8. Elara
Chapter 8
My hair had long since come loose from the monstrosity I had tied it up in. Now the long curls danced in the wind, rippling around my face as I sat on my perch on the edge of the high wall, legs dangling over the side; the skirt of my dress speckled with dark purple stains of the smudges of the blueberries I had stolen from the kitchen on my way up there.
The high turret was one of my hiding places, it was also the best place to view the town of Turin and the expanse of the Realm beyond. The bustling streets of the capital were a jumble of roofs and twisted streets from this height, but the plains that stretched past the city were the real beauty. From up there they were a never ending wash of greens and browns that stretched into the stormy horizon before continuing on forever. Somewhere far from Turin was a land untouched by the Ramal and my mother. A place outside of Okivo. How far would I have to go to be free? How far would I make it if I tried to find it?
From way up there, it didn’t seem so far, it didn’t seem so impossible as I sat, watching the distant rain roll over the world as the thunderous clouds moved closer to Turin. Seeing it from far above I could imagine what the world was like.
That was all I had.
I hadn’t been outside the castle walls since I was child, and even then I hadn’t been allowed outside my carriage. I didn’t even know what was out there, I only knew them as names on the maps I had studied for hours on end back when I had thought I could find a way out of this fortress and escape my prison.
I had even made a plan to journey out of Turin by way of The Spine Road, make my way to the Forest of Ok and the Temple of the Sister where the chosen servants of the Goddess would surely help me. If I looked hard enough I was sure I would see the red trees of the Forest of Ok, the hint of the gold leaves that never fully form every year. Those red trees would be full of tiny golden leaf buds when they arrived for the wedding, the golden leaves never fully growing before they prepared to drop for winter, and I would miss it.
The Forest of Ok was where the last battle in the Black War had been held and the Goddess Leilan abolished the Sister and the Fae, saving the Lynar from the enslavement the Fae had locked them in and returning what was left of the magic. I had heard that it was sacred from my tutors, although all the servants talked about it as though it was haunted, telling stories about how the trees themselves would come alive to devour anyone who entered. I wasn’t sure which I believed, all I knew was that every painting or carving I had seen of it was beautiful.
Just like the rest of the world that I longed to see.
It was a foolish dream from a girl who thought there was a life outside of this; that there was a way out of this.
They were all dots on the old parchment now, each of those dreams all somewhere off in the distance. But I was in the Runturin, backed against the high, sharp points of the Luftyn mountains, locked behind the high stone walls built strong enough to keep out Fae.
I popped another blueberry in my mouth and wiped my fingers on my skirt again. The Boy shifted his weight beside me, moving closer. I didn’t need to see his face to know what he was thinking, why he was so close, what he had thought I was about to do.
Once, nearly eight years ago, after Mother had moved my room to the opposite end of the castle, I had come up there, ready to throw myself off the edge and be done with this place.
Be done with everything.
He had stopped me. He had pulled me off the ledge and stopped me, he had held me and soothed me as I cried that she didn’t want me. He had signed in his simple way that he wanted me. It had been enough to keep me there. But with how close he was sitting, with how the arm closest to me was holding on so tightly to my skirts, something I am sure he didn’t think I would notice; I was sure he thought I was about to do the same.
I ate another blueberry, and continued swinging my legs, my mind still reeling with what I had seen.
“I can’t leave him. I won’t leave either of them,” I said suddenly, the Boy's posture visibly sagged in relief. “I have to try to find a way to help him.”
‘How,’ he gestured, his hands moving about in front of him in question.
I didn’t look away from the city as I popped another blueberry in my mouth.
“That’s what I’m hoping you can help me figure out.” I turned to him then, offering him a blueberry which he did not take, not that he could eat around me anyway.
He shrugged, gesturing toward the city and then himself and shrugged again.
“Where is his Catalyst?” I asked, piecing together what he was asking. He nodded, gesturing again to himself and the city again.
“I don’t know. He was in the throne room a few days ago. But it’s not like I see my family that often, I don’t know if that is usual. I have to believe that he is still close, but having him not with his Requisite…” my rambling trailed off, heart clenching at the reminder of the bare remains of his Catalysts quarters, at the squalor Father was in. It had been that way for a while, too.
