Love Stories

Chapter Eighteen

Everyone was thrilled to welcome her back. Edric had grown so much and Torr was just a brother now. It was all family. Things were so much like they were. It was exciting and she knew she was happy. They all wanted to know about Keldan, of course, and how he could get married to just some girl they'd never met. Leah assured them that he would bring her eventually and probably sooner than later.

                        Leah was happy to be able to take part in the weekly gatherings again, complete with Torr and even with Edric stumbling around the room from one aunt to an uncle. It seemed people were dwelling on the subject of marriages and babies. They teased Erian about a certain cousin's sister's friend or some other called Edina. They had been friends for a long time, but they weren't kids anymore. Leah was reassured when even Torr was being joked about but glad that no one talked about her. It seemed that everyone was simply excited about a bright future. Currently there was no sadness, no heart break, nothing worrisome. It was Runderin at its best.

                        The days passed like they used to; rides and walks in the garden, visits to the kitchen, laughter. Everything felt right again. When news came that Keldan wanted to visit, everything got even better. But when her father sent a letter he would be coming again, it got better than she ever thought it could. There was so much hope and expectation in the air she could taste it.

                        It spoke well of Sinthea's character that she wasn't overwhelmed in the first instant. Keldan had been family since as long as Arlette could remember, and no one was going to give his new wife an easy time of it. But she was a good sport and since it all was in jest, or very nearly jest, nothing was damaged. Keldan had chosen her for who she was, so of course that person would fit right into Runderin. She and Dalussa got along especially well. Sinthea, as Leah had known, was not of royal birth or anything like. Neither was Dalussa. They had much in common because of it; they had led normal, common lives and knew their way around a kitchen. Things the nobility didn't understand they did, and certainly had enough laughs about. The differences that they could see between both lifestyles, all the little things odd they found about marrying a prince, other people didn't know if they were laughing with them or at them.

                        It was another two months of dancing and singing until her father arrived. By that time, Keldan had to leave, so he could only introduce his wife to his sister's father before they returned to Ellora. If he was surprised at finding Torr so reestablished, he didn't show it and Leah had written him about the events, leaving the threat out as always. Something that did come as a surprise was his request. People heard he had wondered if the king might have any use for him. Grace was a nice place, and had been very good to him, but he was starting to miss his old country and Runderin was so pleasant and close to it, he wouldn't mind living there.

                        King Treddian was either so flattered or flustered that he offered a position to him right away and he accepted. Runderin's government was not so different from Ellora's, or even Grace if it came down to the simple things. In Runderin the power was the king's, but he had a group of people he called his lords that all decisions were finalized through. There were lords from the important and opinionated lord of war, also brother to the king, to the lord of horses who was a fiery man but had nothing to do with laws and edicts. Simis wasn't made a lord, but his position allowed him to observe and advise them.

                        His first suggestion started as a whisper to the king's ear only, but soon everyone was marveling about it. For as long as anyone knew, since land existed at all, the only people with access to the sea were Kamarrans or desert people, and the latter made no business of it certainly. Grace's goods would sail to Kamarra, travel through Ellora or Grava, and come to Runderin. It gave Kamarra great power and an entire merchant industry. Simis, however, thought it was time to change that. He proposed to lengthen Runderin out into the desert, all the way to the sea's beginning, and build a dock. Not a dock but a wharf, a town, an entire city. It was stunning to even think about. Runderin, going to sea?