Kaiji’s assertion was enough to drive Priceless to silence for a time, for a few days at least, though it did not keep her embrace back, nor did it keep her from sleeping comfortably in the arms of her lover.
The embrace the brown haired slave gave to her lover only tightened as they drew closer and closer to the city. Kaiji however, was comfortable with the silence.
Then they reached the first ruin.
The village was nothing but burned out timbers, unlike much of the Pasenian construction of village homes that relied on stilts, the Komestran village had numerous small mounds of packed earth, all knee high or greater, and all the dirt taken from the earth around the hill itself, with a great depression in the center.
“Stop!” Kaiji shouted and tugged the rope that would alert the coachman, and when the wheels slowly halted, she went straight for the door and got out before the driver had even dismounted.
She fairly jumped from the carriage and immediately began walking around the burnt out ruin.
Priceless followed and put herself close at Kaiji’s back. “Did you know this place?” She asked while looking around. The forest had already begun to reclaim the place, grass was growing over the flattened dirt foundations where homes had once stood. Green plants were already forcing their way through the cracks between built up stones and breaking the binding between them. Few stones stood atop one another already, and at a glance, Kaiji could tell, in a century none would.
Those fragments of structures that still stood were little more than frames and the fragments of them that had metal nails securing them into place.
“No.” Kaiji answered when she walked up the small hill, reached out, and touched the blackened remnant of a door frame. A few bones lay just beyond, several bodies, none of them intact, but they were obviously several different individuals that died together.
She looked over her shoulder to her mate and asked, “How long were you a slave in Komestra before it fell?”
Priceless scratched her head, “I don’t know, a few seasons, a year, two? What is time to a slave whose day never changes?”
Kaiji looked down at the bodies, “I shouldn’t have asked… I’m sorry.”
Priceless waved it away, “It’s alright, what made you do it?”
“Did you ever hear ‘this is the hill I’ll die on?’ as an expression when you were there?” Kaiji asked, and crouched down to pick up a small skull.
“Yes… I’d heard that in Pas’en, Kai’sen, and even in country paddies which I don’t even know what city they belonged to. Everybody has heard that saying. Why do you ask, Kaiji?” Priceless came closer and laid a hand on the back of her lover’s head, and stroked it softly.
Kaiji looked at Priceless with an expression of pride, raising her chin and clutching the skull in her hands tightly and said, “We of Komestra coined that saying. Did you know that? It’s because of these.” She stood up and tapped the crest of the square angled hill with her foot. “The full saying originally went, ‘This is the hill I want to die on.’ or ‘This hill is my home, and I’ll die on it.’ or ‘I’ll die on this hill, before I give it up.’ It really depends on who you talk to which one is older. Any place you find hills like this, a Komestran once lived, and if there is no house on that hill anymore, I promise you a Komestran died on that hill. Maybe nobody remembers them, but their place in the world? That little place in the world where every man and woman is a Prince? That still stands.”
“Oh… I didn’t know that.” Priceless said shakily, unsure of just what to answer that statement with.
“I was taken from the city and unconscious for most of the trip, I never saw all this.” She took a hand from the skull and waved her arm over the remnants of the place. The depression of the ground was notable, and the little hills numbered no fewer than a hundred, a substantial space at least.
“In villages like this, the water would collect from the great rains and fill the center, it would then overflow, of course, but it would go ‘around’ the many hills and be guided by it… to there.” She turned and pointed to a great open field where the remnants of paddies that had been allowed to grow wild. “I’ll just bet that we could harvest a lot of food from this place still, the harvest hadn’t really hit before the war, so a great deal probably just fell and has been growing all over again.”
“Why are you telling me all this?” Priceless asked, coming up to Kaiji stood.
“I don’t know, I just need to mentally prepare myself for what we’re about to see when we reach Komestra itself.” Kaiji laid the skull down where it fell.
“Remind me when we stop among the living again, to send word to collect the remains here and…” she paused, about to say, ‘...take them for purification and burial…’ but instead said, “secure them to ask our mistress what to do with the bodies we recover.”
Priceless looked at her companion with a furrowed brow. “Mistress? I don’t understand.”
“As I said… she is my goddess, the dead belong to her, I will give myself to the beliefs she decrees. Now come along, it’s a short trip now, and we shouldn’t waste much time.” Kaiji gave a serene smile to her brown haired companion when the skull was laid as it had been found, and then walked herself patiently back to the carriage.
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When the two slept together again that night, Diana and Sado were both quite drained, but between the two, their final words before they got their rest had clearly weighed more on the fallen Prince. She was sure of this because she woke first, and from what she remembered of her time in the Prince’s bed, he was a very early riser. ‘Kind of like our Mistress that way.’