“It’s a royal matter,” I parroted what my mother had said and sighed. “I need to find my Uncle.”
The Boy again gestured to himself, then to the city far below us, his motions almost frantic before they suddenly stopped and he turned and faced toward the city again, his body angling away slightly.
“What?” I asked, leaning closer. “Do you know where he is?”
“Know where who is?” Batian said from right behind me, his boots scuffing and sword scraping as he moved to sit on the other side of me.
“No one,” I answered quickly, shoving another blueberry in my mouth.
Batian smiled, his body folding as he swung his legs over the edge.
“Are you sure you want to sit? You’ll get your pretty white bum all scuffed.”
“I’ll take my chances. Besides, you look like you need company. I don’t like how alone you are.” He grinned and patted me on the head the way he always did, mussing up my already tangled curls.
I wanted to tell him that I wasn’t alone, that I was never alone, that the Boy was always with me; just as his Catalyst was always with him. But, sometimes, I wasn’t even sure if he knew his Catalyst was there.
As Batian sat, the Boy stood, moving to stand behind me as was technically protocol for him and all the Catalysts. Sure enough, Batian’s Catalyst was already standing there, her back plastered against the wall. Heights must not be her thing. She looked a little green.
“I didn’t believe them when they said you were fully dressed for dinner at eight in the morning, yet here you are.” He looked me up and down his smile fading to a glare at the smudges on my lap. “You know, the fabric of that dress is worth a fortune in Turin. Can you keep anything clean?”
He ran his gloved fingers over the smudges and sighed, I batted him away and resisted the urge to shove him, something that was probably too dangerous considering how high up and precariously perched we were.
“You sound like Mother. But, don’t worry, I have no intention of wearing this dress again, so I could care less. Besides, didn’t you just seat your royal bottom on hundred year old dirt? You’re one to talk.” I smirked at him and popped another blueberry in my mouth, taking extra time to run my smudged fingers over the fabric that time. I didn’t look away from him for a second as I did it.
“You’re a child.” He said it like a scold, but I didn’t miss the laugh in his voice.
“No, I’m a princess, can’t you tell?” I gestured toward my dress and gave him a grin; sure I had blueberry skins on my teeth. “Don’t worry about the dress, they can sell it and turn it into handkerchiefs if the fabric is that expensive. Perhaps if you say it belonged to the sickly princess, it’ll fetch more.”
I picked at the embroidering near the waist. It was pretty. I truly had no idea how much it truly cost. I had been locked up in my tower long enough that I didn’t truly know the value of things, anyway.
Maybe, if I did run away I could have sold it and bought a farm or something.
Me on a farm. Something about that thought blossomed in my chest. I had spent so often in the gardens that being on a farm, without walls everywhere seemed like bliss. Open air, growing things. Perhaps I could learn to ride a horse.
I pushed the thought away.
“No one will buy handkerchiefs that look like they are covered in blood.”
“There is more than enough fabric to avoid that, even if it did look like blood, and it doesn’t. No blood looks purple.”
“Some blood does.” He spoke so low I barely heard him, the tone darker than I was used to from him.
“Whose blood is purple?” I didn’t want to know, especially not with how he was staring at it. The color was so deep. Maybe blood did dry that way. I really had no way of knowing, injuries do not happen often with wooden swords, and though I have my monthly bleed I had never seen any stains left behind.
“Fae blood,” he said after a moment, gloved fingers still hovering over the stains.
“How do you know what Fae blood looks like? They’ve been extinct for hundreds of years.” His eyes grew wide at my question, his blonde hair swooping over his forehead as he shook his head.
“You’re right, they have,” he sighed, pulling his fingers back to rest against the ledge of our seat. “What are you doing dressed like this anyway?”
I looked at him, I hadn’t missed the sudden change of subject. I would try to pull him back, but he wasn’t looking at me anymore, he was looking out over the city, his eyes pinching together as the sun peeked out from behind a cloud.
