The young looking man that the beast addressed barely shifted from the boulder where he sat at the mouth of his cave. He gazed not at Ragnark, as would be at the very least respectful thought the Dragon, but rather at the blue blue sky. Why I could extend my great neck and snap him up like so many sheep!
Of course, since they had just formalized the treaty for the next five years, that wouldn't be prudent, he thought. Having grown indolent and lazy, just like his sterotype suggested, he had a great respect for legal and binding agreements. He was a renter, and his landlords were that green eyed witch and her creepy brother. It didn't make for good business to go back on his word by eating her son. It was after all, a generous settlement.
The terms were simple, once a year he dragged himself out of his cave to present himself at some festival, mumbling some crap about "the laws ingraven in the roots of Corilaine by it's supreme lawgiver and protector, her hussiness Whateverhenameis." The people would be in awe over it, that their Queen could command such power. That was it on his end of the deal, he was done for the year. On certain days spaced out through the year some flea bitten farmer would herd some sheep outside his cave, run like hell, and that was it for their end of the deal. Then he did what he did best, and that was sleep and try to return to the Dreaming, and stalk the shadows of the Taingate... looking for a way in.
But every five years the 'kid' would ride out and they would have a little talk, and renew the contract. When he was young, it was amusing to watch him get all nervous at the sight of the dragon. As he grew older and bolder, he proved to be quite the wit. Ragnark, who despised humans as a rule, grew fond of a visit from this particularly bright one every five years or so.. He could stomach that. Some lewd and dirty jokes, some metaphysical discussion, some stories of embarressing situations involving randy human mating practices and how he (the boy) served to embarress his mother, the 'Queen Bother.' Maybe a game of chess. Then they would argue all day long about the contract, say goodbye till the next half of the decade, and that was it.
This year, the kid just didn't seem to have that old spark.
"You're not satisfied with the terms?"
"No.. not so much that I'd say that."
He turned and regarded the Dragon passively. "So..?"
"You gave in too easy," sputtered the old lizard. He was tempted to say 'it wasn't any fun,' but Draconian pride prevented that. "Makes me think that maybe you're trying to pull a fast one.. hidden loopholes and such!"
"No loopholes," replied Jayson barely paying attention. "Straight forward, as always."
"You settled for fifeteen. I got twelve last year, and would have settled for thirteen."
The brownish-blonde haired man just blinked a couple times. "So?" After a moment he added, "You got the best of me this year, big deal, in four more years I'll do better. I'll take the loss over the year, it's only two more per installment."
The Dragon yawned, pleased at least his breath managed to garner a reaction from the Queen's Son. "Go home kid.. You lack spirit this year. Wait- for that matter, what is your problem?"
Coughing lightly at the fetid air released from Ragnark's yawn the man replied, "Why the interest?"
"Purely academic I assure you.. You act like you lost your best friend."
The human sobered. "Maybe I did."
"Find another."
"She was special."
Ragnark raised a massive scaled eyebrow. "Oh, you failed to mention that she was a mate."
"Why does she have to be a mate to be a special friend?"
The Dragon laughed heartily, "Come on kid, even *I* hear rumors about you. Spying on young lovers in my hills, when the moon is full and the autumn stars are out.. Corilaine's very own lothario, they say. I still snicker about the one about the triplets."
He didn't answer.
"Boy?"
The man shook his head. "Not any more. Never again."
"I see." He waited for the man to elaborate, and when he only sat there silently Ragnark began to grow bored. "Farewell then," he stated pointedly. "You've no wish to converse, and I'm of no mind to drag it out of you.."
Returning to his steed, the man simply said, "You would not understand."
Watching him ride off, the Dragon said to itself, "Oh yes I would. My kind are very selfish, oh Man. And there is much selfishness in self-pity."
Queen Sand surrounded herself by the most capable of servant's, usually men as the women of Coriliane were not universely cut as she was, of sterner stuff. Ustus Constantine was the burly Captain of the Guard. Henrik Feldspar, a western Viscount headed her primary military, particularly near the Menhite Road. This list went on and on.. Much of it a result of late Jordan's preferences, and as stated before, the most qualified were male. It was a lacking of equality that Sand had noticed in Coriliane's society, but one she could do little about without radically altering her shadows time differential to Amber.. Something Delwin was loathe to do (for technical reasons) since they unforunately remained within the Golden Circle and close to Amber.
