The Fall of Ossard (11 page)

I wondered about that, thinking of the Flet boy who’d died at her conception. Any worries about her true nature faded after they gave her to me to hold. She was amazing, both cute and so very helpless. I knew then that nothing diabolical could hide in such a fragile shell. She was beautiful.

Pedro had been aloof prior to the birth, but the change was stark.

The maid and midwife wiped her over and checked her. They cleaned me, and then brought up the covers, while giving me a damp towel to refresh myself with. They were quick at it, getting us ready to receive my husband, parents, and in-laws. The midwife took the babe, wrapped her in fresh linen, and then sent the maid to fetch them.

I looked to the open doorway, apprehensive. How would he react to his daughter, to the very thing that had imprisoned him? I tensed, trying to lean forward and get the midwife’s attention; perhaps she should just let him see our babe, but not hold her.

He stepped through the doorway, shoulders slumped, eyes downcast, ready to receive the ultimate reminder of his shame. Not a trace of interest or care marked his sallow face, he just wanted this over, not just the day, or the matter of his daughter’s birth, but I think his entire existence.

He stumbled forward, pushed by two sets of grandparents trying but failing to hold themselves in reserve. Three more steps brought him to the midwife.

I opened my mouth to warn her, yet my voice faltered.

She offered him our babe.

I tensed, reaching out a hand.

He finally looked up.

Her eyes remained closed, but her mouth occasionally opened. She didn’t make a sound.

His eyes widened as he took in the sight of her, but he didn’t move to take her.

The midwife held her out to him afresh.

He raised his hands, his shoulders squaring.

The midwife asked, “My Lord and Lady, what will you call her?”

We hadn’t even spoken of it.

My father looked over Pedro’s shoulder. “She’s beautiful.”

The baby then yawned, leaning a little back as she opened her mouth. Her arms appeared, rising out of the linen wrap.

My mother giggled. “She’s gorgeous!”

And Pedro smiled.

Lord and Lady Liberigo crowded past my father to also look upon their grandchild. My father-in-law said, “Beautiful indeed, and red hair - that’s not quite a Heletian trait!”

His wife laughed.

I found my voice, “Perhaps she needs a good Heletian name?”

Pedro looked to me. “Yes?”

I smiled, trying to offer something of a peace between us. “How about Maria?”

His mother smiled. “A good name, your late grandmother’s name.”

My mother added, “And the middle name of
your
grandmother, Juvela.”

Pedro straightened his back, raised his head, and grinned as he drew his daughter to his chest. “She
is
beautiful.” He chuckled and then looked to me. “
Our
little Maria.”

I nodded as both sets of grandparents gave a cheer.

He said, “It’s a good name for such a beautiful little girl.” And with each word his voice grew stronger, finding some of its old depth.

He stood there stroking her, marvelling at what had been made. I saw love in his eyes. My own heart softened at the sight.

He had changed.

In time Pedro and I built a better relationship.

I think he came to respect me; my strength and determination, but there was certainly no love. Maria had bonded us together. Sometimes I wondered if he loved her more than I did - and that would have been a marvel!

In her first season of life, she lost her red hair to have it replaced with something closer to Pedro’s dark locks, and that better matched her olive skin. From me she carried a Flet’s blue eyes and a petite nose. A child of two cultures, a bridge, she bound us together.

My parents forgot their shame, and their household thrived with its close association to Lord Liberigo as did the family business. In so many ways I’d achieved everything I should have. All that was missing was love and its peace.

I came to trust Pedro with Maria, anyone watching them could see the love there. He and I were another matter. Sometimes we sat and talked a little, managing to be company for each other, but more often we didn’t. I could never forget his part in the boy’s murder and the way he’d treated me, but I realised that I could live with it.

As the years passed, he began to talk about his experiences at the monastery, something he shared with me bit by bit. I pitied him when he told me of the season he’d spent enduring confinement in a cramped cell, it damp, dark, and cold, and with the barest of rations. That imprisonment had ended when he finally accepted and confessed his sins.

When he talked of these things he looked to me for understanding. Never did he mention the cults, and I still couldn’t get the words out of my ensorcelled mouth to ask, but I knew he stood ashamed. I think that’s why he wanted to tell me of his bleak time in the monastery. He wanted to show me that he’d not only been punished, but that he’d accepted that he deserved to be.

He truly was a different man.

To see him remorseful gave me hope; maybe I could share my life with my husband and perhaps even come to enjoy it. But such remorse came couched with what had delivered it, the dogma of the Church.

We lived in a grand old house in Newbank not far from my parents. Pedro began working for my father, acting as a liaison between his own father’s contacts and my father’s business.

My own time was lost in setting up our household and tending Maria. I often visited my mother. We saw less and less of Pedro’s family as they realised how much of a shadow he’d become; a man with no spirit.

