Chapter 34

Aris left the moment he received the dispatch. He was livid upon hearing the news of the attack. The guards at the gates scattered at the sight of his stony march and eyes filled with the threat of death.

Treall’s death served to cap off his rage and his heart turned to ice. If he found whoever was responsible for sending the Inquisitor after his niece, there would be no trial. There would be no law. He would repay Treall’s death. The man had been one of the brightest recruits he’d taken under his wing in nearly a decade.

Aris’ rage was a deadly silence. It hadn’t been seen in years, but when it happened, it would become the subject of gossip for weeks afterwards. His rage was deadly. Only God could save the person whom his anger fell on, and, like the servants in the keep said, God turned a blind eye when Aris’ anger boiled.

Minutes lengthened into eternities as Aris stormed through the keep, past the guards and made his way to the stables, where the stable-hands scurried to provide him with the quickest horse housed there, desperate to avoid the wrath of the General. It seemed like years later he arrived at his estate, but it had been mere minutes after receiving the news of the attack that he passed through the dark cherry colored gates.

He didn’t say as he passed through the gates and leapt off the heaving steed, leaving the horse for the stable-boy to clean the lather from.

Corrine, who’d received word of his arrival the moment the gate guards had seen the General came jogging out to meet him.

It was rare seeing her husband in such a fury. It outmatched the one she herself had felt upon seeing the duo battered and bloodied.

Aris, when angered, was like the typhoons that buffeted the old capital city of Vealand.

“She isn’t gravely injured, just some cuts and bruises,” Corrine sighed, she was so tired of the secrets being kept but she felt helpless to do anything about it. “She won’t tell me what happened, but whatever it was, it’s sitting heavy on her mind.”

Aris’ ears perked up at that last part. Did the attack have something to do with his recent baptism into the unseen world of magic?

“What do you mean!?” Aris couldn’t hide the edge in his voice.

“She won’t go into the details with me,” resentment crept in Corrine’s voice. “All I know is that she and Kestrel were attacked and Treall sacrificed himself to save them.”

“And the toll you mentioned?” Aris’ voice strained.

“They had the same looks in their eyes that the recruits get on their first murder case. It was like they’d seen the darkest horrors that the world had to offer.”

Aris stiffly nodded. Had she too been pulled into the world of Memory Magic that he’d so recently been baptized into?

“Please have someone fetch Kestrel as soon as possible,” Aris requested before marching brusquely upstairs to Sephira’s room.

“I’m coming in,” he knocked on the door and waited a minute to give his niece time to make herself decent if she were undressed.

She didn’t reply.

He opened the door to see Sephira laying in her bed, covers pulled to her chin.

She let out a faint smile when Aris’ fathering instincts kicked in and he wrapped her in a smothering hug. Sephira returned his embrace and clung to him like she might lose him if she let go for even a second.

Sephira wished she could stay in the safety of his arms forever.

Aris wasn’t her father by birth, but he had been the best dad she could have asked for since the loss of her own father and she always felt secure in his powerful embrace.

Sephira felt her eyes had been opened to the world she’d never knew, her eyes had been opened to just how cruel the world could be. It wasn’t the stories she heard snippets of when she eavesdropped on conversations between Aris and Corrine, it wasn’t a detached sort of darkness anymore. She had been thrown headfirst into the violence her Uncle called home. How could he face such darkness and violence daily and not be corrupted? She was traumatized by what had happened and he saw that sort of evil almost daily.

Tears started to form in the corners of her eyes.

“I love you, I’ll protect you no matter what,” Aris said, kissing Sephira’s forehead. The thought of someone harming her infuriated him.

Everything that Sephira’d been holding in, in an attempt to protect her aunt and the twins came bubbling out and with a shuddering breath, tears began to pour from her eyes and sobs racked her body.

Aris cursed inwardly as he held Sephira, who’s tears soaked his dark brown and emerald green uniform. He ached to be hunting down the monsters that had hurt her so. He would make them pay dearly. He would have his pound of flesh.

