Chapter 49 The Avanki
The Avanki
Iwake to noise. Voices, the sound of boots on frozen ground, the rhythm of troops moving in formation somewhere above us. I blink through the remnants of sleep and listen. Beneath it all I hear something else, the snap of fabric in the wind, and I know before I see it what it will be.
Colsar is already up. He helps me sit, one hand braced at my back, and the wound tears through me the moment I shift my weight, a sound leaving me before I can stop it, raw and immediate. He holds me through it without comment, waiting until my breath returns before he does anything else.
Saurin moves to the pack and begins sorting through it while Colsar steadies me. She works quickly, pulling layers free, setting things aside, and then she goes quiet for a moment.
"There are baby items in here," she says, her voice carrying something careful in it. "Sewn by hand."
"I packed some," I say. "Just in case."
I look at Colsar. "At the bottom there should be two small hats. Warm ones."
"No need," Saurin calls over, already holding them up. "I found them."
She sets them aside and continues sorting. "The minute he sits up they will wake," she says, something like a laugh moving through it. "I will take them when I have their traveling clothes ready and when I find something suitable for you, Majesty."
It no longer felt strange being called that. It had stopped feeling strange somewhere in Alarna, and now it simply was.
"There," Saurin says a few minutes later. "Everything is ready."
Colsar carries the children one at a time to the table Saurin has covered in blankets, a warm basin beside it, cloth for nappies, and the small layers she has assembled for the cold ahead.
He holds Ari against his chest while she dresses Fiorakis, who begins screaming the moment she is pulled away, her objection immediate and absolute.
Colsar reaches into the other pack with one hand and holds something up. "Will this work?"
I look at it. "That is a nightgown."
He frowns. "It looks like a dress to me."
Saurin and I exchange a glance.
"It is not," I say.
He puts it back and digs deeper, eventually producing a warm wool dress, which he brings over without comment. He passes Ari to Saurin and comes to the edge of the bed.
"Are you ready to sit up properly?"
"No," I say.
He helps me anyway, his arm behind my back, and the wound announces itself with a force that pulls a howl from me, the place where the magic had torn through my abdomen remaking itself known as I shift upright.
It is terrible and slow and Colsar is patient through all of it, dressing me with a care that belongs to someone who understands exactly what each movement costs.
When he finishes he crouches down and puts my boots on, lacing them without being asked.
He reaches into the pack again and pulls out a brush. He works through my hair until the tangles give, though it is still far from clean, and when he finishes I pull it into a quick braid and look at him.
"Do I look like I just had a baby?"
He pauses. “I do not know how to answer that.”
Saurin's voice carries across the room without hesitation. “Do not, Majesty. Simply say she looks beautiful."
Colsar turns back to me. "You look beautiful."
I raise an eyebrow at him. "I want the soldiers to respect me. I do not want them to think me weak."
"When they see the bodies outside," he says, "no one will think you weak."
I consider that for a moment. "My staff."
He frowns, then goes upstairs and comes back with it. "It was on the floor."
I take it and attach it at my hip. "What else?"
"My cloak," I say. "And my circlet.”
He nods, drapes the cloak around my shoulders, then reaches into the bottom of the pack and produces a gold circlet, the one Aunt Petunis had given me. He places it carefully and steps back and looks at me with something in his expression that he does not bother to conceal.
"My queen," he says.
I smile, and then wince as another wave of pain moves through me.
"Two healers travel with them," he says quietly. "You will feel better soon.”
I nod and hold my hand out to him.
He takes it, but instead of pulling me to my feet, he draws me forward and lifts me with care, one arm braced beneath me, mindful of the strain in my body as though he knows exactly where it hurts.
“You’re not walking,” he says.
I don’t argue.
Colsar shifts his hold, then glances back. “Arabar will get the packs.”
He takes the steps without slowing. At the top, I press my hand lightly against his chest. “Put me down.”
He understands immediately and sets me on my feet. I straighten despite the pull through my body. Saurin follows carefully behind us with the children, and then we are through the door.
The flag of Alarna moves in the wind above the assembled troops, gold and the pale green of early spring, a color that looks gentle from a distance but carries something else entirely up close, the kind that belongs on a standard rather than a garden.
