There was silence. It felt like it traveled throughout the group into the landscape, quieting birds and rodents as they also took notice of his promise. Al continued to stand in ceremony, bowed, in a strange purgatory where he wanted it to be true, but not, he wanted to know, but didn’t. His fingers began to curl and claw into his shoulder as he waited.
“Al, what do you mean?” Anla asked quietly.
“Yes, you’re acting a bit stranger than normal,” Raulin agreed, “though I suppose I’ll take all the help I can get.”
Al finally looked up, feeling a bit foolish, but ultimately confident in his discovery. He turned to Anla, pointing at Raulin, and said, “He’s Caudin Alscaine.”
She blinked. “The dead Arvonnese prince?”
Raulin laughed. “Wizard! I warned you not to read all those alley novels. Now your brain has rotted and you’re seeing things that can’t be. Preposterous.”
Anla didn’t laugh. In fact, she was frowning and her eyebrows were knitted together. “Is it true?”
Raulin rolled his eyes. “You believe him?”
“I don’t know if I believe him, but I know that you were lying when you said it was preposterous.”
“Well, I suppose it could be, then. Yes, why not? Maybe the prince could have survived and he’s somewhere out there,” he said, waving distractedly. He turned to Al and said, “Wizard, let’s you and I go for a walk. Maybe I can help you clear your mind of the odd fantasies playing in your mind.”
He started to stand when Anla said, “Answer the question.”
He smiled and turned to her, looking away when he saw the intense expression on her face. He rubbed his palms on his pants, laughed once, and shook his head at the silliness of the situation. Finally, his humor fell and he clenched his jaw before growling. “Damn you, Wizard! You couldn’t leave well enough alone!” He tented his hands in front of face.
“It’s true?” Anla asked.
“Yes,” he said, moving his hands away. “Yes, I’m…yes.”
It was at this point that Al’s legs could no longer support him. He fell into a genuflection, which was a position he was pleased to be in at that moment. Anla’s hand slowly covered her mouth. Telbarisk grinned.
“I’m sorry, Al. It was never a lack of trust. I just figured that if there was one person in this world who could somehow know who I was, it would be you. I had hoped that you wouldn’t, though.”
“S…sorry, Your Majesty.”
“Stop kneeling.” Al collapsed so that he was sitting. “All right, then,” Raulin said to no one. “There, now, it’s done. My worst nightmare is realized and there’s not much I can do about that.” He sighed loudly and looked up. “We’ll have to move on from this point. We’re going to go back to the road and continue walking north. Once we leave this forest, we are never, ever going to speak of this again.”
“You have to go back,” Al said, his voice warbling.
“What?” Raulin asked.
“To Arvonne. You have to go back and take the throne.”
“I don’t have to do anything,” he responded.
“You do! Your people are suffering.”
“They are not my people.”
“They are! You are destined to be their king!”
“I will never do that.”
“But why?”
“Because they killed my family!” The forest around them actually grew quiet as birds startled away from the sound. Raulin drew in a few heavy breaths. “If you think I would go back and help those vile murderers, you’re insane. I’m glad! I’m so very happy they’re suffering!”
“But, that’s millions of people…”
“So what? Do you know what they did to my little sister, Petulet? They stabbed her fifteen times. She was five years old! Can you imagine what her last thoughts were as they killed her? My older brother, they taunted him. Eight of them fought against him. He killed two before being run through by three epees. Those people? You want me to go back and lead those people?”
Al’s hands clenched his head. “But, it was only two thousand that took the palace! There were millions of people who didn’t want that. Caudin, you have to understand that-”
“Raulin,” he snarled.
“You have to understand that the Arvonnese didn’t want the Coup, didn’t support it, and still don’t. They-”
“They can rot for all I care. Listen to me very carefully. I’m not going back. I am never going back. If you bring this up again, Wizard, I will have to-”
The two of them looked over as Anla ran into the woods. “Anla?” Raulin stood, his mood changed from hostility to concern in a heartbeat. He looked back at Al. “Don’t move until I get back,” he said, then followed Anla.
