A Thread of Time: Firesetter, Book 1 (15 page)

“Amyr,” I called, tears threatening at my
eyes.

“Someone get the doctor,” a voice yelled.

“It's too late,” another cried. 

“Oh Amyr!” I wept.  “Let me through!  He's
my cousin, as close to my heart as a brother.”

To my horror, and further surprise, it was
not Amyr who was now dead.

It was Torym who was splayed upon the
road.  Blood was seeping from his eyes and mouth, his skull concaved as if it
had been bashed by a fierce hammer.  A long gash cut across it where a knife
had been drawn.

“One slash,” the voices whispered around
me as I dropped to my knees before Torym.  “The lad killed him with a single
stab of his knife.”

I did not think my heart could manage
another beat, nor another breath would ever fill my lungs.  I collapsed alongside
Torym, who I had imagined would someday lay beside me in a grave.

The villagers thought me mad, for they had
never seen the two of us pass a word, let alone walk hand in hand about the
streets.  But, Amyr knew my heart.  He knew what he promised me years before
and he knew what he had taken from me in just this moment. 

“Why did you do that?” I wailed and keened
as my cousin walked away.  “I hate you.”  I spat upon his shadow and cursed his
name.

At first, Amyr didn't respond, nor offer
any explanation, until he had mounted his horse and resumed his place among the
warrior boys.  He gazed at me with his odd eyes, which burned red like the
fires of the world below. 

“He was not for you,” Amyr said.  “I have
saved you from a lifetime of disappointment.” 

Now, he smiled slightly, a condescending
upturn of his lip, as if I should be grateful, something I never would. 

Forever after, I would hate my cousin. 
Every morning, I would curse his name and never again, would I welcome him to
my home.

Another girl, the farmer’s daughter joined
me in a vigil by Torym's body, until the old men came to collect him and take
him to his grave.  Together, the girl and I walked behind them to the burial
ground.  Together, we recited the prayers for Torym’s soul.

That night, I lay alone upon my cot,
watching the moons rise above the forest trees, listening to Uncle's snoring
from across the room.  Hate for Amyr, like a tiny cancer, began to grow in the
pit of my stomach, filling a void that had once been my hopes and dreams. 

Life for me would never be in a boat upon
the sea, next to the man and children who I loved.  Instead, Amyr had condemned
me to remain forever a maiden, tending to this shop.  Forever, I was destined
to care for the sad, old man across the room.

Chapter 18

Ailana

For a short time, I thought I was in love
with the King, not overly so, just a little bit.  When I spied him from a
distance, or when someone said that he was passing down this hall, or when the
guards made us clear away, my heart skipped. 

Sometimes, I imagined that when he was on
the balcony waving at the crowds, his eyes found me amongst them, and he
smiled.  From my spot far down below, I imagined he could see me smiling back
and mouthing words about his button, which I held tightly in my hand.

“Come collect it,” I would say and imagine
what we might do on that occasion, for it would entail far more than just my
mending. 

He was old though, especially to me, who
was barely twenty years.  He was double my age, or even more so, well into his
forties.  He was widowed and had lost a child, thus the owner of a shattered
heart.  Yet, in my innocence and naiveté, I thought myself solely capable of reassembling
it.

Certainly, I forgave him for his cruelty
to my friend, Lioter.  After all, Lioter should never have conspired against a
king. 

A king was all powerful and entitled to do
as his royal heart wished.  To that end, if he wished for me to join him in his
grand four poster bed, I would have gladly run across the courtyard and climbed
the many stairs to his magnificent suite. 

Although I had never seen it, I imagined
he would have a hearth in his bedroom, which would warm the air to just the
right degree.  On summer nights, the French doors to his balcony would remain
open to let in the fresh ocean breeze.  While lying there, I would wear no bed
clothes so the air could caress my naked body, and the King would like this. 
He would smile and his sad eyes would light with desire and appreciation.

Although, he would give me my own suite,
the King would prefer if each night I dwelled by his side.  While I lay nestled
safely within his arms, satisfied in the knowledge that he needed my love, I
would gaze out at the white crests of ocean foam beneath the golden moons. 

It was just a matter of time.  Each day, I
fingered his button, assured that this was so.  He was only waiting until his
heart was ready to love again.  It was still too soon since the Queen and his
child had passed.  When this business with Korelesk had settled down and his
reign was no longer challenged, surely, he would announce that his heart now
belonged to a Karut seamstress from Farku.

The autumn arrived again and with it, the
news of my grandmother’s death. 

