Sigil #2
“Your dog is cute,” I told him.
“He knows that.”
I looked at Hurley’s blissful face.
Yes, he knew.
“What breed is it?” I inquired. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen one like him.”
“Keeshond.”
That really told me nothing, since I’d never heard of that breed.
Hurley licked my wrist.
“You’re not only cute, you’re a charmer,” I told him.
Hurley panted then licked my wrist again.
I smiled at him.
Tanyn broke our moment by offering me a martini glass, three fat olives hugging the bottom.
“Thanks,” I muttered.
He moved to the chair opposite me holding what looked like a heavy, squat tumbler containing a healthy vodka rocks. He sat and lifted his glass to me.
“Welcome to Sigil.”
I lifted mine in return, tardily getting a weird feeling from him, and as such noticing he might be impassive, but he’d never been distant.
So, he might not smile, laugh or shout, and any expression on his face was so micro I could talk myself into thinking I didn’t witness it, but when he was around me, he’d always been engaged with me.
Now, he seemed detached. Short. Right there and still far away.
I took a sip of my (excellent) martini, studying him and wondering how to play this, because it seemed, for once, I might have an advantage.
At the same time, that niggly section at the back of my brain shared it was a little worried about him.
While I had these thoughts, he shifted his bottom half toward the fire, crossed his long legs, turned his head that way too, and brooded while the firelight danced along his face and frame.
He wasn’t wearing just any sweater, but a thick fisherman’s sweater in marled blue wool that did amazing things to his eyes.
And he hadn’t even run his fingers through his hair to right it from the wind, so it was messy, and, I noticed, about a month beyond needing a cut, so it was overlong, curling around his neck and ears and falling on his forehead.
He’d never looked so handsome.
Oh gods.
“Do you know the history of Sigil?” he asked the fire, thankfully breaking into my thoughts.
Since I was going to spend time there, before I came, I’d looked it up.
But I was in a kind of trance concocted from his mood, the vibe of the room and the visage of him seeming far away from me, at the same time seeming at one with his surroundings, which weren’t kingly in the slightest, and that was attractive too.
When I didn’t answer, he turned his head to me and lifted his brows.
“Tell me,” I said softly.
He jutted up his chin and looked back at the fire.
“It all began when the realms were still ruled by the clans, and they warred over everything. One of the demon clans had been beaten back to the sea. Many lives lost. Lands. Homes. Belongings. The chieftain was weary of war. Of blood. Death. Fear. Grieving widows. He decided to quest to find a land no one would fight over. To find a place where his beings could be safe.”
Tanyn took a sip of his drink and kept speaking to the fire.
“They took to boats. After many months of searching, they discovered Sigil. It was almost perfect. The journey to it was treacherous. It could easily be defended, but there was no reason to venture here. However, since there was never a thaw, they couldn’t grow food and would have to subsist on fish and wildlife.
Even then, they knew a body needed fruit, vegetables and grains.
But he didn’t forget Sigil and passed the knowledge of it along to the next generation.
Chieftains, and then kings became fascinated by it.
In war, it was a perfect place to retreat or strategize, if it was amply supplied.
It was also a quiet place to get away from the rigors of rule and contemplate.
Construction on this castle started only a few years after the Demon Rift. ”
When I’d read about it, I’d been startled by that fact, considering how far away this island was and how much effort that would take using antiquated means of transport and construction.
However, beings back then got stuff done regardless that they hadn’t yet harnessed electricity or created construction bots.
“And then there was a female. A fae,” Tanyn continued.
“Lauded as the most beautiful female on the continent, and this would seem true, because she was hounded by royals, aristocrats, merchants, sorcerers. All of them wanted her, none of them she wanted. To escape their romantic pursuits, she ended up running from Land’s End all the way up to Sky’s Edge.
And of course, she came to the attention of the king, who was different in one way than the others. ”
He took another sip of his drink.
I waited.
He swallowed and said, “He didn’t mind capturing her and imprisoning her to keep her for himself.”
All right.
I’d read up on Sigil, and the whole war-weary-chieftain-discovering-it story was easily available to find on panes.
But there was no mention of an imprisoned fae.
“Even if he was married…” Tanyn went on.
And…
Did I detect a hint of bitterness in his tone?