Al looked at Tel in a daze. “How are you so calm? Do you understand what just happened?”
“Raulin finally admitted to his past.”
“’Finally’? Wait, did you know?”
Tel shook his head. “I suspected. Raulin never told me anything save what he told you and Anla. Among what I could gather, there were too many things that added up to him being someone of importance. We already knew he was a hayinfal. I never really believed that his current path was going to lead him to the conclusion that he needed.”
Al’s eyes widened. “Hayinfal! Yes! He needs to go back to Arvonne and take the throne. This is what the gods want him to do. Oh, Kriskin malor,” he said, slapping his hand over his mouth, “that’s why…that’s why the chalice chose us. The gods put us in his path to help support him to get back Arvonne. How…how do you get a hayinfal to take a hold of his destiny?”
Tel shook his head. “You can’t. They must realize what they must do in their own time.”
Al’s shoulders slumped. “But, he needs to go back.”
“He has had the choice available to him ever since he was spirited from the country. I’m sure feeling alone and unsure of who his allies would be are large reasons why he hasn’t returned, but this comes down to his anger at his people. You’ve known how he’s felt since the first time you’ve met him.”
“He’s not right, though! I’ve read enough to know that it was just one thousand men that stormed the palace and killed the royal family. There may have been another thousand supporters, but that was it. It was definitely not the whole country. There are millions of people in Arvonne who wish they could get the monarchy back; the current system is crumbling and the people are starving. Why doesn’t he understand that?”
“Because, he only sees red when he thinks about Arvonne. There is an obstacle in his path, just like you had for many things you’ve changed your mind on.” Al sat back and thought for a few minutes. “Alpine, I know that look in your eyes. You’re trying to think of a way to get Raulin to change his mind.”
“Of course I am.”
“Do you remember how you reacted whenever anyone tried to get you to change your mind, say about Raulin?”
“I’d argue.”
“It’s not Raulin’s way, but his usual course of action is also to brush off things that bother him. If he hasn’t brushed this off, what do you think he’d do?”
“He’d argue. He’d fight. And, instead of giving in, he’d do what he’s done before: he’d alienate whomever was becoming an enemy to him.”
“We have a gift, Alpine. We know him. We know how he’ll respond to things. What he needs most in his life are not jailers, not guards, not seneschals, but friends. He needs people who will support him and give him a safe, comfortable place to perhaps change his mind. He will not do that if he feels yoked or threatened.
“You need to ask yourself which is more important to you: Arvonne or Raulin?”
“Raulin,” he answered, without hesitation.
“Then understand that being his friend may mean you never get to see him return to rule. Are you okay with that?”
He took a few deep breaths. “Honestly, no. But, it’s something I can keep to myself.”
“That’s enough for now,” Tel said.
* * *
When Anla didn’t want to be found, she was good at hiding. It took whatever skills Raulin had learned from her to spot her light footprints, to see broken branches made when she had passed through in a rush. And finally, after twenty minutes, he found her.
She was sitting at the base of a tree, crying, her shoulders heaving as she hugged her knees. He tried to recall when he had seen her cry. After her sister’s rejection and…well, there had been no other times. He’d seen tears of frustration and anger, sometimes because of him, but he’d never seen her sob hysterically, like she was doing then.
Since she didn’t know he was there, he gathered his thoughts. He hated to do this, but he had a prime opportunity to spring her plot early. Her resources, at the bare minimum, were to have the strength to crush his heart. Right now she was vulnerable. If he forced her to talk early, to admit to what her plan was now, then a lot of the sting would be taken from the scheme.
Raulin hesitated. He was already reeling from having his past exposed. Now he was going to have his heart crushed. He sighed and made his steps obvious. She looked up, hastily wiped away her tears, and plastered a smile on her face. “Raulin. Just give me a few minutes and I’ll be back.”
