Eldan climbed the few steps up through his father’s small garden and began to run towards Cale’s house, finally ready to move into his new life with some partial closure on his old one complete. The painfully distant and banal visit with his father and utterly confusing goodbye with his mother had stripped him of most of his early morning excitement and fantasies. He would likely be shunted into the first trade where he showed any aptitude, starting his apprenticeship next year. As he ran, though, he shed some of the thick anxiety and dread that had settled in his chest over the course of the morning, and found himself jumping over small hedges and rock walls despite the stiff, awkward blade pressed against his back as he cut through shortcuts to Cale’s street. He slowed down a few houses from hers and settled the packs on his back, not wanting to arrive on her doorstep out of breath.
As he walked up to her house, nearly twice the size of his parents’, with cheerful white siding and green shutters, the door swung open and Cale’s father stepped out to greet him.
“Good morning, Eldan!” He called up the walk. “Come on, come on, Cale has been about to jump out of her skin waiting on you all morning.”
Cale’s father was slightly round and slightly balding, with bright, intelligent eyes and a nearly permanent smile twitching to break at the corners of his mouth. He was as relaxed and easygoing as Eldan’s parents were tense and unpredictable, and Eldan took enormous pleasure in his company.
“Thank you, Master, I’m sorry I’m late.”
“Nonsense, you aren’t late. And I’ve told you before, none of this Master stuff. Don’t I wish I was young enough to be mistaken for a journeyman.” He shook his head ruefully, laughing. “Just between you and me, Cale has come down with a near terminal case of the jitters, and she had us up hours ago worrying over what to pack and what to leave behind. Mind you, her bag has been packed and repacked twice a day for a full lunar cycle.” He winked conspiratorially and waved for Eldan to follow as he turned to the door.
Cale’s father, Gregorial Goldkeeper, was the current Master of the jeweler’s arts within the 32nd annex, and had been honored with the title of his trade. While the other annexes had Goldsmiths, Goldmen and Goldwomen, all of whom would take apprentices and pass on their trades, Gregorial alone personified the depth of knowledge and sheer artistry that denoted a keeper. He had taken apprentices over the years and considered himself a proud father and grandfather to several of the jewelers in the surrounding annexes, but his heir apparent now sat on his parlor floor frantically examining the tools, notebooks and clothing sitting around her empty knapsack in neat piles.
Cale glanced up at the approaching footsteps, then sat back with a sigh, brushing a tangle of brown curls away from her storm gray eyes. “So I suppose it’s time to go, then.” She gave a tense, sad smile, a slight flush rising on her heavily freckled face before she dropped her head and began to methodically repack her knapsack.
Eldan started to step forward to try to break the tension hanging over his best friend, but Gregorial beat him to it, doing a small jig of silly dance steps before grabbing Cale’s hands and pulling her to her feet to swing her around. Cale’s face broke into a true smile as she spun around her father. “A greater goldkeeper than Gregorial Goldkeeper goes to the grotto of goldlore to gain grace, good grades and.. gills!” Gregorial sang in a deep baritone, enunciating his words as though he were performing a call to arms in an opera.
Cale rolled her eyes, laughing. “Ugh, that was terrible!”
Gregorial held her at arm’s length, raising his eyebrows in mock affront. “Are you telling me I should not proceed with my plans to petition the Court for a new career as a bard? I burn from your vicious betrayal.” He pulled her in for an embrace, burying his nose in the curls on the top of her head. “All right, my little river shrimp. Let’s get you out the door.”
Cale nodded and turned back to her knapsack, quickly finishing her task and hoisting it onto her back. She walked to Eldan’s side and leaned her shoulder companionably against his, then throwing her arm across his shoulder and unexpectedly finding the rigid weapons across his back. “What the…” Eldan cut her off with a quick shake of his head. Cale shrugged slightly and went back to leaning against his side.
“Look at the two of you all grown up.” Gregorial shook his head sadly. He sighed, rocking back on his heels, then shook his head and visibly made an effort to throw off the weight of melancholy. “I bet you aren’t too big to turn down my famous gooseberry tarts, though!” He pointed to a table by the door, where two paper packets sat, tied with string.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Eldan’s stomach growled immediately, the thought of tarts further chasing away a bit of the cloying tension of the morning and leaving him suddenly famished. “Thank you for your thoughtfulness, Master” he bowed slightly.
Gregorial rolled his eyes “always so formal and yet always bringing my daughter home covered in river muck.”
