Chapter 37
Slengral watched the comings and goings from his nest suspiciously. He refused to touch any of the food brought to him and banished any female that scented of even a hint of aroused pheromones. In the end, mated males had to be sent to serve him, not that it made him anymore cooperative. He refused to yield and cooperate with those who stopped him from searching for his mate. From honoring his mate properly.
Even if she perished in the dunes as Payeri and his mother claimed, there had to be something remaining of her somewhere that would help them do their final duty to send her to court of Shangla and Higthar where she could await them in peace and enjoy the plentitude of the gods to dwelt beyond the scorching sands and high mountains.
“You are in a mood,” Jathella commented as she entered.
“Is that unusual?” he replied flatly, his tail coiling unhappily beside him.
The commander of the guard regarded him quietly and dipped her chin. “Perhaps once it would have been, but no longer. You do not take pleasure in anything your mother provides for you.”
He hissed quietly, unamused. “Mother thinks that if she distracts me that she can easily swap out my mate for another and that I will thank her for the favor.”
The female frowned, obviously displeased with his answer, but he did not care. She might have known him once when they were nestlings together, but revolutions had passed and different fires of Higthar had forged them. Jathella was a tool forged by his mother. She was no ally of his.
“What is your purpose for coming here, Jathella?” he murmured as he turned and settled upon the broad cushioned bench just behind him. “There are plenty of servants available to see to my needs—they come more frequently than I have the patience for.” He met her gaze, leveling her with a hard stare. “I know I have spoken of this before the last time you came.”
Jathella sighed and leaned against the wall. “You are impossible. Why do you fight so hard knowing that your mate is dead? Why can you not try for another life and move on without her? Do you think she would enjoy for you to be alone?”
He growled and rose slightly off the cushion as he regarded her through narrowed eyes. “What makes you believe that I should sacrifice myself without time to grieve or even the ability to properly send my mate along to the next world if Payeri spoke true?”
A look of discomfort flitted across the female’s face. “Lori was brave... a strong and capable female despite the fragility of her species, but it is not right to insist that she would be welcomed into Shangla’s abode. The queen would not hear of it to honor her in such the way as the mate of a royal nest.”
“She lacks nothing that we possess,” he replied vehemently. “She is deserving, and if Shangla finds fault with arrival within her fragrant palace, then she can determine that for herself without any arrogantly assuming on behalf of Shangla. My nest brothers and I deserve the opportunity to grieve and honor her memory. And to grieve for the nestling we have lost. Hashal deserves the opportunity to say goodbye to the only mother he has known who loved him. Higthar would not discount us, nor our mate, for he rose from the barren darkness with nothing but his velkat, hand-forged in the primal fires and defeated the great beasts that barred his way to take his places in the northern heavens where his star dawns every morning. He carved out his own fate. He will not discard our prayers for our mate, even if Shangla dismisses her. But who would say that they know better than the gods?” he gritted out bitterly.
Jathella stared at him silently, her body frozen in place as she regarded him in shock. Slengral was certain that he stepped over the lines of decorum that were permitted a male, but he was done with the shinara’s laws that would restrain him. They were the same laws that killed his mate. Her frame shuddered and she expelled her held breath in a long sigh.
“You are right,” she rasped. “We are willfully doing an insult to the gods.” Her expression shifted, flitting to one of discomfort before flattening again in an attempt to not betray too much of her inner thoughts. “There have been those from the great spire who arrived at the palace these last days in protest upon hearing the rumors spreading through the shinara. They were not pleased with what they heard and demanded to know why no one was sent from the palace to collect her remains for proper respects to be made.”
“And what was my mother’s response?” He held her pinned with his gaze, his anger festering deeper within him. Even the matriarchs of the spire had scolded her and still she held him captive within the palace!
Jathella’s mouth twisted in a grimace. “She said that she was doing her duty and that seeing to your next mating overrode any rites for a being not born of Shangla.” The tip of her tail twitched, and she coiled in tighter into a knot. “This did not please them either, as it disrespected your mate, who was still attached to this world for so long as her pheromones bound her to you. They had many harsh words for the queen matriarch, and they all displeased her.”
Slengral hissed a mocking laugh. He was certain that they did.
“There is one more thing,” Jathella said slowly as she reached into the fabric wrapped around her upper body. From within it, she pulled old a single golden flower withered with age and yet gleamed as if it were dipped into the heart of a flame. “The high matriarch of the spire asked for this to be gifted to you, that the dishana has been used from time beyond memory to convey the devoted and eternal love of mates.” She turned it slowly in her fingers as she looked down at it. “She was aware that you were too late in gifting your mate such a precious gift and that your mate was taken from you far too soon. She wished for you to have this as a memorial to remember that the love you had will never fade or wither like this flower dipped the precious divir metal.”
He drew in a sharp breath, his eyes widening as she handed him the metal-encrusted bloom.
“It is one of a select few preserved within the spire. Each harvest, the most noble of the dishana blooms is chosen and preserved. They are kept within the spire and parted with only under the most exceptional of instances.” She swallowed thickly. “She told me to convey to you that your mate’s decision to undergo the maiden trial to demonstrate your love and keep peace between our people and hers, despite how wrong the request was, demonstrates a rare sort of devotion that is deserving of it. She hopes that your human will continue to live forever in your heart.”
Head bowing, his heart heavy with the weight of sorrow and the intensity of emotions running through him, Slengral took the flower from her and cradled it against his chest, recalling the sweetest moments of being with her from the time she had stared up at him terrified and yet defiant in his nest after he rescued her. Her precious smiles, and the way her laughter had released the pain and loneliness that he had kept within him. The way she completed him more and more as their family grew around her at their center.
She had given him everything and he could not even give her the human tears to demonstrate the depths of his sorrow.
He had never understood the human tendency to leak water from their eyes when possessed by sadness. Although he had seen his mate cry before and he had been moved by it and lived her sorrow and pain with her, he had never wished to shed water... until now. Now he cursed his inability to weep. A low, keening tremble started deep within him, the sound soft and heart-shattering.
He barely noticed when Jathella moved until she dropped before him, her upper coils striking the floor hard as she spread her wings and dropped her head. Her wings trembled with her own sorrow as she submitted herself to him.
“I swear to you, you cannot suffer more. I will help you, Slengral,” she rasped. Her eyes, dimmed with misery, lifted and fastened upon him. “I left her in the dunes. It was my error. Regardless of the queen matriarch’s reasonings and preoccupation with the welfare of the shinara, I never should have agreed to what did not sit right with me. I will see to it that you are freed, and I will help you to find her remains. I swear it.”
His head dropped, his gavo snapping weakly in agreement as he drew the metal preserved bloom to him. For their ashlava, their hithana whom they adored, he would never stop grieving. He would never forget.
He would never forgive.