The soldiers are well dressed and well armored, their lines straight, their attention fixed.
Colsar offers his hand, and I take it. The first step hurts.
The second is worse. By the third, I understand exactly what my body is doing, and I understand that Saurin was right.
It is the change that breaks me, the moment between one position and the next.
That is where the pain lives. Once I am upright and holding there it does not disappear, but it moves deeper, becomes something I can breathe through instead of something that pulls me under.
I tighten my grip on him.
"I am not as well as I look," I murmur.
"I know," he says.
Light breaks over us as we step outside, the brightness hitting first and then the sound, chanting and boots striking in rhythm, and I blink against it and look out at what is waiting for us.
Rows of soldiers stretch outward in formation, gold banners rising above them edged in a spring green that cuts through the snow, alive and bright and carrying something dangerous beneath the beauty of it.
They see us and drop, all of them, to their knees. The movement is immediate and total, not a single soldier remaining standing. Even the horses lower their heads.
Two riders dismount and move toward us but I do not wait. The pain is already building and I need to speak before it takes me.
"Thank you for coming to our aid," I say, my voice carrying across the quiet.
"And for following us." I draw in a breath and it costs me.
"I am Asharin, Queen Heir and daughter of Ryaran of Alarna.
We will travel to Shalvar, the beast kingdom, where my husband is king.
You will be treated as family and you will act as such.
What we require now above all else is discretion. "
I hold them, every one of them, and I feel their attention the way I have learned to feel a room. "For three days, thousands of undead came for this place. My husband stood against them alone while I brought forth Alarna's heirs."
Saurin steps forward and places the children into Colsar's arms. He moves to stand beside me and holds them where every soldier in that clearing can see them.
"These are our children. Princess Fiorakis. Prince Arakis. They carry power from two royal lines and many will seek to harm them, particularly as the controversy surrounding Thren bonding remains unresolved."
The pain shifts, deeper now, a slow pull rather than a sharp tear, and I hold through it.
"They are innocent," I continue. "You will protect them at all costs."
Silence answers me, not empty but held, the kind that means something has landed. Colsar steps forward. "We move to Shalvar," he says, his voice cutting clean through the air. "There is a hidden kingdom within it where the Queen Heir will recover. When she is well, we continue to Veynar."
The two riders reach us.
One bows, a woman, direct and unhurried in a way that belongs to someone who has spent a long time being exactly what she is. "I am Wyn. Your sworn protector. Uralish sent me. I have been waiting some time to meet you, Majesty."
I look at her for a moment and something about the way she holds herself, without performance and without apology, tells me Uralish chose well.
The second steps forward. Broad, unhurried, with the particular knowing quality of someone who has seen a great deal and learned to keep most of it behind his eyes.
"General Trophi." His gaze moves over me once, quick and thorough. "We brought a healer. She will not fully treat you here, only enough to keep you alive for the journey."
Colsar's jaw tightens. "She lost too much blood. She looks fine until she moves and that will not last."
"I know," Trophi says.
"And the road?" Colsar asks.
Wyn glances behind them. "You will not be taking one."
I follow their line of sight. Beyond the soldiers something waits, low and reinforced, layered in heavy fabric that shifts faintly in the wind with something beneath it holding form and holding power.
"Warded transport," Wyn says. "Built for conditions like this. For recovery and protection." Her eyes move briefly to the children.
"How long?" Colsar asks.
"Two days."
He does not like that. "You expect her to survive that?"
"We will not be traveling as you think," Trophi replies. "Half the Avanki will move ahead using lightpace, clearing everything in front of us. The other half will move with you, rotating through the transport, reinforcing it, feeding power into it."
I understand before he finishes. "They will carry us."
"Yes."
I look at Colsar. "I can do two days."
He studies me for a moment and then nods once.
Wyn steps forward. "If you are ready, Majesty, the healer is prepared."
I nod, because there is no other choice.
Around us the soldiers rise as one, orders moving through the clearing, and within minutes everything that has been still begins to move, and we prepare to leave the snow behind.