“I was going to go make a good impression,” I smoothed the dress out a bit, suddenly regretting the supposed blood stained skirt. “Show Mother how perfect I can be so she will get her head out of her ass about me attending your wedding.”
“Did you just say the Queen should get her head out of her ass?” He was chuckling again, the sound rich as I heard both his Catalyst and the Boy snicker.
“I did. Because she should.” She should do a lot of things.
“True or not, you are making my job to convince her to let you accompany us to my wedding harder when you do things like this.” He gestured toward the dress.
“Do things like dress the way she wants me to?” Good grief, was there no winning? Don’t wear my work dresses, don’t wear your Princess dresses…
“You are dressed like you are going to dinner.”
“What does that mean? Are there special clothes for dinner?” I laughed, but Batian blinked.
I guess there were special clothes for dinner. I had been barred from court for too long. I supposed, in some twisted way, Mother was right; I would embarrass them.
I sighed loudly and laid down on the walkway, legs still swinging over the edge of the turret.
“I’ll never impress her.” Batian said nothing, no calm reassurance or pat on my knee. He sat there, which wasn’t really reassuring. “How much did I upset her?”
Batian exhaled and ran his hand through his hair, his usual tell for bad news. Great. This was going to be disastrous.
“What exactly did you do this morning? She was… quite upset.” I guess my well thought out plan to impress her and get the invite to Batian’s wedding had spectacularly backfired.
“I was going to go see her, show her how I could act for your wedding, but then I went to see Father instead.” I stopped, heart pinching as my mind continued to run over what I had seen in those rooms.
“How did you get in there?” Batian asked, he almost sounded more upset than Mother had. “No one is allowed in there. No one–” he stopped himself, shaking his head as though he was stopping himself from saying something he shouldn’t.
My gut twisted violently as Mother’s sneer recoiled in my memory. ‘It’s a royal matter.’
“Batian, do you know where Uncle Jahn is?” I asked, shifting my weight to face him.
Batian sat there, his eyes narrowed.
“Father’s Catalyst, you mean. Catalysts don’t have names, Elara. They lose those in the vow.”
“Uncle Jahn has a name,” I corrected. “They all have names. Where is Uncle Jahn?”
“What about him?” Batian’s eyes dipped to the color of coal, if that was possible, his nostrils flaring. I had seen the facade of the Crown Prince that he put on only once or twice in my life, one of which being a few days ago. But there it was, staring again. The vice that was still clenched around my rib cage tightened even more as mother’s voice echoed in my head. ‘It’s a royal matter.’
Royal like Batian, but not like me.
I pushed the thought away, continuing on.
“I visited Father, Batian. His room is a mess, and his Catalysts’ quarters were bare. They had been for a while, Uncle Jahn was gone.” I wanted to add that Father was clearly going mad without his Catalyst there, and that something needed to be done, but the way Batian was looking at me with those eyes like coals, and a face that was more King than brother made me pause.
I was suddenly having trouble breathing, whether from corset or panic, I wasn’t sure. Maybe both.
“Uncle Jahn,” he said after a minute, his voice biting slightly as if the words were tough to say, “had to be removed.”
“Removed?” He wasn’t there, yes, but the way Batian said the word made it sound like something more.
“Yes,” Batian exhaled, and some of the hardness on his face left. “You’ve noticed that Father is not well.” I nodded, prompting him to continue. “He’s been getting worse lately. He gets confused, he doesn't know where he is, or who he is.” He paused, and I waited, everything feeling heavy at the truth there.
“He attacked his Catalyst, so we moved him. The Ramal’s Catalyst is close, but it wasn’t safe for him to be near the Ramal anymore.”
All of that time when I could have been with him, when he would have known me, it had been taken from me, too. That pressure in my chest was growing.
“How long ago did they move Uncle Jahn?” I had stopped swinging my legs, the swirling fabric of my dress dancing around them in the biting wind.
“A year, maybe more,” he whispered, and I nodded as though I understood. Father had started to decline before then, but he had also gotten worse since then.
“Don’t you think it’s making him worse, having his Catalyst away from him?”