But Morrigan was a child of circumstance, and it pleased Sand to have at least one of her trusted servants be female.
Found as a young child shortly after Jayson's birth, Morrigan was made a ward of the Court. The soldiers had found her miserably trudging down the Menhite Road in the middle of an intense thunderstorm. She had been precieved as a breed child, that is half-sidhe. Battered and tortured.. and worse.. by the soldiery from Menius who had viewed her as less than human from her suspected elven heritige. Orphaned, alone, near death.. she struggled in the only way she knew how to get to someplace like home. Word of a ragged little girl reached all the way to Court, and to everyone's surprise Queen Sand took an interest. She was brought to Tiliane, and before the Queen herself. Morrigan was not much to look at even as a child. The Menhites had blinded her in one eye. Worse than that, they seemed to have drained some vital spark of life out of her.
Truely a tragedy, her nobles and barons whispered, but what of it? They would gut an extra dragonman in the next clash in the child's name.. but such things happened when two country's.. no- when two worlds collided.
But Sand had ideas of her own. She saw to it that whatever Morrigan wished to make of herself, she would have that chance.
Morrigan did not fit in with Courtly life, that was very clear. She could be distant, hard edged, and cold. Yet still the girl's tragedy had struck a note with the Queen. Morrigan lived for only thing in her early life, and that was revenge. Sand saw to it that she was given the opportunity.
Morrigan was trained by some of the greatest warriors available. Some human, some Sidhe, some that were both. She made combat her craft, and professional espionage and assassination her hobby. As she grew to be a woman, lean and hard, with strong wirery muscles, and lithe if not absent curves. Her face could be attractive, but it has been a long time since true joy has graced it, and it was angular. Her expression carved from rock by a knife. A black eye patch covered her left eye, after it had been ruined. She hair, silky despite her best efforts to not take care of it, was cut short and sat on her head like a mop. She dressed in all black even when not about her business. She looked every bit the part of a professional mercenary pretending to have some symbolic link to a raven.
She served with distinction for several campaigns, with a reputation for being a top notch spy, scout, and even ranger when the need arose. The Menhites called her Thorn.. implying that she was a rose that someone wished they had never picked. After a successful career, she went into semi-retirement. She was given the lucrative post of being the Queen's Personal Guard. Her accounterments were enchanted, to give her every benefit to match against an assorted range of foes. Thanks to an implanted bit of witchery, the sight in her left eye was restored by Lord Delwin. He gave her a new eye, completely mobile even though it was of glass, and colored quite skillfully to match her real one. She was grateful for that, but also understood Sand's motive. She was to have no impairments to her depth preception or range of sight.
Her new eye enabled her to see past normal perceptions, into the world of the magical and arcane. She also was told secrets, in the course of her duties.. terrible secrets. She knew the Queen's true family. Morrigan knew everything, even if Prince Jayson did not. It made her feel just a little dirty, but then that was a feeling she could, if necessary, tolerate. She knew their names, and their faces, their preferred habits. She knew how to kill them- quickly and with total surprise, because she would never get another chance. She knew who to stay her hand with.. who to watch and to wait with. Llewella in particular she was not to harm. If Carl appeared in Castle Tiliane unannounced- she was to kill him at the first opportunity. She was assured he would do the exact same thing if permitted. Carl was an evil evil man.
All those people, Sand's own family, and the Queen had not even told her own son about them, and their strange eldritch abilities.
But that was her job.. She dispatched who the Queen wanted dead within the provinces of Coriliane and Menius. When she was not doing that, she was staying ready in the eventuality that members of the royal family of Amber would invade here, to hurt and hunt their lost brother and sister some more. That was important.. she was never to initiate, never to start trouble, she was only a last line of defense. In that sense she was not an assassin aimed towards Amber. She was a sentinel.
That's what made what she was doing at this particular moment all that much more peculiar.
