Chapter Four

KIRKWELL

The Ladle Archipelago coated Alleria’s northern coastline almost to Aurora’s doorstep with more than one hundred islands of varying shapes and sizes. Kirkwell was the name of both the northwesternmost island on the archipelago’s long handle and its one and only city. At forty square miles, Kirkwell looked like an apostrophe plopped down in the sea. It was a barren, windswept place with long dark winters and bright mild summers. Its inhabitants owed their livelihoods to sheep raising, shipbuilding, and fishing. An influx of war workers and refugees, however, had almost doubled its prewar population of fifteen thousand. Kargas selected Kirkwell as the royal twins’ hideout partly because he had early in his career lived there and partly because it was one of the most remote and isolated places in Alleria with any culture and infrastructure.

Kargas waited until nightfall before ordering Lattamore to slip the boat’s cables and push into the archipelago’s maze of waterways. He knew that there were plenty of dangers lurking ahead. For one thing, many of the channels Lattamore planned to use were so poorly-charted that even the most skilled captains had difficulty navigating them. In addition, the war’s backwash – smugglers, deserters, refugees, and discharged soldiers – filled the region. Although they were Allerian, Kargas knew that their interests did not necessarily match his own. Finally, Rowowan forces were filtering in to establish their authority and quash those Allerians who had not yet surrendered. Despite his worries, Kargas had confidence in Lattamore’s ability to overcome such obstacles. They traveled mostly at night, passing the days in isolated coves that Lattamore had selected beforehand. Everyone suffered from the resulting tedium and tension, but Iona also succumbed to seasickness so severe that she was unable to keep anything down or even walk around. She spent most of the voyage sprawled out on a cot below deck. By the second evening, she wondered if she would have been better off falling into Rowowan hands.

Shortly after midnight on their fourth night on the water, Lattamore spotted Kirkwell’s streetlights in the distance. Two hours later, he eased the motorboat alongside a pier tucked away in a small inlet adjacent to the city. A heavy, pipe-smoking, baby-faced man hustled down to greet them as they disembarked. Lloyd Juganhouse was another of Kargas’s trusted assistants. Four months earlier, upon deciding upon Kirkwell as the royal twins’ refuge, Kargas had arranged Juganhouse’s appointment as Kirkwell’s mayor. Juganhouse, in turn, had upon assuming his post selected Lattamore as the city’s police chief. After brief introductions, Juganhouse led the party down a back alley to a beach house he had purchased for them. Although it appeared cozy and unobtrusive from the outside, it contained sufficient space to provide Rael and Iona with small suites, as well as rooms for Kargas, Iona’s servant girl Lana, and Frederick. Juganhouse explained apologetically that he had furnished the house in a hodgepodge manner to avoid attracting too much attention. After four days of vomiting in the boat, though, it seemed like paradise to Iona.

Because Kargas expected the Rowowans to turn Alleria upside down in their search for the royal twins, he had thought carefully about the best way to conceal them on Kirkwell. The day after they reached the city, he met alone with Rael and Iona in his room in their beach house. Iona was still so queasy and unsteady that she just wanted to return to her bed. Rael, on the other hand, was eager to explore his new home. After explaining their new names and backstories, Kargas gave them the forged documents necessary to prove their assumed identities. Although there were innumerable and often contradictory descriptions of the twins circulating, Kargas saw no reason to make the Rowowans’ task any easier. He persuaded Rael to shave his mustache, alter his hair style, and dress in a more plebian manner. Iona was predictably more difficult. She refused to cut her long blonde hair, but by way of compromise agreed to wear it up while in public. Kargas had concluded that keeping the twins cloistered in their beach house would generate rumors and attract unwanted attention. He instead urged them to get out and become involved in the community. After all, Kirkwell was full of refugees. Two more trying to establish themselves on the island would raise no suspicions as long as they were not seen together very often. Summing things up, Kargas stated that their best camouflage was hiding in plain sight.

