Lasting Burns
The arrow missed by only half a foot, plunging into the tree at her left.
Emmer did not dare a glance back, but the thunderous pounding of horses from behind was enough to urge her on. Her grasp on the branch was unsteady as she advanced, but with each breath her grip grew stronger. Her focus came and a certain calmness with it. Emmer watched her fingers, numb now from the cold, lace roughly against each tree limb, hooking an arm around the next branch and pulling herself farther into the canopies. It would be harder for them to see her, even in the snow, and more difficult for their arrows to reach her. It was not true safety, but it provided needed cover. The sun sunk low in the sky, rimmed by a blue-hued darkness, as Emmer wove quietly around the spindly arms of the trees. She willed her attention to the climb, and the sound of distant pursuit melted away.
Emmer had been a child of great concentration, brighter than any of her brothers and just as troublesome. She grew up the sole daughter of Earl Roric and Countess Hana of Kale, lord and lady of a Carpannian province in the south. It was not a very large parcel of land, but Carpanne itself was of inconsequential size, cornered by the two much larger countries of Baste and Topus. Carpanne did, however, border a particularly calm region of the Southern Ocean, which lent some much-needed notoriety to the otherwise inconspicuous kingdom.
Yohan and Emmer were closest in age with hardly a year between them. Yet Yohan paraded about as if he were the king of all Carpanne, noble and superior merely by virtue of the year between them. Naturally, however, he did everything first — he began his lessons, learned to ride, went to the capitol with father all before her. He carried on as if he had been given the stars and the moon for that year, no matter that he was the last of six brothers. And so it was that there was no one in all the world that Emmer loathed more than Yohan.
And if his pomp and age were not enough, he was also the first — and only — member of the Earl's immediate family to find himself a Speaker. If one survived the experience, it was a special fortune in Carpanne, and in other lands, to be a Speaker. Yohan and Emmer, by nature, spent heir childhoods together. Their brothers were a great deal older, off becoming proper sons or whatever begged their heed. Emmer would have liked differently, but even Yohan was a better alternative to have on rambles than just herself. It was on such ramble that Yohan slipped into the river. Emmer apologized for every evil thing she had thought of him as she ran beside the river, shrieking and crying as he struggled to overcome the current. Yohan was a weak swimmer, bobbing under the water as the river tumbled him as if he weighed no more than a pebble. It was then that she appeared, his Listener.
She was a lovely thing, Emmer thought, brown and even black in some places. She was bigger than any creature Emmer had come across, and she wondered at the sharp awareness in her eyes. As quick as it had happened, the bear had entered the river and scooped Yohan up. She rolled over the bank, eased him down and waited for him to right himself. It took several coughs, wheezes and a few incredulous glances for him to attend the bear. They stared at one another for a long while until she ambled off into the woods again, Yohan and Emmer behind her. When she begged him for answers, for she had not known what she had witnessed, he refused to say anything on the matter. Yet when he denied her, it lacked his usual authority. Emmer didn't ask him after that, but could not stop herself from demanding answers from her mother as she went to sleep that night:
"Mother, what is a Listener?" asked Emmer, sitting up against her pillows.
"They are a mystery, dear," said Hana softly, "and what it is that makes Yohan a Speaker and not you or your brothers— that is a bigger mystery yet. Don't be too upset, darling. Don't worry."
"But what is a Listener, Mother?" Emmer cried impatiently, waving her hands as if to erase her cloud of jealousy. "Are they all bears like Yohan's?"
"No, Emmer, they are not all bears. They can be foxes or even chickens, I suppose, so long as they Listen," Hana said, a thoughtful furrow in her brow. "Emmer, think of the fire there in your fireplace. Do you remember when you fell into it last year?"
"It burned me," Emmer lay back dramatically, a hand to her leg. "And it hurt and my leg is all wrinkled still."
For added measure, Emmer pulled her gown up one knee, jutting her leg in display. Just below the knee on one leg the skin puckered and colored differently, a wrinkled bit of lighter flesh. Emmer's mother leaned forward and rested her cold hand against the healed burn. Emmer shivered.
"It scarred you," said the Countess, "when your leg touched the fire there. Listeners are like those flames there, Emmer. They flicker in and out of lives, and they leave lasting burns."
"Scars?" Emmer said, head tipped to one side.
"Yes," she said, "but necessary scars."
"What do you mean by necessary, Mother?"
"I told you not to worry, Emmer. You're going to go to bed and dream of wonderfully ordinary things, am I understood?"
