Karadra's Shipwreck

The Ship - Chapter 19

“You are a madman, Arsik De Rois.”

As he regained consciousness, Arsik heard the smile in her voice and slightly raised his head, his hair disheveled. “What happened?” he croaked.

Maestra c****d her head to the side. “You don’t remember, do you?”

Arsik blinked. Her smile was back, as was her warm expression. He smiled in response. “I think I did something stupid.”

Maestra shook her head, laughing. A vein appeared on her forehead. “You went mad, Arsik, literally. If I hadn’t gotten to you, Arthax would have burned you alive by now.”

Arsik coughed. “As if he could,” he sneered, blatantly lying.

He examined his throat, feeling the wounds and bruises where the Sarkanta’s steely hand had encircled it like a python. Maestra yanked his hand away. “Don’t touch them. I’ll take care of them.”

She produced a small alchemy box. She dipped a piece of cloth in an acidic concoction and pressed it against his neck. He could feel her touch through the fabric.

“Maestra… What happened?” Her breathing sounded loud. “Who hurt you if not Arthax?”

Maestra lowered the cloth and looked at him. “Arthax, you fool, is our hired protector. The captain paid a fortune to bring him here with us. He’d better not find out that you tried to kill him. He would throw you overboard, and me with you, for insisting to keep you here.” She forcefully pressed the cloth on his wounds and made him hold it there. “I should like to see what the two of us would do in that case,” she said cheerfully.

“We would swim, among other things,” Arsik answered quickly, earning himself one of those looks. He felt silly for a moment, thinking of Arthax. Whatever hope there’d been for the two of them to get along, it’d evaporated. He ought to keep an eye on him, even on the battlefield.

Feeling the need to dispel the awkwardness in the room, he said the first thing that came to mind. “It is hard to imagine Arthax with a pen, signing a contract.”

His joke wasn’t particularly successful, and he lay back on the bed. Maestra sat near him. He looked at her with his one eye shut. “It wasn’t Arthax that hurt me, Arsik, unfortunately…” she said. “If that were the case, things would be much simpler.”

Arsik sat up. “I want to know,” he said firmly.

Maestra took a deep breath. “Alright, then. I imagine there is no other way.” Arsik nodded, satisfied. “There are things you need to know about me, Arsik.”

Her voice conveyed fear.

“I want to know everything,” he rushed to answer, and she blew out a breath through her teeth.

“We’ll see if you like me after that.”

For the first time, her words reminded him of every other woman he’d met. He smiled. “Try me,” he said, and Maestra had expected that.

Her attention shifted to the violin, leading Arsik’s eyes there too. “This violin is about a thousand and eight hundred years old, Arsik…” Arsik grimaced. “As am I.”

Surprised, he shook his head.

“I hope you like older women,” Maestra went on smiling. Arsik watched her with a half-smile. After a short silence, Maestra continued. “We –the Elves, I mean– live for many years, Arsik. Didn’t you learn that during your voyages? I thought you often traveled to the East.”

Arsik nodded. “Yes, no… I mean… I did know it, it’s just…”

Maestra sighed. “I guess there is a difference between imagining it and actually seeing it, right?”

“Exactly…”

He wandered in his thoughts for a while. The number was inconceivable; almost two thousand years. How many experiences could be accumulated in that amount of time? What kind of life does one live in that many years? How many burdens, how much joy, how much love?

The last thought annoyed him. He felt insignificant compared to her, an insect darting through her life, unimportant, meaningless. She would go on existing and falling for different men along the years, along the centuries. No doubt his name would cease to be even the faintest memory after some point.

How many men had she met in her life? Surely someone, maybe one of her own kind, had shared a lot with her. Perhaps they’d had a relationship that lasted for years, thousands of years. What kind of bond would something like that create? An unimaginable one. He could never compete with something like that, no matter how hard he tried.

Sorrow painted his face, draining the life from his eyes. It didn’t escape Maestra’s notice. “I know what you’re thinking,” she smiled, and he averted his gaze.

“As it turns out, everyone on this ship knows what I’m thinking.”

When he attempted to get up, Maestra straddled him. “Don’t you want to hear my story anymore?” she pouted, winning him over instantly. Arsik nodded. “Excellent,” she said happily and sat across from him. “Do you remember what I told you the other day? My name?”

He remembered everything. The information circled his thoughts at all times; it couldn’t be helped. “Hearthworn,” he provided, and she nodded in approval.

“My people, Arsik, come from Arcanara, a kingdom under the surface of the Earth. Back then, our Queen’s name was Ankh-Khales-Na. She was one of the most powerful mages this world has ever seen.”

Arsik gulped. Once again, he found himself in dark and uncharted waters.

“She was fear, Arsik. She was terror. There was no man who didn’t tremble at her name. Magic was her natural talent. She was a demigod, an ancient one. She had been alive during the years of the Meteor, had led our people to it, had shared its power with us. She made us what we are.”

Mesmerized, Arsik listened on.

“Her soul knew no bounds, Arsik. Just like the enemy we are now hunting down; she was intoxicated by her own power. All she cared about was the various aspects of her magic. Down there, in the depths of the Earth, there was nothing to stop her…”

Her words were terrifying. There was so much that Arsik didn’t know yet, so many things beyond the secrets of the sea. He felt like a local farmboy that had experienced nothing yet.

