Fated Desire

Three - Judgement

Winter 34th Year of the rule of William Farview - WF34

In midwinter, Sastra sat between the stone pillars of the courthouse. She was dressed in a simple, beautiful dress of dark blue, the family colours of Farview. As if to remind the King that she was that, family. William Farview, her Uncle had always treated her as the daughter he’d never had. His own wife had blessed him with four sons, where she was the only child of his brother, Godfrey. Around her, the courtroom hummed with excited gossip, like the sound of a thousand little bees fluttering around her, though none would approach. She closed her eyes, willing herself not to shiver. Over the last two years the world had fallen around her. A neatly stacked tower of cards it had fallen in the slightest breath of wind. Her loyalty to the Crown had been sorely tested and found wanting.

Her father had died from an illness even the greatest healers from Myst were unable to cure. He’d wasted away in a matter of weeks, left a living skeleton before the final breath had rasped from his body. She had loved her father, in many ways a cold, exacting man he’d been clear in his expectations. He expected her to be great, and to do great things in service to Milany. Slow tears built behind her closed eyelids, threatening to spill down her cheeks. Sastra drew an unsteady breath, waiting for the crowd to clear away behind her, so that she might leave the courtroom and find solace in her private chambers.

William had acted more the doting father than ever, and so his betrayal had shocked the core of her. Godfrey, Duke of Khama had passed his title and lands to his only living child, Sastra. She had expected the freedom to chose her future and the ability to govern Khama as her father had, as though Queen of her own small realm. Albeit a troublesome realm of stark mountains that boarded the desert and the tribesmen that kept invading. Khama was a frequent battlefield as the Barons attempted to claim more of the desert sand and turn it to agriculture. The tribesmen called themselves the People of Staven, and they had taken the lives of countless young Knights and soldiers over the years.

Apparently, it had been a cost William was no longer willing to bear. A cost, her father had come to regret in his final days. They had decided to forsake Khama and relocate her Barons and return the desert to the People of Staven. Even now, even with all of her regret Sastra couldn’t help the sense of loss whenever she considered how that single decision would leave her with nothing. Nothing but the life her Uncle decided for her.

It had been the Baron of Ardeth who’d approached Sastra with a plan. A man who just an hour earlier had been sentenced to execution with his daughter, Sastra’s former handmaid. Treason. Sastra tried to block out the word but as the fuss of the onlooking crowd started to fade, it echoed again in her thoughts. She would never forget the way her Uncle had looked down at her, from the bedside the Lord Provost. King William Farview was a tall, broad man much like his four sons. They, like Sastra, were fair of hair and skin. Unlike most of his children, he kept a full beard and neatly tamed hair that was more white than blonde these days. His eyes were the pale blue of a summer sky, matching her own. For all her hope in wearing a blue dress, perhaps it would have been better not to remind the man that they were family.

Finally, Sastra managed to exhale. Treason. She gripped her skirts tightly with white knuckled hands until movement at her side made her look up. She stared at the Knight who had come to kneel beside her. She knew Jason De Straffe, part of the assignment of Knights and magic users, Myst who had been sent to capture and arrest her. They’d saved her from Ardeth and his family, but had been duty bound to return her to the capital. Even though she understood that the Lady Knights, and Jason felt that perhaps she had been unfairly judged for her part in the treasonous plot.

Ardeth had never mentioned trying to kill the King’s sons, her cousins. Just the thought of it made her feel sick all over again. How could she ever want to hurt Ronin, or Arnit? She loved her cousins like brothers. Why would she ever have ordered the death of Lady Grace Denare, a Lady Knight who had become a fast friend. A woman born in Khama, Grace had volunteered to help plead Sastra’s case to keep the Duchy intact. It had been a life lost too young.

‘Your Grace?’ Jason’s voice was low and carried beneath the chatter that was fading in the courtroom.

Sastra tried to concentrate on the present, rather than the past. Even as hot tears stung the backs of her eyes. She blinked at the man before ducking her head, embarrassed to lose control of such emotions in public.

‘My Lady,’ he continued and with his body blocking the view of anyone passing, placed a light hand on her knee.