“No, I think we should talk,” he said, sitting not too far from her.
“Please,” she said, her head dropping. “Just a few minutes.”
It hurt to see her like this, but he had to do it. “Why are you crying? Is it because I was so cruel to the Arvonnese?” She shook her head. “Is it because of what you just heard?” She nodded. “Is it because of your secret?” She wiped the tears with the backside of her arm and nodded.
He took a deep breath. “Yes, let’s get that disgusting little piece of information out into the open, shall we?” She looked up at him like she’d been slapped across the face. He barged on, trying not to lose his will. “I know what your secret is. I knew about it a half hour after you said you had one. You have a plan to seduce me, to make me fall in love with you, then enact some form of revenge by telling me how disgusting I am or having me catch you with another man.”
She shook her head, her lip quivering.
“I just can’t believe it came to this. We know each other. We’ve been through so much together. I know I’ve been awful to you. I am truly sorry about Iascond and Mount Kalista and Riyala, truly sorry. I’ve been trying to talk with you for the last month about it, to apologize and begin to make up for it. I sincerely hate what I’ve done to you. But, if this is what you want, to hurt me, to teach me a lesson, to…whatever it is you want to do, then I can’t allow it. I won’t let you do-”
If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
“Please stop,” she said, angrily slapping the tears away. “That’s not it at all.”
“Then what was it? You have something orchestrated.”
“Yes, you’re right that I had a plan,” she said, her eyes meeting his fiercely. This was it, he thought. “I did want to seduce you, to make you fall in love with me, but not because I wanted to get even with you. Why would you think I would do that?”
“Because that’s what most people would do? I’m sorry, I get that what you went through was horrific, but I don’t believe that you don’t consider revenge in situations like the one we have. You’ve lived on the streets for a long time. Revenge is a survival tactic.”
She shook her head and sniffled. “That’s not true at all. When you’re on the streets, you make yourself as small as possible until you can leave. You’re a ghost, a puff of wind. If a man hurts you, you forget about it and you run. You can’t afford to get back at someone, because they might in turn start a war with you, which may lead to your friends getting hurt. You don’t get even, you get away.
“I’ll admit I think about it. I get angry. But, when I think of something like humiliating someone or making them hurt, it’s like I’m a glass with no bottom: all the water poured in just leaks out. Nothing stays. Yes, you’ve hurt me, yes, I thought that maybe doing something in retaliation might make you stop and think twice about doing something like that again in the future. But, I never get past the pain. I get sick in my stomach and I think about Analussia. And then, it’s gone, and I think it’s better to just hide.”
Raulin blinked a few times. “So, what is this about, then? Why did you suddenly decide to start sleeping with me after months of coyly keeping me at a distance?”
“We have so little time…” she whispered and looked down. “I thought that if you loved me, you’d take me with you when you left for Noh Amair.”
“Why?” he asked, hoping against hope.
A single tear ran down her cheek. “I know you don’t love me like I love you. I know you don’t understand how I can no longer live without you. I thought that maybe with some time you’d come to see me more that what you do now, that if we were closer then you’d see something in me worthy of loving.” She sucked in a ragged breath. “I’d hoped you’d marry me. I’d hoped that you’d turn to me one day and say that you’d decided I could follow you in your contracts or that we’d find a house somewhere, like your mentor had done with his wife and child. And that was possible, until I learned you were a prince. Now…” Two fresh tears ran down the already present tracks. “Now it’s all over. So, please, let me be in peace for a few minutes more and I’ll go back to the group and we can do whatever you want.”
It took him a few moments to take in everything she had just said. He rubbed his mouth for a moment, then said, “How could I have made such a mess of all this? I was so sure you hated me. And I deserved it, too.”
