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March 18, 1189
"Really?" Rona leaned forward in her seat, grimace sinking. "Huh. I won't pretend to know Morgan very well, but she's always struck me as... content, I suppose."
A little queasy, Vera nodded. There was a lot to be said about the ability to keep one's cool, but Morgan had taken everything in stride for too long. Hell--even Vera wouldn't have guessed anything was wrong if Morgan hadn't told her. And she'd lived with her for years now! "She's grown restless with contentment. She spends most of her life helping other people, and she's so independent that it's difficult for anyone else to know how to help her. Not that it's a bad thing to be independent, but..."
"But she needs a bit of a break."
"Exactly."
Should she have been talking about this, though? Rona had said it herself, after all: she didn't know Morgan well. If Vera had to discuss Morgan with someone, shouldn't it have been Lucien or Cherry or Lettie? Rona was only here because both sets of children had been in need of a play date, because Vera still had an extra crib from the twins that little Celina could nap in, because Lonriad had wanted to go look at hunting dogs with Ashe, and Vera's house was close enough to the kennel to make a good meeting place. Delicate conversations were not the purpose of the visit.
But Vera, apparently, had grown worried enough that she'd ask just about anyone.
"She needs to have some fun. And maybe she's grown to used to spending time with people who are a lot like her. There's nothing wrong with that, of course, but maybe she needs someone complimentary. They could balance each other out."
Why had Rona looked over at her husband when she'd said it? "Rona, I don't know if Morgan's looking for romance."
"Perhaps not. But if she should happen to stumble upon it, surely that would ease her burdens somewhat? Little Viridis would have a father, and they'd have two incomes, and she'd have more time to work on her writing and pursue some other things that make her happy."
"Well, maybe. But I don't think she's looking for just--"
A loose stair creaked. Ashe managed to jump the opportunity. "Hello, Morgan."
"Hello." Morgan cleared the last few steps and greeted the couple with a forced smile. She hadn't heard much, had she? It wasn't as if anything nasty had been said, but still--it wasn't any of their business. "Celina and Renata were stirring a little, so I lent them a few of Viridis's stuffed animals."
"Sweet of you, but you're not a nanny." Rona gestured to the seat beside Vera. "Please, join us."
"All right." Morgan strode over and took the chair. Vera wondered if Rona had anticipated what she said next. "What are we talking about?"
"Oh, just idle chatter before my brother gets here," Vera half-lied. Across the table, Rona's eyes lit. "He and Ashe are going to look at some hunting dogs."
"Oh!" Rona sprung from her slouch in mock-alarm--much to Ashe's surprise, Morgan's puzzlement, and Vera's horror. "Oh, no! I'm sorry, darling, but you can't accompany Lonriad today. I just remembered!"
Ashe, of course, did not. "Remembered what?"
"Dinner with my mother and stepfather, remember?" Surely, even Lady Celina and Sir Ovrean hadn't 'remembered'. "We'll have to round up the children and leave fairly soon if we don't want to be late."
"Are you sure it's tonight? Because I think I would have considered that when Lonriad--"
"Of course it's tonight! How could I have forgotten? My mother even sent a messenger over yesterday!"
"I don't recall a messenger--"
"You were busy." Rona stared at him, brows arched, willing it to be true. Or true enough.
"I don't--"
"What's going on here?"
In through the front door stepped Lonriad. Vera swallowed. Her brother, she'd been told--she never would have thought so on her own--was a handsome man, tall and silky-haired and olive-skinned. As he brushed his shoulder, his wedding band flashed. Its twin was six feet beneath the ground, but it had been long enough that a second marriage would not be untoward. And he was young enough that it would not be unnecessary.
Damn it, Rona! "Just waiting for you, brother. Nothing else."
"Oh, if only!" Rona practically danced out of her chair, slippers skipping against the floorboards as she moved to greet Lonriad with a hug.
"I must apologize, Lonriad, but I'm afraid there's been an oversight."