She lay beside him and ran her fingers over his chest, he felt so strong, vibrant, and alive. His chest rising and falling with every breath, in this state, he seemed utterly at peace. Bereft of worry or care. Diana sat up and stretched out, the rustle of the cloth stroking her legs as she drew them up to herself to watch him from above. ‘Of all the things in my job, this is the part I like best, everyone who sleeps is a baby, totally innocent, utterly unaware of anything around them. Except for nightmares, they are completely at peace… even the worst of those I’ve slept with for mistress Kaiji or for Prince Sado… looking at the worst like this… I know them so well…’ The beautiful predator sat quietly and laid her hand on the rising and falling chest of the Prince who ruined them all, and could not help but feel the pity welling within her.
“Dreamer…” She gave him a fragile smile that quivered just a little, “Even now, all you do is dream, all your work, all your effort, for what? Another dream that you can’t have…?”
His chiseled face disappeared as he rolled over in his sleep, facing away from her, the sheets moved down and exposed a scar on his back. ‘So you know that touch now too, do you? Not much, not as much as some… but maybe that will wake you up…’ She wondered, and the thought died as she touched the once perfect, powerful back of the Prince of Dreams.
Diana’s finger ran along the length, it wasn’t hard to conclude the source. ‘Kaiji wouldn’t do that to a boy she all but raised. Priceless is far too gentle, the Mistress is gone, Freyjin still has to get out of the mindset of a peasant… Lady Solution.’
Of all the people in the manor, other than the mistress herself, that was the one that Diana felt the most sure would kill her if she stepped out of line in any way. ‘Still, she is more comprehensible than the mistress. Though how a monster like that came to serve ‘anyone’? Curious. Dangerously so.’ Diana set aside the thought and got out of bed, the motion was enough to wake the Prince by the time her feet hit the cool wooden floor.
“How long have you been awake?” He asked as he got out of bed and reached for his pants.
“Not long, Prince of Dreams.” She winked at him, causing him to pause and do a double take before he pulled them up to his waist.
He chose not to comment, and they went about their routine, seeing to their baths and then changing clothes for the day, followed by a short meal of fish and potatoes.
They were just barely back at their quarters when the steady sound of a knock came at the door.
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Sado opened it at once and found a messenger boy waiting for him.
“The Prince will see you today. Arrive early.” He was a pimply faced youth in the short pants and shirt of the city, with the same absurd sandals they seemed so fond of. But his clothing was all clearly of silk and very expensive, however absurd it seemed to Sado’s eyes.
The blue eyed boy, having delivered his message, abruptly departed without awaiting any kind of response, leaving Sado dumbfounded for a moment, staring after the sandy haired boy.
“This is why you should travel more, Prince of Dreams.” Diana chuckled a little and reached out to touch his arm, “Protocol for Hanak’sen is abrupt, like Komestra, but… they border on rude. Good hosts, but if you’re a guest, you’d better get to the point, this place doesn’t like to waste their own time, they’re always in something of a hurry.”
Sado nodded as understanding dawned. “All of us responding to the same fears… in different ways… no wonder I lost… no wonder…” His face fell as another aspect of the cause of his defeat was made clear, but before Diana could address it, he shook the matter off.
“We go now.” Sado said with a sharp and abrupt decisiveness, “This is why we’re here, there’s no reason to wait.”
Diana said nothing in immediate response, though as she heard Sado grumbling about their wasted plans, she had her mind elsewhere. ‘The Prince, or someone close to him, predicted how we would respond, and kept us waiting until we were going to act. Could it be coincidence? Maybe, but I don’t think so. I must be on my guard.’
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Lodira waited until her number was called, with her hands folded neatly in her lap just like everyone else. She stared straight ahead, making no conversation and disrupting nothing. There was only the sound of the city stamp in a steady rhythm. Just an endless ‘thud’, ‘thud’, ‘thud’, and she shifted in her seat as anxiety slowly rose. “Twenty-five.” She heard the drab utterance and looked to the wall on her right. A black and white candle sat on a metal shelf, the candle’s interchanging colored wax was done in bands, each band took one hour to burn down, when the wick went out, the building would close.
Even without looking she was absolutely certain that the employees, free and slave alike, had banded candles burning behind their work stations. They were well down on the last band now. She watched the burning little light intensely, like it was Albaer’s own life.
Any moment now, the puddled wax around the chamberstick threatened to run out.
