The Beginnings Omnibus: Beginnings 1, 2, 3 & Legend of Ashenclaw novella (Realm of Ashenclaw Beginnings Saga) (39 page)

Only the events of my impending future will confirm that,
he thought as he exited the room.

“Tell Tiyarnon I shall return shortly to discuss the details,” Garius called after Elec as he headed toward the main meeting room and the opportunity of a lifetime.

Rose Thorne sat comfortably on her living room sofa in her home, which was located in the Commons District of Oakhaven on the Street of Jackals. The Commons was where the multitude of laborers and craftsman made their homes, and was the largest of all of Oakhaven’s districts. It was also referred to as the ‘less-fortunate’ section of town. Rose knew. She preferred this area and remained here to keep up appearances. It did her well to behave as if she were deprived in order to blend in with the common folk.

She sat with her feet up on an end table and a glass of wine in her hand. It was just after Sun’s Peak on The Second Day of Holy Enlightenment when she heard a knock upon her door.

She stood up, placed her glass down and slowly walked to the door, pausing for a moment.

“Yes?” Rose asked.

“I am a representative of the High Council, my lady,” returned a voice from the opposite side of the thick door.

“One moment,” Rose called out. She quickly went about disarming a crude trap aimed at her front door that she had set to ensure that if anyone forced entry, they were assaulted by a pair of bolts fired from concealed crossbows. Once finished, she returned to the door.

“I am here,” Rose called. She slid the bolt and threw open the door.

“You are hereby summoned to the Hall of the High Council on official business,” announced an unknown man as he handed Rose a rolled-up parchment with the official seal of the realm,
 a stylized dragon seal, set on it. “This is your invitation.”

Rose didn’t even acknowledge the man as she received the parchment, shut the door, broke the seal of the document and unrolled it. It read:

‘You are hereby summoned to the Hall of the High Council to confirm your presence as a member of the chosen ones led by the Order of the Faceless Knights. Please pack a travel bag and make arrangements to be gone from Oakhaven forthwith. Time is of great import. Understand that you will be given details of the journey upon your prompt arrival.

Sincerely,

Tiyarnon,

High Priest of The Shimmering One and Main Spokesman of the High Council.’

Rose Thorne smiled.

She was finally going to get a chance at setting her extensive abilities to task on something worthwhile. She had gotten much enjoyment from the life she had made recently in Oakhaven after a childhood full of abuse and misery, but here was her chance at something she hadn’t even conceived of until very recently. She immediately went to get her things packed. A series of exploits and thrills awaited her in the very near future.

Saeunn was roused from her slumber by a voice in the distance that seemed to grow louder each minute.

“Saeunn!”

Her mother stood over her, waking her forcefully from her sleep.

Saeunn shot up, chased away her dreams, and rubbed her eyes. She hadn’t slept much in the past month, so it was no surprise that she slept so deeply now. Pure fatigue had finally caught up with her.

“A servant arrived with this,” Huuna told her excitedly, shoving a parchment in her face that was marked with a noble seal.

Saeunn’s eyes widened, looking like giant pools of emeralds, and with a noticeable conveyance of surprise followed by delight. She ran a hand through her long, blonde locks as she stood unashamed by her bare body and took the parchment from her mother’s outstretched hand. Her mother fetched her robe and placed it over her back and shoulders. Saeunn did not notice at all as she slowly broke the wax seal.

She unrolled it in eager anticipation and looked at the symbols on the parchment. She embarrassingly handed the note back to her mother with a frown. In her excitement, she had forgotten that she could not read.

Her mother took the parchment and hugged her daughter, attempting to comfort her from her obvious shame. “I cannot read either, Sae,” Huuna reminded her daughter. “I merely meant for us to find someone who could read it for us.”

The two of them ran out into the common area of the facility.

“Could you read this for us?” Huuna asked one of the servants there. The older, leather-skinned woman looked at her with a saddened expression and shook her head, indicating that she could not.

