“Forgive me, Your Majesty,” Aldric said. “I would never think you to do otherwise, but I still don’t understand. You wish her, a mageborne, to become your servant?”
“No, my friend.” Lelandis set a hand on Aldric’s broad shoulder. “She is to become my wife.”
Silence filled the room. Inside her prison of forced apathy, Dnara wanted to scream. The collar reverberated intensely against the base of her skull until her internal scream became a muffled whimper that drowned in the starstone’s void before it could be heard. Her eyes blinked slowly and a log in the fireplace split with a thunderous crack that broke the quiet.
“My lord,” Aldric spoke cautiously. “Mageborne or not, she is of unknown ancestry. Would the people accept her as queen?”
“Desperate times,” Lelandis replied, his gaze returning to Dnara. “Tell him of your vision, Delmurra. Help him understand.”
“As you wish, my king.”
Delmurra’s eyes became a luminous white and wind rushed through the open door to feed the fire. The flames leapt high in a roar and the wind rustled through papers on the desk. A book blew open, its pages turning. Though her limbs did not move, Dnara reached for her abandoned friend, but the wind did not caress her. It swirled around her, as if kept away, and the starstone in the collar sang a lamentation that only Dnara could hear.
Above the wind and the fire, Delmurra’s voice carried across the room in ominous monotone. “A child lost to time will emerge from the thorns a woman. With her walks the shadow and the hope of men. A promise is broken. A path is chosen. Ravens fall and a dragon roars as the fire dies and the wind rises. The King’s Sword strikes true and a misplaced queen is returned to her people. From her is reborn the savior of man.”
The wind settled. The fire dimmed. Delmurra’s eyes regained their pale blue color as her prophecy ended, leaving Commander Aldric speechless in its wake. Dnara tried to absorb the mage’s words and commit them to memory, but they quickly faded into the places of her mind kept out of reach by the collar. Although most of the lines could be left to interpretation, the last words relayed one singular conclusion.
“Savior of man,” Aldric whispered, his eyes searching the face of his king for the truth. “You believe Dnara is to be mother to Retgar’s return?”
“Yes.” Lelandis exhaled the word and let it hang within the room, his gaze cast solidly to a future only he could see. Blinking away the heavy nature of his thoughts, he gave Aldric the fraction of a smile. “Well, with my help, of course.”
Aldric glanced from his king to his charge, the girl who stood barely a woman and had placed all her trust into his hands by placing a collar around her own neck to save the lives of his men. Prophecy or not, his king’s decree or not, none of this sat well with Commander Aldric. “My king,-”
Lelandis held up a finger, silencing Aldric. “I know what you are to say, my friend. Prophecy or not, I don’t like the idea of wedding and bedding a woman without her own blessing any more than you do. I intend to give her the opportunity to-”
“My king,” Delmurra interjected but ended her argument as Lelandis shot her a look serving to remind her who wore the crown.
“I intend,” Lelandis continued with emphasis as his headache returned to wrinkle his brow, “to give her the opportunity to get to know me first. It is my hope that we will be well matched, or at least both agree to the importance of our union.”
Aldric opened his mouth, hesitated, then asked, “And if she does not?”
Lelandis shook his head and swallowed, as if the very thought disgusted him. When he looked back to Aldric, Lelandis resembled less a regal king and more a man at the end of an ever shortening rope. “I alone bear this crown and all that comes with it. I must do what is best for my people, Aldric. People are suffering. My people are dying. The blight spreads and hope wanes. You’ve seen it with your own eyes! Surely, you can understand? If there is but a small chance that this prophecy rings true, then I must take it!”
His last desperate words echoed off the book lined walls and out over the crashing sea beyond the balcony. With his eyes reddened by anguish and shoulders sagging under the weight of his crown, Lelandis stared at Dnara as she stared right through him, her detachment from the world unshaken by his raised voice and pleading gaze. As the unwavering nature of her doll-like apathy set in, Lelandis turned away and stared instead at the dwindling flames of a fireplace now lit mostly by embers.
“I hope you will stand with me, Aldric,” Lelandis said quietly, less a command to his soldier and more a plea to a dear friend. “And in time, forgive me,” he whispered to the dying firelight.
40
“Forgive me.” Muttered words tumbled from dry, cracked lips as all around him, the world moved even as he remained still. Rays of sunlight passed over shut eyelids, but they could not keep the shadows of his mind at bay. He had betrayed her, and then he had lost her. “Please, forgive me.”
“Hush now,” Garrett softly commanded, patting a damp cloth across Athan’s sweat-beaded brow. “There’ll be time enough to seek forgiveness once you
