Her hero was dirty, but at least he spoke the truth. His eyes had lingered on the strange mark on her forehead before his answers were given. Elyna, perched on the middle step, folded her arms on her knees and watched the exchange. Ed was bleeding from the hand and a few scraps down the side of his face. His dark eyes were wild and his hair untamed. Stubble haunted his cheeks and she couldn’t remember a time when she’d seen her brother looking so uncivilised; like a pirate. A traitor to the crown. The young woman nodded when Malcolm glanced in her direction, taking care to appear calm and unmoved by the situation.
Her stomach threatened to reject her breakfast. The cellar stank of stale ale and worse. Everything that seeped down from the floorboards and clung to the walls. She made a note, never to eat anything from the tavern again. Not unless it had been boiled first.
Yoreth, Yoreth, Yoreth… perhaps she should have killed her lover instead of her Uncle. Was he the true serpent behind the rebellion? The woman lent to the side as Malcolm passed her by. His steps thundered on the stair, shaking the wooden frame. She waited until the last tremor faded before she stood and edged down the final steps. Her legs felt wobbly beneath her, so she held onto the railing. Clammy palms slipping over the wooden pole.
There were two guards that she didn’t know, and they’d followed the Wardens’s instructions.
“Would you excuse us?”
The two men exchanged looks, before the younger shook his head, “My Lady-”
“You’re worried that the prisoner could hurt me?” She peered around them at her brother. His hands a feet bound as he sat on the chair. Gripping the mug of water as though it was a lifeline. The woman drew her own small dagger and inspected the sharp blade, “he won’t.”
They exchanged looks again, “beg your pardon Captain, I don’t want to be the one to tell the Warden that you’re injured.”
“Or that the prisoner has escaped,” the older guard finished and glanced at the Burhan sailor. The resemblance between the siblings was striking.
Elyna gestured to the top of the stairs, “they’re the only way in or out. I’m not going to free him, that is the truth. Stand at the top if you must, but I need to speak to my Brother and I would prefer to do it privately.”
Another exchange of looks before the older man shook his head and made towards the stairs.
“Sarge-” the younger man almost whined but followed his commanding officer towards the steps. He looked back, regretful as they climbed to the top. The Sargeant paused at the top before ushering the first guard through, “you’ve got ten.”
Ten bits. Was it going to be enough? Elyna sank down onto the chair opposite her brother. They had the same eyes, it’s what everyone had always told them. They had their father’s eyes and the curved oval faces of their mother. They both had thick dark hair, though Edmunds was shorter and scruffy, falling over his features in a tangled mess. Water dripped in the darkness. Her breath came in uneven wisps and Edmund watched her as though he too, was unwilling to break the stillness.
His cup was empty, so she pulled it from his grasp and re-filled it. Pushing it back into his hands, silent. Her foot shifted, jigging from side to side as she forced herself to remain otherwise still.
“I saw you at Veljorn’s wedding,” Elyna watched the eyes that mirrored her own darkness.
“I saw you too,” he smiled for a moment, as though the memory was a happy one. The expression was fleeting and it passed.
“Where did you go after the ceremony?” she edged forward and curled her fingers around the base of the chair. Gripping it tight, afraid to fall off and onto the dank stone floor. There was a note of panic in her voice that she struggled to smother.
“Yoreth and I were bound for Krome. There wasn’t much time to stick around.”
She wanted to ask if he’d been there, when Marcus had dug his blade into her skin and made her scream. She wanted to know if her brother had been sat downstairs in Burhan and done nothing to help her. The questions were stolen from her. Her lips thinned into a line and her eyes burnt hot once more. Elyna hadn’t seen her brother in four arcs before the wedding. The only correspondence she’d had, was the notice that her lover was dead. The young woman stilled, as if he’d sunk a burning blade into her back. Paralysed she could only stare at the man who’d been her idol. Beneath the beard and the wild eyes was the boy she’d spent a lifetime, scrambling to keep up with. Desperate to prove herself, not to their parents, or their grandparents…but to him.
Her childhood dreams fell away in brightly coloured ribbons and left behind nothing but grey stone. The skyrider stood, feeling more like a little girl than she had in decades.
“I loved you,” she summoned the words as she studied him. Was there remorse on his features, or merely regret that he’d been caught. That all his lies were coming undone. Her instinct was to flee, but then she might never get another chance to find her answers. Hesitating before she forced herself to cross the room once more and planted her hands on the back of the chair.
“Edmund you turned traitor against the crown, and against your own family.” She struggled to keep her voice level. Overcoming her desire to flee by meeting his gaze. Her fingers turned white against the wood and her nails pressed against it. “You lied to me, you told me Yoreth was dead and then you - you joined with him?” She glanced back at the door and the small crack of light that snuck through.
“Ely-”
“Don’t!” Her hand wavered in front of his face, fingers extended. She wasn’t about to strike a tethered man so her hand dropped once more. “Four arcs and you slip away with the man you told me was DEAD. You told me he had Edmund!”
“I was trying to protect you!” It was a roar, almost louder than the bellow of panic that Malcolm had coaxed.
The rush of silence that followed was only broken by the inane dripping in the dark. He’d told the truth. Her fingertips tingled with the force of it.
“What from?”
He didn’t answer and she moved around the chair to sink down once more.
“Ed, what were you trying to protect me from?”
Her brother seemed to edge back in the shadows, watching her through his hair. “I’ve seen the way he treats women, and men… I don’t know his intentions but somewhere along the line he would have hurt you,” the words came slow and unsteady, “you would have stopped being useful, or convenient…or you would have done something, Elyna and I had to get you out of that.” He let out the air in his lungs and it clouded the air between them. “I saw the way you looked at him, you would have followed him to the end of Idalos…the only way to stop you was to tell you he was dead.” He seemed to gather himself and watched her in reply. “I love you, Elyna. Seven, you’re my sister…”
She shivered and dropped her gaze to her lap. Wondering just who was being interrogated now. The steady earth she’d planted herself on was slipping away beneath her feet. “I make my own decisions, Edmund.”
Edmund Burhan looked at the stairs beyond his sister, “you’re involved with the Warden now,” it wasn’t a question. “I saw the way you looked at him.”
A smile pulled at the edges of her mouth and Elyna nodded, “we have a child together.”
Her brother sucked in a breath and she took her cue to stand again.
“You’re not allowed an opinion on my daughter, or my lover, Edmund,” the Skyrider was proud of the calm she managed to project, even if she didn’t feel it.
She made it to the bottom step before he called out again.
“You’re just going to leave me here?”
Elyna turned to face him a final time, “yes. Because you’re a traitor to the crown.” She bit her bottom lip before shaking her head. “But I’ll make sure that you’re fed, and given water…and that while you’re at the mercy of my commanders, no one brands your skin or rapes you. Alright? I promise to do a far better job at protecting you, then you did me. Because you’re my brother…is Vaughn alive?”
“I don’t know.”
The woman left without another word and heard the door slamming closed behind her. As blind as she’d walked down to the cellar, she made her way back through the tavern and up the stairs. At first, she was confused to find the tall-man within the room. Blinking at him as he stood with his back towards her. Silhouetted against the morning sky and the falling snow.
“Mal?” The woman approached him, resting a cold hand against the middle of his back before bowing her head against his spine.
