The Forgotten (The Lost Words: Volume 3) (48 page)

I am the king
, he thought incredulously,
but my choices are made for me. When my father peppered my tongue, when he lashed his belt against my back, when he died and I felt a wave of hot relief, when I hunted animals and bandits in the desert, when I rode out to avenge the honor of my nation. When Vlad died because of everyone’s mistakes, and when I thought that death could be justified somehow through gallant deeds. When I appointed Sasha to lead the princedom because there was no one else suitable
.

He had not chosen any of this. He had not wanted any of this. He had not wanted to name his sister the ruler of the new princedom. He had not wanted to slight his dukes and brand them with shame for their incompetence. But that was how things were, and as a king, he had his duty.

I do want peace
, he told himself. Lady Lisa was right. He had to make good from this misery called Athesia.

“Is there no other choice?” he asked hopelessly.

Sasha put her hands on his shoulders, almost affectionately. “Brother. Lady Lisa tells a lot of things that are true. And maybe even wise. But you forget. She is the mother of the deposed empress of this realm, and her
duty
is to see the people of Athesia thrive. Don’t you see? Lady Lisa was married to Adam the Godless. She is not just some bereaved mother tired of all this killing. She is your deadly enemy. She is making you lose this war. Ask her if her husband was so lenient with his foes.”

“Emperor Adam did spare the city and its people,” he tried.

Her brows shot up. “Oh, the city will be spared. I do not wish to see Roalas burn. This is my prize, this is my court, and I intend to keep it. But, dear brother, Emperor Adam murdered his enemies to the very last one. He was compassionate after he killed everyone.”

Sergei swallowed. He was feeling miserable. He was hoping he could put away the pain and focus on making a life. He frowned. “I did win this war. Now, it’s time to be merciful.”

Sasha shook her head. “Brother, the war is not over yet. As long as Amalia and James live, the war rages on. Let me finish it for you. For the sake of Athesia. For the sake of Parus. Please.”

The king leaned against the desk. His eyes fell on the two letters, then the message from the north. Emperor James was his enemy. The young lad did not seem burdened by ideals of peace and reconciliation. He was leading his army from one town to another, liberating them to his cause. His goal seemed quite clear, and that meant purging the Parusites from Athesia.

Am I being a fool or a great leader?
he wondered. A man could only do as his choices offered him. Sasha might be cruel, but she was his sister, and he loved her, despite all her failings. She was the only one who truly, deeply understood his pain, his grief, his bitterness. She had her own share, but she had always been stronger than him.

Sergei rubbed her hand. “May the gods and goddesses bless your mission, Sister.”

Sasha smiled. “They will, Brother. They will.”

CHAPTER 35

E
wan frowned at the text before his eyes. “
Kabah
,” he read awkwardly.

“No,” Naman said, looking at him intently. “No, the tone is guttural. R-r-r-r-r-r-r-r.”

Ewan swallowed. “H-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h,” he tried, and managed to spit.

The fat Oth Danesh smiled. “Perhaps your voice is already too developed.”

“Perhaps,” Ewan agreed wearily.

Like most days, he was caged in his ugly palace, on his ugly throne, talking to Naman and through Naman, to his frightened subjects, trying to piece shreds of tales and fables and dusty ancient history into meaningful information that would help him understand who he was, why he had the special powers, why he was invulnerable, and why he needed no food or water.

Nothing, so far.

Ewan rapped the top of the small table balanced on his knees. For some reason, these people believed he liked being close to the floor. Even the writing board had tiny, stunted legs, so if he wanted to maintain a pose ever so slightly more comfortable, he had to place it in his lap.

He was feeling rather irritated with Kamar Doue. Weeks had passed, the wretched gut feeling only intensified, and the answers eluded him.

He pushed the desk off his folded legs, and it rattled to the floor, the books and papers scattering, gliding farther than he would have expected. Naman wrung his hands nervously, and that stab of cold fear filled his eyes. Ewan hated the fact his presence invoked that emotion. What had he done in a lifetime he did not remember to cause that?

“I want a normal desk. And a chair. Like in the realms,” he said. For more than three months, he had put up with the weird ideas and customs the folk of Kamar Doue had, but he could no longer stand it. No more.

Naman bowed slightly. “I will order the carpenters to make one today.”

Ewan felt his anger oozing away. He felt foolish. He should not be angry with the people around him. He had come to this strange place of his own volition.

“Why is my throne a pile of cushions and rags? Why am I writing on the floor?” he asked.

His mentor seemed confused for a moment, but that twitchy, half-terrified smile remained plastered on his lips. “We…read in the books you always wanted it this way, so people would have to grovel before you. And you had clerks writing like this. It amused you.”

Ewan looked around the empty chamber; without the heads, it was larger than the first time he had entered, but even so, the dome felt close and oppressive. The air stank of too much food and spices, of fear. Over time, he had gotten used to the sight of a dozen servant girls groveling round the hall, waiting for his whim, mercy, and pleasure.

“Where did you read that?” he asked darkly.

Naman pointed at the scattered volumes. “In
The Pains of Memory
. In our books.”

All of a sudden, Ewan’s stomach tingled. Almost involuntarily, he stared north.

He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, trying to keep desperation from his mind. A mountain of books written in an alien manuscript, in a foreign language, supposedly held the key to the chest of secrets that was his life. He had been trying to master the Oth Danesh tongue, but it was more difficult than he had expected, especially with his thoughts burdened with confusion. Worse yet, the dialect in those old tomes was obscure, forgotten, and only a few of the people in the city could read it. Which meant Ewan’s learning was slow, laborious, rife with errors and frustration.

He did not want to rely on Naman telling him what he wanted to hear, but it seemed he would have no choice. He would have to trust the fat man.

