The Past Is Prologue: chapter 8

Naomi meets her brother

"I remember the day I met my wife. I was assistant to the harbor master back then. Queen Shuriki's laws didn't affect me much, but I knew people who suffered under them. Mostly I tried to keep my head down and stay out of trouble. The night I met Scarlett I had gone to the most popular port 'Tavern' – an unofficial establishment that had no sign advertising it but where alcohol flowed freely and the music was always lively. As long as the Guard got their cut of the profits, no one bothered them. All types of people would show up – noble and commoner, Avaloran, Norberger, and Northern Islander, criminals and guards. It served as the perfect meeting place for a variety of purposes, both above-board and illicit. That evening the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen, a red-headed Norberg ship captain, was speaking with a local carpenter, Rafa, whom I didn't know well.

"When they got up to leave, I noticed a man get up to follow them. Well, I didn't like the look of that, so I decided to follow him. He went straight to a guardsman outside and pointed towards where the ladies were heading.

"I had always stayed out of political conflicts before. But when I saw the guard leave and come back with reinforcements, I knew I had to act. I caught up with Scarlett and Rafa and whispered, 'Play along.' I began to act the stereotypical drunken Norberg sailor, and Scarlett, who caught on to what I was trying to do, was able to jump right in to the act. So when the guards came looking for the co-conspirators, they found a sailor and two sisters from Norberg, who were too drunk to make much sense. The guards let us go in disgust and the two ladies disappeared into the shadows.

"One memory of that night has stuck with me after all these years. Rafa was terrible at pretending to be drunk."

-Captain Daniel Turner, harbormaster during the reigns of Queen Shuriki and Queen Elena Castillo Flores, A People's History of the Reign of Queen Shuriki, compiled by Professor Catalina de Torres

"David!" Carla and David turned as the chancellor ran up to them. Carla had been showing the young Norberg sailor Castillo Park, holding onto his hand so he wouldn't get lost, of course. They'd only just met but the apprentice wizard felt oddly protective of the handsome stranger. He'd told her he knew no one in Avalor City, so how did Naomi know his name?

"Hey, Naomi. Hey, Tziloco," Carla greeted Naomi and the crystal bat perched on her head.

"Oh, hey, Carla. You found David! How did you know I was looking for him?"

"I didn't. What do you want with him?" Carla's voice cooled slightly.

"It's a family matter," Naomi responded, dismissing her. She then turned to the Norberg sailor. "I heard about your parents. I'm so sorry."

"Naomi?" he asked hesitantly.

"Yeah, it's me. Been a while, hasn't it?"

"Did you know?" he asked her coldly. Know what? Carla thought. And how did David know Naomi?

"For about an hour now," Naomi gave a rueful laugh.

"So she lied to you too, then." Where was this hostility coming from? Sure, Naomi could be a bit much at times, but she hadn't done anything yet.

"Lying might be a bit strong," Naomi ventured. "She just never got around to mentioning…"

"That I'm her son?" David snapped. "It seems like an important detail to bring up."

"Look, why don't you come with me and talk to her? She's been very worried about you."

"I have nothing to say to my mother," the young sailor spat.

"Well, maybe Mom had things to say to you. Did you ever think of that?" Carla could tell Naomi was getting frustrated with David. But why would Naomi's mom have anything to say to David? And what did that have to do with David's mother? Wait a minute…No way. David was Naomi's brother?

The young man drew in his breath. "I don't mean to get mad at you, Naomi. It's our mother I can't forgive." Carla gasped as she realized her guess was right.

The chancellor put her hand on David's shoulder. "Give her a chance to explain," Naomi said softly.

"No!" David shouted. "I want nothing to do with that woman!" He shoved her hand away. Tziloco spread his wings and hissed at the man who had just shoved his mistress. Carla drew her tamborita, ready to defend David if need be. David looked startled, and Naomi took a moment to quiet her pet.

"If you're not ready to talk to Mom, there's someone else at the palace who would love to meet you." Naomi looked at her brother. "Esteban found out the same time I did."

"Esteban Flores? The Traitor?" David scoffed.

"Yeah, I'm trying to get people to stop calling him that," the chancellor responded ruefully.

"Good luck with that," Carla muttered under her breath. Naomi glared at her.

"He's really not so bad once you get to know him. You have to be a little bit curious about your father," Naomi continued. His father? Weren't they just talking about Esteban Flores? Carla was thoroughly confused. Wait a minute…no way!

"I suppose I don't really blame the man if he truly didn't know. But neither do I have any wish to meet him. He is nothing to me." David was adamant.

"You really won't come to the palace with me?" Naomi seemed sad. Why sad? Oh, right. This was her brother she was talking to. "Well, you have until sunset to change your mind. Mom has to leave with the tide to defend Avalor. It will break her heart not to see you before she goes, but you know the threat she's fighting."

"I should. That blaggard murdered my parents – my real parents."

"I know it's hard for you," Naomi said softly. "But you're not alone, David." The young sailor didn't respond. After nodding to Carla, Naomi turned and left.

"So what was that about?" the apprentice wizard asked her companion. She had a pretty good guess, but thought it would be best coming from David himself.

The young man took a deep breath to steady himself and pushed an unruly lock of brown hair out of his eye. "I told you my mother had deceived me." Carla nodded. "I discovered yesterday that the parents who'd raised me were not my real parents. I received a letter telling me that my godmother, Scarlett Turner, and Esteban Flores, were my true mother and father."

Scarlett Turner and Esteban Flores had a secret love child? The prissy, perfect Turners had a scandal in their family? Oh, this was too good. Just wait until she told Papá! Then a thought struck her as she looked at David.

