Kingdoms - Book 6 - The Frencolian Chronicles (complete)

Chapter Eighteen

Feeling someone with a light touch shaking his shoulder, Luke woke to see Maia's face close to his. He smiled a thin smile at her. Seeing tears spill from her eyes, he asked, "Is something wrong, Maia?"

Dashing her tears away with her fingers, she replied, "No, I'm all right but I was worried for you, Cousin Luke, you've slept for over an hour now at least... we're all so bored. We don't even have a book to read..."

Moving the chair with him to face the other way, Luke saw the children's sad faces and sensed their boredom. Borrowing one of Princess Helena's soft slippers, he invented the playing of a game called 'magic slipper'. By folding the lambskin inside itself, the heel inside the toe, and throwing it like a ball at one of the children, the child it landed upon was then the 'slave' and as slave of the slipper, it was their turn to throw it at another, until the magic of the touch made the next victim the slave of the slipper.

Maia joined in, reluctantly at first, when Luke placed the slipper in her limp hands. Soon the room was filled with laughter and screaming, running children, trying to keep away from the 'dangerous' slipper. When their cheeks were red from the exertion, Luke returned the slipper to the princess who had watched the children with interest lighting her eyes.

Helena watched as the young king planted himself down in the middle of the floor, gathering the youngsters around him. Maia rested her elbow on his knee and Irma climbed on his shoulders. He told them stories as his father had done when he'd been younger. The king of Frencolia became an elephant, a camel and a horse, giving the smaller children rides around the room until he collapsed in exhaustion and laughter when Maia took a turn, sitting sideways on his back. Returning to the less stressful pastime of story-telling, the children quietened as he told them about the shepherd-boy, David, who killed the lion, the bear, then the giant, and who became king over Israel.

"The Gospel Book says that God appoints kings and princes."

Luke had uttered these words without considering their effect in such company. He dared not look up at Prince Gustovas or Czarevna Cynara; instead, he began telling the story of Moses, and he encouraged Maia to act out the part of Miriam with the baby in the bulrushes. When one of the small children entered into the story and screamed—"Look out, hide the baby! The soldiers are coming!" —Luke forwarded the story to where Moses was grown and led the people of Israel out of Egypt to the promised land. In the next story, he described Jesus' first visit to the temple in Jerusalem, when he was a boy of twelve.

Julian strode into the room to see all the children gathered around Luke. When the knight directed servants to bring the evening meal, the children stood, sullen-faced, waiting fearfully. That they expected to be poisoned seemed obvious to Luke. Hunger was paramount to Luke and food had never tasted so good. There were no utensils and they all helped themselves from the same bowls, eating with their fingers. Varieties of bread; loaves and rolls were available, with broth and meat stews for dipping in. Luke, with gravy on his fingers, remembered his home life at the manor house in Chanoine, broke a bread roll and wiped his fingers on the inside before devouring the roll. 

Kedar, who was keeping close to his new friend's side, laughed and followed Luke's actions, wiping his mouth with a piece of bread, "It's better than my sleeve!" he said, chuckling.

The moment the meal was complete, they were escorted one by one, or room-by-room, from the Dining Room. Maia clung to Luke when the soldiers called her name together with Cynara's, and Luke kissed his cousin's cheeks, pushing her away saying, "Tomorrow, Maia. I'll see you tomorrow."

Back in the small cell, Luke hoped he would be allowed to be with them the next day; the time with Maia and the children had lifted his spirits and he knew they had been encouraged.