A/N
I couldn't stand to leave Rhoop on the Dark Island, so here is what happened after he was rescued. It's complete, too, so you don't have to worry about my famous habit of posting part of a story and then never finishing it :) Enjoy!
Ex Tenebris Lux - Out of darkness, light
Chapter One
Even the Night Will be Bright Around You
He had slept. These were Rhoop's first thoughts. He had slept as sound and sweet as an infant. His eyes opened on sunlight and of a sudden tears coursed down his cheeks. It could not be a dream. This was waking at last. Shafts of sun fell on the table where he had slept for he did not know how long, and he raised his head, blinking away the tears, to find that the king was looking on him with a great pity in his face.
Rhoop half turned away. So many things he had to say, and he did not know how to say a one of them. He could scarcely believe that he had reason left to think anything.
"Sire," he said. He drew a deep breath and wiped his eyes. "I am most humbly grateful …"
The king held up his hand.
"You were every man loyal to my father and were punished shamefully for it. You most of all, my lord. It was not only my sworn duty, but also my honor, to find and rescue you. I trust you slept well?"
"Yes, sire." Rhoop looked into the face of the king, a face he had never thought to see again. How very like his father he was! And yet there was something more: a graciousness and a gentleness which Caspian the Ninth had lacked. A light in his eyes, too, as of a man who had been shown things not revealed to other mortals.
"I have returned from the end of the world," Caspian said. "or as near as I could go. Your friends have awakened."
His friends. How often on that island he had wished they were with him. But now. They had never come for him. Was he expected to greet them as if he had forgotten the years of terror and sorrow?
Caspian turned and beckoned, and a moment later three men approached. Very different they were from the men he had set out with. Their hair had gone gray to varying degrees. Argoz' hair was silver, Revilian's grey peppered with remnants of black, and Mavramorn's was the color of iron. They stopped a short distance away and Caspian withdrew with a slight bow.
Rhoop stared at them, and they stared back. Emotions welled up in him which he could not keep back.
"Where were you?" he burst out. "Why did you leave me?"
The words were those of a pitiful child; the old Rhoop would have forgiven and forgotten all before he would have spoken in such a manner. But he had small dignity left, and their abandonment cut his wounded soul like a knife.
Mavramorn stirred and came toward him. The other two held back and dropped their heads.
"My lord Rhoop," he said, sinking to his knees and reaching out his hand like a supplicant before a king. "There is nothing we can say to make up for the years. It was not for lack of love for you that we left you. Indeed, it was not our intention. We have heard what you suffered."
"But why?" Rhoop looked down at Mavramorn and again the tears started to his eyes.
Mavramorn opened his mouth but seemed too overcome to speak again.
With his head still bowed, Argoz spoke.
"When you had gone," he said. "we debated amongst ourselves as to the nature of the island. The sudden disappearance of the storm struck us with dread, and none of us liked that you had gone. You seemed not yourself at the time, as if overtaken by enchantment, and this also made us fearful. We decided to take you back on board, willing or no; but as we prepared to lower the boat we seemed each to hear our own worst fears and nightmares; they grew so terrible and so real that we turned the ship and began rowing with all speed, though we did not know which way to go; and after a very long time we emerged from the darkness into the sunlight. To our shame, none of us dared return into that darkness."
Argoz and Revilian stepped forward and knelt beside Mavramorn.
"We do not ask your forgiveness," Revilian said. "for we do not merit it. The bonds of friendship were broken, and we have no excuse for our cowardice."
Rhoop listened to all in silence. He could not have spoken even if there had been anything to say. Then he turned and walked away slowly. He had long held the faint hope that they had been simply unable to return. He had staved off madness sometimes by repeating that the ship had sunk, that they could not rescue him because they were dead. His friends … his friends! They had left him for seven years, because they were afraid. Not one of them had rebuked the others and turned back to the island. He did not know where he was going, only that he must get away and be alone.
Alone. The word struck him like lightning. He had been alone for seven years! He stopped in his tracks. Alone. He dropped to both knees and buried his head in his hands. They had not burdened him with asking his forgiveness and for that he was grateful. But that small courtesy could not erase the wrong they had done him.
He had grown up with Mavramorn; they had been the truest of friends, so he had always thought, closer than brothers, and had once vowed each to defend the other to the death.
