Chapter 32 #2
I sank to my knees beside her, covering the thorns with sandy loam, gently patting it down until it was a perfect mound.
Jesamin took my bloody hands. “They’ll grow,” she said, her voice soft but resolute. “And for as many years as we have on this earth, they’ll bloom.”
I took her in my arms, feeling her heart racing against mine.
When we stood, Jesamin turned to her father. He reached out to take her hand, uncaring of blood and dirt.
He nodded to me, his gaze satisfied. “You could not have found a better man, my dear girl,” he said, and Jesamin sniffed, dabbing at her eyes. “Guard her well, Lord Wroth. She’s now your greatest treasure as well.”
I smiled down at her, holding her close. “She has been from the very beginning.”
We walked through the field together, watching the sun die, our hands entwined. In the week since we had made our vows, the bloodroses had already begun growing, pale green shoots curling from the sandy earth.
Jesamin leaned her head on my shoulder. “So…I’ve made plans.”
“Plans I should worry about?”
She smiled, shaking her head. “I thought of asking, but you did claim the Tower of Waves was mine, from foundation to peak. I’m setting it up as a new workshop.”
“You can turn the whole castle into a workshop,” I told her, in all seriousness. “So long as you leave a little room free for other activities.”
“I only need the one tower.” Jesamin snorted, but her face gave way to solemnity. “I’ve been studying the Artifice I brought up from Liuridar. There are…things, Wroth.”
“That’s certainly descriptive.”
She flicked my shoulder, but her smirk didn’t last long. “I don’t know if any of it should be used,” she finally said, her gaze serious. “I think it might be best if we threw it all into the deep ocean and never set eyes on it again, but it might be too late.”
“What makes you think that? I can charter a ship right this moment, and find the deepest trench to throw it in.” I finally faced her, taking her seriously. Jesamin was a brilliant Artificer; she only grew pensive when she was truly concerned about the outcome of a project.
“That crystalline—” She moved her hands around, describing the flat, circular shape, then arched her hands in imitation of the cube-like frame that housed it. “Sphere. I haven’t yet discovered any malicious properties to it yet, but it’s clearly displaying the Fae proto-language.”
“Ah. You’ve been talking to Cirri,” I said wisely. Proto-language, indeed.
It had taken most of the week to get Jesamin to call her Cirri, rather than Lady Cirrien, but by the end of it, they were on their way to becoming fast friends.
I had a suspicion that most family gatherings and holidays were soon to be run on their schedule, and if Bane and I had an opinion, we in fact didn’t.
“Yes. I let her look at it.” Jesamin sighed. “I suspect she will end up studying it, and between her and Líadan, we may know their language, and understand what they were doing in Liuridar, within a few years. All their secrets, their Artifice…may no longer be a mystery.”
Líadan remained in Owlhorn, though she had thus far refused to exit the cellar during daylight hours.
Cirri was still here, both teaching Líadan modern Veladari, and forming a lexicon on the words the ancient human used.
Cirri claimed her language was not actually the tongue of the Fae, but an ancient dialect of formal Veladari, native to the northernmost villages of the Vale, that none today spoke.
Nonetheless, Líadan refused to touch the sphere Jesamin had found, and had confirmed to Cirri that she could read the words that floated over its surface, though she wouldn’t speak them aloud.
Líadan was still broadly attached to Jesamin, but she was slowly adapting, warming to other people, even if she was a complete cipher in some ways. Most things she reacted to neutrally, but other things—such as the plumbing, the carriages, and Bram’s laboratory—seemed to appall her.
“I wonder if it was a mistake,” Jesamin whispered.
“I should have left it all behind. I think…knowing what the Fae made might be as bad as the weapons I built, if not more so. Once we have the knowledge we can never entirely bury it again, and as everything they did was malevolent…I feel nothing good can possibly come of it.”
We stopped on a ridge overlooking the River Aurore. Wildflowers danced around Jesamin’s feet; as usual, she was in her hole-riddled breeches, wearing the shirt with burns all over the sleeves. Her hair was loose, drifting around her shoulders.
I pushed a lock of hair behind her ear. “Bram went back through the mound door,” I told her.
Jesamin looked up, surprised. “He was protected, but he measured the waves of miasma. They’ve risen to roughly half a league below the earth.