“Take it to Logan,” the servant suggested, pointing to the stairwell of a hallway that led to where a man conducted his business for the city of Oakhaven. “Logan is a bookkeeper for the city and works for the Guild of Lawyers and Scribes.” Saeunn followed Huuna up the stairs in a rush and burst into the room where the man they assumed was Logan, was engrossed in writing. He was an older gentleman, with shades of gray in his long hair.

“Can I do something for you?” Logan asked, not even looking up from his parchment. When he received no answer, he looked up to regard the two of them conveying an expression of irritation. He removed his spectacles from the bridge of his nose, revealing a pair of intelligent, blue eyes. However, upon registering the cause of the interruption, he quickly changed his demeanor to a friendlier one.

“I am sorry to interrupt,” Huuna offered. “I have here an important document addressed to my daughter.”

“I would like it very much if you could read to us the message,” Saeunn took over for her mother, almost pushing Huuna over to stand before him and handing him the parchement.

“Be careful there,” Logan scolded Saeunn. “Do not be rude to…?” Logan let the question hang, allowing the woman he was helplessly staring at to respond to the question.

“Huuna,” she said. “I am Huuna of Chansuk.”

She was immediately uncomfortable in the man’s presence as she felt his eyes upon her in an intrusive way. She understood that the man was interested in her or otherwise flirting. It was an odd feeling for Huuna, having been wed to such a strong specimen of a man for the entirety of Saeunn’s lifetime. This man was a different type altogether than the barbarians of her tribe, and she did not know how to react to him.

Huuna immediately felt at fault for several reasons and blushed in embarrassment. She had not felt the same attraction to Logan that he obviously felt for her. She became visibly flustered, but Saeunn, eyes still focused on Logan with the parchment held in front of her, completely missed both the exchange and the changes in her mother’s expression.

Logan took the parchment from Saeunn, forcing himself to disengage from Huuna’s countenance. He unrolled the parchment and replaced his spectacles on the bridge of his nose and read it aloud.

As he finished, he removed his spectacles once again and handed the parchment back to Saeunn, looking up to witness a distressed Huuna.

“Are you all right?” Logan asked her, sincerely concerned for her at this point. “If I have upset you or offended you in any way, I am deeply sorry. I did not mean to—”

“No.” Huuna pulled herself together enough to speak. “I have recently lost my husband and my home. I am feeling a bit foolish as well and wish to return to my room. It is not your fault.”

“I see,” Logan responded, his expression indicating that he’d felt badly now for making her feel uncomfortable.

“I am deeply sorry for your loss,” Logan added, genuinely embarrassed for his actions. “All of them.”

Huuna turned back around nodding in respect now to this gentleman, who obviously meant no harm or ill will toward her. Then she headed toward the door.

“Let me extend my services to you in case you want to learn how to read or write,” Logan called after the departing Huuna, causing her to pause a moment again and nod politely to him before continuing on her way.

Saeunn turned to the man after her mother had left, realizing now that she’d missed quite a bit.

“I know you meant no disrespect, but my mother is in no condition to receive your…friendship,” she began to explain in a firm voice. “Our home has been overrun and she is in deep mourning—as am I—over the loss of my father and our kin.”

Saeunn simply stared at Logan, trying to make the man understand what they had been through. “The pain goes deep and is very fresh. If you intend to befriend her, she will need time.”

“Again, …I am truly sorry,” he started to say, and then simply waved her away. “I did not realize what you and yours had experienced. Please extend my deepest regrets to your mother. And good luck with…everything.”

Saeunn thanked him and exited the room.

A short time later, Saeunn was storing her belongings and feeling badly about having to leave her mother after promising the contrary to her father, Scarr. She stopped packing and looked at Huuna, who seemed to be doing a bit of soul searching too.

Huuna was thinking about her husband and her home and the loss she felt, then about the encounter with Logan, which shook her world to its foundation. It affected her greatly in so many ways that she did not realize. She shook it off and suddenly became mindful of her daughter’s plight and so refocused her attention from her own problems to those of her daughter’s.