Batian shook his head, “He’s only away at nights, which does make him worse in the morning, which is what you saw. He tends to be better by nightfall.”
“He gets better when his Catalyst is with him?” Again, he nodded. “So why keep him away at all?”
As much as everything fit with Father’s decline, not everything was adding up.
“Elara.” Great. His Ramal voice was back. “This isn’t something that you are expected to know. We have it handled. We are helping him. We even brought a healer from the Izyare Kingdom–”
“A witch?” I interrupted him, everyone knew what really lived in the Kingdom of Izyare, and it wasn’t healers. “You brought a witch? Here?”
I almost fell off the side of the turret in shock. There was only one creature in this world that was worse than the Fae: a witch. The withered women worked in blood and spells and old magic that connected the Ether with the underworld. The old women had sided with the Sister, Cassia, and the vile Fae in the Black War. It may have been centuries ago, but they were still known as bloodthirsty monsters. And they had brought one to the Runturin.
“This witch is not a danger, trust me. Besides, we needed to help him,” Batian said quickly, clearly registering the shock and panic on my face. Not that his reasoning did anything to calm me.
What in the world were they thinking?
“Which she did, she was the one who suggested we remove the Catalyst.” He truly believed that, but I was still reeling from the fact that they had brought a witch to the Runturin and given them access to the Ramal.
I opened my mouth to tell Batian just that, but he stopped me with a scowl, those eyes hardening to stones again.
“Elara, none of this is any of your concern.”
He might as well have thrown me off the side of the castle with the firmness in his voice.
Logically, I should nod, agree and move on. But I couldn’t. I flinched as though I had been slapped, and Batian’s eyes widened, his lips pressing together as though he realized what he said.
Who he sounded like.
“It is, though,” I tried to keep my voice soft. “He’s my father, and he cares about me. I care about him.”
My voice caught, Father’s words burning through me, all that love that he had looked at me with, all the goodness he wanted for me. I had felt that so much when I was little, both from my father, and from Batian, and as I said it now, Batian’s face softened, the hard mask fading away as his usual smile spread over his face and he wrapped his arm around me.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn't have said that. It is your concern, he’s your father, too.” He pulled me into him, his body rattling against mine as he breathed. “Sometimes Mother gets in my head. We’ve been doing all this preparation for the wedding, and for me to take my place as Ramal. It’s exhausting,” he exhaled again, his head resting on mine as we sat there, looking over what was soon to be his Realm as the rains began to fall over Turin.
The thought was heavy on my chest. I couldn’t imagine how it felt to him.
“I’m sorry, Elara,” he whispered after a moment. “I should have told you.”
“You are forgiven.” I nodded, wrapping my hand around his and giving him a squeeze. “Besides, if I am to be married as well, I want him to be there.” I said it as a tease, thinking it was something else that Father had said in his madness. But, Batian’s response sucked the air out of my chest.
“How did you find out about that?”
Loathsome corset, I really couldn't breathe now.
I turned to my brother, blinking at him even as he stared back with absolute horror. That wasn’t the reaction one would normally get when speaking of a wedding. All that tightness became unbearable.
“Father told me, he said he signed the contract.” I spoke slowly, watching every inch of Batian’s face for some sign of the joke.
Oh goddess. It was real. I had been betrothed and I didn’t even know it. Clearly, something had gone wrong. My mind flashed through everything, from him dying like my Catalyst, to some war I didn’t know was coming.
“He did… he…,” Batian exhaled, pinching his fingers on the bridge of his nose before he ran his hand through his hair again. “Elara, that contract was canceled years ago.”
My throat went dry. That was worse than my betrothed having died.
“What? Why?” I wasn’t necessarily upset, I mean, I just heard about all of this an hour ago, but it seemed an odd thing to cancel a marriage contract with a princess. Especially the Princess of the realm.
It wasn’t like someone with a higher rank was going to come along.
“Your betrothed… his family…” Batian paused, those wide eyes staring into me. My body tensed, sensing the blow that was about to hit.
“They don’t want someone who is sickly and does not hold magic. No one does.”