“You must return and help me with the
shop,” Embo wrote.  “I cannot manage it, my husband, and two children all by
myself.  You must come pay your respect to Grandmother, and say your prayers
over her departed soul.”

I tore up the letter and pretended it had
never come, knowing full and well that my prayers would reach Grandmother’s
soul from wherever they were uttered.

On the darkest day of the darkest month,
when the rain fell incessantly in gray sheets, and the color of the sky matched
exactly that of the ocean, a page arrived with a note bidding me attend the
King and bring the button that was missing from his favorite cloak.

The Head Seamstress made a tsking noise
and muttered something about servant girls acting above their station.  I
ignored her and cleaned up my table as if I meant never to return.  Then, I
followed the page across the courtyard to the Big House. 

The boy did not take me to the King’s
office, but rather continued up three flights of the marble staircase to the
very suite which I had imagined in my dreams.  A guardsman stood at the door,
his eyes mocking, a smirk upon his lips, as he held the heavy oak open and
waved me through. 

The suite was not as I expected, for I had
envisioned it filled with light and warmth.  Instead, it was as dark and dreary
as the shore outside and as cold as the ocean.  From what little I could see,
the furniture was old and in disrepair, the floors unswept, and the windows
splattered with sea salt and grime. 

“He’s in the bedroom.  Attend him there,”
the pageboy called, as the door shut behind me, muffling the laughter that he
and the smirking guardsman surely shared.

Briefly, I thought to clean, as if this
mess was entirely my fault.  I could hear my late-grandmother’s voice admonishing
the dirt.

“What man would want to live in a house
that was fit for only animals?  If you wish to ensnare him, make his home a
place that he would desire to be.”

To that end, I removed a wayward sock and
a shoe from the cushions of the couch.  The sock had holes in both heels and
toes, and the shoe’s sole was worn beyond repair.  It saddened me that our king
should live little better than the beggars upon the street when once our
nation, our planet was the envy of the galaxy.

“
’Tis
a pity indeed,” he spoke from
behind me, from the door to the bedchamber, and with his words came the stench
of alcohol-filled breath.  “But, it is not your place to tidy the furniture
when I have maids to do this task.”

“What maids?” I exclaimed, waving a hand
about the room.  “It appears that they have been overly long in attending you.”

“Have they?  Ach, I believe you are
correct.  I did tell them only come when they are summoned, and I have quite
forgotten when I last requested their assistance.”  He laughed a little at
this, clinging to the doorframe where he stood.  “No, my wife, my queen would
never abide this room in such a state.”

I set the sock and shoe down upon the
floor, turning to face the King and await my orders.  Did he mean for me to
repair his cloak, or was I brought here for another reason?

“Neither would my mother,” the King
continued, strolling across the apartment to a small kitchen area, whereupon he
opened the refrigerator.  “Or anyone else who has lived in this suite.  Did you
know, this is the very apartment built by the Great Emperor for his wife?  They
were the first to share a suite together, followed by my illustrious parents. 
All of their ghosts live in these walls.  This entire palace is filled with
ghosts, all of them gazing down at me.  All of them reminding me how I have
failed in the stewardship of their realm.”

The refrigerator door closed, and he
emerged again with a bottle of clear liquid in his hand. 

“It is a curse to have the blood of
glorious ancestors flowing through one’s veins.  One is expected to be just as
great, as if their knowledge has passed to one’s brain through their DNA.”

“You are a fine king,” I said, knowing not
how else to respond.  “You are doing your best.  The circumstances now are
extremely trying.  You are not responsible for the Disease, nor the famine and
poverty that has ensued.”

“I do not need you to tell me this,” he
snapped, bringing the bottle to his lips.  “Do you think I do not know how our
planet has been rampaged?  How my people suffer when there is nothing I can
do.  Korelesk challenges my every step, yet provides no remedies of his own. 
And, then there are those who wish to depose all kings and elect a president. 
I fear I shall be removed in due course for unlike my predecessors, I have
overseen the decline of our once great society, rather than the ascent.  But, I
do not bring you here to garner your pity, or to weep upon your delicate
shoulder.  Rather, I have summoned you only to repair my cloak, to return the
button, so I may go out.  The rains have come and soon will be followed by the
snow, and I am trapped inside this miserable place like a caged animal.” 

He paced across the room, waving his hand
at the filthy window panes which were rattling from the onslaught of the rain.

“There, there, fix my button.” 

He pointed at the cloak draped across a
corner stand, and so I took it, and sat upon his sofa with my needle and
thread.  In the meantime, he indulged in his bottle, wiping the spills with the
back of his hand, all the while muttering under his breath, cursing the
ghosts. 

