Chapter 22 - Fiyr

When the court wakes the next morning, I get the impression that half of them had thought that Samn's promotion would be immediately overturned by the queen. She doesn't leave her private quarters, though, and Samn soon disappears into them to speak with her.

I had offered to go talk to Queen Bluelianna with her, but Samn declined. I understand why, though—she and the queen have always had some kind of connection, and if anyone can help her return to her old self, I think it's going to be Samn.

While our captain and monarch are holed-up in their private room, though, the rest of the court is left to just stand around awkwardly. Liang, who looks like he didn't get much sleep at all, throws up his hands within minutes and leaves with Sewif. I shift uncomfortably at his blatant disregard for Samn's authority as the captain of the guard, but no one stops him and I don't want to cause a fuss.

Everyone else seems mostly content to spend longer eating breakfast in the dining hall and dawdling around the throne room until Samn reappears. She looks grim, but gives a slight shake of her head when I shoot her a concerned look. I want to go over and ask how the queen is, but the entire rest of the court seems to have had the same idea first and she's quickly mobbed.

"Lady Fyrra and Sir Strommer, I want you to lead the two dawn patrols to the Shodawes and Rivien borders, respectively," she commands, ignoring the questions about the queen. "Take whoever you like. Sir Wynnd and Sir Teyl, take this list to Thermo and get what you can carry and they can spare. Sir Teyl, you bring Sew—"

I cringe as Samn pauses, her authoritative tone wavering as she realizes Liang is missing.

"Where's Sir Teyl?" she asks, but no one answers.

"He left with Sewif," I tell her, trying not to announce it to the whole court and failing. They're packed too tightly around us for them to not hear me tell Samn about Liang's disrespect.

"Oh." A frown flashes across her face, then disappears. "Well then… um…" She glances back at the queen's door like it will tell her what to do, then after a moment turns back to us and says, "Fine. Sir Styrp, you can go with Sir Wynnd."

The moment I see Darriek's face, I know there's going to be trouble. He scowls at the order and then crosses his arms defiantly. "Am I supposed to take orders from a lady of the court?"

"No," Samn answers crisply, "you're supposed to take orders from your captain. Now go to Thermo and don't come back unless it's with…" she pauses to examine the list, "...a ten-yard bolt of green cotton, a drum of cooking oil, and Thundria's share of the plum harvest."

She offers the sheaf of paper to him, but instead of taking it from her, he stalks out of the crowd with a final glower. Sir Wynnd accepts the list from her and shoots her an apologetic, murmuring, "The transition between captains is always a little rocky. You're doing a fine job."

Samn gives him a grateful nod, but I can't help thinking that Darriek's comments weren't of the 'I disagree with your style of leadership' variety. Still. Most of the court doesn't think that, surely? Although now that I'm looking for it, I wonder if the twist in Lady Fyrra's mouth is from Samn giving orders, or if the reason the elders are hovering around the throne room, murmuring to each other, is her promotion.

Despite what people may think, everyone else keeps it to themselves, and Samn organizes the rest of the day's schedule without incident. She puts me on a mid-afternoon supply run to the village of the Sun Rocks with the suggestion that I take Clowd hunting afterwards.

Eventually, everyone disperses: all either sent off on their morning patrol or otherwise occupying themselves. That leaves me alone with Samn again. My belly grumbles, reminding me that I haven't eaten anything yet today.

"Hungry? Let's get some breakfast," she suggests. "Mom was up early this morning making some big special thing for my first day as captain."

At the promise of a 'big special breakfast', my stomach quiets down in anticipation. When we arrive in the kitchen, I can smell something fried and salty. Also, coffee. Lady Faise stands over a stove, while Lady Fuor spots us as we come in, handing Samn a cup of coffee that I assume was prepared in advance.

"Congratulations," she tells her. "I know we're lucky to have you as captain. You remind me a lot of the queen when she was younger, from what I remember, and I'm sure the queen has enough years left in her to train you up a bit more."

Frostialla winks and then turns away to the stove to take a plate from Lady Faise, who shoots her daughter a smile. I'm relieved that they, at least, seem genuine with their faith in Samn. Samn seems to be bolstered by the lady's praise and the knot that's been firmly lined in her forehead finally untangles.

