Chapter 19: It Wasn't His Name
Mother and son reunited somewhere inside the hidden world.
I was grateful they kept me out of it.
I sat on a rock and watched the training yard instead, thinking about White Wood, thinking about ships, thinking about how far Hekhenden really was and whether I could ever stand raw fish and onions again.
Quiri trained with the archers.
A few feet away, elves sparred with swords.
They were so light on their feet I couldn't hear them dance on the ground. They used body-swerves like water, and their blades barely touched, as if contact was something crude.
Only a handful of arena fighters moved like that.
But none of them moved as cleanly as these elves.
I walked closer and found the instructor.
"Do you mind if I train with your students?" I asked.
The instructor scoffed. "You think you can compete with my students, bard?"
"I'm not a bard," I said for the hundredth time in my head.
"Makes no difference," he said, grinning. "You can't keep up."
"Try me," I said. "Give me your best one."
I grabbed a blunt training sword from the rack and stepped into the yard.
The instructor didn't even hesitate.
"Lavinia," he called. "Take him."
Of course it was a girl.
Tall. Slender. Blonde hair tied back.
She didn't wait for permission to start.
She came at me fast enough that my body reacted before my mind could.
I swerved the way they did, trying to copy, trying to learn while surviving.
It was hard.
Too hard.
She was so quick I couldn't counter.
Or maybe I was too busy studying the swerves to notice the openings.
I could've parried. I didn't.
I wanted their way.
I noticed something though.
Her eyes kept flicking to my sword hand.
So I kicked her leg.
It felt like kicking a chicken.
She dropped.
I stepped back instead of striking, letting her rise.
Then I moved first.
Within a blink, I was on her, using what I'd just learned against her.
One strike to the shoulder.
One to the thigh.
One to the wrist.
She dropped her sword and stumbled back.
"Don't kill me!" she blurted.
I blinked. "Why would I kill you? We're training."
The instructor's grin vanished.
"You're a spy," he snapped.
"What?" I frowned.
"You used our moves," he said, pulling a real sword from his scabbard. "You've been spying on us."
"I'm a fast learner," I said, stepping back. I tossed the training blade aside and pulled Canna from my back.
"Let's not do this," I said. "I only wanted to train."
"Train so you can teach General Bushi," the instructor hissed. "That's it, isn't it?"
My back touched the yard wall.
"Why are elves so paranoid?" I snapped. "I came from Benevira with King Ca'Preva's mother. How am I mixed up with this Bushi?"
"Die," the instructor said, and swung.
I dodged left and countered.
I didn't use swerves now. I used steel.
He tried to swerve away.
Big mistake.
I'd already seen the loopholes.
A wrist twist. An upper slash.
His cheek opened.
His eyes widened.
I stepped in and cut from elbow to shoulder.
He staggered, blood dark against green.
I lowered my blade.
"You have two choices," I said. "Run to a physician and live, or keep bleeding here and die."
The students stared like they'd never seen their instructor lose.
The instructor's pride fought harder than his body.
"I choose death," he snarled, lifting his sword again.
"Enough!" a deep voice thundered.
The instructor froze mid-step.
Then dropped to his knees, bowing.
I turned.
A boy stood beside Queen Est'Chamali.
Seventeen or eighteen.
But his eyes were older than any human's.
"The boy is no spy, Ronii," the king said.
I muttered under my breath, "At least someone is sane."
The king's gaze shifted to me.
"However," he said, "there are troubling matters about you."
I sheathed my sword slowly.
"What matters?" I asked.
The king stepped closer until I could see the resemblance between him and Ca'Libren.
They could've been identical…
Except King Ca'Preva carried himself like a blade, while Ca'Libren moved like silk.
"Who are you?" the king asked. "You look human… but you are not fully human. What are you?"
"You tell me," I said, stubborn. "As far as I'm concerned, I'm human."
Queen Est'Chamali's voice softened. "Who were your parents?"
"Never knew them," I shrugged. "I was raised by my grandfather."
Then I said the name that felt like home in my mouth.
"Pecundo of Noel. Most people called him Edgewood."
The yard went silent.
Not training silence.
A different silence.
One that spreads when people recognize a ghost.
A woman stepped forward from behind the king.
She looked older than Queen Est'Chamali, though her face still held youth the way elf faces did.
"That's impossible," she whispered.
"Pecundo died eighty years ago."
My stomach dropped.
"Then we aren't speaking of the same Pecundo," I said tightly. "My grandfather died four years ago."
The woman's eyes sharpened.
She spoke in the hunter tongue—older, colder.
"Was your grandfather a hunter?"
I answered without thinking, also in the hunter tongue.
"Yes."
Her breath caught.
"He was my husband," she said.
My mind snapped ugly.
I forced a laugh that didn't feel like mine.
"Ah," I said, bitter. "No doubt he left you. I wouldn't want to stay married to an elf either. You treat humans like vermin."
I expected sadness.
I got rage.
"You know nothing," she hissed. "You know nothing!"
Then her words spilled out like poison.
"Pecundo raped and killed three young girls bathing in the river! He was punished. Blinded. Cast into the dark forests with no weapon!"
The yard blurred around me.
My throat tightened.
"That goes against everything my grandfather stood for," I said, voice low. "Either you're lying, or we're not speaking of the same man."
The woman's face didn't soften.
"Hunters live longer than humans," she said. "Even though they were once human."
I turned toward the king, trying to force the situation back into something sane.
"Sire," I said, "tell your guards to let me leave."
The king didn't move.
"The hunters have been our allies for centuries," he said.
"Well that's nice," I snapped. "Can I go now?"
"No," the king said.
His face hardened.
"You will be taken to the Wilder-East."
"For justice," he finished, "for Pecundo of Noel's crimes."
I stared at him.
Then I laughed.
Not because it was funny.
Because it was so stupid it hurt.
An arrow struck the ground near my foot.
I stopped laughing and looked at the king with wet eyes I refused to wipe.
"So," I said, voice shaking with disbelief, "I'm going to Wilder-East to face justice for a crime committed by a man who supposedly died eighty years ago."
I lifted my hands slightly, like that would help them see how insane this was.
"Can someone tell me this is a trick?"