“…with three children, he became obsessed with her. This obsession turned to paranoia. He was certain someone would steal her from him. Or she’d fall in love with one of her guards and they’d make an escape.
In order to keep her only to himself, he devised a plan.
He put her on a boat with a contingent of female guards.
He shipped her to Sigil. He settled her here in this citadel with her guard.
He then left to go back to ruling his kingdom, with promises he’d return frequently, and obviously send supplies in the meantime.
This he did. Until being away from her dulled his obsession to the point he nearly forgot about her. ”
Oh boy.
Tanyn kept going.
“But he remembered. And sent another supply ship, with him on it. However, when they arrived at Sigil, they found she, and all her guard, had perished from either cold or starvation. They noted they’d tried to build a boat, but it’s likely they were so weak from lack of sustenance at that time, they couldn’t.
It’s also hard to hunt and chop wood when you have no fuel to sustain your bodies.
However their tragic last days came about, all that led up to it had to be a very prolonged form of torture. ”
I sat still and said nothing after he finished his sad tale.
Tanyn wasn’t still.
He downed the rest of his drink, got up and moved to the cabinet.
On a little whine (also feeling his daddy’s mood?), Hurley left me and went to him.
I found my voice.
“Did anyone use this place after she and the rest died?”
“Yes. But it went into disuse in the early eighteen hundreds,” he answered, returning to his chair, also returning his attention to the fire.
“It seems like a…well, a mighty big place for just a female and her son,” I noted carefully.
At that, he looked at me. “The majority of it is still closed off. When I said my father restored it so we could live here, he restored it only to what we might need. Electricity. Plumbing. Bedrooms. Bathrooms. Kitchen. Manually supplied Cook-Companions and Chill-Cupboards. And a few extra rooms for us to live in. The rest, in order to assist in keeping it warm, has been closed off. Once I have the time and attention, though, I’ll be refurbishing them. ”
After I took another sip from my drink, I remarked, “If you do, it’s a lot for a lone male. And the citadel caretakers, of course.”
“I’m no longer a lone male, am I?” he asked.
I walked right into that one.
“And we will have children,” he stated.
My heart squeezed with anxiety, and my stomach with something else.
Ummmm…
He cocked his head to the side. “Do you want children?”
“Yes,” I said like it was pulled out of me.
“How many?”
“I had to wait to meet Laura, then Gayle, to get siblings, so at least two. Maybe three.” Or four, just to round it out, but I wasn’t going to say that.
“Acceptable,” he muttered before returning his attention to the fire.
A change in subject was heartily in order.
“I looked into Sigil, you know, so I’d know what to pack and what I was in for,” I told him. “There was no mention of that fae female in its history.”
“A king obsessing over a female, not his wife, then essentially murdering her and a number of his own guard very slowly through criminal neglect is not something the Hellsfire Dynasty wanted splashed all over the history books.”
“I can see that,” I mumbled into my glass, watching him over the rim. I took another sip and spoke again. “So, you expect us to spend time here.”
“Yes.”
“Frequently?”
“As frequently as I can manage it.”
“Why?”
He appeared confused before he said, “Because it’s home.” He then set his glass aside, pushed up from his chair and announced, “I’ll go ask Zyra to program the Cook-Companion. It’ll take at least half an hour for it to make the meal that’s been planned.”
With that, he strode out.
Hurley watched him go, looked to me, then scooted after his dad.
I stared into the shadowy area, which was the space beyond the door through which he’d disappeared.
Something wasn’t right.
Contemplating this, I went back to my drink, only on the way to see an oddity in this old-fashioned room sitting on a narrow table against the back wall.
A digi-frame.
I got up, and me and my martini walked to it.
The pics in it were cycling, but the one I saw when I got there was of a much younger Tanyn, standing all bound up warm in the snow, the Borea Sea behind him, huge chunks of ice floating on top of it. He was holding up a stringer of fish, a broad smile on his already handsome little-boy face.
I’d never seen him smile or appear even remotely carefree.
But in that pic, it was clear he was happy.
This cycled to another pic of him, younger, grinning so huge it contorted his face, and he did this in an obvious effort to show off the fact he’d lost his front tooth.
Okay.
I needed to stop looking at these pics.
I needed to.
I did not, or maybe I simply could not, and the next one cycled in.