seeress,” he said. “You always wanted to hear tales of my homeland. Well, she is my greatest tale of all.”

  Arunae cupped his chin between her hands, gazing into his eyes. “She does not love you back.”

  “She can't. She must leave here soon to return to her own people. She is to them as I am to you.”

  A sad smile touched Arunae's lips. “It is a child's dream of love, to believe we can always be with the one we care for most.”

  “Then I am a child.”

  “The people would not love you if you were anything else,” she chuckled, but there was no mockery in her voice, just tenderness and affection. “The Dawn King may be gone, but has the world fallen apart around us? Many of the younger girls fear it might, but I remind them that we have still woken up beneath the same sun each morning since he died.” She paused, looking aside momentarily. “I loved a man in my village when I was young. I thought he would be chieftain one day, and me the mother of his many children.”

  “Is he still there waiting for you?”

  Arunae nodded faintly. “He has other wives now, but he still comes to the temple every few seasons to remind me of our promise. I always meant to return to him once Thakayn and the others grew weary of me. I planned to leave the temple as a woman of the highest status, with the ear of the Dawn King himself. Our village would have prospered.”

  “Why didn't you ever go?”

  “Every time he comes to see me I want to. But our village has grown prosperous without me. He is a good chieftain, and his wives are kind to him. I could provide them with little more than what they already have.”

  “Yet here the other concubines need you.”

  Arunae nodded. “I've comforted many a nervous girl. I've made sure the men who treat them poorly are punished, and that those who are kind to us bring our concerns to the Dawn King's ears. It isn't because I don't love that man that I stay, it's the thought of what the temple would lose if I left.” She stroked his cheek with her thumb, eyes falling as her hand slid down to rub his shoulder. “You are the high priest everyone feels they can talk to, Jarek. You remind them that there is kindness and laughter within the conclave. They need that when all most of them ever see are spears and blades at the temple gate. I think that was why the Dawn King chose you.” She leaned forward and kissed his cheek. “The seeress is a fortunate woman, but we are fortunate too.”

  Even though they were just words, they breathed life into the fading embers of Jarek's heart. Atalyn was gone. Adel would be as well. Yet people like Arunae would remain. He might have no lovers, but he would have love. That was something his drifting, hopeless heart could cling on to.

  “You're right, Arunae,” he said with a weak smile, “I really would have been a fool to let the others see me like this.”

  Embracing her, he buried his face in her shoulder and wept the tears that had gone unshed on the day of mourning.

  —36—

  The Cold Plains

  The night Kale fled the temple was the first time he called upon his wolf in many days. The beast had become restless during those nights in the storage house with Caspian and Fern, and he'd begun to fear that it might burst through his skin of its own volition. He understood now why Kiren had once told him he could never go back to the way things were before. How could he sleep alongside his brothers and sisters, his mother and father, knowing that they might wake in the night to find a nightmarish demon beside them? He'd always resisted his wolf, holding out hope for the longest time that it might go away if he smothered it, that he might some day be free of its awful niggle deep within his soul.

  Yet on the night he fled the temple, the beast saved his life. With Jarek's help he'd slipped past the guards and made his way down into the village, casting off Liliac's borrowed gown to make himself less conspicuous. He knew he needed to find Caspian and Fern. Adel had told him they might need his help during the brief conversation they'd shared, along with impressing upon him the importance that he leave the temple village. Despite all his dreams of some day returning home, the thought of abandoning the Moon People who'd taken him in filled him with regret. He did not want to leave Kiren behind, yet Adel had been adamant. He was either to return to his village, or take Caspian and Fern with him and head back across the mountains.

  Those were still distant worries as he made his way out of the village, but they weighed on him all the same. He attempted to slow his pace as he passed by the warriors on the path, trying not to appear hasty. They would remember someone leaving the village in a hurry once they learned about what had happened.

  He had almost passed the final hovel on the outskirts of the settlement when he heard a temple messenger crying out behind him, his sandals slapping upon the sun-baked earth as he approached the guards.

  “No one is to leave the village! There's
been blood spilled in the temple!”

  Looking over his shoulder anxiously, he locked eyes with the guard he had just walked past. For a moment the man looked apologetic, as though he didn't want to inconvenience a passing traveller by calling him back, but then he saw the look of fear on Kale's face. Raising his spear, the guard began moving toward him. Kale ran.

  He felt grass whipping past his thighs as he veered off the path, running with his heart in his throat. The fear was a shock to him, but he managed to smother the deeper panic that was trying to rise within his chest. He was afraid, but he'd been afraid before. This was no worse than the dangers he'd faced in the lands of the Moon People. The fear felt more natural this time.

  Trying his best to summon up a warrior's courage, Kale let the fear sharpen his focus instead of crippling him. He'd gotten a head start, but the guard behind was gaining on him. It sounded like there was another person giving chase too. Soon they'd be close enough to throw their spears.

  Cutting a swathe through the grass, he ran to the south of the village, making for the thicker undergrowth near the fields. It seemed an awfully long way, and his thin moccasins made the ground hurt his feet. The warriors behind him were wearing thick sandals that let them ignore the sharp stones and lumpy earth. They would catch him, he realised, if he did not give in to his wolf. It burned along with the heat in his biceps and thighs, yearning to let him feel how much stronger, how much faster he would be if he allowed it to surge forth. The grass was up to his chest now, and it was tangling around his ankles as he ran, slowing his pace to a crawl. A spear crashed through the undergrowth next to him.

  Dropping to his hands and knees, he pulled the wolf into his body. Clothing peeled into fur as he dragged it along with him, his senses sharpening as the ache in his feet faded. Changing shape often made him reel dizzily for several moments after he did it, but this time the nausea was gone instantaneously. The warriors behind him must have thought they'd felled him with the spear throw, for their pace had slowed and they were now calling out to each other as they approached. Kale wasted no time, darting away to the southeast with a speed that made him feel like a fish swimming through the tall grass as if it were water. He leaped over the tangles that had snared his feet before, relying on his nose and ears to tell him what his eyes could not.