"What sort of oversight? Did poor Lemons hit her head and gain a personality fit for a hunting dog?"
"If only!" Rona laughed. "You see, it completely slipped my mind that Ashe and I are supposed to dine with my parents tonight, so I'm afraid he won't have time to browse the kennels with you."
"Really?"
"I could go with you," Vera offered as a saving grace. Surely Rona's meddling was the last thing either Morgan or Lonriad needed.
"Sweet of you to offer, Vera, but you'll be up all night with your lesson plan if you go." Rona winked at her--oblivious, apparently, to the intent behind that statement. Oblivious, or dismissive.
"You know," Ashe mused, rising from his own seat, "it's not that late in the day.
"Maybe if we go now and don't stay long--ow!"
He grabbed his arm and massaged, annoyed. Rona shook her head. "My mother wanted us there early, remember?"
Ashe opened his mouth to say something, but Lonriad beat him to it. "Ah, it's just as well. Come to think of it, I'd better keep my money away from the kettle master until his son apologizes to Adonis anyway."
"Of course you should." Did Rona think Vera didn't noticed the giddy sway in her stance? Did she think Morgan didn't notice? "But the afternoon needn't be a total waste. Perhaps Morgan would care for a walk around the village? She probably hasn't had any fresh air today."
Lonriad shrugged. "I suppose that's not the worst idea in the world. Care to get away from these lunatics for a while, Morgan?"
If not to the idea, Morgan was at least amiable to the phrasing. "Please."
NEXT CHAPTER:
July 26, 1188
It had been a closed-casket funeral.
Arkon had been a handsome boy, their mother always said. He had their father's soft blond hair, the Mokonri eyes, and their grandmother's flawless skin. The horse had seen fit to remedy that. One eye had swollen shut, and Aerina had had to shave part of his head to administer the stitches. His body hadn't been unscathed either. A broken leg, several broken ribs... one of which had nearly punctured his lung. It hadn't had to, though. The damage to Arkon's head had been enough.
One stupid accident, and his parents' handsome, strong, clever son--Severin's kind and generous brother--was gone.
And clumsy Severin with his crooked nose and his over-sized feet was still here.
His parents were no strangers to losing children. Severin's sister Nearina had a twin who'd died before her second birthday, before Severin and even Arkon were born. He himself had had a twin sister too, and her life hadn't been much longer. But they'd scarcely had a chance to know Alina or Lileina--none of the family had. They'd known and loved Arkon for thirteen years. Severin had known and loved him all his life.
He didn't know how to not have a big brother.
"You'll be all right, Sev."
Severin stiffened. It was Arkon's voice. But it couldn't have been Arkon.
Could it?
"Things will be rough for a while, but you'll be fine. Same with our sisters, and our parents. You'll make an excellent heir for father. You'll be a great knight, you'll marry a gorgeous woman, and you'll live a longer time than a lot of people around here."
Was he insane? Or was it just the grief, the trick of a troubled mind in an attempt at healing itself? "Arkon..."
"Don't worry about me. I'm not anywhere horrible. Death is a temporary thing anyway, it turns out; I'll be back on earth in some form or another in a couple centuries.
"Just name your first son after his uncle, all right?"
NEXT CHAPTER:
May 15, 1188
Searle couldn't take it any more.
Sparron had been gone for over a year. Sparron, gone, without any warning, without any closure. The love of his life, out of the world forever.
And then, only a month ago, his older brother had died too. Jadin, his protector and champion, the one person who'd indulged his weakness without thinking him weak. Jadin was gone, and he'd taken whatever stability Sparron had left behind with him.
Searle had been a burden to Lettie and children, his father and stepmother long enough. His remaining siblings were there, but he'd never been particularly close to any of them. Lonriad was the closest, maybe, but he had problems of his own. At least Lonriad still had his champion in Raia. Raia would indulge Searle if he dropped in on her, but they'd never had much in common. Lonriad had always been the more worthy project there.
As for his younger siblings... well, shouldn't he have been the one looking out for them? Not the other way around?
