Love's Mercy

5.5 Bound For Life

an: 4/1/24 hi there... adding in more because during editing ive noticed some exposition is just lacking... ive also come across some ideas and critiques of other books that i thought i could use to better my narrative.. this chap is short but regarding some other changes ill be making i think its necessary, 4/2 reuploaded bc i thought of more

"Tonight," Viehn announced upon Giovanni arrival back to the inn, "the boys' father has called a meeting of his council, however... it is open to all in town. Now, he has never done so before, the people have been kept in near silence save for what I have found."

"Are you to speak, madam?" Alfred asked. Maria stood nearby, her hair fell beside her eyes to shade her gaze from the conversation at hand. It shifted as Giovanni came near to her, standing closely.

"What do you recall of tales of the Fae, my Lady?" they whispered to Maria, out of Alfred or Viehn's hearing.

She searched their face as if waiting for them to admit it were some sort of play. They held themselves in complete severity. "The Fae."

"Yes."

"Giovanni, hold on."

"I'll speak if Julien will allow the truth to be heard!" Viehn answered at last. "That man does not let me a word even if I do stand in the town's center and shout. All it takes to sway the people's opinion is the mere shake of his head. Most days, I must be here to prove him right, and reason wrong."

Alfred replied; "I am certain he will want your advice..."

"What of the Fae?" Maria asked of Giovanni.

"Something Jareth had said."

"Are you in the habit of speaking to him, now?"

"Not for any reason I should like to!" Giovanni said.

"How would you like to..."

"I would not," they whispered. "The brother, Daraen, he tells me little to nothing about his town's own plight. I could say he has no unique idea as to what had caused for the children's disappearances, but his most devout guess comes in the form of asking his brother."

"He is unique, for none other would do the same," Maria said. "Go on, then."

"I will not bore you, my Lady, but some imagine the children to have been led off by the Fae, he mentioned. I only found it interesting..."

"I don't. The Church despised Fae tales, they were for the weak minded. You should have remembered that, Giovanni," Maria said, a point in her tone.

"Of course I did," they said harshly, quietly. "I do, which is why I found his mention odd. We must be quite early in the Church's history, if not entirely before its organization, for the people to believe at all that Fae could play a hand- be it only a few- I wonder; what God do you imagine they pray to?"

"Be it gods. I've heard their usage of both one, or many."

"As have I, though only whence they curse."

"All of those books in your libraries, Giovanni, and is there not a single one to detail the Church's founding?"

"I have searched for years, Maria..." They sighed with the run of their palms down their coat. "I find no year, no names, nor faces in which to attribute to the origin. It is with the tide of the centuries that the nobility complied, and the rest simply bent the knee to their betters."

"The Blood and its powers need little demonstration to persuade..." Maria nodded once. "Just as your mother had been."

Giovanni became rigid with the memory. "It only took one day for her to be convinced."