Destinare: A Destined Tale Of Time

XIV Secret garden

 “Do…do you want to see something with me?”

Azmeralda paused and tilted her head to the side in confusion. The look on Tiberius’s face was one lost in between hesitation and determination. Two opposite parts of him were colliding with each other as he said the words. It was the fearful part of him, the one molded by the years of living in isolation. While the other part that surfaced as of late – exactly when he started to meet Azmeralda.

Surprisingly, despite the foreign feeling, it was just as strong and loud as the other side of him. In the end, out of desperation, he decided for the first time to let the latter prevail. Honestly, it felt better than he thought. In his pitch-black eyes, Azmeralda started seeing the way how determination dominated over the hesitant child inside of him.

It made her heart beat, she heard it loudly in her ears as she felt the blood rush in her vain. Azmeralda was about to reply until she saw the tall figure that still lingered behind them, Alexander. She doubted him not hearing the request, but the silence that remained meant that he wasn’t opposing anything. Alexander was a man of little words.

“I would love to!” she exclaimed, clapping her hands together.

Tiberius lit up in excitement as well, the corners of his full lips turned up into a cheerful smile. Unconsciously, his hand was moving to hold hers. Alexander flinched backwards in surprise. There was no way he would draw his sword on a child for holding his Princess’s hand. He stood still.

Tiberius led the way back inside the Imperial palace, with Azmeralda still in his grasp. They entered from a different door on the one side of the hallway that surrounded the garden. Once they were inside, warmth welcomed all three of them as well as a long corridor that apparently didn’t have a soul but them. In the distance, as they looked on their right, faint sounds of the banquet went on.

Azmeralda couldn’t help but wonder where he was taking them. Then again, she was reminded of Tiberius’s words, “I know this palace like the back of my hand.”

“At the end is the banquet hall,” Tiberius said. “This is just another door a little further down the hall.”

The hallway they were in seemed to last to infinity for as long as their eyes could see. Dimly lit, apparently by the lack of use of this part of the hallway. But just like the rest of the palace, the ceilings were ornamented and painted with the stories and myths of the empire of Makidia. Azmeralda gazed heavenwards as the silence rose again.

Tiberius couldn’t help but gaze at her in turn and follow the direction of her sight. He has seen these paintings too many times than he cared to count. Sometimes he would even believe no one but him used this part of the palace. However, the servants never failed to attend to it, there wasn’t a speck of dust on the floors or the columns directing the hall.

These paintings, he spent hours staring skyward at till his neck was sore. He studied every cranny and inch of it, identifying each person painted and what those paintings represented. Tiberius believed that the work done on painting these ceilings was too much to just be for decoration. They meant something, and one day he would proudly say he finally understood the extent of honor of the victories of the empire. The proudness made them go to the extent of showing it off in the hallways of the imperial palace.

Simply, he understood the curiosity Azmeralda had, as he shared it with her.

Before long, Tiberius stopped before another double door. It was too narrow to emphasize anything important behind them. Azmeralda couldn’t help but feel that their spot was a little out of plan compared to the whole palace.

“A room in the middle of the main corridor?” Azmeralda puzzled. “The door looks like that of a bed-chamber.”

Tiberius glanced over at her and nodded with a faint smile. “I find it weird as well,” he agreed. “Wait till you see this.”

Tiberius held both his hands out and pushed the door open. They clattered on the rusty hinges as they swung inwards to a room that was no different from a bed-chamber – except that it had no bed. In addition, the opposite wall was made of glass. Complete glass, like that of a greenhouse.

Beyond the glass, Azmeralda saw the rose garden lit by the direct moonlight. The chamber itself was lit by nothing but the moonlight flooding in through the glass. The hearth was against the wall with two chairs and a sofa surrounding it. Opposite to the hearth were bookshelves extending along the wall, not a single empty space to another, even a piece of paper.

What Azmeralda found even more surprising was the crib that stood beside the desk in front of the bookshelves.

“What room is this?” she couldn’t help but ask, her legs moved on their own to explore the chamber.

“I don’t know,” Tiberius said, following in her path. “I found this room years ago and even though it feels no one should be able to enter, the door was never locked.”

Azmeralda felt like she was exploring a mystery in the imperial family. She walked up to the crib, the dust piled up on the wood of the shelves and the desk. Obviously, this room hadn’t been cleaned in years, and that was contradicting the clean corridors outside. Clearly, the servants weren’t lazy to clean this room alone.

“Come here,” Tiberius called, standing before the glass doors. “You have to see the garden.”