Her world had just ended, but the warmth of his palm against her skirt was enough to see the woman’s breath falter. The tears eased without falling and she looked up into earnest blue eyes.

‘This is not the end,’ he promised quietly.

She wanted to argue with him, to push him away. But she couldn’t see any hint of pity in his expression. He believed it, she realised as she studied the square line of his jaw. Her gaze flicked back up to be captured and held by his. Jason was a lean, muscled man who didn’t look like a typical Knight. But then, she was learning to reconsider what the appearance of a typical Knight might be these days. Lost for words, the world reeling at her feet, Sastra closed her eyes. What could she say? What was there to say?

Her Uncle had made his sentence clear. She wasn’t going to be killed for her treasonous acts, though maybe that would have been the preferred option.

‘My life is no longer mine to choose,’ she stumbled over the words and looked up at the man once more. Expecting pity again, she saw only the faintest smile curve the corner of his full mouth. Strange, how she’d never really considered Jason’s mouth before, during their journey back from Blessun where she’d been arrested. He’d been a kind man, a good Knight, she had told herself. He was always attentive, ensuring that she was as comfortable as possible given the circumstances.

‘Such is the life of most noble women,’ Jason grimaced, ‘though I expect that doesn’t make the judgement any easier to accept.’ With the courtroom emptied, he looked up. The enormous wooden doors slammed shut behind the last onlooker. He twisted and sat beside Sastra on the wooden bench of the accused. Watching as Lord Gale, the Provost finished tidying his notes and passed them to one of the clerks. Gale looked up, across at the pair of them with a frown before giving a slow nod. Jason returned the gesture, waiting for the man to make his own exit from the front of the chambers, before finally turning back to Sastra. He could have winced at the anger in her expression.

‘May I?’ He reached out before she was able to answer and took one of her small hands in his own. Watching as dark blue eyes dilated. Her breath caught again as her eyes flicked back and forth over his features.

‘Your Grace, your Uncle has decreed that’ he’ll find you a suitable husband,’ she’d already been pale, struggling with the stress of the trial and the judgement placed upon her. ‘But you will live. Yes, you had hoped to find your own match-’

‘Or no match at all,’ she sniffed, before lifting her chin a little higher.

Jason held back his smile, glad that some of her fight had returned. He’d watched the trial with growing dread, as though seeing the fire within the woman slowly being smothered with loss, guilt and something that definitely wasn’t relief that she wasn’t going to be executed.

‘You’re far too beautiful to imagine you’d never marry,’ he teased softly. He stroked his hand over the back of hers, still holding her fingers in his other. She hadn’t pulled away, which he was grateful for. Instead, he was certain he could see the beginnings of a blush at the base of her neck.

‘Only to the right man, one who would never try and control me,’ she admitted.

Sastra, King’s Niece, Duchess of Khama was known to be a Princess made of Ice. Untouchable, distant and reserved. But Jason had found himself wondering during their journey back from Blessun in the Autumn, if maybe she wasn’t deeply lonely. Travelling with the woman had made him consider that maybe, no one had ever tried to take her hand. Fear made cowards of far too many men. Cowardly, was something no one had ever accused him of being.

‘I’m sure your Uncle will find a good man for you,’ Jason squeezed her fingers and knew that he should retreat before he offered up his own hand. Sastra had a beauty that was hard to forget. One that had haunted him since their journey back to the Capital. A spirit that had seen him lingering in the city, rather than return to the borderlands where he was usually happiest, away from the politics and machinations of court.

‘Only a fool would try to control you, my Lady,’ he lifted her hand and pressed a kiss to the back of her knuckles. The shadows had been lifting from her shoulders as they’d been talking. It should have been scandalous for them to sit like this in an empty room, but Jason was well aware that the clerks were waiting just outside. He was confident that they were watching through the crack in the door and would never allow the suggestion that anything improper had happened.

Sastra looked down again, she shook off the melancholy that had descended with the King’s judgement and glanced at the man who held her small hand between his burly digits. The skin on the back of her knuckles tingled where he’d kissed them and she pressed her teeth into her bottom lip.

‘What about you?’ She found herself asking.