We're both given plates by Lady Faise and shooed out of the kitchen as they begin to clean up. I guess everyone's already eaten. I'd overslept a bit, still basking in the warmth of the morning, and Samn had been off conferring with the queen in private, but I'm glad we've gotten the opportunity to talk. Also, to eat: the 'big special breakfast' turns out to be some kind of egg and potato omelette with a layer of ham in it.

"What is it?" I ask Samn as we sit, inspecting my plate.

She sips her coffee, seeming a little revived by the bitter cup, then answers with a half-smile, "Pincho de tortilla, very classic Old Thundrian breakfast." As she picks up her fork, she huffs a little laugh.

"What's funny about it?" I raise an eyebrow.

"It's not just a breakfast," she explains, "it's also a hangover cure. Mom was so sure I was going to be captain someday that she's been planning to make this since I was a little kid."

She was going to make a hangover cure for Samn's breakfast after she was appointed captain?

"I guess she thought it would be a more joyous occasion," Samn mumbles. "And that we'd need a hangover cure."

Though it's ironically, a sobering statement, I can't help a smile. "I had a pretty good night last night."

She snorts at me and I repress a giggle, but after a moment she levels a more serious look at me. "I actually wanted to talk to you. Relating to what—what I said last night."

I blink, trying to push back the old concerns that I misread the situation. She said she loved me. Even just remembering it sends a twinge of warmth through me. There is no way I could have 'misread' that.

"I…" She pauses, as if trying to phrase it properly. "I do want to Unite with you. And maybe one day, have kids, and... the whole… everything."

Whoa. That's… a lot at once. An old, anxious part of me finally shuts up. "Oh! Well, I… want to as well," I agree, made almost dizzy by the confession. Despite that, there still seems to be something on her mind and I search her gaze. "What's wrong, though?"

She licks her lips nervously and glances at the entrance to the dining hall, where we can see the throne room and in it, the court going about their days. "This captain thing has really thrown me off. But… look. I'm worried that if I suddenly rush into getting United, everyone's going to think that I'm going to be pregnant soon after."

"Right…?" I'm still not completely sure what she's getting at. Isn't that usually why people get United at court? To show who the parents of the children are and to be together in a more established way?

"I just…" She rubs her eyes and then takes a sip of coffee, before continuing. "If I have kids, that's twelve years of my life that are being put toward having and raising children. During that time, even if I stay captain in title, I won't be performing the duties that I'm expected to. That I want to."

"You don't want everyone to think that you're just a temporary captain of the guard," I guess.

"Yes!" Her eyes flash. "I'm going to be captain for a long, long time if everything goes well. I'm young, the queen's still strong as ever, and I'm not going to try to kill her and steal the throne, so unless some dragon picks me off, I need to think about my future as the captain of the guard. I need to earn the respect of the court, like you said yesterday. Who's going to respect me if they think that within a few months I'll disappear into the nursery?"

"Ah." I lean away from the table a bit, understanding. "You want to establish yourself as captain before you give anyone the idea you might have kids."

She stabs her fork in the air in agreement as she chews a bite of her pincho de tortilla. Swallowing, she adds, "Exactly."

I shrug. "Makes perfect sense to me."

There's still a hint of concern in her expression, though. "You're not disappointed? I was worried you… would want it all right away."

I shake my head, stifling a laugh. "Samn, I've been waiting for you to stop hating me for more than a decade—I don't mind waiting another few years while you prove to the court that you'll be a great captain."

"Actually, that brings up something else," she admits, then fixes her gaze on me with an intensity that makes me redden. "I need to apologize to you. I treated you like shit when you first came to the court and there was no excuse."

I shift uncomfortably. "Well, I also kind of—"

"No, I behaved terribly," she insists.

"But your father—" I try again.

"His death was no excuse to take out my pain on you," she counters. "I was angry and hurt and I directed it at you because I thought you were an easy target. And I know how wrong that was, now. I'm sorry."

I want to argue, but I know she'll shoot down the disagreement anyway, so I just duck my head. "Thanks."

