Luminous

114 - The Dance (1/3)

Silence fell but for the distant chirp of crickets and faint echoes of music and chatter from the faraway feast, as the old knight and erstwhile squire locked eyes for the first time in half a decade. In a surprising turn, it was the elder who yielded first.

"Goodly Freda, why must you fear me so?" Baron Graye frowned, shaking his head, "It was a tragic accident. I don't curse Hadrian for the fire that took little Agnes. You must know that."

"Oh, I'm sure you wish that fire upon us. Only then can you set your rivers of iron alight," retorted Coris through teeth still grinding.

"You are sorely mistaken." Baron Graye tilted his head with a sigh, still magnanimous. "Your father and I have our differences, Corien, but we are both humble knights of the Council, serving our one king for the good of Latakia. So long as that appears to be the case, you have nothing to fear."

Tension emanated from Coris, so thick in the air Meya felt the flesh in his arms clenching as he raised them ever higher to shield her. Baron Graye must have caught a nose-full as well, for his sigh fell heavy, knowing the time to abandon a lost cause. He glanced at Meya, his ocean-blue eyes hollow.

"You've found yourself an enchanting young lady, Coris." He said softly, his eyes still studying Meya, "You should enjoy your evening while it lasts."

With that simple, yet inexplicably ominous remark, he swept away, his white cloak rippling after him like a rain-stream through a maze of grass. Meya followed his receding white silhouette until he vanished behind a left in the hallway, then turned around at Mum's stern voice.

"My lord, if I may. He may have his feuds with your father, but he seems nothing but gracious to you. He's clearly fond of you, and that is not how one treats one's old mentor."

"Mum!" Meya moaned. There she went again, mothering every youngster in sight, hers or not. Yet, Coris seemed too baffled to be offended. He spun around and gawked at Mum, gray eyes like blinking moons, then shook his head in horrified awe, torn halfway between laughing and cradling his forehead.

"Alanna, you're worse than your daughter." ("Oi!" snapped Meya.) Mum huffed and rolled her eyes, no doubt taking him for the arrogant prodigy she'd heard he was. Coris leaned in, desperate now as he pleaded his case,

"Grimthel Graye may appear to anyone as anything—because he isn't anything. He sees nothing but uses, even for his own daughters. He used them both, and he'll do the same to Meya—"

Meya seethed in mounting frustration. Would everyone stop with all this smothering protecting-the-fair-maiden? She wasn't that gullible!

"—Then perhaps you shouldn't have declared open war," Mum's soft voice was grave as a cornered viper's hiss, taking the threat seriously now. She cocked her head at Meya. "She's your wife. That is your child. You choose the battle they suffer. If he doesn't wear his colors yet, why should you?"

Coris closed his mouth and swallowed his words, his cheeks coloring. But then, Mum froze. She peered at Coris, then her eyes widened.

"But of course, you must know that." She muttered, her hand absently straying to her lips as she leaned in, her voice disappearing. "Poor thing. He used you, too, didn't he?"

Coris paled to match the moonlight on his face. He averted his eyes, his short bursts of breath jarring in the quiet. Mum raised her eyebrows at Meya, and she nodded slightly, even as vapors of doubt swirled deep within her.

From the tales of Agnes and Coris himself, she'd long imagined Baron Graye as a conniving, ruthless, cold man incomprehensible in his ways due to the lack of a human soul behind his choices.

So, meeting him in the flesh, she couldn't reconcile the real Baron Graye to that twisted portrait she'd drawn. He seemed a kind gentleman. A wee unnerving with his empty eyes, yes, but then it was probably necessary for court intrigue. Even the Clardarths weren't so honest.

Agnes and Coris's accounts were filtered through their eyes, colored by the ordeal they suffered. And Freda knew how paranoid the Hadrians have become from two centuries of secret-keeping. And as Baron Hadrian himself admitted, they hadn't always acted in the interest of Latakia, either.

Baron Graye spied on Hadrian on orders from the King, who had full right to be suspicious of the old guard that had supported his demented predecessor he overthrew. He may not have expected Agnes and Persephia would be harmed. Or, like Coris often did, may have sacrificed them for his duty to Latakia.

There must be more to him than the rumors that precede him. She should trust what she saw with her own eyes than what others told her they saw, shouldn't she? But then again, Meya didn't fare well so far as judge of character. Especially when it came to men...

Meya's eyes strayed to the only man in the vicinity. Mum looked mournfully at Coris, who squirmed under her scrutiny. He turned to Meya,

"Are you feeling better? Shall we head back?"

"I doubt it'd be long before we find ourselves rushing back here," sighed Mum, eyeing Meya who jolted out of her head. Coris peered at the faraway window of light, nodding.

"It'll be downright chaos soon. Just you wait for the dance."

Dance?

Meya's eyes widened, appetite for novelty restored now that her stomach was a growling void. Her eyes must have glowed twice as bright—Mum caught the spark with the corner of her eye, frowning as she always did when smelling oncoming unruly Meya.

"Either way," she drawled as she puttered about gathering spent rags, "you won't be singing tonight, Mama Bird."

Having retrieved Baron Graye's abandoned cloth and tossing it into the basin, she straightened with a haughty ultimatum, "I'll fetch your father."

Basin on her hip, Mum strode off. Meya shot Coris an incredulous look. He stood, arms crossed, the look in his eyes not unlike Morel gloating over Meya's torture. Growling, she stomped after Mum.

"Mum, I'm fine! Give me one glimpse of the King and you'll have me blessed silence!"

"I'm not sure His Majesty would be as gracious if you spewed on him!" Mum snapped.

"I spewed it all already! I dun have nothing left to spew!"

"Again, Meya—the Fest ends with the month. You'll have your chance."

Coris's voice blew in from behind, sounding weary—and hurt. Meya caught herself. Still, she couldn't help but grumble shamefacedly,

"But you haven't eaten. You haven't got to dance."

Mum's face unwound, softened in the moonlight. She drew close and grasped her hand.

"Meya, it's all right."

Clear blue eyes bore deep into hers. Meya hung her head in defeat, although she still couldn't believe it truly was. Mum ran the back of her fingers down her cheek, then turned to Coris.

"My lord, do you think I can trust you alone with my daughter for a quarter-hour?"

At her raised eyebrow of suspicion, Coris heaved a dramatic sigh and shrugged.

"She's pregnant. I'm afraid there's nothing else I can do. Ow!"

Coris must've known the consequences by heart, so either he yearned for pain, or he'd mistimed how fast her fist was. Meya concluded it was the former, for he chuckled with pride as Mum glowered at him as if debating whether she could splash him with sick-water from the basin and get away with it.

At long last, Mum melted into a smile. She mussed his hair as any mother would for her boy, then went on her way.