I am trying too hard
, Ewan thought. Perhaps he should not try to unravel an age of mystery. Perhaps he should start with simpler, more immediate things. But not here, in this cage. He rose, not a single cramp in his tireless legs. Most men would find the cross-legged position unbearable after a while. It all made him wonder, these little details, these little terrors.

Who am I?

He left the hall, Naman trailing after him, trying to don his winter coat. In the square outside the palace, the few citizens who happened to find themselves in his line of sight dropped down to their knees and palms, awaiting his wrath or praise. Three months since arriving in the city, he still could not get used to their reactions.

Wordlessly, Ewan walked over the snowy ground and headed away from the narrow, cluttered streets, heading for the
lake’s shore. The white layer lent everything a softer, more serene quality. Ugly little details were covered or blunted, hidden away, and he could almost forget the fact people would never look him in the eye, that they gave him a huge berth when they could or scraped against the walls and the road’s dirt and filth when they could not. Even toddlers were indoctrinated enough to keep their baby mouths shut, and if they failed the parents’ lesson, the lashes came quickly, harsh and brutal.

Life ceased around him as he trod down the foreign alleys, every doorway, every cellar crammed with extra people and their cooking pots and little hide tents. Kamar Doue was bursting with newcomers. Since he had stepped into this new world, many other faces had come. The people of Oth Danesh, drawn from all the corners of their kingdom, their lineage as obscure as everything else. Like one, they stopped doing whatever they were about to do and lowered their faces to the cold, wet ground. Only when he walked past far enough did they dare resume their activities.

“Why do your places have no names?” he asked Naman, a question that had been burning in his head for weeks now. He had hoped the books would tell them, but he was yet to read a single page on his own.

Naman pulled the rim of his fur cloak closer to his neck. “That way, if one of us is caught, they cannot divulge where they come from.”

Ewan frowned. “But the pirate coves do have names,” he protested.

Naman reached behind him and pulled his long gray braid from below the cloak and let it dangle outside in the crisp air. “They…are outcasts, rebels.”

“Rebels?”

Naman puffed, his breath misting. They were following a sloped street, its few flagstones slick with wear and ice, shiny
like a hipbone picked clean by worms. The old man was balancing with his fat arms out, wriggling up and down in tiny, jerky motions.

“Yes.”

“Tell me more,” Ewan goaded.

Naman grimaced with concentration. “Back in the old age, we were banished from the Old Land, sent here, and forbidden to return. The people of the Old Land had their wizards put powerful wards in the northern desert, in a circle, all around their realm, so we would not be able to cross. Over time, the judgment was forgotten, the meaning of our banishment replaced with the routine of life. The wards weakened and even vanished altogether. But our leaders knew we must not cross north. We were forbidden by our king.” His eyes flicked up.
Our king, you
, they said.

Ewan did not interrupt.

“But some among the people grumbled. They no longer believed the ancient edict and thought it was only a silly tale. So they decided to form their own league, and they set off from the villages and towns and settled on the coast. They became fishermen and sea voyagers and corsairs, and they named their docks so they would know where to return and so that foreign people would be able to find their harbors.”

They reached flat ground again, and the man folded his arms. “Over the centuries, more folk followed after the rebels and settled near the shore, but out of fear and reverence, they kept their cities unnamed, as we were ordered in the ancient times. Those loyal to our vigil stayed inland and never ventured north, and we named no cities but this holy place—so you would find your way back to us.”

The lake stretched before them, a leaden sheet, perfect without a single ripple. Two tiny boats floated some distance
from the shore, fishing in the icy water. The rest were laid out on the pebble beach in neat rows, the smaller ones turned upside down and coated in tar, the bigger ones grounded in dammed channels. Come the spring, the dams would be broken and the little inlets flooded again, allowing the barges to venture out to the lake once more.

There was a lot of filth and dross everywhere, rotten lake-bottom grass, semieaten carcasses of tiny fish, bits of driftwood, broken glass and oars, tatters of sails and nets, bones, broken crates, ropes that looked like snakes.

“But we forbid the pirates from coming to our towns. They are sullied, so they cannot leave their docks. Whatever goods and people they bring from the foreign lands must be passed on to the loyal Oth Danesh first, and only then travel elsewhere.”

Ewan listened, fascinated, trying to snag flakes of truth about himself from the story. Had he really ordered these people to stay here and wait for his return? Was that in another time, in another body? He had no memories of any life before this one. His mind swam with the surreal, dreamlike experiences from the Abyss, but that was different.

“You are two peoples, then?” he concluded dumbly.

Naman nodded. “Yes, we are. And we keep our creeds and lives separate. We do not venture beyond our borders; they are not allowed to step beyond the shoreline. We hope you are not displeased.”

“About what?” Ewan bent down and stared at the pebbles. Each on had its own grain, its own shape. Most were soft gray, with veins of pale colors striated through the mineral.

“We tried to maintain our promise as best as we could. But so much time has passed, we just could not convince everyone to remain faithful. We did not want to risk a war with our
brothers and sisters; we knew you would not want us to die for nothing. So, we stayed apart and tried to live as best we could with the sins of our kin.”

Something nagged at Ewan’s conscience, the one sentence from the start of the story.
If one of us is caught
, he remembered.
Caught by whom? What could they possibly tell?
Everyone knew where the Oth Danesh lived, more or less. People from other nations traded with them. He had glimpsed all sorts going through this strangely lush land.

Ewan picked up a lovely round stone in his palm. With effortless strength, he tossed it away, almost as far as an arrow would fly from a longbow. Naman watched with terrified fascination. The pebble sank into the gray water with a tiny splosh maybe a few paces away from the nearest boat. The fisherman inside looked sideways, but did not notice the throw.