As things turned out, Rael had little trouble adjusting to his new life. He was an outgoing man whose status predisposed people to give him the benefit of the doubt and forgive his foibles. Incognito did not erase his attitude. Moreover, he had Frederick to keep him company. The two men plunged into Kirkwell’s limited social scene by frequenting the city’s various watering holes. Iona, however, had a more difficult time fitting in. She was fond of her servant, Lana, but Lana was at fifteen still more a child than a woman with whom Iona could exchange confidences. Iona disliked beginnings and environments in which she was uncertain of her standing. Under such circumstances, she became anxious and withdrawn. Her expeditions into Kirkwell depressed her. For one thing, wounded veterans seemed everywhere – men with empty sleeves and trouser legs, disfiguring scars, and eyepatches. Others had haunted looks that indicated psychological injuries every bit as profound as those physically shattered by the conflict. She could also identify widows by the emptiness in their eyes. Iona felt a sense of responsibility toward all these people because they had sacrificed so much for her family and gotten little in return but suffering, loss, and dislocation. Finally, and most disconcertingly, there were the random individuals she saw who reminded her of people from her past: a clerk at the bakery who looked like a Valgor diplomat, a woman sitting on a bench who could have been a teacher’s twin, and a bookstore owner who was the spitting image of a boy she knew from the royal academy. Small wonder Iona found Kirkwell eerie and distressing.

Not surprisingly, the stress, boredom, and loneliness of her new environment resurrected some of Iona’s worst tendencies. She grew irritable with those around her, complained about even minor inconveniences, and treated Lana poorly. Most ominously, she turned her attention to Frederick. On the surface, this did not seem like a bad idea. There was in fact much to commend Frederick. His family was one of Alleria’s most distinguished and venerated. He and Iona had known each other since childhood and had attended the royal academy together. Frederick was a handsome man, taller and better defined than Rael, with close cut blond hair and steely blue eyes. He enjoyed the finer things in life, from the silk shirts he habitually wore to the pistachios he frequently ate. He was also more intelligent and less flamboyant than his royal friend. Both were confident, but Frederick’s self-possession was based on an understanding of his abilities, not his station in life. Whereas Rael tended to give up easily if his status and looks could not immediately secure what he wanted, Frederick was more patient and persistent. There was also a vaguely mysterious and dangerous quality to him that women such as Iona found irresistible. It was not exactly arrogance, but rather the self-confidence of a man accustomed to achieving his goals in such a way that pleased everyone around him.

Unfortunately, a troubled history between the two counterbalanced such positives. Both had been popular students at the royal academy. Iona was after all a beautiful princess, and Frederick was the dashing scion of a prominent Allerian family. Their short and intense adolescent romance was as predictable as its messy ending. First of all, the relationship cost Iona her virginity. Although sexual activity was hardly uncommon in such elite circles, her father was greatly distressed when he learned the news from his sources. In addition, the liaison aroused considerable jealousy and resentment among Iona’s friends. Finally, Iona’s selfishness, neediness, and high-handedness soon drove Frederick into the arms of another, more agreeable, woman. Iona was predictably devastated and furious with what she considered Frederick’s betrayal, and she made her displeasure known to everyone. All this drama so roiled the royal academy that the king ordered Kargas, then a young assistant adviser to the royal family, to restore tranquility. Happily for Kargas, the oncoming war with Rowowa diverted everyone’s attention from these parochial concerns.

Iona sorted through all these feelings and memories one afternoon while sitting on the back porch of the beach house and watching the wind sweep across the water. She had hardly spoken to Frederick since he and Rael went off to war nearly ten years ago. Although Frederick had returned with Rael to the capital toward the end of the Rowowan siege, Iona was too busy nursing her father through his final illness to pay much attention to him. Iona was so seasick during their voyage to Kirkwell that she scarcely interacted with him during those four long days. After they reached the island, though, they had exchanged pleasantries while eating their meals in the dining room. Time had so dulled her once bitter recollections of their brief romance that she was inclined to attribute their previous troubles to youthfulness and immaturity. Moreover, she noticed that he had retained his good looks and self-confidence. He was also familiar and available. These were all important factors, but there was more to it than that. Frederick possessed a certain alluring animal magnetism that she could not explain. He was edgy and dangerous, the kind of man who could make a woman feel desired, adventurous, and alive. She sensed it every time they were in the same room, that electricity that certain men were capable of generating. He may not have shared her love of literature, languages, solitude, and reading, but that did not seem to matter. His attitude is what counted.

