Chapter 23
Twenty-Three
I was not the only one to be softened by Fell’s return.
I came into King Arik’s study the morning after Fell and those I’d befriended had wrestled with those I’d annoyed, and found the king absent.
I waited and waited. Then I waited some more.
Finally, our usual hour passed, and I grew hungry.
I wandered to one of the smaller halls where berries and honeyed tea could be found in the early hours of the morning.
Ivar had been insisting I drink hawthorn tea for many days; when I asked why, he’d glared and said, “I am a healer, can you not trust me? You are imbalanced.” So, I sought out that tea, enjoying the rich, rosy taste of it and how my chest from the collarbone all the way to the end of my rib cage felt warmed by it.
As I sipped my tea, holding the clay vessel up to my chin to feel the heat of the steam on my face—I remembered? not with my mind, but with my body—the sweetness of the evening before.
The sensation of hiding under the table with Fell.
The feeling of being protected by someone, even if it were just from losing a silly game.
The hall was empty apart from those laying out the morning meal and a father who was being dragged around by his teeny daughter.
The man looked utterly miserable with the experience of being awake, while his daughter happily rambled about rabbits.
I revelled in it; the freshness of morning air, the comfort of slow quiet, the oblong beams of light on the floor from the three windows.
When my tea was half complete, I heard a giggle in one of the nearby alcoves and King Arik’s stern voice. “What hour is it? The young woman is probably waiting for me.”
I hopped from my chair and found my way to the alcove, peering around the corner slowly, ready to look away quickly should I find someone indisposed, which happened a lot with the alcoves.
King Arik and Fell were sitting among the pillows, drinking what I hoped was milk (the king drank milk every morning) but very well could have been spirits carried on from the evening before.
Fell was leaning very far to one side with three pillows beneath his shoulder to keep him at the strange angle.
“I was waiting,” I said, feeling very Norsern because of how teasing my tone was. “But I gave up on you and came to eat.”
The king smiled as he looked up at me with bright eyes. “That was quite the show you caused last evening.”
I pursed my lips. “I wouldn’t say I caused it.”
Fell began to laugh but winced.
The king struck him playfully. “Just be still, let your shoulder find its resting place.”
I quickly understood that Fell was lying so strangely because he was sore from the evening before. Please don’t hate me, I thought.
Fell frowned. “She has come to take you away, but it is not fair. You are my king too—my king first indeed—the mornings used to be for my lessons.”
King Arik snorted. “Yes, but you never attended.”
They both laughed, and Fell winced once more.
“He exaggerates,” Fell said when he finally caught his breath, his eyes prancing to me and then back to the king, whose mouth was open—ready to contest the statement. “I came at least twice. You taught me about the crab man.”
The king frowned. “What?”
“The man who collected different crabs and painted them and then let them go to study how they travelled.”
King Arik snorted again. “Ah, yes, a most valuable lesson.”
“It was,” Fell said matter-of-factly. “I think of it often. Every time I see a crab, I wonder where it is going, and I think, ah, that crab man might know.”
They both laughed again—laughing caeliken—how you laughed when you were with your closest friend, like no one else was watching.
I delighted in it. Their ease. The sound of gulls outside. The flowy sensation in my stomach that maybe came from the sea beneath the floor, but maybe also came from the man lying on the pillows laughing so joyfully before me.
“Oh! Mira.”
I turned to find Jorn entering the hall from the far side.
“Have you seen Arik this morning?” he said.
I responded with a point into the alcove just as Fell shook his head and playfully mouthed “No.”
It was too late; I’d given them away.
Jorn approached and peeked around the alcove corner. “There are many waiting.”
“Of course there are,” King Arik said.
Jorn’s eyes warmed. “Fell, how are you?”
Fell laughed. “Sore and… sad now that you have come to collect Arik. I was going to hide him for the full day.”
Jorn smiled—it was not his typical smile, but one of adoration that came about often when Fell was near. “I could keep walking around for another hour. Pretend I cannot find you?”
“No, I will come.” King Arik said grumpily. He set his hands on the floor to push himself up. He might have been drunk; I couldn’t tell for sure, but it took him longer than normal to rise. “Ingvar is waiting too, I expect?”