Emmer didn't answer but said, "Mother, do you suppose there are human Listeners? You said a Listener could be anything and— "
"No, Emmer, I think not," said the Countess absently, gently pushing her daughter farther into her bed, adjusting the covers as she did so. "It has never been heard of, and is quite impossible."
"But why?" Emmer scoffed, prickling at the finality in her mother's words. How could anything be impossible? It was such an ridiculous thought, that something could never exist because nobody had ever heard or thought of it. Nobody had ever thought of water, and it existed quite without the consent of people. There was a lot of it, too.
"It would be a very unforgiving life for a person, don't you think?" Hana said, more to herself than her daughter. "Though there were once dragon Listeners, they say."
"Dragons?" Emmer said breathlessly, eyes wide and mouth agape. There was nothing Emmer loved more than the idea of dragons. Her eyes went instantly to the pile of books stacked neatly on her mantle, one of which contained a story about a bright red dragon with orange hair. It was true that the story wasn't very nice about the red dragon, calling her a villain of all sorts, but stories never thought very highly of dragons anyhow.
"Dragons," said Hana, a pat to her daughter's bouncing leg. "Though they are, of course, all gone now —"
"What happened to them?" Emmer asked.
"Maybe another night, dear. Not tonight."
"But—"
"Not tonight."
"Mother, if I ever have a Listener, well I'm just positive she'll be a dragon."
"Goodnight, Emmer."
Eventually, and quite throughout the subsequent years, Yohan understood how greatly it aggravated his only sister that he should have a Listener. He grew with a superiority that he could not afford, but his mother was too gentle to think it more than the cavalier of a young man and her brothers far too occupied with their own emerging lives. If her father ever thought ill of it, he said nothing. Yohan eventually outgrew Emmer's company. It bothered her little, but made for a very lonesome time. When they did meet, however, nothing had changed and he always managed to casually remind Emmer of Bear — what he had taken to calling his Listener — with a great air of importance, and leave her again with a simmering jealousy. Emmer had hoped for a great many years that Yohan would come to understand his folly, and the time had come when her wish was granted.
Of all things, he had stolen from a king. With his father on business at the king's estate in Isidrid, Baste's capitol city, he had seen a little sculpture. It was said to not be made of any great material, of a nondescript brown stone, but Yohan had liked the shape. It was a heavy bison that fit in the palm of his hand, and that was the only reassurance he needed as he slipped it into his pocket. He had taken it from the king's gallery without a second thought. Yet it was of Yohan's complete astonishment that the king had noticed the bison's absence and ordered a search of all his guests. When it was found, Emmer's hopes were set in motion.
Lord Kale sent word home of Yohan's imprisonment by the king. It was not long after that the seven of them, Emmer included, huddled together in hushed conversation. They met in Emmer's room, cramped by the presence of one another, but said nothing on the matter. Jebb and Arlyn, as the eldest, led most of the conversation — dissecting the report, grieving the foolishness of their brother and, most dangerous of all, planning a rescue.
"Why should we go, Arlyn? His Highness has never needed our help before," said Onnto. "Stealing from a king? This is bad even for Yohan. He'll be hard-pressed to find sympathy from me. Some prison time would do the boy some good."
"Yohan is most deserving," echoed another.
"Temmis, Onnto," admonished Jebb, waving his hand. "Yohan is our brother. We can't just leave him there. Even if he is a little — brash."
"Brash," snorted Onnto. "And I suppose going barefoot in a Carpannian blizzard is just a little foolish?"
"He'll be killed," Emmer said quietly, holding her knees. "They'll kill him."
Her brothers stopped. In the ensuing silence, Onnto said: "You don't think... Not even a Bastian king would go so far over a little trinket…"
Even as he said it, they all knew it to be true. Baste did not treat foreign criminals, especially Carpannians, with mercy. Their king was not particular known for his malice, but Carpanne and Baste had been on tentative terms for decades, with little thanks to the scuffles between minor border lords. The king was within rights to punish Yohan, and no one would cry out for the life of an Earl's seventh son.
"We have to get him."
The plan had been simple enough. They would travel to Isidrid under the guise of appealing the king, even though Roric himself had made several unsuccessful attempts. They would assess the conditions once they arrived, and the smallest of them, Temmis and Emmer, would travel to the prisons before the sun set. The other brothers had planned on an undetermined diversion, in hopes that they could retrieve Yohan undetected. None of them was hopeful on the journey there, however. It was a four day ride to Isidrid, and they spent most of it quietly, or in low, doubtful whispers.
