Chapter Four Idris #2
He seems surprised. “There is nothing you can do about what happened before. You can only look forward.”
“Fine! Let’s look forward. What about my sons, if I have any?” I shake his hand off my arm. “Before even that, what about Abram? Sometime, somewhere, the debt will come due.”
“Not for a century or more, with any luck,” my father says. “You can’t think like that.”
“Maybe you can’t.”
“I’m sorry you have been brought into this,” Father says, measuring his words.
I wave aside his caution. “Speir says we can speak freely now. You aren’t held to whatever promise you made to him about keeping it all a secret.”
My father frowns. A new suspicion enters his eyes. “Regardless, you have no reason to be ashamed. You won’t always feel it so keenly.”
“Maybe that’s the problem—no one seems to feel it enough!”
“For God’s sake, Idris,” Father snaps, his patience breaking. “You are in this now, whether you want it or not, and there’s no use fussing about it. You said no, and Abram will say no, and it will go on. There’s no point in being upset.”
I clench my jaw and meet his eyes.
Father pauses. “You said no, correct?”
“I’m not like you,” I almost spit. My voice cuts my own throat. “I would not leave my brother to this fate.”
Father’s eyes widen. He takes a step back and runs a hand through his hair. “Tell me you said no, Idris.”
I don’t answer. True returns, sensing the tension, and cautiously sits between me and my father.
I don’t expect the sudden redness in my father’s eyes, the gloss to them. “What did he say? What did he tell you would happen?”
I spread my hands. “That I’ll fulfill her dancing days.”
“What does that mean?”
“I’m not sure,” I admit. “He said mortal days are short.”
“Damn it, Idris!” Father throws up his hands. “You didn’t even gather details about the terms you were agreeing to? Did you give this any thought at all?”
“Of course I did!” But as I say it, I feel like a child, petulant and whining.
“How could you do this?” Father demands. “I told you to say no!”
“What, the way you did? Grandfather, Uncle Matthias, all of them? You would have me pass this on to Abram and my sons in their turn?” I shake my head. “Maybe you could live with that, but I can’t.”
“I have lived with that. I’ve lived with many things, Idris, so that you can thrive.
If I had said yes, all those years back, you wouldn’t be here.
Neither would your brother.” He steps closer again, and True tenses at my feet.
“Do you think you’ve done something noble?
Something heroic? You’ve only played into their games. ”
“I’ve done what’s right. I’ve stopped the cycle.”
“You’ve stopped nothing.” Father rubs his eyes.
“The Hidden Folk might not be hunting our family from now on, might not come asking their simple question, but you’ve done nothing to stop the cycle of grief—you’ve only made it fresh.
Do you think that by sacrificing yourself, you’ve spared any of us from pain? ”
“It is on us to make amends. We are the ones who committed the original crime. One of us has to pay the price.”
Father shakes his head. “None of us can restore that—woman. She suffered enormously. And that is regrettable. But her suffering will not be eased by yours, or by ours. Nothing that we can do now will atone for what’s already done and finished.”
“It isn’t finished,” I point out. “And I will not leave this burden for someone else to carry.”
“You have only surrendered what they might never have taken! Who’s to say that you would have a son?
Who’s to say that you and Abram wouldn’t both have daughters who would have lived without this ridiculous curse?
The magic in our land is fading. The Folk draw deeper into the sea.
In another generation they may not have had the strength to even impose this curse. If you had just followed my orders!”
I had imagined my father being frustrated, of course, that I disobeyed him, displeased that whatever was going to happen would happen to me now. But I did not expect this anger, this thing that is almost disdain.
“Did you not teach me, as a prince, that my duty is to right wrongs?” I ask him. “Isn’t that the entire point of our whole family—to seek and distribute justice, even when we are the party at fault?”
He rakes a hand through his hair, and his voice rises, almost to a shout. “You are not bringing justice! Mervyn is dead, and when he died the crime died with him. If the Folk cannot move beyond this, it is not our responsibility to offer our blood to satisfy their need for vengeance.”
“But it didn’t die,” I say through my teeth, “and they aren’t after vengeance. She’s still suffering.”
“What did he say? That you will dance? How is that to help her?” Father holds up his hand. “We will argue this no more. But make no mistake, Idris. Your foolish decision will echo through the family just as loudly as Mervyn’s did.”
I am too shocked to speak. And in that moment of silence the flame in me cools to a simmering resentment. Father is right about one thing: We will never agree about this.
“We need to go home,” he says, gazing back at the castle. “Perhaps one of the wise women can help you get out of your poorly made agreement.”
I shake my head, but Father is already marching back to the castle double-quick. I jog to catch up. My anger has shifted into something more confusing, and I find an apology on my lips. I don’t know what I want to apologize for, though. For doing the right thing? Because surely this is right.
Abram sits in the Great Hall with Princess Catharine, talking to her while she spins wool. He straightens when we come in, glancing from Father to me. The smile of greeting fades from his face. I suspect he can sense the tension between us hotter than the hearth’s fire.
“We need to return to Skyare at once,” Father says. He smooths his voice as he addresses Catharine. “We’re sorry to be so abrupt, Princess, but urgent news calls us home.”
Catharine rises and makes a deep curtsy. “I will let my father know.”
“I will speak to him myself,” Father says. “Abram, please see to our preparations.”
Abram glances at me, bewildered, but goes to let our servants know. He gives True a pat on his way out, and then True trots over to Princess Catharine. She stiffens uneasily.