What the hell was wrong with him? He was an adult. Sure, losing loved ones was difficult, but why couldn't he take care of himself like everyone else? Was he not a complete person on his own? Was there some part of him missing--
Yes. Yes, there was. That was Sparron. And now every loss since and to come would be that much harder.
He didn't think he could lose anyone else.
But the only way that could happen was if he was next.
Maybe that was why he'd left the castle, wondered off into the woods. His feet knew he was a waste of space, and his head had just caught up. Maybe he'd call out for Deian. Beg that creature to put him out of his misery. Surely Lettie and the children would be better off without him. And his parents and siblings, maybe it would be easier if they lost two close together. Maybe it was the kindest thing he could do for--
"Searle!"
"What are you doing out here?"
NEXT CHAPTER:
May 14, 1188
Vera shut the door slowly behind her, not wanting to wake Lucien. Their door had been unlocked tonight, much to Morgan's relief. She'd been able to nudge Vera awake without disturbing the man beside her. Lucien was the heavier sleeper of the two anyway, but not to the point where a knock wouldn't have jolted him awake. Morgan--or whoever needed her--only needed Vera.
"What's going on?"
Morgan swallowed. Thank God it was Vera. Anyone without an inexplicable power of their own would dismiss her as a lunatic. "I have a feeling.
"Someone needs you." As if Vera didn't have enough going on. After who knew how long of trying, she and Lucien had finally conceived their fourth child, still in the delicate early stage of pregnancy. Add this to the lingering shock of her brother's death the month before and her other brother's failing marriage and she was nearly the last person Morgan cared to rouse from what had appeared to be a half-decent sleep. But if she could have helped someone and didn't take that chance, Vera was not the sort of person who would brush that off easily.
Nor was Morgan. "Needs us, I guess. They need me to lead you to them."
"Why me?" Though, something in her worn, tired voice ventured a guess.
"I suppose they need to talk to someone."
"I suppose. Well, I'll help if I can. But if whoever it is doesn't want to talk, I can't reach over to the plane of the dead and drag them here."
A pity. Vera might have wanted another word with her brother. Or her sister, or her mother, or her grandparents. Morgan's husband was there, as was her foster mother, and perhaps her daughter had grown to an age of linguistic consciousness on the other side. Everyone in the kingdom had lost loved ones. Vera might have made a tidy, morbid business if she could summon spirits at will, though Morgan doubted she would have cared for such a thing.
But in this case--she also doubted that the spirit in question would be uncooperative.
"They'll come. I can feel it."
NEXT CHAPTER:
March 15, 1187
Vera had thought it was just her. The first time her mother had come, she'd been alone. The second time, Lucien had been asleep. But she'd assumed that these visits--or whatever they were--were for her and her alone.
But her father saw her. Even if he couldn't fully believe it. Even if his blinking eyes and strained face of forced stoicism wouldn't let him. "Alina?"
"Hello, Severin." She smiled. It looked painful. "I only have a few minutes."
"But how are you here?" How she'd blurted it out this time and hadn't managed to ask last time, Vera didn't know. "You're dead."
"You brought me here, sweetie--or, you could have." Her mother stepped forward and reached for Vera's hair, tucking some behind her shoulder. Her hand was solid as that of a living woman. "There's not much separating the living and the dead, and the line between isn't impassable. Think of yourself as a gatekeeper of sorts."
"Gatekeeper?" As in... she was in charge? This was supposed to be voluntary? "But I didn't bring you here on purpose! Not that I'm not glad to see you, but..."
"I know. I know." Her mother's hand took to rubbing her shoulder, as it often had when Vera was little. Definitely solid. Definitely present. "See, you were upset about the color the first time I came to you, and you were upset about not being pregnant when Sparron showed up. Now, you were upset about telling your father about Sparron. If you're upset, a well-meaning spirit can cross if they're determined enough. The not-so-well-meaning ones are held at bay by other forces."