--
Emmer's fingers went cold, even as she blew warm breath onto them. She paused for a moment before looping herself through the next tree. It was to her benefit presently that she had grown in the company of seven boys, each of whom loved to climb and jump and run. She would need that to fortify her safety, even though she had not seen arrows for some time. The sun had finally set, and the sky darkened with each minute, blazing stars newly visible. She prayed the darkness would be her friend, a cloak to hide herself from the king's men. She hoped the same to her brother's, wherever they had run. Emmer had lost Jebb and Frandis miles back, and she prayed for their safety. Their scheme had had it's successes and it's unforeseen complications. Yohan was out there somewhere with Temmis and Arlyn, if things had worked out accordingly. Emmer laughed unintentionally, short and breathy. Yohan was safe, and she was tiptoeing through the King's Forest for her life.
Emmer's body ached with the journey from Kale to Isidrid, with the pain of the run from the prisons to the forest. King Norn was angry, that Emmer knew. They had stolen Yohan back, and scattered. To Emmer, it seemed he was taking whomever he could — whether Yohan or Emmer herself. His horse had led the several that trailed after, a fierce black creature. Their arrows had come alarmingly close, but the narrow passage of the forest had been a grace, however small of one. It did not, however, stop them. They were slower, but Emmer could not doubt their tenacity.
And then the world was spinning, whooshing around Emmer at a disorienting speed. She hurt, in a strange burst of pain. It felt as though something had ripped through her chest and set her on fire. She cried out at the shock and the pain to her body, the breath pulled from her lungs. When Emmer looked up, she saw the trees and, around her, snow. She coughed and realized, in horror, that she had fallen— loudly. Then she heard the sounds of hooves against the snow, a swift crunching. It was only a single rider, Emmer heard with some relief, until she caught the vision of Norn on his great mare. His hand reached for an arrow and she pushed herself up and ran through the trees.
She knew being small, and fast, was her one advantage to a king with a poised arrow. Though it turned out to mean hardly anything, for an arrow is much faster than an Earl's daughter. The arrow struck her arm, throwing her backwards into the clearing. All her breathe gone from her, Emmer cried out against the sharp intensity of the pain. Her vision blurred, and she was overwhelmed with the need to heave, a sudden sickness seizing her. She turned onto her bad arm and wretched over the snow, gasping from the pain and the sickness and the knowing that she was very soon to die. What chance had she now? Her breath became fast, a panic seizing her rationale. She had never hurt so much, and she was so very afraid. She tried to right herself again, only for the pain to overwhelm her. With a small, desperate cry, Emmer slumped over into the cold, her injured arm limp. She did not yet see him, but she heard the king swing off from his horse and come forward.
Norn entered the clearing, his bow slung to his side as he progressed. His eyes went to her right arm, the one with his arrow pierced through it. As he trudged forward, the snow crunched under his boots, and Emmer heard each step like the loud beats of her heart. She turned onto her back, groaning as she did so, and her breath was hard, labored as she strained to see the king. As he came closer, she considered him. He was no greater than fifty, with unremarkable eyes. He was of medium build with plain, gray-stricken hair, but what struck Emmer most was how kind he looked. He reminded Emmer of her father, with the same round, companionable quality about him. He was close enough that Emmer could see the laugh lines scrunched around his narrow eyes, tense under the pressure of his glare. It was as striking a thing to see him there as it was to view her bright blood against the snow. Emmer touched a hand to her head, vision swimming again.
How could he want to hurt her, coming towards her with a face like her father's? For a brief moment, Emmer looked beyond the king and thought perhaps that it had all be one grand misunderstanding. It was a strange thought that, in future times, Emmer attributed to her desperate, unsteady awareness. For in the next moment, he was over her like a great tree, strong and tall. She loved trees for their rigid and unchanging ways, for their quiet power. The king was like that, quiet but strong. Yet she now saw strength for the terrifying thing that it could be. He wrapped a gloved hand around the arrow in her arm and jerked it from her. She was screaming from the pain of it all, yet he remained silent, his expression carefully blank. He held the bloody arrow in his hand and considered it.
"I promised my men that it would only take one arrow," he said.
No matter how brave she had thought herself, Emmer was afraid to die, especially in such a way. The king maneuvered the arrow into his bow, orienting the tip at her heart. Emmer closed her eyes, so she could only gamble at what kind of face the king made now. Perhaps when she wasn't looking he wore a sorry look, sorry for what he was about to do, or perhaps he wore a silly grin. Emmer cried as she heard him shift the arrow back.
She waited for the sound of its release, even if she knew it would be too fast to discern. And she waited, and waited.
Stop.
She opened one eye and saw the king, arrow still posed, but stopped. His gray eyes were wide, mouth agape. She had not seen a scant of emotion on his face, even as he was poised to release his arrow into her heart.