Delwin had trumped her. An odd event, since she rarely if ever recieved a call from him. Sand was her mistress, she took her orders from there. Still, the call accepted, he had said that there was something odd happening atop the northwest guard tower, and that he could see it 'a little' from his own tower window. He'd asked her to investigate, and without so much as a 'by your leave' cut the contact.
Damned strange. But that was Lord Delwin. Shy, enigmatic, most of the soft people thought of him as a charming meek little man who never had time for a wife, and whose third love was his apple orchards. However he made the hair on the back of her neck stand on end, like some sixth sense. She had only taken one look at him after she had come to live at Tiliane to know that here was a man who knew what it was to hold the power of life and death in his hands. She knew the extent of his power, and the magician knew her quite well. He knew her better than anyone else ever could. If she could bear to be touched, as a woman, he would be amoung the few that she thought she could tolerate as a lover.
He loved his trumps too.. Sometimes she could just picture him up in those secluded chambers, dealing out the whole of life itself.. Besides, if Delwin thought she should go, instinct told her that he was probably right.
Stalking out in the rain, she approached the northwest guard tower that supported Tiliane's walls. The Unicorn only knew how much she hated the rain, it reminded too much of days she would like to never remember again.. that and she looked a lot like a drenched cat on two legs. It only took a glance to see that something was wrong, because the guards were standing outside the base entrance of the tower in the rain. She gave them a curt nod that extended acknowledgement and asked a silent question.
One of them thumbed towards the inside tower stairs. "It's the Prince, he said he wanted to be alone.."
"So?" she shot back, "The post still has to be manned. What were you thinking?"
"Well Tomas is still marching the wall between the east and west," the other one answered. "And we figured-" he said starting to get defensive, "Well if you had seen the Prince, you'd know what I mean. He's acting all funny again."
"What's he doing?"
"Just standing up in the lookout window in the rain. No cloak or anything. Just staring."
With a sigh, she ignored them and entered the tower. Castle Tiliane was a lot like a walled manor. The castle itself could have been designed better, but Tiliane was not near any borders and it's designers clearly didn't think that the Castle itself would be stormed. Oh it was defendable, but not intended for a seige. To rectify this, tall stone walls had been erected, with connecting towers in all four corners. These walls not only held the Castle but it's immediate needs such as stables and a smithy, and storage areas as well, not to mention some of the most beautiful gardens in Coriliane. These gardens existed within and without the walls. The fifth tower, an incongruous piece of archeticture was attached to the Castle itself, the exclusive domain of Lord Delwin. His tower was the tallest of all and looked over everything else. She knew, she had been there before and seen the few herself, as a child, and when she had her sight fully restored.
As it was, the walls and corner towers were tall enough to leap from...
She padded her way up the circuling stairs, passsing an assortment of arrow slots and peepholes that always made these stone structures miserable places in the damp and in the winter. Her left eye compensating for the darkness, it picked up ambiant magic that prevaded all things and used that for illumination.
The tower had two upper most chambers. The first opened only to the two walls (which were walked by sentries) and served as a guard post and shelter. A ladder led to a ceiling trapdoor to the topmost chamber, which was open to the air, and could be used for bowman and lookouts. The trap door was open, and ladder in place. Growling to herself Morrigan climbed up and poked her head through the trapdoor.
The Prince of Coriliane stood on the edge of the tower opening, his back to the trapdoor. He was soaked to the bone from the rain which blew in as close to the edge as he was standing.
Dammit! She thought, this is not exactly my cup of tea. She was hard and tough, life had made her calloused. Kind words to the mourning were not really what she was suited for.
Oh she had a good idea what this was all about. Nearly a year ago the royal Consort had killed herself in some nasty bit of business. Morrigan had always thought Meloni was a worthless little piece of fluff, not to mention a shade on the slutty side.. But that was okay, because Jayson, the Queen's son pretty much qualified as a slut himself. They were to be wed and try to get themselves off, but something had happened, and Meloni was dead by her own hand. The Prince had spent the last year blaming himself.
Morrigan did check herself for a moment.. it was not so much that she resented the Prince and his late Consort, but those sort of relationships were alien to her.. and they frightened some little part of her way deep down. It was easier to mock them as a weakness than to acknowledge them in herself. She was at least that honest with herself. The Prince was beautiful as far as men went.. and he made her uncomfortable. For that reason they seldom if ever spoke. It didn't help that she knew terribly important things that she had vowed never to repeat to this particular man.