He moved closer and tipped her chin up with his finger, but she still kept her eyes low. “Anla, look at me.” She did. “I have always loved you. We left Carvek with me completely smitten with you and I have only grown to love you more. I should have said this a long time ago, but it was never the right time, and I didn’t want any strangeness while we so close, and I was afraid I was…I was afraid. I was deeply petrified that you were going to say you weren’t interested in me and I was going to have to spend the rest of our year together mending a broken heart.
“I won’t say I haven’t loved other women, but I can easily say that I’ve never, ever loved someone as deeply as I love you. And, unfortunately, a burning jealousy that I didn’t know how to handle came with that. I am so sorry about the pain that I caused you, but I found I couldn’t stand the thought of the woman I loved with someone else and it caused me to say and do some pretty terrible things.”
“You love me?” she whispered, her eyes wide.
“Yes.” He pulled her towards him and they kissed. He held her and wiped away her remaining tears. “Now, ainle, if you’re willing to accept a man with a little bit of money and not a lot of skill as a husband, I would like to offer myself. We’ll move to Aviz. I’ll have to learn a new trade, since I won’t be a trirec anymore, but I believe that place is ripe with opportunities.”
Though her mouth was open, she still smiled. “You’re quitting?”
“Al has hatched some plan. It needs a lot of work, but it might get me out. I told him that if you loved me, I’d leave and start a new life with you.”
She laughed. “He knew?”
“Yes, even Al figured it out. Tel knew, um, from right before he got sick. Teased me occasionally about it. Now, I don’t have a ring to give you, but would you like to get married?”
“Yes,” she said. “Of course I do.”
He stood. “Shall we go tell them, then?” he asked, grasping her wrist.
She pulled him back down. “We don’t have to tell them immediately.”
“You know, you are absolutely right,” he said.
* * *
Some time later, the two made their way back to the clearing, spending a good amount of time brushing dirt off their clothes and picking leaves out of each others hair. Raulin’s hair was loose with a small braid twisting his hair off his left side. “You know, I do have one question,” Raulin asked. “Why did you always spirit off after our encounters? I would’ve liked to talk with you.”
“I thought that’s all you wanted from me.”
He raised his eyebrows and tipped his head at her. “Yes, that’s why I slept next to you at night, courted you for months. It was because I wanted the thing you weren’t giving me, not because I loved spending time with you.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“You didn’t stop to find out.”
She inhaled deeply. “All right. I think it was easy for me to throw myself into what we were doing, but when things cooled I became a little flustered around you. I was afraid I’d say or do the wrong thing.”
“Interesting how we both found ourselves in the same predicament, then. I could have given you advice on how to talk to me, but that sound silly and kind of hurts my mind to think about it.” He leaned over and kissed her temple before they crossed into the clearing where Tel and Al were. Because he’d heard them approaching, Al turned to see this.
“You two are good?” he asked.
“We’ve had a long talk, Wizard, and sorted a lot of things out.”
“You’ve been gone a while. It’s now actually past lunch.” He handed them each a leaf of steamed fish and rice.
“Apologies. We’ll hit the road as soon as we’re finished.”
Since Al had finished packing and cleaning while he and Tel had waited, he sat and watched them. “Out of curiosity’s sake, how good are you two?”
“Very good, Wizard,” Raulin said, popping a chunk of rice in his mouth.
“Like, are you…part of my book club still or…?”
“Will I be reading any more fictionalized tales of myself? No. I told her that I love her.”
Al let out a breath. “Thank every god twelve times.”
“Yes, and we’re getting married.”
“Well, that’s…wait, what?”
Anla smiled. Raulin said, “The institution when two people decide they want to spend the rest of their lives together?”
“Yes, I know what it means. I’m just…surprised I could be even more shocked today. You don’t want to think about it? Plan more?”
“I’ve wanted this for a while. She wants it. What more is there to think about?”
Al ran his hand through his hair. “Well, I mean, normally these things take a year or two of contracts and lots of organization, sending out invitations, paying for things. You don’t have any of the normal things needed.”