All the while the kidnappings continued to not only plague the city, but worsen, yet my own magic lay stubbornly idle.

Four years after our marriage day, I took Maria to see an Evoran herbalist down near the docks. She suffered from a regular chill, something that came on seasonally, and that I’d come to think might be brought on by the flowering shrubs that covered the surrounding valleyside.

I took our coach and driver, Kurt, and Maria’s bodyguard, Sef, who’d joined our own household. Ossard’s children were still being stolen, the problem now so bad that it even plagued the Heletian districts.

The thefts occurred in groups twice each season. In each group five children would be stolen, all on the same day between sunrise and sunset. Lord Liberigo had tripled street patrols
and
called up the militia, yet the diabolical crimes persisted.

On the day of the kidnappings, the Cathedral bells would toll out the number of children missing with each newly discovered crime. The macabre practice meant that the people of the city knew on the fifth ring that the danger was over - until next time.

Despite the patrols, and the offering of a generous reward, none of the children were ever found. Rumours circulated the restless city, some blaming the Evoran slave trade, others the Lae Velsanans, or witches, and on occasion even the forbidden cults of the Horned God.

On this day, such a day of misfortune, the Cathedral bells had already rung out four times. It meant that Maria never left my sight, and that we were always accompanied.

The visit to the old Evoran’s shop had been successful. The dark owner had sold me some herbs to stew and give to Maria as a watered broth. As I left the store, I asked Kurt to take us home via the waterfront only streets away. It had been a long time since I’d escaped the confines of Newbank, and I was eager for some of the city’s other sights.

The coach rumbled down the cobbled street and soon rounded a bend to reach the port. On one side stood tightly packed warehouses, stevedoring businesses, and a few rough taverns, on the other the wharves busy with a maze of moored ships and labourers.

A spectacular ship lay moored alongside one of the main piers. Its three masts stood tall, sloping gently backwards, and all cut of silver timber that caught the sun. The graceful lines of the ship meant it could have come from only one place - Lae Wair-Rae.

Lae Velsanans!

My Flet blood cried out at their presence, a chill reminding me of the dark history our two peoples shared. Despite it all I was curious, curious to see a Lae Velsanan first hand, and to have a closer look at their sleek ship.

In the cab of our coach, I leaned across to slide open the port and called to Kurt, “Take us towards that great ship and draw us near. I want to have a closer look.” Sef was sitting opposite Maria and myself, he shifted uncomfortably, but didn’t protest.

Kurt brought us closer before coming to a stop.

The crew hurried about the deck of their great ship and also up a gangplank linking it to the wharf. The uniformed Lae Velsanans carried aboard crates and sacks of supplies. To my surprise, it seemed to be a military ship and not a merchant vessel.

Feeling relatively safe and with my curiosity only starting to stir, I said, “I’m going to get out and have a look.”

Sef helped me dismount, and then lifted little Maria down to put her on the cobbles beside me. She looked about with big blue eyes, setting her long curls to bounce.

I said, “We’re going to look at the ship, Maria.”

“Why, Mama?”

“Because I haven’t seen one so big before. Come along now.”

Kurt stayed with the coach while we walked forward.

I held Maria’s hand tightly as if some part of me expected the Lae Velsanans to turn from their duties and charge. Despite their apparent ignorance of our approach, I just couldn’t forget that these exotic foreigners had tried to destroy my people.

We stopped half a ship-length from the gangplank.

Intricate rigging webbed over the magnificent vessel, all of it artfully reinforcing the ship’s picturesque lines and curves. It may have been built for war, but I felt it could also manage a great speed out on open water. Festooned with brightly coloured flags and tattooed with intricate carvings, it was as much a ship of art as of war. It was amazing.

Behind us, I could hear the banter of a more refined tongue than that of fast-flowing Heletian or rugged and blunt Fletlander. I turned to see three uniformed Lae Velsanans walking towards their ship. They looked to be officers with bands of copper at their shoulders, it clamped over leather armour and sea-green tunics. Nervous, I watched them as they passed.

They all stood lean and tall, taller than men, or the
common
or
middlings
that they called us, and moved with powerful grace. One of them even smiled at me.

My nerves faded.

We watched them board their beautiful ship while the air sang full of their noble tongue. I wondered at my fear; they seemed so civilised. Finally, I said to Sef, “It’s fantastic.”

He nodded, but it was a stranger’s voice that answered, “Thank you.”

We both turned to see a silver-banded Lae Velsanan. His sea-green uniform, light armour, and helmet spoke of his heritage, but his strong face, blonde hair, and blue eyes, startlingly, were those of a Flet. Unlike the others, he stood thickly muscled with a broad chest, and barely reached my own height. He seemed at ease, but still radiated quite a presence.