We eat in silence for a few minutes and I get the chance to fully appreciate Lady Faise's cooking prowess. It's mostly salt, fat, and ham, though, so I don't imagine it would be easy to screw it up, but even so. It's like a warm day after winter; crispy and chewy in the right places, and so comforting that I feel ready to go back to bed after finishing it off. I lick the last bit of grease off my lips.

"On a lighter note, I have to say that you had a pretty good retort lined up for Darriek this morning," I remark to her as we clear our plates.

She actually laughs at that. "I couldn't sleep last night, I was so worried about what everyone would say."

"So you started crafting snarky answers?" I huff a laugh.

"Pretty much," she admits. "It's most of what I do at night. My mind can't seem to settle down, so I just win arguments against myself."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah." I give her a look and she frowns playfully. "What?"

I shake my head. "You are something else."

I bring our plates to the kitchen and she chases after me, catching up easily. "C'mon, it's not that weird."

"Yes, it is," I answer, setting the plates down in the sink. I turn back to Samn. "That's just a small step away from talking to yourself."

She shrugs. "I do that too."

The dishes clatter abruptly as I let go of them. "Should I be concerned?"

"It's stupid stuff, just trying to figure out what to do and stuff like that," she says. "You should try it."

"I can sort out my own problems without sounding like a crazy person to anyone in the next room, thank you very much," I tease.

"Your loss."

With a flash of a smile, she leaves the kitchen. I watch her go, feeling a matching grin make its way across my face. When I look away at last, I see that Lady Fuor and Lady Faise are waiting in the doorway leading out of the castle. A basin of steaming water in Lady Faise's arms explains their momentary absence, though they apparently came back quick enough to catch the end of our conversation. They're wearing identical smirks.

I blush and try to scoot out of the kitchen before one of them can make a remark. Brindellia is too fast for me, though.

"So, should I start calling you 'son?'" she inquires, though the splashing produced by her pouring the water into the sink saves me from having to reply immediately .

My blush deepens. "We're not getting United!" I think of Sir Tayle for a moment. It's been a long time since I saw him in a dream… shouldn't he be bringing his cryptic messages to his own daughter? What's so special about me? He better not call me 'son' the next time I see him…

"Not yet," Lady Fuor says, and from the way her mouth twitches, I can tell she's enjoying this a little too much.

"Oh, shush," I tell them, hurrying out before they can comment on my flaming cheeks. Why do I still act like a lovesick squire? I ask the air silently. And also, why is my stubble so patchy? Am I shaving wrong? There are a few very important questions I have for the Starlaxi—or whoever cares to listen, but I still have some time before my mid-afternoon supply run, and I had been hoping to visit Cindra.

I didn't get a chance to talk to her much after the battle last night and I know she was up late, making sure every injured member of the court was comfortable in the healer's wing and checking up on their wounds. It lifted my heart a little to see her bustling around, comforting knights three times her size and working in tune with Yllowei, but I'm sure she's exhausted.

When I head into the healer's wing, though, I find it missing Thundria's tiny novitiate. Lady Fennen's wrapping something around Lady Peilte's fingers over at her desk. I cross the wing, shooting sympathetic glances at the half-dozen members of the court that were kept overnight. My black eye cleared up enough that Yllowei permitted me to sleep in my own room, but not everyone was so lucky.

"Sir Harte," Lady Fennen rasps, still engrossed in Willowamina's fingers.

"Where's Cindra?" I ask by way of greeting.

"Went to take breakfast to the queen," she answers. "She'll be back in a minute, I'm sure." There's a dark cloud hanging over Lady Fennen, and I remember last night.

Sure enough, not thirty seconds later, Cindra comes back through the doorway of the healer's wing. I greet her with a smile, but she seems distracted.

"Fiyr."

"Cindra? Is something wrong?" I follow her into the back of the healer's wing where she and Yllowei have their rooms.

"Did you…" Cindra's brow furrows. "Did you notice anything strange about breakfast? Did the leftovers taste strange?"

"Leftovers?" I shake my head. "I had the egg-potato thing that Lady Faise made, not leftovers."

"That's what I'm talking about," Cindra clarifies. "The pincho de tortilla. I brought some to the queen and it was cold and weirdly green and black inside. It had a strange smell, too, so I threw it out. I just figured someone hadn't put it away properly."