Lodira clenched her hands at the timeless indifference around her. ‘Tomorrow the ones who don’t get seen today, will come in early tomorrow after having swapped out today’s numbers for the reset counting up from one… but I can’t… Albaer can’t… wait that long!’ Her thumb clenched the wooden strip with her number on it so hard that it snapped in half.
She shot to her feet, drawing sudden jerking glances her way, she strode over the cheap wooden floor to the nearest counter and held out the half of her stick with the number four on it. She slapped it down hard on the countertop between herself and an iron collared slave of great age. She had wrinkled skin and gray hair done up in a simple bun, the dull and listless hazel eyes stared back at her with the only light in them being surprise at the actions of the maid in front of her.
Lodira wasted no time, “I’m number four! Did a man come here today with two letters to send, he would have been a head taller than I, slender build, well dressed, identified himself as a servant of Count Valoisin?” A dumb look met her, Lodira’s voice was loud and bounced off the walls, there wasn’t a servant who didn’t hear her. Eyes from around the room turned toward the presumptuous maid with almost horror and disbelief etched on their open mouthed faces.
“Was he here or not! That is Albaer! He has gone missing and his master wants him found!” Lodira exclaimed and stamped her foot, drawing herself up she crossed her arms in front of her and stared daggers at the woman across the other side of the window. The old slave stepped back without thinking.
“I… I… you’re not number four… your ticket stick is just broken…” She stammered.
“Was he here or not?!” Lodira roared the question as loudly as she could and someone spoke up. ‘You’re doomed no matter what… fuck propriety… what’s the worst Anton can do to you now?’
A bronze collared man of middle years and slightly overweight appearance emerged from a door at her back. She turned around when she heard the low, rough voice. “He was here.” The slave said, “I remember him because he used silver and asked for change, doesn’t happen often, but he paid for a rush delivery, then left. That was this morning. Now please, go… just doing this will get you reported to your master’s house, keep it up and you’ll get me in trouble too!” He hissed out and desperately backed away from the space between them as fast as he reasonably could.
Relief flooded Lodira’s face, she clutched a hand to her heart and let out a deep sigh, “Thank you!” She breathed and left many confused faces behind her as she headed out the door.
Just as she reached for the handle, she heard the quiet waiters stand up in unison and the wordless shuffling walk begin as people moved to trade out their numbers to reserve their places for tomorrow.
The sun was going down and lights were going out with the dusk, she looked left and right, up and down the street. People were already preparing to go home or to indulge themselves in the secret vice houses where the publicly straight laced became private wantons and reprobates.
Here and there among the larger places, wagons waited to take slaves and free people back to their residences to ensure that when night cloaked the city, the only ones out were guards and those who were not supposed to be out.
‘If he hasn’t been found now, he won’t be.’ Lodira had the thought and hated it, but with nothing else to do, she rushed back to Anton’s estate as fast as her feet could carry her. ‘Stars, you may have authored a poor fate for me but… but Albaer has never been anything but righteous in his life, a good man, he lived by your will for all his life, please… please let him be safe…’
She uttered the desperate prayer, and then repeated it, and repeated it, and repeated it as her legs carried her through the encroaching night until she reached the steps of the Valoisin household. She went up the seventeen steps and entered the open hall.
The maids, butlers, girls and boys who served in the estate wore hangdog looks, eyes tilted toward the floor, and Lodira felt her heart sink. They milled about until she entered. Lodira blinked her eyes rapidly. “Albaer?” She asked the nearest maid.
“He’ll be here in a moment.” The maid replied, and relief flooded Lodira, she exhaled a breath she’d held for what seemed like an eternity.
“Here he comes.” The maid added, pointing to a door, and out of it came a priest of the Starwatchers.
“To the stars he flies to see to his reward, he came to his fate as a man should, following the path laid by the stars at the ordaining of our lives. He traced the thread to its end, and now he goes to one final service…” The creaky aged voice beneath the white full body covering.
Behind him followed a box being carried by two iron collared slave men. They were shirtless, as laborers tended to be, wearing only a white sash over their left shoulders that was secured at the belt of their white pants.
The box was over their heads, so that the honored dead would depart with head held high.
“Albaer…” Lodira whimpered as heads went down.
Anton was behind them, and moved to the front, taking the handle of the door, he touched the handle for the first time in his life, and opened it for his Steward.
Lodira felt her knees grow weak, shake, and she fell hard to the stone floor she’d scrubbed so hard that day, but could not even cry.
“What… how?” She looked around for answers, and a chamber boy spoke up.
“I found him, he was hit by a carriage after leaving the courier building, his body was taken for collection, and they told me there that he just… well he walked in front of one. He must have been distracted, thinking of all the tasks he had to do that day…” The boy droned on, but Lodira heard nothing else.
