Leslie Moore - Griffin's Shadow

“I’m sure they’ll settle it, Highness, one way or another. You shouldn’t let it worry you,” Eikko said, as she followed her mistress out of the bedroom. Jelena sat on the couch before the fireplace, and Eikko quickly moved to throw a fresh chunk of wood onto the glowing embers of last night’s fire.

But it does worry me , Jelena thought, well aware of the bitter rivalry between her aunt and Sonoe, but still ignorant of its origins. Neither mage had offered an explanation, nor had either one asked her to make a choice between them.

One day, they might, and then what?

“Shall I bring you your tea, Highness?”

A soft rap upon the outer door interrupted Jelena’s reply. Eikko hurried over to admit a rather flustered Sonoe. The mage pulled off her green velvet cloak and dumped it into Eikko’s arms, then swept into the sitting room and dropped on the couch beside Jelena. She held herself stiffly upright, eyes closed, jaw locked tight. Her long, graceful fingers clinched into fists on her lap.

“Sonoe, I saw you with my aunt. What happened?” Jelena asked in a low voice. She stared at her friend’s profile and waited.

With an explosive sigh, Sonoe relaxed. She opened her eyes, turned toward Jelena and smiled. “It’s nothing that I haven’t had to deal with many times before, pet,” she answered. “The princess and I have…old grievances. Grievances which I have long since put aside, but she seems unable to move past. I try to live peacefully with her, for your father’s sake, but, well…” She shook her head and reached out to gather Jelena into her arms. “I am sorry if you were worried,” she whispered.

Jelena felt Sonoe’s warm, comforting energy envelop her like a soft blanket.

“I…I wasn’t worried, not really,” Jelena fibbed. Sonoe chuckled. The baby jumped and both Jelena and Sonoe gasped, then burst out laughing.

“That little one of yours… she grows stronger every day,” Sonoe said. “I can feel her Talent, Jelena. It blazes like the sun. She will be a great beauty and an even greater mage one day.”

Jelena looked down at her bulging belly and tried to imagine what her child would look like. “I pray every night, Sonoe,” she said, “to Hani, the Soldaran goddess of Beauty. I ask her to let Ashi’s face come again into the world when our daughter is born.”

“Eikko!” Sonoe called out.

“Yes, mistress?”

“The princess is ready to go to the bath house now.”

Eikko disappeared into Jelena’s bedroom and emerged a few moments later carrying a heavy cloak of fine, golden brown wool and fur-lined leather boots. She flung the cloak over the top of Jelena’s robe and bent to assist her mistress with the boots.

“Now you’re ready to go out into the cold,” the maid pronounced after she’d done up the last bootlace.

“I’ll wait here for you,” Sonoe stated. “Don’t dawdle. Your father is expecting us for breakfast.”

Jelena smiled. “I have an announcement to make that he’ll want to hear. I’ve decided on a name for my daughter.”

Sonoe beamed with delight. “I won’t ask you to tell me now, because I know you’ll want to tell your father first,” she said. Her emerald eyes shone with affection. Jelena wondered anew how she could have ever been afraid of her father’s Companion.

Jelena waited for Eikko to pull on her own cloak, and then the two young women descended to the courtyard and hurried toward the bath house, their breath swirling in gouts of steam about their heads. As they walked, Jelena glanced over her shoulder to see Sonoe standing in the sitting room window, looking upward, head cocked, as if listening to something.

That’s odd, Jelena thought as she followed Sonoe’s line of sight to the peak of the roof directly opposite the window. The enormous raven she had seen earlier still clung to the frost-slick tile. The bird opened its beak and uttered a harsh cry.

The sound sent an icy finger of dread trailing down her spine, and she shivered. Why the caw of a raven should affect her so, she couldn’t fathom. She looked back toward the window, but Sonoe had disappeared.

“Princess! Do come along, you’ll catch your death out here!” Eikko pleaded through chattering teeth.

“Coming,” Jelena replied. She glanced once more at the roof. The raven remained motionless, a black form silhouetted against the blue sky.

Many Soldarans believed that ravens harbored the souls of executed criminals, bent on mischief and mayhem. Claudia had always discouraged such thinking, believing it to be nonsense; nevertheless, ravens had always made Jelena uneasy.

Pulling her cloak tighter around herself, Jelena turned her back on the bird and followed Eikko’s retreating form. From behind, she heard the flap of wings and a heartbeat later, the raven swooped by, low and fast, then angled up over the roof tops and disappeared. A single, blue-black feather floated down to touch the ground at Jelena’s feet. She sidestepped to avoid treading on it, her gut twisting in irrational fear.

Ashinji would think her silly, and in her mind, she could hear the sound of his good-natured laughter, sweet and mellow. A sharp pang of sorrow opened the ever present wound in her heart as fresh tears wet her cheeks.

I’ve got to stop crying every time I think of you, Ashi. I know you’d want me to get past the pain and move on, for our child’s sake!

By the time she reached the bath house, she had stopped crying, but she felt like the hurt would never truly end.

"Keizo, Jelena has something important to tell you,” Sonoe said as she slipped into her accustomed place at the dining table, to the right of the king. Almost without conscious thought, she arranged her robes to artful effect and settled into the attitude of seductive attentiveness she always adopted when in the presence of her royal lover.

Jelena came to her father and accepted his paternal kiss, then took her place across from Sonoe. The two of them had Keizo all to themselves this morning, for which Sonoe felt greatly relieved. The thought of having to face Taya again, after their run-in earlier…

The old bitch is getting suspicious, she thought. I must tread carefully, very carefully, indeed. Things are at a crucial stage, now. I can’t afford any mistakes!

“What is it you want to tell me, Daughter?” Keizo asked. His voice, as usual, was calm and measured, but the sparkle in his eyes betrayed his eagerness to hear Jelena’s news. Before she could speak, however, the servants arrived with the meal.

Sonoe watched Jelena surreptitiously as the servants laid out the food. The magic of the Key within Keizo’s daughter bled through every pore of her skin, as beautiful and bright as the sun. Sonoe felt intoxicated by its energy. How could any serious mage not wish to possess such power?

The Nameless One thinks he controls me, and that I will meekly assist him in obtaining the Key! I’ll let him believe he has the upper hand, for now. But when I turn the tables on him…then we’ll see who controls whom!

“Shall I pour you some tea, my dear?”

“Uh… yes, please,” Sonoe answered, turning her attention back to Keizo and smiling as he filled her cup. He always seemed to derive pleasure from serving her with his own hand, and she derived enormous satisfaction from letting him do so.

“Now, Daughter… Tell me your news,” Keizo commanded after he had poured tea for them all.

“I’ve decided on a name for your granddaughter,” Jelena said, smiling. “Ashinji and I didn’t have much time to discuss names before he… left for Kerala. I’ve picked one that would please him as well as me.”