Froi of the Exiles

Chapter 4

In Isaboe and Finnikin’s private chamber away from the prying eyes of their people and the world of their court that forced them to be polite and restrained, they spoke of Charyn and Froi and Rafuel of Sebastabol and curses and lastborns and Sarnak, and then Charyn again and taxes and empty Flatland villages, and then Charyn again. When all that talk was over, they stood before each other ready for the mightiest of battles, which they had saved until last.

Finnikin would describe the situation as tense. Isaboe didn’t describe situations. She described how she was feeling during the situation. Then they would argue about what was less important. Facts or feelings. Tonight it was about both.

‘How do you expect to rule a kingdom and be so weak in this matter?’ he said, trying to keep censure out of his tone. He saw her face twitch at the mention of the word weak.

‘Not now,’ she said. ‘Another day. Perhaps next week.’

‘And then perhaps the week after that and then the week after that,’ he suggested with little humour.

He saw the pain flash across her face.

‘Do it, Isaboe. You must show strength!’ Finnikin could see her softening and he nodded. ‘Now,’ he urged in a whisper.

Isaboe took a ragged breath before crouching to the floor. Finnikin knelt down beside her. Their daughter looked from one to the other. She had Finnikin’s face and Isaboe’s hair, and now she was nearing the age of two, she was showing some of Trevanion’s temperament, which was beginning to alarm both of her parents.

‘Jasmina, my beloved. Finnikin and I …’

Isaboe’s eyes met Finnikin’s and he nodded at her with encouragement.

‘ … We’ve had the most beautiful of beds made for you. So beautiful that every little girl in the whole of our kingdom wants to sleep in it. Tonight we thought you could sleep in the most beautiful bed in Lumatere, and Finnikin and Isaboe could sleep on their own. Together.’

Together. Finnikin smiled at Isaboe. He was proud of his queen. Proud of them both. Jasmina meant everything to them and he couldn’t imagine their lives without this blessing. He did imagine frequently, however, sharing a bed with just his wife while their little blessing was asleep in another room.

Their daughter stared from Finnikin to Isaboe. He beamed at her, his shoulders relaxing for the first time in days.

Jasmina’s bottom lip began to tremble.

‘Do you think she’s going to be smarter than us?’ he asked as they lay in bed later that night. He could see the moon through the balconette doors before them, looking almost close enough to grab and, as usual, it made him wonder about all things strange and mysterious. And about how insignificant he was in the scheme of things.

Finnikin turned to see Isaboe bending to kiss Jasmina’s brow as she slept between them. ‘Most probably,’ she murmured.

‘Then she won’t need us one day.’

‘What a thing to say, Finnikin,’ Isaboe said, ‘when I feel a need for my father and mother now, more than I ever have.’

‘True enough,’ he said gently. ‘It may have to do with such attachments belonging to women,’ he added.

When Finnikin added words, he always regretted it. He was regretting it now because the flames from the fireplace illuminated his wife’s stare of disbelief.

‘Your father lives in the chamber beside us, Finnikin. You speak to him every night and every morning and if for some reason you can’t sleep through the night, you speak to him then as well. Do you not see that as an attachment?’

She waited for his response and he chose not to reply because then they’d get into a discussion about why Trevanion had not announced his betrothment to Beatriss yet, which would lead back to a discussion about empty Flatland villages. Then they would both fall asleep thinking of neighbourless Flatlanders and Finnikin would wake up in the dark, despairing for his kingdom. Not able to get back to sleep, he’d knock on his father’s door because Trevanion didn’t sleep either, and then Isaboe would win this argument.

‘True enough,’ he sighed. He could see her mind was already elsewhere and he knew exactly where.

‘Sleep and don’t think about it,’ he said. He was sick and tired of the subject of Charyn.

‘How can I not?’ she asked. ‘Barren wombs and curses. If you ask me, they’ve poisoned all their children.’

‘If only you did believe that, then we could kill the Charynite in the mountain and banish those in the valley and not send Froi into the unknown.’

Isaboe turned to face him. ‘But you must think it’s all strange?’

‘Isaboe,’ he said, exasperated. ‘Unbeknownst to us, our neighbouring kingdom has not birthed a child for eighteen years. How can I not think it strange?’

She placed a finger to her lips as a sign for him to lower his voice. ‘I know you,’ she whispered. ‘I know you’re trying to find reason where there is no place for it.’

‘Reason failed halfway down that mountain,’ he said. ‘I think Rafuel of Sebastabol speaks sincerely.’

‘Then you seriously want me to consider this plan for Froi?’

‘I don’t think we will ever get into that fortress any other way,’ he said.

‘It’s too perfect,’ she said. ‘We want the King dead. They want the King dead. They need an assassin who is of age and speaks Charyn. We have an assassin who is of age and speaks Charyn.’

She looked at him, pained. ‘How would they have known?’ she whispered. ‘Do you think we have Charyn spies in Lumatere?’

They had spoken often of spies in the early days after the curse was lifted. Exiles had entered the kingdom with nothing to vouch for the fact that they were indeed Lumateran. Anyone could have been a spy. They both knew that there was still a lack of trust between those who had been trapped inside and the exiles. Regardless of the years of progress, it would be some time before their kingdom was back to what it once was.

Finnikin sighed and reached over to blow out the candle and they lay silent, listening to Jasmina’s breathing.

‘I hate them,’ she said, moments later. ‘It hurts to hate this much, but I do. I want them all dead, especially everyone in that cursed palace. I think of that abomination of a Princess and I want her dead as much as her father. Because I want to lie down to sleep and not imagine them coming over our mountain and annihilating my yata and Mont cousins first. I don’t want to imagine them clearing the Flatlands, turning our river into a bloodbath, storming your rock village. I want to stop thinking of them coming through the castle doors and doing to our daughter what they did to my sisters and my mother and father.’

He felt her breath on him as she leaned close.

‘Promise me, my love. Promise me that if they come through the palace doors and there’s no hope, you do what you have to do. You make it quick for her so she doesn’t suffer.’

Finnikin swallowed hard. He remembered the first time he was forced to make Isaboe such a heinous promise as Jasmina suckled from her breast.

‘Let’s not talk of these things, Isaboe.’

He gathered them both to him and he felt her lips against the back of his hand. At times like this he ached for her, but sometimes there was more between them than their daughter.

‘I’ve never spoken of this,’ she said quietly in the dark, ‘but when we lost Froi in Sprie that first time, I didn’t return for the ruby ring he stole from me. It was as if I was sent there to search for him.’

Finnikin was quiet. He had always felt threatened by the bond betweeen Isaboe and Froi. They shared a desperation to survive and there was a feralness and a darkness about them that he envied fiercely, though he was frightened by what this might mean.