What…? "That's impossible. Lady Faise made it specially for Samn this morning to celebrate her new position. It wasn't leftovers."

Cindra blinks. "What?"

Then why was it green and black?! It was freshly-made.

More than confused, though, Cindra looks alarmed.

"What's wrong?"

"I…" Cindra shakes her head and sits down on her bed, staring straight ahead with a fearful look. It seems like a bit of an overreaction to me, but maybe the queen was really upset.

"It's just bad food," I reassure. "I'm sure the queen knows you didn't mean to give her rotten potatoes."

"No, I don't think it is 'just bad food,'" Cindra says, still not looking at me. "I think it's an omen."

"What?! Really?" From the Starlaxi? "Have you told Lady Fennen yet?"

"No, not yet." She looks down at her hands and her voice trembles a little as she says, "But I think I know what it means."

I sit down on her bed as well and shift closer, my curiosity overtaking me. "What? What do you think it means?"

She turns to me finally, and I see that her eyes are filled with despair. "That Thundria is rotting. From the inside out."

The alarming nature of that prediction makes me recoil, but I'm anxious to reassure Cindra. "That seems extreme! Why do you think that?"

She shakes her head, nibbling on her lip like she's lost in some memory. "I… don't you think the Starlaxi is upset with what's going on in Thundria right now?"

Is she talking about Samn? "What do you mean?"

"I mean with… with Sir Cawle, and the queen, and—and everything." She waves her hand vaguely, but I can tell that something else is eating away at her and I'm going to find out what it is.

My instinct is proven right when she presses the heels of her palms into her eyes, then runs her hands back through her hair and sighs, then finally drops them into her lap and says, "I broke the healer's code."

"You did?" I'm astonished. Of all the different answers for why she's feeling this way, I never in a thousand years would have guessed that it was her breaking a rule. "What, do you have a Rivien wife too?"

The look she shoots me tells me it's a bit soon to be making jokes about Silaverre. "No. In the battle. I attacked Braukkin and Sir Cawle. Healers aren't supposed to hurt."

Sir Cawle's eye, I remember suddenly. "Why don't you tell me what happened?"

As she tearfully recounts how she ran into the healer's wing to get Murderstick after she, Clowd, and I rode back to the castle and encountered Braukkin, sympathy wells in me. How can she blame herself for defending herself?

"I'm not even a novitiate yet, not really," she says, voice shaking. "And I've already broken the code. The equinox is tonight, Fiyr! What if the Starlaxi rejects me? What if… what if I've ruined everything?"

"Don't say that!" I exclaim. "Cindra, the Starlaxi can see our paths. They know that you attacked them out of self-defense."

She shakes her head, squeezing her eyes shut like she's pressing back tears. "I was scared for my life, that's true. But I also wanted to hurt Sir Cawle. On the rope bridge… when he tried to drown me…" She takes a quivering breath. "I felt so scared and helpless. And I wanted to hurt him for it. Healers aren't supposed to want revenge."

I take her hand and give it a squeeze as I choose my next words. Would the Starlaxi really cast her out for that? I want to reassure her, but I also don't know the answer to that question. She's courtborn. She was raised on tales of the Starlaxi. I know of them, I've seen Sir Tayle and the Lunar Temple… but they're not so much a part of me as they are for her. I survived twelve years without them, but for her to lose their favour… She must be terrified.

"Cindra… you say that it was revenge. But think of it another way," I urge. "You knew firsthand how dangerous Sir Cawle was. He tried to kill you. You knew that he would do it again if he could, so you protected yourself. How can the Starlaxi fault you for that?"

"But I broke the code, Fiyr. It's like my life-force, like you told me. Some are just naturally more destructive than others. Maybe I am too; maybe I'm just not cut out to be a healer," she says, her voice quieting until she sounds defeated.

Oh, blessed Starlaxi, why did I have to tell her that?

"No, Cindra, I was wrong," I admit. "I thought that fire couldn't heal, but remember after the fight with Braukkin and his outlaws, a couple years ago? You cauterized Lady Flourer's wound. Besides, there's so much more to being a healer than just life-force!"

She still doesn't seem to be hearing my words.

