Chapter Eighteen
“You have been unusually quiet on the walk back, Your Highness.” Elisaf pauses as we move through a set of open doors into the castle. The air is stifling, the sun bright, and yet candles flicker nearby.
“Just thinking.” I feel the curious stares following me and catch the bows and curtsies as I pass. From guards, from nobility, from servants. The servants are the only ones I feel truly safe around, now that I know everyone else has fangs that they’d sink into my neck if permitted.
Sofie said the Islorians could not find out what I am, but I still don’t understand why, and Wendeline’s history lesson didn’t shed much light on that. All it succeeded in doing was to make me wary of this nymphaeum and the seemingly straightforward task I must accomplish if I want to get out of here. If what Wendeline said about Malachi is true, then sending me here to steal this stone is likely tied to something else. Possibly something horrible, with dire consequences.
“I do miss our conversations.”
Elisaf’s voice pulls me from my thoughts. “Huh?”
“I would have liked to have had one last night, if I were permitted.” He smiles sheepishly. He is trying to apologize for abandoning me when I was on the verge of tears.
It doesn’t help to be angry with him anymore. Besides, he’s one of the few friends I have here. Alienating him would not be wise. “You said you were from Seacadore. Was that the truth?” His faint accent surely marks him as a foreigner.
“I have never lied to you, Your Highness. I simply omitted some details.” Earnest eyes meet mine, his voice low so as not to carry. “I was from Seacadore, in another life. I was a ship hand, and I often traveled across Fortune’s Channel to Islor and Kier.”
“You wanted to come here?” Knowing what these Islorian immortals are?
He grins. “I was young and naive. It was fascinating to me, this land that the fates had plagued, both mortal and immortal living together as they did. I would leave the port to enjoy Cirilea’s nightlife, which can be lively at times. If you ever have the opportunity, I recommend it.”
I snort. “Something tells me I won’t be allowed out to enjoy the city’s nightlife.”
“Perhaps you are right.” He dips his head. “The night I was attacked, I had spent the evening at the Goat’s Knoll in a jug of mead, and I was on my way to my room. The immortal grabbed me in an alleyway outside the tavern. I had no servant’s cuff, so I was fair game as far as he was concerned. Things were different back then. I tried fighting him off, but he was too strong and I too inebriated.
“Zander came upon us. He was in the city that night, prowling in the shadows amidst the commoners as he sometimes used to do. He stopped my attacker, but it was already too late. The man had infected me.”
I file away that tidbit on Zander. “Why?”
Elisaf shrugs. “I did not ask him.”
“What happened?”
“My attacker suffered a public and vicious execution. It was meant to be a peace offering to the Seacadorians. Islor’s relationship with them is important, and their people need to feel safe. I was no longer allowed to return home. Seacadore may enjoy trade with us, but they certainly don’t want us on their lands. Zander took pity on me. He helped me through the adjustment period, and I became a soldier for the royal guard.”
“So he can be caring.”
“He can. Though, dare I say, you knew that already, did you not?”
With Corrin, with his mercy for Boaz, with his kindness toward the hobbled old man in the rookery. “He’s using me,” I remind Elisaf, as if to sway the pendulum back in a more comfortable direction, where Zander has no appealing qualities. It dawns on me. “This is why you don’t have an affinity.”
“Because I was born by infection, not by the nymphaeum’s power,” he confirms.
I hesitate. “Do you prefer this? Being what you are?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes not. I do not care for the way mortals are treated here.” His brow furrows deeply. “I remember my life in Seacadore, sitting across from my parents and sisters at the dinner table, discussing what paths we might choose. They seemed endless. The mortals here do not sit around the table, having those same discussions. Outside of fantasy, of course.”
“Maybe you should talk to your friend the king about that.” He is part of the problem and could be the solution.
“Do not assume Zander does not take issue with the system currently in place.”
“Right. He’s appalled by it. I could tell last night.” Though that slave didn’t look miserable about her predicament.
“It is complicated.”
“It isn’t, really. The immortals were taught that they can take what they need, and two thousand years later, the humans kneel, or they die, but either way, they bleed.”
“I suppose when you put it like that, it does sound rather simple.” He sighs. “There have been uprisings. Mortals have fought for the end of the tributary system. The last time ended poorly for them. The immortals are too strong.”