Stop.
She made a small noise, something between a gargle and a cry. The king blinked and caught her eye.
"Why didn't you tell me you are a Speaker?" Norn said quietly, in somewhat of a mumble.
"What?" she said, for no other word in her vocabulary could quite capture the sentiment.
"You didn't tell me— why didn't," he frowned at her, thought unfinished.
He kept looking at something behind her and, as much as it agonized her to do so, Emmer craned her neck to glance behind. She did not stop to think about Norn's arrow, for she was speechless for the first time in her life. Utterly, truly speechless.
He was a great white creature, speckled with dark spots around his chest and a few, Emmer saw, under his wings. He settled his snow wings quietly, rustling them with his beak before turning his bright, yellow eyes upon Norn. Norn inhaled, swallowed and closed his open mouth. Emmer blinked and, quite ruining the moment of awed silence, heaved.
Norn nodded very briefly at her and, dropping the arrow, trudged from the clearing without so much as a word. He was all black against the snow in his riding gear as he sauntered off. Emmer heard him mount and ride off. She did not truly know to do next. Was she truly so upset that she could just have imagined that Norn, with his arrow readied at her heart, had simply decided to spare her?
The relationship between a Speaker and a Listener is a sacred thing, something said inside Emmer's mind. It was not her voice, she started, but a smoothe, dark tone that she did not recognize.
Norn believes no greater thing, it said again. And rightly.
Emmer opened her mouth to speak, but could think of nothing to say.
The bird, bright against the snow, swooped down before her. She could see him now without becoming sick. He was large, and so beautiful it almost hurt to see him there. She looked into his yellow eyes and understood. He had been the one speaking to her.
He would have killed you, the owl said, if I had not come. But he knows, Emmer — and he would not cross such a bond.
"Norn?" she said. "I don't—"
Norn himself is a Speaker. He understands. He understands and he and you are similar. He would not.
"Speaker—"she said, then stopped. "Me—" and stopped. "You?"
Yes, said the owl, unblinking. I have been Listening to you.
She could feel the blood on her shoulder now, on her side, on the snow beside her. Her head was light, and the voice inside her that was not her own did not steady her.
"But you're not a dragon."
The voice laughed, a deep bell sound as the darkness rolled in.
--
Norn had dismounted some time ago, confused and angry. He ran between the narrow trees, marched through the snow, muttered curses beneath his breath. He could not sort through his thoughts, so distracted was he. He even almost missed the creature as he pushed through some pesky sort of thorn bush. Norn stopped.
"Thorn," said the king, wide-eyed at the hulking bison. "Am I in danger?" Norn glanced around, but Thorn gave a great shake of his head. No, it said.
You are a good man, Norn, said the creature abruptly, but you have stumbled today.
"Thorn, what—"
You were going to kill her.
"I am a king, Thorn. It is my—"
Your anger got the better of you, king. She was no harm.
"Thorn."
The only danger you have become is to others, Norn. You are a good man… good men do not kill without reason.
Norn said nothing.
I will always Listen, Norn. I hope to hear that you have righted what was never meant to be wronged.
"I didn't kill her," Norn said.
No, you didn't, Thorn said, no, you didn't.
--
Emmer had lived her last weeks in two extremes, in fear and happiness. She had never thought to see her family again, trapped beneath the blank eyes of King Norn. She never thought to see the sun or her bedroom again, cried at the loss of the simple joys in her pleasured life. She had taken them all for granted, sorry for all that she had missed and would never again experience. To have them all again was a miracle that Emmer still wondered at.
Even with the ache in her arm, a pain she feared would never wane, her life became a string of fascination. She would be going about her day as she always had when, suddenly, the thought would strike her. She would glance at her mother for a moment, pondering, and decide how beautiful a mother she was. She had always known that Hana, with her pale hair and fetching smile, was quite lovely, but it was somehow different— strange. It was the kind of beauty she could only know by almost losing it, a sensation of thankfulness. She saw it in flowers, in sunlight, in her breakfast— in everything. Though, sometimes, she cried, for as greatly aware of her blessings she had become, the unanswered questions remained. Why Norn has spared her remained a vast mysterious in the few weeks that passed. The only greater question was when he would return, and then she would have to lose it all again. A king was a powerful enemy, and, finally, he had come knocking.