All of this were some very good reasons that she was the last person who should be up in this tower trying to speak to him. She went for her trump of the Queen..
"Please don't," he said.
She froze.
"Please don't trump her. I really don't want to talk to her right now." He turned, his hair and shirt plastered to his front, water dripping from his nose and chin. His hair looked a darker brown in this light, his green eyes regarding her from the shadows.
"You should come in your Highness. You'll get sick in this weather."
"I may look overly primped to you Morrigan, but I am damn near indestructible. I could stand in a frozen rain and probably not get sick."
"That's not the point," she snapped. She then immediately stopped and reconsidered her tone, he wouldn't be bullied like anyone else. "I mean, Prince Jayson, it's dark and late, and your family will be concerned."
He remained silent and turned back to the gloom.
She waited for some sign for several long moments. Then she decided to take a gamble and shock him back to interacting with her.
"You're really not responsible."
It worked. "How do you figure?"
"We all make choices. She made a choice. You didn't tell her to try to do that. She was obviously disturbed to begin with.."
He whirled around. "If you ever say that again I swear I'll kill you myself Morrigan."
She just regarded him cooly. "Is that before or after you kill yourself Jayson?"
She expected him to advance on her, and at least she could distract him from the ledge. She was disappointed. He turned right away back to the night sky.
"I deserve nothing less Morrigan. I am surprised that you feel otherwise. I'm aware of what you think of me. Some sexually addicted immature little boy, who for the first time in his life suddenly feels some pain, and you think I am over-reacting. You hold me in contempt for it. Well fuck you, Morrigan. I happen to finally agree with your opinion of me. I'm not fit for much of anything. If I hadn't tried to break some record for sleeping with half the population of Coriliane than she would have never had tried to get pregnant to hold on to me."
"I never said any of those things your Highness. You put those words in my mouth, I didn't say them."
"You don't have to."
"Why don't you let me bring your loved ones to you..?" One hand reached for her trumps.
"They're already with me." He skirted that much closer to the edge.
She grew frustrated, and because of that, angry. "And this will make you such a moral man after the fact? To throw it all away without hesitation?" Her heart softened for just an instant as her left eye could make out the tears in the rain. His voice never wavered at all though..
"Would you have me pretend that I am innocent?"
She shook her head. "That is for you to decide, not me. You have to live with yourself, not me. But Jayson.." she paused struggling.. "There was no intention on your part. She may have thought whatever it was that she thought, but that just means that she didn't have faith in your relationship. She never gave it a chance. And as far as suffering.. look.. I do not usually speak of this, but the Menhites.. Jayson- they raped me. They blinded a little girl and left her to die in the rain. Alone. I am never going to be what I might have been, but I am not going to let them kill me either." She took a deep breath. "Jayson, I can't place a measurement on your sorrow, and say that it is any more deserved or any less deserved than anyone elses. I can say, that the only person in this Kingdom who doesn't feel that you have suffered enough for this tragedy is you. You can get through this. Instead of throwing your life away to say you're sorry, prove it by making a change."
She waited breathlessly to see if any of this would make any impact. Agonizing seconds passed as she waited for some sign.. fighting the urge to dive at him and pull him back.
"How would you suggest I begin?"
She reeled from the release. She scrambled for an answer. "Have you tried a priest? Perhaps they could help.. The Book of the Unicorn?"
It was a lame answer, but it was a start. A half an hour later she had him out of the tower and heading back to the Castle.
Morrigan raised her head a little higher.. for her this was a different sort of victory. Far above she could not help but notice that the light had just winked out in Delwin's tower.
She wondered if he had gone to sleep, or if he had trumped away.. or stepped into his great mirror that he kept covered with a sheet. The one drew little attention to as possible when his nephew and sister were about. Morrigan worked for the Lady Sand, but she would always have a great affinity for the master magician.. You see, Morrigan was not a Breed. She was a whole different kind of being, orphaned from her family. She was a Shroudling.. Lord Delwin had explained to her what she was. That was how they had developed their strange affinity. Ironically, the most withdrawn man she had ever met was the only one who had been able to give her any sense of personal identity. Sand had given her something physical to call her own, Delwin had given her something internal to hold dear. He told why she was the way she was.. why she needed to hunt..