“At least it happened after he sent my letters.” Lodira immediately thought, and heard her father’s voice in her head as her own as she had it. And that was half the reason she wept for the next few hours.
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The empty land stretched out for mile after mile, detour or not. For several days she rode, the sun shining brightly and the breeze comfortably warm. With the rainy season well past, all she had were relatively mild conditions and silence. So much silence. Yersin was pleasant enough when she visited his realm at night when the campfire crackled, but she found herself both longing for and hating her sense of isolation.
The night of her seventh day, she chose not to visit her partner, and instead just sat staring into the crackling flames. ‘Is that really why you’re doing this? Do you just want to save someone so you won’t be lonely on the rest of the trip back? That’s not heroic… not that you were ever a hero… hell that’s not even petty revenge… that’s just… pathetic. Just pathetic. God’s bones, Nua! All those years becoming all but unbeatable by normal opponents. Now here you are beaten up by what?’ She brought her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around herself, staring into the flames, she had no answer.
“So how long before you reach the border…?” She wondered out loud and looked off into the night, howls of distant wolves bothered her not in the least, well off the road, the Tlalmok travel restrictions meant that she had very little chance of encountering anyone she shouldn’t, and if she did… ‘I can kill them easily enough. I beat one of their city champions. If there are any of their peasants out this way? Well, that’s just extra meat for the trip.’ She chuckled at the vicious thought, and reached into her pack to take out the length of hair she’d cut from Sobella’s corpse.
It was comforting to take it out at the fire, like she was still there. She clenched it in her hands, ‘You have to give this to Prince Rasgen.’ Her eyes didn’t leave the length of silky black hair, the light caught the sheen and danced over it, such was the perfection of the shine even now, that Nua could see her face reflected back at herself. ‘Some of it… I suppose… Sobella loved Contessa Lodira too… I should give some of it to her. Can I keep any for myself?’
She stroked the length, recalled the caress she had given to the demon-elf when she was at her low points. Her wild shriek of ‘I hate heights…’ And Nua recalled the place of sacrifice…
‘You stupid… stupid elf… oh god… she must have been so scared up there… she… bad enough to be… but then to have to be at her greatest fear… and you didn’t even notice.’ Nua clenched the length ever tighter.
“Damn it! I don’t have a right to this, none of it. I was too weak to save her, too weak to stop this… if I were the Dark Savior I’d raise up a rebellion among the livestock and use divine power to make the beastmen kneel and beg… if I only had more power… power…” She muttered and turned her thoughts to the east where Pas’en and the great cities lay waiting for her return.
“Prince Sado was right about many things, he might have been a dense dreamer, he might have failed to appreciate the kind of resistance he would face. He might not have believed that his old friends would bring him down… but I have no such burdens. There is only one answer here… absolute and total power.” She spoke only to the fire that crackled back at her, and the length of hair still comforting her right hand as the warmth of the fire was carried along its length to her flesh.
‘The basis of power in the city states is slavery… the basis of stability in the city states is slavery, the basis of their security against the Tlalmok is a helpless population they can harvest themselves. The chief support of that… the temples of the Starwatchers. They set me up… they’re my enemies. They’re in the way.’ Nua’s thoughts ran darker, she caught the fire only out of the corner of her eye as she looked eastward.
‘Are you really going to hurt innocent people?’ Nua heard the voice of Sobella in her head as if the woman were there in front of her.
‘Anyone in the way, is guilty of being in the way, and that is a death penalty offense.’ Nua answered the voice in her head.
‘What about your promise to me? To be happy, to have something to live for, you haven’t even gotten back and you plan on breaking it?’ She heard Sobella’s voice again.
‘No, but some things just have to be done. I will… try to find some happiness along the way, and though I know you didn’t ask… I will do my best to look after your friends, like Rasgen and Lodira. I won’t forget my promise… and I’ll carry what I have of you, home.’ Nua replied, and the voice was quiet. She took the shock of hair in her hand and brought it around to the back of her head.
‘This is much easier when you have a slave to help.’ Nua thought with annoyance, recalling the way Kaiji would aptly tend to her body with deftness and devotion.
Despite her minor complaint, she managed the twisting motions of her fingers and bound the length of black hair into her blonde locks, securing it from both its tips to wrap around the strips of her remaining gold, there she tied it tight after the spiral that she made of it. When she was done, she felt a profound sense of weariness, and laying with her eyes facing the burning, crackling fire, with the fragrance of the sweet burning wood, Nua Calen Aiwenor finally fell asleep to dreams of power and the lengths she would go to in order to acquire it.