It had taken the household by complete surprise, the visit of the Bastian king. It was one thing for a tightly ran castle to welcome in such an auspicious visitor, but quite another for an unsuspecting manor. Upon hearing of Norn's arrival, Emmer's brothers, all seven of them, returned home with varying looks of brazen defiance. Earl Roric of Kale was, in contrast, much worried. He had been expecting word from Baste for some time, as all eight of his children has crossed the king. That was no small crime. Roric greatly feared Norn's retaliation, and it showed in the uneasy set of his mouth.
"To what do we owe the honor, Lord King?" said Roric.
Norn passed the Earl over, a brief nod in his direction, striding farther into the house. It was a finely kept estate, the king decided, blue-gray eyes sweeping over the manor's belongings. Yet it was not half so fine as Norn's stead in Isidrid; it was clean, and perhaps a dash simple, but it was certainly accommodating for a man of rank.
Roric's sons stood in two crooked lines beside Norn, each dipping into a shallow bow as the king passed. At the end of the brothers, he saw her. Her dark eyes peered at him defiantly from behind her youngest brother, right arm limp and wrapped at her side. She had truly vivid eyes, dark like obsidian but bright too. She was, Norn supposed, of considerable beauty. Her face was heart-shaped, framed by full, straight hair, her nose small and lips thin. But it was those eyes that held Norn. Countless ladies had lovely hair and finely cut mouths, but few had burning eyes like hers. Emmer finally looked away, whispering something harshly to the brother at her right, the one who had stolen Norn's little statue.
Norn looked at their father and said, "I've come to speak with your daughter."
"My daughter, Your Grace?" said the Earl, huffing in a great breath of air, nervously eyeing his daughter. "Surely not Emmer—"
"I've come to see your daughter, Lord Kale— the small, impertinent one glaring daggers at me. I assure you that I am not mistaken." Silence. "Lord Kale?"
"Yes, of course," he said.
The gathered family said nothing, a silence hanging between them. Yohan looked down upon his sister, frowning. It should have been him, he had whispered to her moments before. This is my fault.
"Emmer, the king wishes an audience with you," Roric said.
"Father, I—"
The Earl shook his head and came to her, touching the elbow on her uninjured arm.
"I have taught you to take responsibility for your own behavior," whispered her father, "even if I am afraid for the outcome."
"Father."
Emmer exchanged a look with her eldest brothers, Jebb and Arlyn, before nodding stiffly. She righted her dress. It was pretty, but nothing she would have dared don in the presence of a king, if only she had known. She nodded at the rest of them, narrowing her eyes with a confidence she had not had in the clearing. She had had weeks to prepare for this moment. If she was going to speak with Norn, it was going to be with pride. Aside, Emmer did not think that even Norn had the daring to hurt Lord Kale's daughter in his own home, but she could not be sure.
She swallowed hard and said to the king: "This way, Lord King."
She led them both into the manor's drawing room. "Will you sit, she asked?"
He turned and said to her, "No."
"I think I will," Emmer said.
They were both quiet for some time, she sitting and he standing. They faced one another in that silence. Emmer considered Norn again, as she had in the clearing. Even then she had thought his face kindly, had wondered at the cruel look in eyes. It had seemed so odd there, fierce and brutal on his soft features, even with his arrow jutting out from her arm. It was nowhere to be found now, and the dull blue of his eyes and pieces of gray amidst his plain hair were positively ordinary.
"I come with a gift for you," Norn said.
Emmer looked up, genuinely surprised, then frowned. Emmer had never received a gift from a king, let alone a king that had tried to kill her. She could not even fully imagine what a king such as Norn should want to offer her. A hanging, beheading, another arrow? Emmer thought it cruel to be called anything other than what it was.
"A gift," she weighed her words, "Lord Norn, what sort of gift could you offer me?"
"An apology," he said, so unabashedly sincere, that Emmer was not sure of herself anymore. She looked from one end of the room to the other, for what she didn't really know. For an answer? Norn probably thought her daft.
"Norn, I—"
He stopped her, and it was not what Emmer had expected. "My son," he said.
Emmer tipped her head, asking, "Your son? Lord, I'm afraid I don't understand."
He came closer and, instinctively, she leaned farther back.
"I have a single son, Lady," Norn said, eyes steady, "and I offer him to you. If you marry him, you will someday be on the throne of Baste."
"I… what?" Emmer leaned in, eyes wide, voice raised.
"I'm giving you my kingdom, Lady. It's everything I have."
"Lord King, I..." Emmer balked, jumping to her feet as he turned. What was she to say to a king who just proposed his son to her?
"Think it over," he said her name, for the first time she noted. He was turning to leave, his hand already on the door, "Emmer." He paused as he said the last bit and then gave her a very small smile, as though he liked the sound of the name on his lips.
Toodle Pip.