Jorn nodded and laughed softly. “Since before daylight. He has brought maps and two witnesses to his counting of the disputed cattle…”
“Just ignore him,” Fell said. “He will go away on his own.”
“This is why I am king, and you are not,” King Arik said.
“Yes, the gods do sometimes get small things right,” Fell said.
And then there was a moment of thickness between the three men that I knew I was entirely excluded from. They all got quiet and held their gazes down, like the floor was suddenly a dangerous thing.
As fast as it had come, it was gone. Fell grinned. “But if I were king…”
King Arik sighed. “What is it?”
“I would notice that The Fearsome Beast is still docked in Aalt.”
Fell looked at the king with mock sternness.
The king looked back with genuine annoyance.
The staring contest carried on for several moments before the corners of the king’s lips twitched.
He fought the smile for a heartbeat or two before it took over his face.
“Fine.” He turned to Jorn. “Release Flojer. Tell him it was Fell who reminded me he was here.”
“No, do not mention me,” Fell said. “I do not want to play politics.” He’d used the dry word for play, suggesting he thought poorly of the games he was referring to.
“You have just played,” King Arik said. His voice gained a stern edge as he looked at Fell still lying oddly on the stack of pillows. “Please let your shoulder rest, or I will send Ivar to force you to stretch.”
“You would not dare.”
“I am king because I daily dare to do what others will not.”
I couldn’t help but smile at that, but then, the king turned to me. “Mira, you will attend my listening this morning. I would like to watch Flojer’s face when he sees you for the first time.”
Fell locked eyes with me. Blueness beyond comprehension. An ache in my chest. I realized a moment too late that he’d said something. I hadn’t been listening at all. What is wrong with me?
“Sorry, what?”
“You do not need to obey him, you know this, yes?”
Jorn saved me from the struggle of trying to say something that pleased everyone while I dealt with Fell looking at me. “She knows, I promise. But she is clever, so she will listen to him anyway. You could learn something from her if you so choose…”
I wanted to stay and stare at Fell, but also, I wanted to run as far away from him as I could get. “I will attend,” I said.
And that’s how I ended up sitting in on my first court hearing.
I sat with King Arik and Jorn in a sparsely furnished hall where they received those in need of a king’s opinion.
I was to the left of the king which felt…
select. I’d not been part of many decision-making meetings in my youth (indeed, none), but I could sense that sitting next to the king as people approached and nodded their heads and presented their cases meant something.
They looked at me in a way that felt frightening but also a little delicious.
If I frowned, it would make their hearts flutter, I was sure of it.
Most of the conversations were dull, having to do with disagreements over property lines and herds of animals.
There was one interesting fellow who’d been counting mushrooms at the king’s behest. He had thirteen chests full of different types of mushrooms. There was a captain who’d returned from a quest assigned to him with a small box full of black stones, a second box full of scrolls and the words: “The mine is dead,” which, at the time, I assumed was another Norsern phrase.
There was also a pirate hunter with a collection of fingers from his latest success, but the king suggested I look away when the fingers were revealed, so I didn’t see them.
Between every visitor, there was time for Jorn and the king to discuss what had just happened or what might happen next.
Jorn read each visitor in the same way I’d read the tapestry for the king, sharing his sense of them and their intentions.
He would sometimes mention the stars, which King Arik did not seem to put much stock in, and occasionally, he pulled a stone to make his point stronger.
I was asked to contribute whenever I had something in my mind that hadn’t yet been said, but the only thing I added was that the black stones brought by the captain who’d “killed the mine,” looked very much like dewerath—a stone widespread in my home country to which many ballads had been dedicated.
Sometimes visitors commented on my presence, asking if I was the woman from the Land of Mud and Mist. King Arik would always say something like: “Never you mind her,” which left me feeling guarded and safe.
Captain Flojer passed through the hall just before midday.
Even if the king hadn’t raised his hands and shouted joyously, “Ah! Flojer!” I would have known the man was important.
His eyes were the emerald green of moss back home, shimmering and dancing, and I liked him immediately.
He wore a fox fur coat, and though his face was relaxed and unexpressive, I had the distinct feeling that he was smiling.