"But if I wanted to, I could bring someone back without being upset?"
"If they want a few more minutes--though most don't, if they don't have unfinished business. The dead aren't supposed to yearn for the land of the living."
Then what was the use, calling those who didn't want to be called? "How will I know who has unfinished business?"
"If someone wants to cross, they'll let you know. Usually in a dream or something similar. It will mainly be souls asking after people you know; you can't do much for someone whose loved ones dwell on the other side of the globe."
That made sense. She supposed. "Mother, will I see you again?"
"Not while you live, baby." Her mother pulled her into a hug, and a lengthy one at that. No--she would not have held on like that had she planned on calling again. "So, for now, be glad of every day you don't see me. You're young. You have life ahead of you yet."
"I'll miss you."
"And I you--but my place is there, and yours is still here." Her mother gave one last squeeze, then let her go, sighing and smiling all at once. "Say hello to the rest of your siblings for me, and I'll say the same to Viridis and your grandfather from you."
Vera nodded. Her siblings would believe her, even if some needed their father to vouch for it. "Yes, Mother."
"Good." Her mother stepped back. She still faced Vera, but her eyes flicked to her left--where Vera's father stood. "Severin, why are you looking at me like that?"
"I..." He blinked again--once again surprised to see that she remained. "I don't want to see you disappear again."
"I'll warn you when it's about to happen. You can turn around, or close your eyes." Her mother's head followed the lead of her eyes, and her body followed her head in turn. She took his hands in hers, her thumb stroking his knuckle. "I know I'll have to."
They stared at each other a moment, as Vera vaguely recalled them doing every now and then when her mother had been alive, but back then, such moments had been happy--joyous. Here, a thousand conflicting tensions stood between them, the old dreams and the eternal feelings and everything that had happened in the past twenty years. Her father had spent two years getting over her mother, two long drunken years of self-destructive shadow-hedonism that Vera and her siblings preferred to forget. Then he'd married Nora, who'd been a wonderful stepmother, and they'd had their five children. And one by one, Vera's siblings had married and started having children of their own, Vera herself included. Her mother hadn't even lived to see her first grandchild, Raia's Alina, so obviously named for her.
But her mother, from wherever she was, had seen it all, from afar. And she would understand by now that life would go on, with or without her, with or without any of them. That nothing her husband had done meant he no longer loved her, just that they no longer inhabited the same plane of existence. Just that letting go was the hardest thing he'd ever done.
"We won't see each other again for a very long time. Try to remember that that's a good thing?"
Lip caught in his teeth, Vera's father bowed his head. "I don't know what to say."
"Just kiss me once." Her mother drew herself into him, arms to his back. "That will be enough."
NEXT CHAPTER:
March 15, 1187
Severin's remaining adult children, he was lucky to say, all lived well within visiting distance of his castle. Rare was the day when he didn't see at least one of them at some point or another, and indeed, Vera and her eldest would occasionally accompany his younger children and Jadin's children back home after school. But most of them kept their visits to daytime hours, and most of them did have their patterns. Tonight was not a night he would have expected Vera.
That usually wasn't the best of signs. "Something wrong?" He'd thought the color, at least, had vanished some time back.
As she broke from his embrace, she nodded. "I saw Sparron."
Sparron. She wouldn't have come if she'd meant that casually. "After the fact?"
"I think so. But before I heard. Before anyone heard, maybe, except those kids and the guards." She shuddered. The death of an heir never failed to shake the populace, but those in the know had found Sparron's demise particularly surreal. All there was to be grateful for, Severin figured, was that he hadn't perished chasing illusions, as Octavius had long feared he would. "He was in my room, but the door was locked. He talked to me, and I thought I was dreaming. But then the next day, Xeta showed up and told us.
"What do you think it means?"
He'd had nothing when she'd asked him that as a child. He'd gained nothing since. "I don't know, Vera."
"Could it have been a coincidence? Just a poorly-timed dream?"