Despite her rather dismal track record in the field, Iona felt that she had learned through hard experience a great deal about romance since her days at the royal academy. Indeed, she had come to view it in almost clinical terms. She thought that the goal of any romantic relationship was to provide her with a predictable and ample supply of emotional sustenance – love – without risking or losing anything in return. To achieve this objective, she believed that she needed to control the pace and depth of the courtship process – how fast it progressed and how intimate it became. Sexuality was the key. Indeed, she saw her sexuality as her deus ex machina, something that served as lever, bait, and drug all rolled into one. Applying it, though, required a subtlety and deftness that she had spent years perfecting. She knew to show just enough interest in a man to attract his attention, but not enough for him to be certain of her feelings. This meant saying no as often as yes, keeping conversations flirtatious and superficial, and never committing to anything. Doing so forced him to work hard and gave him the illusion of possessing the initiative. If all went well, the end result was a man who told her what she wanted to hear and did what she wanted done.

Oddly enough, Iona was aware that the romantic tactics in which she took such pride rarely yielded for long the results she wanted. For this she blamed sex. Although she understood its importance, she did not think much of the act one way or another. She felt the biological urge for it, but disliked its messiness and awkwardness. Indeed, she suspected that its full enjoyment required a vulnerability she was unwilling to demonstrate. Whatever her feelings on the subject, she knew it was part of the process. But that was the problem. If she withheld sex for too long from a man in whom she was interested, he became frustrated and moved on. On the other hand, bestowing sex made him complacent and unappreciative. It was a puzzle she had never been successful in resolving. She wondered why such conundrums did not seem to apply to men. They took sex where they found it without putting much thought into the larger issues surrounding the act. It made her question whether they were that smart or that dumb.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Whatever Iona’s qualms, boredom, habit, and Frederick’s magnetism pushed her into undertaking yet another romantic adventure. He unknowingly confirmed her desires two weeks after they reached Kirkwell. Frederick and Rael were tossing a ball around on the beach one evening when a hysterical woman ran up to them and exclaimed that her child had somehow stranded himself on an old dilapidated pier. While Rael struggled unsuccessfully to calm her down, Frederick plunged into the surf, swam to the pier, retrieved the child, and hauled him back to shore. An admiring Iona watched him strike a pose in the setting sun, shirtless, with the water dripping down his sculpted chest, as he basked in the mother’s gratitude. That, she thought to herself, is the man she had always wanted Frederick to be – and the one she now wanted to have.

Attracting Frederick’s attention was initially more difficult than Iona expected. He was friendly, but not as interested as Iona hoped. Iona attributed this to the other sexual opportunities available to him in a city full of young widows, as well as unhappy memories from their previous relationship. Even so, their proximity made it difficult for him to ignore her beauty, status, and increasingly obvious overtures. Once he recognized her intentions and calculated the advantages involved, though, their renewed friendship progressed rapidly. Iona’s dislike of Kirkwell’s social amenities did not prevent her from accompanying him to the local theater on several occasions. Their previous familiarity enabled them to fast forward through the courtship, so that by the beginning of winter they had become physically intimate.

There was nothing unusual about Iona’s romance with Frederick. She had participated in a dozen such relationships during the war. Nor was there anything out of the ordinary about the frustrations and doubts she soon felt about it. For one thing, Frederick was uninterested in anything beyond the immediate. Literature, politics, science, philosophy, and the rest of the world’s big subjects bored him. Ten years of war had narrowed and stunted his outlook, emptying his mind of everything beyond life’s day-to-day concerns. Small wonder he found Kirkwell so accommodating. Moreover, Frederick continued to go out with Rael and sometimes did not return to their beach house until the next day. He was invariably vague when Iona asked of his whereabouts. Iona refrained from the tantrums and tirades that such responses once provoked from her. Kargas had warned her to avoid behavior that would attract attention, and voices carried even in their secluded homestead. Besides, she wanted to show Frederick that she had matured since their last romance. It was not easy, though. Frederick made no effort to defend his actions, but simply left the room and later acted as if the argument, such as it was, had never taken place. To Iona, the control she so valued was rapidly slipping away.