“My wife was better suited for this job,
than I.  She had a much more level head.  Damn the Disease which took her
life!  Damn Satan for thrusting this plague upon us!  Why did he take all whom
I loved, and leave me here alone?” 

I said nothing, but did my work, letting
him rave and rant with abandon.  Just as I snipped the thread and rose to
present him with his cape, he drained the dregs from the bottom of his bottle.

“Thank you, Miss Ailana of Farku.” 
Instead of taking the cloak, he put his hands upon my shoulders and held me
fast.  “Ailana of the motherland, whose eyes bespeak the wisdom of our elders,
and golden hair mirrors the light of the two moons.  Do you know what I want of
you now, Mistress?”

I didn’t answer, for I suspected, but was
too afraid to voice the thought.  My heart was pounding so loudly, I feared he
could hear it.  I had dreamed of this, but now, I wished for nothing of the
sort.  His breath, strong with the drink, nearly made me retch. 

“Come,” he ordered, and tossing the cloak
upon the floor, he pulled me into the bedchamber, his steps unsteady. 

The bedroom was as bad, if not worse, than
the rest of the suite, for clothes were strewn about the room, and giant plumes
of dust rose as we walked through them.  The bed itself was not the elegant and
inviting four-poster of my dreams, but rather, a tussled mess of well-worn
sheets and wrinkled blankets.  They reeked sourly from lack of washing, after
hosting sweaty bodies, and they were dusted with cigarette ash.

“No,” I said, although my voice was barely
that of a whisper.

“Do you know what I do not have?” he
cried, overly loudly, clearly drunk and without care.  “I have no heir.  I
leave this land nothing, but an empty throne.”

An heir.  I thought on this.  An heir, a
king who could be my son.  I could do this.  I could provide him with that
which he was missing.

Closing my eyes, I ignored his filthy bed,
his foul breath and temperament, and I did what I had been brought there to
do. 

It was neither pleasant, nor unpleasant,
merely a task for me to perform.  Fortunately, it went quickly and satisfied
him well enough, after which, I gladly took my leave.  He had no objection as
he was quite content, snoring drunkenly, spread out upon the bed. 

Two days later, it was announced that King
Mikal was deathly ill.  The Disease which had taken his wife and daughter
before him, was in his blood, and he was suffering a spell.  He had retreated
to his suite and was attended by physicians who would do their best. 

Weeks later, I feared I had contacted the
Disease, too, for I did not know how it spread, and neither did I know the
symptoms of a quickening in a womb. 

For days, although I worked at my sewing
desk, my head felt as if it was in a spin.  I became clumsy with my stitches
and extraordinarily slow in all my work.  When it was clear I could no longer
manage even the simplest of tasks, the Head Seamstress dismissed me. 

With nowhere else to go, I returned to the
place of my birth, the tiny corner of Farku, the ghetto filled with those
descended from the motherland. 

“It is good that you have returned,” Embo
declared by way of greeting.  “You can manage the shop while I tend to my
children.”

“But, I am ill,” I insisted.  “I cannot
work.”

Embo eyed me critically and tapped a foot
against the floor. 

“You are no more ill than any other woman
has been.  Who was he, a poor student, or a cavalier professor who didn’t know
your name?”

“Neither,” I mumbled, and stumbled to my
old room.

Two weeks later, Embo produced Pellen from
the village pawnshop.  He brought me a bouquet of roses in many colors, and
blushed shyly in my presence.  His hands trembled when he touched mine and
sweat formed upon his brow. 

“He is a good man,” Embo proclaimed.  “He
will take care of you and love you with all his heart.”

“I don’t love him,” I muttered, staring
out the window of Embo’s kitchen, imagining the King dressed in his heavy
cloak, wandering the countryside under this same rain. 

“It doesn’t matter who you love.  You are in
need of a man and home.  You could do worse than Pellen.  He will treat you
like a queen even though you don’t deserve it.  He doesn’t know of your
condition, so I suggest you complete your courtship at a rapid pace, before it
becomes clear that what you carry is not his.”

Pellen’s looks were nothing, and his
conversation was just as plain, but he was kind and brought me flowers at every
visit.  I grew ill, I thought with the Disease, and would often retch
immediately after he left.

“Marry him and move to your own flat!”
Embo ordered.  “Your malaise is making me ill.”

I assumed my days were limited, and grew
indifferent to how they would be spent.  Within a week, I was married to
Pellen, and six months later, instead of dying, I produced a tiny and sickly
infant boy.