Azmeralda grinned faintly as she went to join him. Alexander took small steps to stand at the glass door as the other two children walked inside the garden. Once inside, the strong smell of sweet lavender teased Azmeralda’s nose.

Another mystery… ‘Who took care of this garden?’

“How…?” she whispered under her breath.

“I don’t know…magic maybe,” Tiberius answered, hearing her wondering question. “I’m not sure who took care of this garden. It’s isolated except for this door.”

Azmeralda listened closely to his low voice. She felt the same, peaceful and warm, unlike the banquet’s garden. She walked along the stone-tiled path amid the bushes and lavender trees. The leaves glittered brightly, appearing healthy from the mysterious care it got.

“This is…” Azmeralda paused. “This is beautiful.”

“No one knows about this chamber?” She added.

Tiberius stopped as he walked in the opposite direction, and glanced over at her from over his shoulder. He nodded, a sad faint sad smile lingering on his face as it was illuminated by the moonlight.

“Is it okay for…Alexander?” she whispered the name, glancing at Alexander who stood still at the glass door with his hands behind his back.

“It’s alright,” Tiberius said. “It’s not mine to begin with…however...”

“You pretend as if it was yours,” Azmeralda finished for him, looking heaven’s wards at the stars. They were even prettier here. “As long as it’s abandoned, you remain here imagining it’s yours.”

Tiberius was taken aback at his fantasies being told out loud…and she said it so effortlessly. Almost as if she experienced the same thing as well. His eyes lingered on her as she stood before him. He saw the way her tinted lips smiled as she kept looking heavenwards. He tasted salt in his mouth…

He flinched as he brought his hand to his cheeks to feel the wet skin under his fingertips. Tears escaped his eyes without him even knowing, it was aching inside. A hand clutched his heart tightly and out of the blue. Something about the warmth in this secret garden, the smell of lavender, the presence of the princess… made him go weak.

In the relative darkness, Azmeralda failed to see the tears on his face. She smiled brightly, holding her hair back from her face.

“Thank you, Tiberius,” she said gently. “For letting me in.”

~~~~

Time passed slowly between them in the garden. They didn’t say most of the time but enjoyed each other’s presence. After all, there was too little to be said in the place. In fact, it felt wrong to break the silence created by the spirit of magic in the place, it was almost as if she was forced into silence by the effect of this place.

“Princess, it’s getting late,”

If it hadn’t been for Alexander pulling her back to reality, she wouldn’t have left…neither would Tiberius. They walked back along the way they came from. The hallway was now colder as the moon got high in the sky. Their path was silent; the banquet was over, considering the silence of it when they passed by.

They reached the part where the hallways parted, and it was their time to part as well. Azmeralda stood before Tiberius with Alexander behind her. She could hear the sound of her heartbeats loudly in her ears and hoped that she was the only one who heard them.

Alexander cleared his throat with a hand over his mouth. “Princess…” he called out, gesturing for her to say what she has to say.

Azmeralda copied her escort movements before turning her attention back to Tiberius.

“Sadly, we will have to end this adventure now,” She chuckled. “It appears it has gotten late.”

“It has,” Tiberius agreed. “However, I have had fun thanks to you, Princess.”

The complexion on his face was priceless. Azmeralda now believed that she had truly reached out to him. Friend, now she can say the word easily.

They kept looking at each other in silence. Alexander gave them that moment. Before long, Azmeralda was waving goodbye to Tiberius as she turned on her heels to head back to her chamber.

The youngsters moved with their ears out for each other’s footsteps until it could no longer be heard. Now that there was nothing but the sound of Alexander’s boots on the marbled floor, she turned to glance over her shoulder in hesitation.

“Is there a matter, Princess?” Alexander said, keeping his sight out ahead.

“Are you going to tell my father…about today?” she spoke weakly.

Alexander lowered his head to look at her tiny figure, he seemed to be thinking of something it was impossible to pin out with his poker complexion.

“I do not wish to lie to you princess,” he simply said, taking a moment to figure out the right words.

Azmeralda now knew that there was no hiding anything from Julianus. She ought to know the moment he gave her Alexander. She gave him an odd look before she sighed in defeat, turning her eyes back ahead of her. She took a deep breath.

There was no ruining the good time she had, not even her father. ‘So what if he knows,’ she thought, and shoved it away. All she could think of now was the magical chamber that appeared to be hidden from the rest of the world. A place where she and Tiberius were the only people aware of it – and Alexander.

She wasn’t even in bed yet, but she was looking forward to tomorrow.

“Let's hurry up!” she chuckled and dashed out into the corridor.

“Wait, Princess!”

Despite the protest, Alexander ran all the way after her. With no idea whatsoever about what got to her out of the blue.