"My dad hates your dad," she admitted.

"I'm certain all good citizens of Avalor hate my father," David spat the word. "Can you imagine anyone choosing to collaborate with that witch Shuriki?"

"Um, yeah, I see what you mean," Carla laughed nervously. Now was probably not the best time to mention that she herself had once been a minion of Shuriki, a position which her own father had arranged for her, nor that Victor Delgado's grievance with Esteban had been the dark queen's preference for the latter, despite Victor's greater loyalty (at the time, of course. Not now that he was reformed.) That was such a long time ago, the 23-year-old thought. Why bring it up now?

"Now that you know the truth about me, I don't blame you if you want nothing to do with me." He sounded so forlorn that Carla impulsively reached out to grab his hands.

"I'm not going anywhere," she told him fervently. "I know what it's like to be alone, and you don't deserve that."

"Thank you," he whispered, looking directly at her with those soulful green eyes of his. No, she would not leave him alone.

"So what are you going to do now?"she asked.

"I don't even know what to feel, let alone do," David answered in a trembling voice. "Two days ago my life was stable. I had parents I loved and trusted. I knew who I was. I had a job and a plan for my life. I was going to work hard and one day become a captain in my own right. And then in an instant everything changed. My parents and shipmates were killed. I learned the people who raised me weren't my real parents. That my godmother was my actual mother and had deceived me my entire life. My father is one of the most infamous men in Avalor. And I can't even honor the couple I thought were my parents – their bodies were lost at sea." His eyes filled with tears, which he angrily brushed aside. "I'm so angry at them, but I love them, and didn't even get to say goodbye. And it's all because of that Duke Cristobal."

"What did happen?" Carla asked softly.

David sank down on a bench. Carla sat beside him, the better to hear him, of course. She placed her hand on his arm as he began to speak.

"My family and I had moved to Avalor less than a month ago, to Nueva Vista. We were out on the sea, fishing, when we heard an explosion from land. A huge wave swamped our boat and we almost capsized. We would have been all right, though, when another small sailing vessel came speeding past us, faster than any boat should be able to move. It then circled us once, and I heard someone call out, 'Leave no witnesses.' Then another wave arose, from the opposite direction of the first, and our vessel went under and broke apart. I found myself on top of a part of our ship and was later taken from the water by my godmother's," he laughed bitterly, "my mother's ship. That's when I first heard of Duke Cristobal. Only three of us survived. The most tragic part is that none of us even knew who Duke Cristobal was. We were no threat to him, couldn't have reported we'd seen him. And yet he was seen from land, so his secret wasn't protected anyway. It was all for nothing. And now my parents and shipmates are dead, and he still lives. Where is the justice in that?"

Carla laid her head against David's shoulder in comfort. The ex-malvaga did not frighten easily. She had faced down or worked with the most infamous evil sorcerers in Avalor; had challenged ghosts in their lairs; and had been hunted by a magical princess with a lethal scepter. Through it all she had never truly been scared. But when she'd been introduced to Shuriki's ally Duke Cristobal she'd instinctively wanted to run. Oh, on the surface he was far more charming and elegant than most of her father's associates, but his smile never met his eyes. He had a way of looking at everyone as if to say, "I wonder how and when I will destroy you? That will be most amusing." And unlike Shuriki or Fiero who were dismissive of Carla, Cristóbal seemed to notice her. She felt he'd sized up each and every one of them individually, probing for weaknesses, and found herself hoping Shuriki would strike him down. That hadn't happened, of course. The dark queen had viewed Duke Cristóbal as her most valuable ally, and then had been slain in a duel with Princess Elena. Duke Cristóbal had been locked up in a tower for treason, where he'd remained until his recent escape.

"It's not fair," Carla muttered, surprising herself. Her mother wasn't locked up in a dungeon or tower somewhere. Queen Elena had slain Ash the day of her coronation. Carla understood the reasons why; her mother's wicked deeds had brought that fate down upon her head. Carla truly didn't blame the queen; but the fact that the life of the queen's cousin had been spared, and he'd been locked up in a cushy royal tower, while her own mother had not been shown the same mercy, rankled more deeply than Carla had realized. If her mother deserved to pay with her life for her treason, then so did Duke Cristóbal.

"Someone needs to make him pay for what he's done," Carla said more loudly.

"Yes, but who?" David asked. "No one even knows where he is."

"We know where he was – Nueva Vista. That would be a place to start looking for clues."

"'We'? I want to avenge my parents and shipmates, but I wouldn't have the first idea how to go about it."

"I could help you," Carla responded, warming to the idea. The notion of embarking on an adventure of her own devising appealed to her. She'd never done that before; she'd always followed someone else's plans – first her father's, then Shuriki's, then her mother's; and now she obeyed Queen Elena and Mateo. No more. It was high time she started to make her own decisions, and righting this wrong was a great way to start. And if she got to spend more time together, so much the better.

"But it would be dangerous! I couldn't ask that of you."

"You're not asking; I'm offering. Besides, it's my duty as a royal wizard apprentice!" she proclaimed grandly. Carla liked the sound of that. "The question is – do you want to do this?"

"I think I do," David replied slowly. "Bringing this Duke Cristobal to justice, me being the one to do that after the contemptuous way our boat was destroyed is the only thing that's made any sense in the last two days. But we don't even have a boat."

Carla smiled at him. "Leave that to me."

AUTHOR'S NOTE: A story cannot contain a song, of course. But if you would like one, imagine a pop latino duet between Carla and David, "Something of Our Own."