Although Iona and Rael were twins, they had never been especially close. Iona resented that Rael was heir simply because of his gender. Rael, for his part, suspected deep down that Iona was more suited for the throne. As a result, they shunned the kind of discussions that revealed and overcame such insecurities. It was, however, impossible for them to avoid each other in their Kirkwell home. One afternoon they found themselves together in the study. Before the silence grew unbearably awkward, Rael asked one of his questions that was simultaneously innocent and inappropriate.

“So, are you with Frederick now?”

Iona looked up from her book. “Why? What did he tell you?”

“Nothing,” said Rael. “I don’t pry into his personal business. It’s just a question based on observation.”

Iona considered her options before responding defiantly. “Yes, we are. It’s wonderful being with someone like Frederick.”

Rael chuckled at her bravado. “You know, he’s not the marrying kind.”

Iona sneered. “Who said anything about marriage?”

“Well,” said Rael, “if you don’t want to marry him, then why are you seeing him?”

“It’s not all about marriage – as you well know.”

“Of course,” said Rael, “But from what I hear and have seen, these kinds of relationships make you miserable.”

“Have you ever considered that I might want some companionship?” Iona huffed.

“Companionship?” snorted Rael. “You’re alone all the time. You read alone and walk alone….”

“That’s different,” Iona responded. “Sometimes I want time to myself, but that doesn’t mean I want to be alone.”

Rael arched his eyebrows. “Then why don’t you get a platonic friend? Or a dog?”

Iona started to dismiss him, but changed her mind and offered him an explanation. “Not that kind of companionship. I want more than that. Besides, you’re a man, so you wouldn’t understand.”

Rael scoffed. “Sounds to me like you want a love slave to fill up all your leisure time. Too bad that’s been illegal for two hundred years.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” retorted Iona. “And anyway, what do you know about relationships?”

“I know enough about them to avoid them until I’m on the throne.”

“Well,” replied Iona, “That’s your prerogative.”

Rael smiled. “Indeed it is, and I’m happy with my decision. And it works for me. Are you happy with yours?”

Before Iona could respond to the question, Rael made it rhetorical by abruptly leaving the room.

That evening, Iona and Frederick went out to dinner at one of Kirkwell’s finer establishments, followed by a walk along the beachfront. As the evening progressed, Iona became increasingly conscious of their lack of communication. Frederick seemed disinclined to initiate or hold up his end of the conversation. He responded to her questions and comments with noncommittal grunts and long silences. The more aware she became of his taciturnity, the more frustrating she found it. It was almost a relief to go to her suite and tumble into her bed. Sex required minimal talking.

Afterwards, as she lay in bed with her head on his chest, she asked, “Where do you think we’ll be at this time next year?”

Frederick reached over and took a long drag from a cigarette. “I don’t know.”

Iona persisted. “Do you think we’ll still be on Kirkwell? Maybe Rael will be king? What do you think will become of us?”

“I don’t know.”

Iona’s temper rose. “Well, surely you must have some opinion on the matter?”

Frederick reached over her head to crush the cigarette out on an ashtray. “Look, Iona, I spent ten years wondering if I was going to survive to see the following day. I’m not interested in next year.”

Iona rolled onto her back and pulled the covers over her breasts. “What do you want in life? Anything?”

“Yes,” Frederick replied. “I want to enjoy it. I spent ten years fighting for your family. Ten years I will never get back and in many respects prefer not to remember. I want to eat, drink, and be merry. You’re interrogation is not making that easy.”

They lay in silence for several awkward minutes. Finally, Frederick got up, put on his clothes, and left the room. Iona stayed in bed and sulked. Her brooding, though, produced that rarest of events: an epiphany. Whatever his attributes, her romance with Frederick – indeed, any relationship of this sort – was clearly a dead end that promised little more than diminishing returns. That being the case, she decided to terminate it. Frederick accepted her decision during a late afternoon discussion on the beach house’s front porch two days later without much comment or emotion. Before he walked away, though, he asked one question clearly designed to demolish her self-worth: “What will you do without a man in your life?”