"Even if you did break the code," I allow, "better a code-breaker than dead. You saved your own life. I don't care what the code says. What's important is that you're alive."

"What about the Starlaxi?" At last, she seems to be a little less completely sure that her life is ruined, but doubts still cloud her eyes. "What if…"

She doesn't have to finish her thought for me to know what she's afraid of. Being a healer brought meaning back to her life, and now she's scared it'll be taken away from her and she'll be put back in the place she was after the accident on the soulpath. Put in those terms, I'm scared too.

"If the Starlaxi gets angry that you saved your own life, I'll march down to the Lunar Temple and chew them all out," I say, hardly joking at all. "Their rules are great if it means we're not all killing each other for no reason, but they do more harm than good sometimes."

Cindra's mouth drops open at my words, but I continue, my thoughts on Graie and Silaverre.

"You didn't die. Whatever caused that is a good thing in my books. I don't give a shit if you were thinking 'bad' thoughts when you saved your own life. I care that you're still here, and if the Starlaxi has a problem with that, then they can come down here and tell me themselves why you should have died." The words rush out of me as if they've been waiting a long time to be let out. When I'm finished, I take a deep breath.

I half-expect Cindra to be horrified by my irreverence, but instead, she throws her arms around me. I hug her back awkwardly, still trying to assess her emotional state. Did Yllowei hear that? Is she going to yank me by hair over to the Lunar Temple to apologize? Did any of that even help Cindra?

When she lets me go, I see that the tears that have pearled in corner of her eyes are gone. Her blue-gray eyes are still glassy with unshed ones, but she's smiling.

"Thank you."

"It's the truth," is all I can say. What could have been different if our code was different? Would Silaverre still be with Graie? Would Cindra be less afraid to defend herself?

"Will you volunteer to be the escort for me and Lady Fennen tonight?" she asks.

My eyebrows rise. Since when do the healers need an escort? Who would attack a healer? "What? I mean—of course. I didn't know you brought knights on the equinoxes."

"The queen told Lady Fennen to bring one last equinox," Cindra says. "With things how they are between us and the other kingdoms, not to mention the outlaws… and now with Sir Cawle…"

I nod grimly. "There's a lot to be worried about."

She nudges me. "I'd feel safe if you were the one with us."

"What, you don't want Duss?" I joke. "I've heard he's an excellent conversationalist."

She rolls her eyes and I laugh. Then she remarks, "While you're here, why don't I have a look at that eye?"

"It's fine, really!" I protest, but she's already getting out the little anti-swelling tincture and soothing drops. I sigh and resign myself to letting her pry my eye open and dribble a little fragrant liquid into it. Great. Her last act as an un-confirmed novitiate will be to poke my eyeball. Truly a wonderful memory that she can look back on fondly in ten years.

…

"I think I'm the first novitiate to ever finish half her training before being accepted by the Starlaxi," Cindra remarks. Lady Fennen has stopped answering her after the fifth random statement; I know Cindra's really nervous, and it's making her chatty.

"Stop trying to distract me; I have to keep an eye out!" I reprimand her jokingly, making a show of peering into the empty air.

We crossed the solstice pavilion slightly less than an hour ago and we're riding along the Wynnder-Shodawes border. I'm bundled up in a scratchy brown travelling cloak, but even so, the nip of the autumn air is present on my cheeks when the wind blows.

The dusky sky is darkening little by little as the sun dips lower, just brushing the Silver Peaks. When we set out, the sun was still corn-yellow and high enough in the sky for us to see it above the trees, but evening has set in faster than I expected. I'm happy to be worried about whether we'll be late or not rather than if we're going to be set upon by mercenaries armed to the teeth.

Not a hair of the other kingdoms, either. The Rivien sea is just a mass of dark water with glints of reflected orange and red in the distance behind us, which I'm relieved by. I don't want to see their captain, or their king, for that matter, until they agree to let Graie's son and daughter stay in Thundria. Wynnd and Shodawa are another matter; the rolling hills to the left and the shadowed forests to the right are foreboding enough without a half-dozen knights jumping out to challenge us.