“What more do you need, Wizard, other than two people, two witnesses, and a priest?”
“Well, I don’t know…flowers? A bouquet?”
Tel, who had been sitting and listening to the conversation, walked over to the edge of the clearing and found a flowering bush with bright pink flowers. He gathered enough to make a nosegay and handed them to Anla. “I think it’s wonderful you’re getting married,” he said. “Congratulations.”
“Thank you,” Anla said, smelling the bouquet.
“A veil?” Al asked.
“I have one of those!” she said, She picked up her knapsack and rifled through to the bottom and gently tugged the scarf Raulin had bought her out. “See. I’ll wear this.”
“And you’ll look as beautiful as ever,” Raulin said, grabbing her hand and lacing his fingers with hers. “I will admit, I don’t think I had this in mind when I bought it, but it’s a wonderful coincidence.” He turned to Al. “I hear your point, Wizard. Marriages are essentially the joining of two people as well as their families. There are long engagements so that clothes can be sewn and details planned and contracts written so that those two families feel pleased with the end result. The fact is, we have no family. We’re orphans. We are just joining together us, no families, no houses. We’ll start something new today. That’s good enough for me.”
Al had the good graces not to say anything about a prince marrying a commoner and how problematic that might be for the future. That was partially because his mind had already thought of something else. He leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, and let out a soft moan before using the heels of his hands to wipe away the tears in his eyes.
“Wizard?”
He pulled his pack to him and began looking for something. “I’m all right. It’s…I can’t talk to you about this. I’m trying to be respectful of your choice. But, then I remember things like this and I can’t help but feel like I did as I was standing on that cliff, choosing what to do, but feeling peaceful and powerful at the same time.”
Al threw him the inkwell and hugged his stomach. “Is this a gift?” Al nodded. “Well, thank you. I don’t recall my father owning this, if that’s what you wanted. Still, I appreciate it.”
“Open it.”
Raulin unhooked the clasp and pried open the top. “What is it?” Anla asked.
He inhaled slowly, prying the contents out of the wax and placing them on his palm. “Wedding rings?” she asked.
“My parents’ wedding rings. Al, you had these inside the entire time?”
“I couldn’t leave them there on a shelf, collecting dust. It was…it was wrong. I knew stealing was bad and I had broken the law, but I felt so right doing it, like…” He sighed in frustration and grabbed at his hair.
“Speak. Say what you need to say.”
“Like I was meant to do it, like everything in my life had pushed and jostled me to that decision. Caudin, you have to go back. I’m not saying that because it’s what I want; I’m saying that because I truly believe that everything, me stealing the chalice, each of us meeting, of finding you, of the highs and lows from the last year, have all been because the gods wanted us to help you get back the throne of Arvonne.”
Raulin stared ahead in thought for a few moments before standing. “I don’t recall a shrine in Pies’rael. Our best bet will be to head north and hope there’s one in the next village.”
Al opened his mouth before a large hand clamped down on his shoulder, keeping him still while Anla and Raulin made for the road. “Small steps, Alpine,” he said.
“But this is destiny!” he hissed. “Why can’t he see that?”
“It’s been just a short time. Raulin has a lot of anger inside of him that he needs to move through. Hopefully we can help him with that.”
“We need to take the next ship to Arvonne. I’d lash a raft together and paddle across the Gamik myself if I thought I could do it. We’re wasting time.”
“Raulin isn’t the only one who needs to work through things. This will be good for all of us, some time to slow down and think. If kouriya still holds for me, I think we’re doing the right thing. But that doesn’t always mean it will be easy. Let’s enjoy things while we can.”
“I still don’t get kouriya. If things are going to be hard, why can’t we avoid it?”
“Because life is not always easy. You’ve had to go through a very hard thing to become the person you are now.”
“But if the gods want this, if the world is somehow tipping us this way, wouldn’t They want to reward us for doing the right thing?”
“It isn’t about rewards. And we might not be on the right path. We’ll have to wait and see.”