“Oh, Caledonia..” a sing-song voice floated down the stairs and Eldan felt Cale stiffen against his side. Even Gregorial faltered as his wife’s footsteps began to click slowly down the wide staircase that curved up from the entranceway. Iyena of House Goldkeeper drifted into view like an eldritch specter, draped in layers of gauzy, silvery silks. Her silver hair tumbled down her back, her eyes a lighter gray than Cale’s storm cloud eyes, and her skin so pale it was nearly translucent, reflecting the silver fabric to complete the illusion. “Were you planning to leave without paying your respects to your mother?”
“Now, now, Iyena. She didn’t want to disturb you so early.” Gregorial’s tone was light but his smile was strained.
“Mmm.. perhaps.” Cale’s mother reached the bottom of the staircase and turned her gaze, somehow simultaneously piercing and unfocused, on her daughter, her lip curling slightly as she seemed to peer through Cale to a distasteful truth crouched, hidden behind her back.
Eldan had never been clear what had happened to Cale’s mother, but he understood that there had been a time before when she was different, full of life and laughter like her husband. Whatever had wrought this change had occurred before Eldan first laid eyes on Cale, when the two five year olds had both wandered away from their parents at market and found their way to the river’s edge to splash in the mud and search for newts. Eldan had been knee-deep in the water, dipping his face into the surface and opening his eyes to try to see through the silty water to the creatures at the bottom. He lifted his dripping head to see a girl had unexpectedly appeared nearby, dragging a stick through the mud. Their eyes met and Cale had imperiously waved him over with her stick, marking the beginning of a fast friendship and the first time they would be dragged apart by her exasperated, laughing father and his indignant, infuriated mother to be dried off and scrubbed clean of each other’s influence at their respective homes.
“Does your mother truly mean so little? Is she so light that she might float from her own daughter’s memories?” Eldan faintly felt Cale tremble, whether with anger or fear he didn’t know. Iyena waved her hand as though brushing a spiderweb aside. “Mm, I see.. the currents tumble on but she drifts in an eddy.” Her lilting, singsong voice made her words sound eerily childlike.
“Iyena, be fair.” Gregorial’s face was drawn, seeming to age a decade as he unconsciously stepped to stand protectively in front of Cale. “You know well how important this morning is for all of us. I beg you to remember the day we went to the Court and find it in yourself to send her off with your blessings.” Iyena’s gaze remained fixed in the middle distance, appearing as though she registered neither Gregorial’s entreaties nor movements. Her attention slowly slid toward the space just behind Eldan.
“Mm, does the boy wonder if he is a man now he bears a blade?” Eldan froze, a jolt of cold fear spearing through his body. “It matters not, he will not bear her any more than he could bear the rapids. He will be washed downstream and battered against the rocky shore.” Suddenly she bubbled with laughter, a light, completely natural and joyful sound that left Eldan reeling with dissonance. As the laughter trailed off she waved her hand airily and dabbed a tear from the corner of her eye, all while fixated on the same spot behind Eldan’s back. “I jest of course.”
Gregorial turned to Eldan and Cale and put a hand on each of their shoulders, speaking with forced joviality. “The sun must be high now, let’s pack up those tarts and send you off. I trust you to take care of each other on your journey and write to let me know when you are safely at the court.” He kissed Cale’s forehead and gave Eldan’s shoulder a squeeze before nudging them forward.
Cale glanced at Eldan and then shot toward the door without looking up at her mother. Eldan followed, feeling unsteady and exposed, keeping his arms rigid to stifle the urge to reach back to feel whether his sword had somehow become visible. They silently packed up their tarts and moved to open the door.
“Ca-le-don-i-aaa..” the lilting song came again. “A kiss for your poor mother, at least?” Cale’s eyes darted to her father, who nodded reluctantly. She tugged on the straps of her knapsack, hoisting it higher on her back, and trudged across the entranceway and up two stairs so she could reach up to kiss her mother’s cheek. Iyena stood stock still, arms hanging at her sides. As Cale turned back her mother’s hand shot out and seized her elbow. Cale yelped but Iyena held fast, and as Cale whipped her head back in fright her mother stared straight in her eyes, her mocking song now interspersed with warbling and gurgling mirth.
“Have you seen the fattened ripples? We will meet once, years ago, between the sunken and the drowned, so I may let you take what has been taken, so I may let you wake the unforsaken.”
Iyena’s pressed her lips together, seemingly satisfied with her pronouncement, as her eyes unfocused and her hand dropped limply to her side. Cale leaped backwards to the door, throwing it open and running out onto the walkway, with Eldan spinning and running behind after a fast half bow to Gregorial and Iyena, who stood in what looked like a frozen tableau.