But that belongs in another story....
"I understand completely, Sand," Dayelin replied quietly. "I've never any any delusions that I could be anything to like Jordan was. For myself I am only grateful thay he accepts me as well as he does. I do feel.. awkward at times, because I did you know you and Jordan.. from before."
"That is a drawback to becoming overly close to mortals. No offense sister, I was fond of Jordan too", said her twin brother.
Sand merely nodded to Delwin's comment. Her late husband, the last king of Coriliane had passed on around a century ago when Jayson was forty. The three of them sat in a darkened drawing room near the fireplace. Sand and Dayelin came here often for quiet conversation and to be alone from the bustle of managing a kingdom. Delwin rarely made an appearance, and when he did, like tonight, one was careful not to make him feel uncomfortable lest you not see him again for another stretch.
"I could just.. plague Morrigan's dreams for suggesting religion of all things," she muttered. "She herself finds it a crutch, but here I have my son building a chapel on the grounds. And you know I am going to have to appoint a monsignor to it, and then have him about to offer me unsolicted advice."
"Oh I don't think it's all that bad, Sand. You listen to a great deal many other windbags, why should a little old priest be any worse?"
"You try and-"
Delwin waved her off, "I never wanted to in the first place, we both know that. You're the Queen, just like you wanted."
She bit her lip, "You're the most righteous out of any of us, even the rest of the family, and you never got into religion."
He smiled, "But I never saw the harm in it either. The hermetic arts sort of ruins you for it anyways. If you wish to be angry at someone, be angry at me, not Morrigan. I after all gave him my copy of the book." Sand snorted.
"Actually," Dayelin piped up, "I have to agree with your brother, my dear. At least now he is actually doing something, functioning, moving on with his life. It may not be the path we would wish for him, but at least he is on the road to healing and not locked in his pain."
She layed a hand on his, "I know.. But I am concerned abut how deep he is getting into this. The Church of the Unicorn in all it's many splinter sects can be a fanatical group. Their beliefs are very aesthetic. Sex for reproduction only? Even I am nowhere near that severe, and that is so unlike Jayson that I find this sudden change in personality frightening. The royal family has always found the church to be somewhat.. laughable, even if we are the Unicorn's children. I just wonder if this isn't just another symptom of his problem?"
"It's just a phase.." Dayelin replied. "He'll get over it, and this sudden preoccupation with religious matters will fade. Actually I find the Book of the Unicorn itself to be fascinating. This Dworkin Barimen may not have been a maker, but he was certainly some sort of savant. If possible I would like to get a copy for myself to take back to Euterpe. I am sure Nodonn would like a copy for his libraries."
"I have another copy," said Delwin. Sand raised her eyebrow at him archly. He wiggled in his chair. "Well my brother always said there was much more to Dworkin then met the eye, so he lent me his copy before I got my own.. I forgot to give it back." He was referring to Bleys, the only other he would ever call his 'brother.'
"My thanks," nodded Dayelin.
"Well, I didn't bear a son just to have him gropw up to be some sort of silly priest," she added.
Suddenly from the darkened corner of the room Jayson's voice rang out. "So exactly why did you bear a son, mother? Are you saying that you had something in mind when you concieved me? Some preconcieved notion?"
The three of them whirled around. "Jayson!" Delwin excalimed, "How long have you been sitting there lad?"
"I was praying.. since before any of you even entered the room." He turned to regard Sand. "Mother why don't you see, that I must live my life the way that I feel is right for me? It may not be right for you, but it's right for me." Sand just sat there quite speechless.
"Jayson, wait-"
He turned his back and walked right away.
"He'll come around sister.. just give him time.."
Sand just bit her lower lip again, thinking to herself, what he needs is just to find someone else.. Someone to convince him that he hadn't found the perfect girl and lost her. He needed to have someone love him like he deserved, and never doubt his love for her. Tonight, she would see what she could find..