They wouldn't dare, I remind myself. But they dared to come to our castle, push through our defenses, and try to kill our prisoner. He's dead now, though. There's nothing more they can ask for. I look at Lady Fennen's dark silhouette. She rides in front of us, her pace steady and determined, but I've seen pain lingering in the lines of her face as of late. My heart aches, and I wonder if she's told the queen. What will the queen do, anyway? She didn't want to kill him after Wynnd and Shodawa attacked, but then again… that was before he turned on us and tried to kill Cindra. Just the memory of it makes my hands tighten around Blitz's reins. Ungrateful monster.

"We are almost there," Yllowei speaks, her raspy words carried back to us by the wind.

Trepidation fills me and I remember the last time I visited here. The first, too. As a squire… with Sir Cawle. I remember crossing the soulpath, Sir Cawle's dark gaze as he commanded Ravne to go first, his hands on my back when I faltered. Throwing up. Samn making a glass bird. The terrifying vision.

I dart a sideways glance at Cindra. She's much older than I was when I first came, but the wonder and fear that sits nakedly on her face reminds me of my own nervous anticipation. I wonder what it's like to be initiated. Surely different than how the queen brought us into the chamber. That was about her; she needed to speak to them. Maybe she can go to the Silver Peaks again sometime soon. It might help her return to normal. But tonight is about Cindra. I know I'm probably not going to be invited into the temple, so when we reach the yawning mouth, carved thousands of years ago from white stone turned silver by the moon, I dismount Blitz and hang back.

As Cindra and Lady Fennen do the same, I check the Trace, half-instinctively. It's familiar, and for a heartbeat I wonder if I remember it from almost a decade ago, but that's not quite it, is it? No… it feels like… It's cold, sparkling, trembling… Like the queen. Which I guess makes sense; her Blessings must change her trace to make it feel like the Starlaxi and the Lunar Temple.

Yllowei leads the horses toward the treeline, and Cindra and I are left standing, halfway between the trees and the temple. As Cindra comes over to me, I see that she's holding more than her staff.

"Is that…?" I peer at it, a little confused as to why she has it with her.
She just nods, looking down at the sheathed sword in her hands. Then she looks back up at me and half-laughs, a strangled sound. "I think I'm the only novitiate to finish half her training before being accepted by the Starlaxi."

"I—yeah, I know, you said that before," I remind her, also laughing a little in a more bemused way.

She nods again, and then a tear drops off her cheek. "Here."
Cindra lifts the sheath and offers it to me. I take it, touched by her gesture, and gently slide the hilt out of the scabbard, revealing enough of the blade to see the little inscription. Murderstick. I smile. The name is a reminder of the girl she used to be. And I feel my eyes fill with tears as I look back up at her, standing in the moonlight in the clothes of a novitiate, holding her cane and smiling with more sadness than joy.

"I wanted to tell you something before I go in there," she says, looking back quickly to see that Lady Fennen is still standing off aways by the trees. Maybe she knows that Cindra has some unfinished business.

I wait, feeling a little unsure of what she'll say next.

She presses her lips together. "It's… it's stupid, I know, and I'm happy for… never mind. I—I only wanted to admit that I was kind of… kind of in love with you for like… all my squirehood."

Her voice trembles a little, and then she gives a half-laugh.

"And when I was unofficially a novitiate. And until now. Well, still now. But I'm going to be a healer, and you don't love me the same way, so I just… I know…" She fumbles with her words for a second and I can't say anything at all. "I wanted to let it go. Or put it to rest, or whatever the right word is. You don't have to say anything. I'm sorry—I didn't mean to make it awkward."

I still can't speak, anything I might have offered her in any slightly different circumstance just out of reach. She was always fond of me. Sometimes I wondered. Never returned. Loved her like a sister. Never wanted to hurt her. Nothing fits together in a way I could say aloud.

"But… even though I knew it wasn't going to turn out…" Her voice softens until I can barely hear, as if the words might not be for me at all. "Turn out the way I might have wanted in another world, you were still so important to me. And I think you saved my life. So… thank you for everything. I wouldn't change it."

When I can speak again, all that leaves my mouth is, "Cindra…"

She stands up on her tiptoes and kisses my cheek quickly, almost awkwardly, and then smiles in that same painful way. She turns around and disappears into the Lunar Temple.

~Akila