"I suppose so. I hope so." But his gut nagged at the thought. His and Alina's youngest had been born with an inexplicable connection to the world beyond, a connection even she didn't understand. To outright dismiss the possibility of a visit from the dead seemed a little hasty, and far too optimistic. "Has this happened before?"
"Once, maybe." A tear fluttered from her lashes; she caught it on her sleeve, then dropped her arm back to her side. "Just before the color went."
"Who was it?" Did he want to know? Did she want to tell him? "If you remember."
Vera opened her mouth, but the voice that answered was not hers. Nor did it come from her. "It was me."
It was a voice he hadn't heard in years. It was a voice he heard every day.
NEXT CHAPTER:
March 12, 1187
"Vera?"
Lucien's soft snores ruled him out as the speaker. The voice was too male to be Morgan's and too adult to be one of the children's. That, and Vera knew the door was locked. After some months' debate, they'd reached the half-reluctant decision to try for another baby, and tonight had been the first attempt of what--if the past said anything--would have to be many. The stress of it all robbed the act itself of all enjoyment, leaving her guilty and hollow as Lucien would ease himself out of her, looking down with concern as if he'd done something terrible, all too aware of her translucent lack of pleasure.
Why couldn't it have stayed as it was, that hungry, impassioned lovemaking of their engagement and newlywed days, back when a baby had been inevitable and she'd assumed her fertility on par with that of Raia or Riona? Why had it become... this? This chore, this ache? This futile effort?
"Vera?"
And why did she have to think of this now, again--and just as she'd thought she'd finally found some semblance of sleep, if the voice said anything?
There could not have been another person in the room.
"Vera, please. You're the only one I can talk to."
Her lashes parted and what the room caught of the moonlight leaked in. Surely, she was dreaming. "Sparron?"
Her brothers' friend--her father's friend's son--nodded. Barring their shared scenes in the university's play, he'd never sought her out, except maybe for that one odd party back when they'd been children when they'd awkwardly flirted before he progressed to the apparently more interesting Riona and then disappeared for the rest of the evening. She certainly couldn't have been, as he'd said, the only.
But she stood anyway. It was a dream, after all. Dreams didn't have to make sense. "What are you doing here?"
"I... I need you to pass on some messages for me. I wouldn't have bothered you had there been anyone else; I didn't want to drag another person into this." But there was not making sense, and there was that feeling of having skipped half the pages of a book. "But I guess it doesn't matter now, does it?"
She might have agreed, had she known what 'it' was. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"You'll know soon enough. I don't want to burden you too much when you're tired. But I need you to tell your brother--Searle--" Why wasn't she surprised that it had been Searle? "--tell him that I'm sorry I never said it."
"Said what?"
"He'll know. And he knows I did, but he still wanted to hear it, and I couldn't say it. I wasn't strong enough."
For what? "Sparron..."
"And tell him and Lettie both that they were better friends than I ever deserved. Camaline too. And my father and Jeda... tell them things are better this way. I think they both know, but they may need to hear it aloud."
"How are things bet--?"
"I'm sorry to keep interrupting you, but I'm running out of time." Was she to wake so soon? Just as she'd finally drifted off? "Most importantly, I need you to tell my son that I love him, and that I always will and always would have, even if I'd lost all concept of everything else. Tell him I'm sorry that it wasn't enough, but that I'm not sorry he didn't have to suffer the burden of me. Tell him he'll make an excellent baron and I'm so proud of him."
Even in her dream... why was he telling her this?
"And my daughter, if she ever finds out about me. Tell her I love her, even though I shouldn't."
Daughter? Sparron didn't have a daughter. "Wait, what--?"
She'd cut herself off this time, anticipating an interjection that never came.
He was gone.
NEXT CHAPTER:
"Mother?"
Was she? Others were worse off. Others like the people who kept her up at night. "I just have a lot on my mind."
"Anything I can do to help? I mean, I know I can't help with that, but I could... I don't know. Grade papers or something."
She smiled. The living could at least do that much for her. "I'd like that."