It was mid-afternoon when the road moved farther inland from the sea and the farms began to collect closer together. Almost immediately they found a tiny, one room building with a carving above the door of a book with a feather on one page and a coin on the other. “It’ll do,” Raulin said.
“What can I help you with?” a man in a black cassock asked. He was seated behind a desk with stacks of papers, scratching things with a traditional quill.
“We’d like to get married,” Raulin answered.
The priest gave a nervous smile, transfixed on Raulin. “Don’t you want Beliforn’s temple? There’s one in Aparista as well as an Aliornic temple or church of Zayine.”
“No, this will do nicely.”
“I…You’re sure you wouldn’t want another place? I mean, all gods accept the union of their children, but Cyurinin is usually not sought out for this reason.”
“Well, we could have stumbled on Kriskin’s hall,” Raulin replied.
“Imagine the kind of marriage Skethik would bless,” Al chimed in.
“Perhaps Cyurinin isn’t the worst of the gods, but…I haven’t ever married anyone. We did the ceremony once in school, but that was over twenty years ago for me. I do record keeping! I’m sorry, I just don’t want to disappoint you two.”
“This is just another record,” Raulin said. “We’re not looking for perfection. We just want to be married.”
The priest sighed. “All right, but don’t get upset with me!”
“We won’t.”
Anla and Raulin changed into their finest clothing. The priest took a half hour to set things up, donning more ceremonial robes, fetching the paperwork, and lighting all the candles on the mainly unused dais. He summoned them over and he had them read the contract. While dry and lacking the flowery language other priests would put into theirs, it still held a peaceful dignity in its words. It didn’t speak of love and providing so much as living life with each other, growing together as they changed and learned, accepting that a bond involved leaning on the other in times of need. They signed their names to both the original and the copy.
Caudin Alscaine
Anladet Auchindol
She looked at him with an arched eyebrow. “Legal issues,” he explained.
The ceremony itself was full of imagery and the priest stuck nervously to the script, which he read from unabashedly. He warmed up towards the end and gave them a warm smile as they exchanged rings and kissed to seal the contract. Tel and Al clapped, the latter slipping the priest a tip and taking the copy while the newlyweds led them into town.
They found the main tavern and took the one empty table near the middle. Al approached the barkeep. “One bottle of your finest wine,” he said with a grin.
“Oh, what’s the occasion?”
“My friends just got married!”
“Here? What, by Mikan?”
“The priest at the Cyurinin temple? Yes, then. Look!”
The barkeep leaned to look around his patrons and saw Raulin steal a quick kiss from Anla. “Newlyweds in the house!” he yelled. The room didn’t seem to need confirmation, they cheered and threw their mugs into the air.
“How much do you think a round would be?”
“Kind of you,” the barkeep said. He eyed the room and tallied under his breath. “Let’s say three gold.”
Al flicked the coins on the bar. “From them,” he said, nodding towards Anla and Raulin.
“The newlyweds just bought a round!”
The room cheered again and this time the men who had figured it out came to slap Raulin on the shoulder and offer congratulations.
About an hour later, a man approached the table. “Excuse me, but I heard you were just married?”
“These two wonderful people,” Al said, starting the feel the effects of Genalian hospitality.
“Do you have a place to stay? I ask because I have an extra room out back that I had built for my mother-in-law. It’s just sitting there. I’m sure my missus would love to cook for you in the morning.”
“Sounds great!” He had a thought to check with Raulin. He pivoted his head to him and raised his eyebrows dramatically.
“That does sound wonderful. Medemme?”
Anla grinned. “Yes, wonderful.”
They paid their tab and followed the man to his house, not terribly far from the center of the village. It looked fairly ramshackle, the room freestanding and made of scrap lumber, but they didn’t need much. Raulin carried Anla into the room, his forehead touching hers, before closing the door.
Al turned from the scene to the owner and asked, “Do you have a spare couch?”