“On the surface, over our underground country, there were forests – vast, dense, beautiful and isolated. Our tribe’s reputation and human superstition had made sure no one in their right mind would come near this land, and so we wandered in the woods at night, enjoying nature, which we’d been deprived of, being Elves. We hearkened the magic of the stars and the moon, smelled the herbs, tended to the animals. During the time when our Great Sentinel was recuperating from the Battle of the Gods, when nature was still wounded and vulnerable, we were there to help with some of her injuries.”

Arsik was falling in love with her all over again. He was lost in her world and didn’t care. May you take me inside her, darkness, and never release me.

“But one day, they arrived. Numerous carriages with workers, people, livestock, tools and materials, an entire camp that had abandoned Lothen and the South in order to become independent. They lowered the banners of the Lion and the other Houses and raised their own. The House of Hearthworn.”

Arsik frowned, confused. Maestra shook her head. “Yes… That’s where I got my name from,” she said and, by her expression, she was asking for time to explain. “They settled down there and founded Evergrace. It was beautiful, Arsik…”

Her eyes twinkled. “A house of noblemen, castles made of granite, beautiful temples and bridges and gardens with flowers, elegant dresses. Everything was so beautiful it almost made us ignore the trees they cut down and the damage they did to establish their kingdom.” She smiled. “For many years, a lot of us visited them. We bought items from their stores, spoke with their merchants, met their lords. They accepted us. They were afraid of us, a lot, but tried to hide it. They would have heard of us, of course. The Elves of the Meteor didn’t have a good reputation. Why would they? Only the Elves of the East maintained a good reputation, with their grace and their white skin and colorful hair, their peaceful disposition and their eloquence.”

Sadness and rage dwelled in her eyes. Arsik observed her every expression.

“We didn’t mind, though; it was only expected. We simply made sure to be discreet, like shadows. We came and went and didn’t meddle in their affairs much – our Queen had forbidden it. One time, some of our people were caught having intimate relationships with young human citizens. They confessed to it in front of our Queen and she took their lives with a simple nod.”

Arsik gulped. He believed the Judge and the islands had strict laws. Now he was reconsidering.

“One day, the Queen announced her visit to the humans’ city. We were shocked; none of us could believe it. She never went to the surface. She had no interest in the mortal world, let alone political relationships, but the news turned out to be true. She chose a small council and went to the city. Lord Hearthworn and the local lords had gathered to honor her with an appropriate welcome. We didn’t want to miss this, so we went too, my friends and I, in secret, to watch the ceremony. We sneaked into the shadows and watched the people gathering around this magnificent procession.

”It was turning into a suffocating affair. The entire city was present: knights, noblemen, farmers, merchants, diplomats, dukes, even visitors from nearby areas. They had all come, dressed in their finest clothes, to see the Queen of the Earth Below, the creature of myth, the daughter of the Gods, the great mage. And so, it happened. She appeared like a goddess among mortals. You could see it in her eyes. She wore an intricate hat adorned with black roses tied together with spider web. The ladies of the city were gawking at her. And then…”

Arsik spotted the wet sheen in her eyes. Her gaze was changing. The story was just starting, and he had learned by now how he would feel after hearing it. His body shuddered in advance.

Maestra hung her head. “Something horrible happened, Arsik. Something no one expected, neither our people nor theirs.” Arsik waited. “She asked a tithe, a horrible, unjust blood tithe.”

Arsik sat up. “What- what kind of tithe?” he stuttered.

“She asked the lord of the city for ten little children, all of them under the age of ten, to raise them in her kingdom. A way to bring our cultures closer together, she said, a sign of good will.”

Arsik got nervous. He didn’t like where this story was heading.

“I still remember the king’s face. He had paled, realizing that the Queen wasn’t interested in civility or the Hearthworns’ culture. It was about establishing her authority, a game to show them who the real boss in these places was, and she hadn’t come up to the surface for anyone to deny her demands. The lord of the city was faced with an impossible choice. He was one of the few who could understand what would follow. If he refused, war would break out. If he accepted, a civil war would ensue. Ultimately, he chose the civil war.”

She paused and laced her hands in her lap. Arsik kissed her. She smiled.

“We weren’t there the next days to see exactly what was happening on the surface, but we heard tales. The discord was endless. The kingdom had been divided and the local lords took the law into their hands. They formed raiding parties and attacked our tunnels, against their king’s wishes, to retrieve the children they had lost. They trespassed on our kingdom and we returned their bones to the surface, but they didn’t care; they sent more. Until their king enforced strict penalties. He had too. He punished them until this madness stopped; he had no other choice. And so, in the years that followed, the city returned to normality, abandoning ten children to their fate, willfully blind in a falsely peaceful everyday life, under the heavy veil covering their souls.”

Sadness permeated Arsik’s heart. He thought of Karadra, wondering how many people like her could have been there back then, experiencing that collective sorrow. “What happened to the children?” he asked.

Maestra stared at him through glassy eyes. “They all died…” Her words grazed the air around them. “Almost all of them, some quickly, others slowly…”

“From what?” Arsik squealed.

Maestra lowered her head in shame. “Our Queen turned them into experiments, Arsik,” she whispered. “She tried spells on them, curses… She wanted to see how long they would last.”