The door has not yet been resealed and buried, and if you give me the word, I will drag it all back and throw it in.
Nobody but us needs to know we ever found it at all. ”
“Half a league?” she asked, a crease forming between her brows. I smoothed it away with one fingerpad.
“It’s plenty deep, and centered over Liuridar. Nobody is going to dig a root cellar and get a nasty surprise.”
She stared out over the river, the gears in her head turning. “I think Cirri would be genuinely upset if I took it from her,” she muttered.
“Oh, you’d give her less pain by stabbing her through the heart. But we don’t need to know.” I stressed it, ensuring she knew that I would never, ever blame her for such a choice. “Cirri would be fine. If anyone would understand that some things are better left buried, it’s her.”
“Would she swear to silence?” she asked quietly. “No matter what she learned?”
“Ha. Love, Cirri has been keeping the secret of our provenance for longer than you’ve been alive.
None of us are keen to allow secrets into enemy hands.
If you determine the Artifice is dangerous, not a single one of us—neither the Lords, nor Lady Cirri—will gainsay your expertise.
If you want it buried, she will take it to the grave. ”
Jesamin nibbled a finger, the scars of the bloodthorns still standing out pearly white and beautiful against sun-kissed skin.
“Very well,” she said decidedly, pacing back and forth.
“Cirri can study the sphere, but we should keep it secret. As for the rest…” She shook her head.
“Gods, Wroth. I want you to order me to throw it all into the abyss and seal the doors. I make weapons, for Light’s sake; for once in my life, I want to focus on crafting something different, not something that will only cause horror in the end.
I know that I’m tempting fate, but I just…
can’t seem to stop myself. I try to make myself throw it out, but then I can’t! ”
I took her hands, forcing her to stop the endless pacing. “Love.”
She looked at me, the worry in her eyes so deep and dark, I knew what must be done. To save her alone, if no one else. Everyone had a dark impulse, buried deep inside them; sometimes they were couched in noble causes.
I did not want to see Jesamin eaten alive with worry and despair if she recreated Artifice that would only cause harm, and we knew well that the Fae were nothing if not malicious.
She would do it for research, for progress, for knowledge, and in the end, if it all went to hell, she would blame only herself.
“Throw it away.” I stroked her cheek, staring into her eyes. “Throw it all away. We’ll go together. You’ve already made useful and beautiful things. All that knowledge to craft something useful, it’s all up here.” I tapped her temples. “You don’t need the Fae’s relics to do something amazing.”
Through those lenses, I could see the emotions flickering through her eyes: disbelief, obstinacy, anger, and finally, a bloom of pure relief.
“You’ll come with me?” she asked, pressing her hands over mine.
“Of course.”
“Tonight,” she said, determined. “It must be tonight. I don’t want to give myself the chance to change my mind, or try to hide something away for safe-keeping. Cirri can keep the sphere to study for now, but everything else…it has to go. It’s not for us. We were never meant to use it.”
“Tonight,” I agreed. “Then we’ll come home and set up your workshop together.”
Jesamin smiled, relieved laughter spilling from her. “Gods, do you know nothing has ever sounded as seductive as a man offering to set up my workshop?”
“It’s because I was planning for seduction to occur somewhere before, during, and after we arrange your new forge.” I scooped her up, carrying her away from the Aurore and back towards Owlhorn.
She looped her arms around my neck, gazing at me like I was the sun she revolved around. “How am I ever going to get any work done with you around?” she asked, still grinning.
“Easily. Have you ever seen the royal Serissan servant boys? I’ll just pop grapes in your mouth when you’re hungry, fan you with peacock feathers when the forge is too hot, bring you cold drinks…”
“Oh, come now.”
“I’d love to.” Playfully crouching, I sprawled into the grass, dragging her on top of me and pressing a kiss to her lips.
She was laughing, but her eyes were serious. “Wroth…you always came for me. And you still do. Whenever I need you, there you are.”
I plucked a crushed violet from her hair, smoothing it back so I could see her face. “And you set my world awry, tilting every expectation until the earth itself seemed upside down and inside out. But now the sun is shining, and you are still mine.”
“Even when the sun stops shining,” she whispered against my lips. “When the stars have gone out, and the moon hides her face, and all is dark…”
She kissed me, long and deep, tasting of eternity, of trust and faith and unbreakable bonds.
“You will always be mine.”
THE END