Although Iona had ended relationships before, this time she intended to find a healthier way to use her time as a newly-unattached woman. The day before her conversation with Rael, she had learned that the Kirkwell school was looking for a secretary. It was a low-level position that involved filing and paperwork, but Iona concluded that it would keep her occupied and productive. Unfortunately, Kargas did not believe it was a good idea, but would or could not explain why. Finally, Iona said, “I don’t see why not. If I’m going to blend into the community as an unmarried woman, I ought to have some sort of employment.”

Kargas hesitated, sighed heavily, and asked, “May I speak frankly, your highness?”

“Please.”

Kargas chose his words carefully. “During the war you…did not fulfill the commitments you undertook, often under rather public circumstances. Then it was merely embarrassing to the crown. Now, though, it could prove disastrous because it could lead to your exposure.”

Iona had of course felt shame before, but it was supremely humiliating to hear the royal adviser tell her that he did not trust her to accomplish the simplest of tasks. She started to express her outrage, but then realized that doing so would merely confirm Kargas’s conclusions. Instead, she caught her breath and appealed to logic.

“I want to be useful. I have no husband or children to occupy my time. I don’t keep this house. Someone else cooks and cleans and sews. I know I haven’t always lived up to your expectations, but circumstances have changed. I have changed. I assure you.”

Kargas softened. “Okay. We can try it. I will talk to the principal, or have the mayor do so.”

“No,” said Iona. “Let me apply for the position like anyone else.”

Kargas raised his eyebrows. “Well, alright. But remember you cannot expect any special treatment once you start – assuming you get the job.”

“Of course.”

As Iona got out of her seat, Kargas said, “I understand you have ended your…relationship with Frederick.”

Iona was never sure how much Kargas knew about her personal life, so she tried not to think about it. Nonetheless, she was not surprised by this knowledge. She simply stated, “Yes.”

Kargas replied, “I am happy that you did so quietly.”

As things turned out, Iona had little difficulty securing the job. Her obvious refinement, education, and beauty so impressed the principal that he offered her the post at the end of the interview. Although the work was initially quite mundane – mostly filing – Iona discovered a certain contentment in the structure it provided. Her days became predictable and orderly, so she was rarely at loose ends. She valued her limited free time more, and became bored less. Kargas had made it clear that quitting was not an option, so she tolerated the indignities and problems that accompanied such a low-level position. She showed up on time, worked hard, and tried to be pleasant. As a result, within weeks the principal increased her responsibilities. She did the paperwork to pay the school’s bills and buy supplies, freeing the principal to focus on his teachers and students. By the end of the year, Iona had found a place for herself as the principal’s chief assistant. She was proud that she had done so based on her own merits, not on her royal status.

A week before Christmas Mayor Juganhouse threw a party at his house for some of the city’s bigwigs: councilmen, high-ranking civil servants, prominent businessmen, and so forth. Iona and Rael were among those invited. Kargas acquiesced on the condition that they arrive and leave separately. Now that she was employed, Iona could talk shop with many of the attendees. She discovered that she enjoyed discussing the minutiae of small town life. After an hour or so, the house’s stuffiness drove her out to the porch for some fresh air. There she ran into a cigarette-smoking and pistachio-munching Frederick.

“Nice party,” Frederick.

Iona ignored the sarcasm in his voice. “Yes, everything is very pleasant.”

Frederick took a long drag on his cigarette. “It’s certainly not like the ones at the palace before the war.”

“Of course not. I’m not sure that’s a bad thing.”

Frederick was not nostalgic, so Iona was surprised when he referenced a party they attended long ago. “Remember when we stole that bottle of wine and woke up naked in the servants’ quarters?”

Iona nodded, but chose not to elaborate. The truth was that she had found the incident embarrassing then and in retrospect. When her father learned the details, he told her that it was the first time he had ever been ashamed of her. It occurred to her that there is no escaping your past. Even if you do manage to put it out of your mind, someone will always appear to remind you of it.