Revilian he had met at court as a very young man, drawn together by their common love for fine wine and old books. A friendship had sprung up, strengthened by their loyalty to Caspian the Ninth and their suspicions about Miraz.
He had always looked up to Argoz, who was older by eight years than he. Argoz had taught him everything about court life, diplomacy, and law, and Rhoop had looked on him not only as a teacher but as a friend.
And they had all, to a man, deserted him. They had felt the sun on their faces after a black night and had denied him the same. They had gone on, just as they had gone on after Restimar and Octesian had met their demise. But Rhoop had not been dead! He had been alive!
What was there to say when all was said and done? For seven years he had lived his nightmares. Was it possible to have less to live for than when he had been on that dark island?
Seven years. The weight of them bore down on him. Seven years. How had he survived so long? And for what? To find his friends false friends?
For a long time he knelt in the grass, too heartbroken even to weep, until a light hand fell on his shoulder. He looked up to find the woman he had seen only at a distance before, the daughter of Ramandu. Her flaxen hair fell to her shoulders and she seemed to glow with a gentle light.
"My lord," she said. "The meal is laid on the table. Will you not come and eat?"
"No, my lady," he said. "If it does not offend you, I will stay here."
"You will at least take some wine," she said, and held out a glass with her left hand. "The food and drink here are for the refreshment not only of the body, but of the spirit."
He stood and took the glass with a bow and raised it to his lips. The wine was cool and smooth, and as he drained it the fierce ache in his breast eased a little.
"Do not judge your friends too harshly, my lord," she said as she turned to go. "Remember that they are but men."
They were but men. But was a coward a man any longer? What was a friend if he deserted you?
"I would have done differently," he said aloud, though Ramandu's daughter was out of earshot. "I would have done differently."
Yet how could he know? If he had been on a ship, and had escaped the terror, would he have gone back for one man, no matter how dear? Or for ten men?
"I do not hate them," he murmured. "I cannot. I endured the terror and it is ended."
He still could not face them. The men in his memory were friends; the men who had knelt before him in shame were strangers. He did not hate, but could not forgive. So he wandered the island.
Rambling flowers and vines overgrew everything in a profusion of wildness and life. Stillness and peace reigned, unlike the stillness of that other island. The sun shone down, warm but not harsh. Warmth and light. Everything he had longed for.
As evening fell he came to the eastern end of the island and gazed out at the sea with the breeze rippling his hair. Darkness had come over it, and far above him the stars, exceedingly bright, shone on the rippling water.
The fading light did not trouble him. He had been in the dark for so long and yet here it had no terror for him. Wholesome, rich with the smell of ancient things, it came naturally after a day full of sunlight. It would be no hardship to stay on this island for the rest of his life, if Ramandu gave him leave; here he might find full healing.
As he thought these things, the earth shook and trembled. He turned, his heart pounding with a mingled fear and longing. A bright light came towards him. As it came nearer, he saw in the light a lion, huge and golden. His legs became weak, but he stood still as the lion approached with a tread which, though soft, made the ground quiver. He stopped less than an arm's length away.
"Do not be afraid," the lion said.
Rhoop dropped to one knee, trembling, not daring to look him in the eye.
"You are the one," he whispered. "You led us out of the darkness."
"I am." The lion's voice was low and rich. "Look on me, my son."
He dared to raise his eyes. The golden mane was only inches from his face. The lion's eyes were full of a gentle reproach.
"My son," said the lion. "You have endured long sorrow and fear, yet you never cried out to me. I would have comforted you even in the darkness."
"I didn't know," he said in a faint voice. "I thought you were only … only a tale. I didn't know."
"Do you now?"
"Yes. But …"
"Say on. Do not fear."
"But I don't know you, sir. How can I speak to you if I don't know how?"
"You will learn much of me, my son. There are many who know me well, who had never heard so much as my name before."
Silence fell, as rich and deep as the lion's voice. He stooped his head down and breathed on Rhoop, a long breath warm as a summer's day, heavy with the scent of flowers and spices. It flowed into him and through him, and for a moment he could hardly breathe; but when at last he drew in a breath the heaviness of his heart had gone. No bird in the air could have felt lighter than he.
When he opened his eyes the lion had vanished, but the scent lingered in the air.