40. Chapter 40 #2
The question shocked me a little more than it should have.
I flexed the fingers that continued to rest on my body.
Wasn’t this a normal question most women faced during their ripe years?
But the more I pondered, the more I realized I had never given it much thought.
Never thought I would find someone I would wish for this life with… until Peiro.
“If the giants blessed it, maybe. What about you?” I asked lightly. “Would you want a little Peiro saving people in the halls or shouting orders to the chef?” The question held a deeper meaning, and I sensed Peiro caught what I was trying to ask.
He closed his eyes and took a deep inhale before reopening them. “I’m finding that I will fail you, Ophelia. Fail at giving you all that you have hoped and dreamed for.”
“What do you mean?” I breathed, my pulse quickening. I turned my body fully to his, taking his free hand into mine, peering into his face.
“I saw the way you looked at Lady Melisanna’s babe that day.
” His deep brown eyes softened. “And while I would never intentionally hurt you, moonlight, I find that I might not be able to give you what you ask.” Seconds passed as he finally exhaled a held breath.
“This thing that rots inside of me, it’s a curse.
A condemnation that thrives in death’s embrace and never gives life as long as it remains wholly present.
Even if I wanted to.” He stared out into the distance.
“And who knows if I would even make a decent father anymore? If I was only a man, possibly. But this thing? It would forbid me.”
Compassion flowed through me as I searched Peiro’s grief-stricken eyes, his life playing out in my mind.
Just a man, a soldier, who had tried to do the right thing and bring his family honor by following a king’s command—but who had been cursed in so many ways the moment he set foot in that hall to accept orders.
Emotions overpowered me as I continued to feel his pain in my mind. “Can’t curses be broken?” I tried my best to smile convincingly.
Peiro leaned down, his forehead resting on mine. “With the giants’ blessing, I suppose.”
***
It had been days since I stood in that garden, contemplating a future I hadn’t even considered until I watched those children play. I shook off the thought, refocusing on the present and the war that needed to be won before we even got to think about a happily ever after.
Now we fight for Gria. Fight to restore my sister to her rightful place.
Make those involved in the usurping pay.
“How is it all connected?” Fyom asked for the umpteenth time as he continued to peer over the parchment of deciphered runes. Paige sat beside him, buried in another text, seemingly ignoring her brother as she flipped a page, then another.
No one answered. It was the same question he’d pondered out loud for days, and the way he processed questions, it seemed.
It was impressive yet borderline obsessive, the amount of notes and bits of parchment scattered on one of the adjacent walls that used to house ornate paintings.
What was once decorated in art was now decorated in lengths of twine zigzagging to random bits of artifact, all trying to answer the same question: what did the prophecy mean?
I sat in my favorite oversized chair, curled up with a tome, combing through the words, enjoying the feeling of simpler times before mine and my sister’s lives were turned over.
Uriah was always near, examining the text just like his father.
Ora occasionally helped, but focused her efforts more on meeting the people of Loamil with Sury and Peiro at her side.
Anything to help build her army and restore herself to the Grian throne.
Uriah spoke as he flipped a page of a dusty text.
“I don’t think we’re going to find what we need in Where to Pick Your Battles, The Unabridged Tale of Captain Gillenfye’s Conquest of the Northern Shores.
Gah, that sounds dreadful.“ He picked up a larger book.
“Or in The Twelve and Counting Ways to Make Soup From Turfgrass… Who in the giants’ hell is reading this?
The only mention of anything involving keys sounds like something from a Graevick.
“ His voice sounded cautionary, like he didn’t want to spook a wild animal.
Fyom stiffened momentarily before he continued peering down at some parchment like nothing was out of sorts.
Paige sighed and looked up from the book she had been studying, her spectacles sliding down her thin nose. “He’s right,” she stated matter-of-factly. “It’s time to face the facts.”
“Paige,” Fyom warned. The hairs on my arm rose on end. Fyom’s voice, while deep and booming, was usually gentle and patient. His unusual cold-blooded tone made me sit all the straighter, like a child who was on the verge of being scolded.
“I hoped we would find what we needed in these collections”—she waved her hand to the disarray of papers on the wall and the large tower of books—“but your son is right. I’ve already read all the major Feodean scripts, even visited the ancient site of the Original Council at The Spires in my youth—”
Fyom cut in, seething between his teeth.
“We’ve deduced the imbalance happened somehow after Graevick.
Which has to mean the forming of these keys was also after Graevick.
They have nothing to do with—“ I could feel the tension roll off of him.
My magic flashed in response, sensing a need to protect.
“Pa,” Uriah said as he put away his book and sat on the edge of the chair. I nestled deeper into mine as I watched everything unfold.
“No!” Fyom roared, his bright green eyes flaring. “We have nothing to do with them. They chose that life, and we will find the answers we seek. We don’t need to resort to that vile excuse of magic. Not them.”
“If we are indeed speaking of the same keys, those people would know where Deric’s journal is that explains it all. It will give us real answers,” Paige added as she tried to reason. “You can’t avoid her forever.”
“We don’t even know if they are the same keys,” Fyom shot back. “And yes, I can.”
“We’re talking about righting a balance, for giants’ sake—a balance that was broken from the Graevick’s Stone!”
Fyom scoffed at his sister. “That’s hearsay! Tales the Temple tells us! We only have third-hand accounts of what happened, stored in temple archives, and it’s only the High Priesthood that can touch them.”