But he needed to be by her side right now. That was what was most important.

A soft rapping came on the door, and Kestrel entered quietly, lightly stepping into the room, eyes low. When he saw Sephira crying in Aris’ arms ambled to the side of the room where he watched silently. He couldn’t help but feel like a stranger.

This was an intimate family moment and he neither had a family nor belonged with one, so he watched the moment as an outsider, feeling awkward and out of place. His heart burned at the sight.

Aris wasn’t sure how long it was before his niece stopped crying but when she finally let go of him, she turned and smiled at Kestrel. It was a smile that drew strength from his presence. Aris could tell that she was sure she would be dead if not for Kestrel’s actions.

He had been around enough survivors to recognize that look. Their connection was more than an infatuation. Now they shared something deep. Something life altering.

Aris motioned Kestrel over to the bedside where he stood with an uncomfortable stiffness. His eyes were full of guilt. He averted them.

“Why are you avoiding eye contact?” Aris asked bluntly.

Sephira opened her mouth to chide her uncle, but was silenced by the stern look in his eyes.

“It was because of me she was put in danger. We were attacked by the same man who killed Cillia. He was out for my blood and your niece got caught in the middle of it. I’ll understand if you punish me or kick me out. I’d do that if I were you,” Kestrel’s voice broke. He was terrified of losing them. He’d found a place he belonged for the first time in his life.

“That’s it?” Aris asked.

Kestrel nodded a ‘yes’ in reply.

“Don’t be an idiot,” Aris said.

Kestrel’s eye’s widened and his brows knitted in a questioning gaze.

“You saved Sephira’s life right?”

Kestrel’s eyebrows furrowed. What did Aris mean by that? It was his fault that Sephira was in danger in the first place. How did he save her life? He opened his mouth to say as much but the Aris’ words shut him up.

“She believes that you saved her life, and that’s enough for me,” Aris told Kestrel.

“I never said a thing,” there was a hint of disbelief in Sephira’s voice. “How did you know that?”

Aris chuckled. It felt good to laugh regardless of the heavy air that permeated the room. “Why do you think that I got my position? It wasn’t due to connections,” he smiled. “Now; tell me what happened.”

Kestrel looked to Sephira, then to Aris and back before clearing his throat and beginning the story.

“As you know, a while back Sephira asked me to help her with her shopping. She could buy twice as much food when she had an extra set of hands to help her carry everything,” Kestrel cleared his throat. “Well, we must have been being watched, because that guard, Rel, knew our routine. I’m sure he’d been watching and waiting to get revenge for that eye of his I destroyed in our first fight.”

Aris leaned in.

“Well, we weren’t paying attention and we ended up in the alleyways and it was then that monster Rel decided to attack. He came at me with a metalvine and it was only because of Sephira that I was able to escape with my life,” Kestrel said.

“Kestrel started fighting him and he held his own…but the guard had years of training on him, and had knocked the wind out of Kestrel. He was insane and he was gonna kill Kestrel so I picked up a rock and slammed it into his face,” Sephira picked up the story.

Aris felt a prick of pride at Sephira’s resourcefulness.

“It was then that he pulled a knife and tried to skewer me, but Treall, who you must have had following us from a distance, made it just in time and slammed his face into a wall. He was out in seconds,” Sephira said.

Kestrel picked up the story, “Treall then led us to a nearby guard house where we manacled Rel and began to question him. We were able to learn that he really was a guard and learned his name. We were gonna get more out of him, but at that moment a hooded figure appeared from nowhere. I don’t know what happened, but practically as soon as we saw him we were overwhelmed with a pain like nothing I’ve ever felt before. It was as if we were reliving every horrible torture that a man could think of,” the look in Kestrel’s eyes let Aris know he was talking of Memory Magic. “Before I could even think to react under the pain, the cloaked figure sliced the throat of one of the guards, and had buried a spike in Rel’s eye, and in the blink of an eye, the rest except Treall were all dead. It was only due to Treall’s skill that us two weren’t killed with the rest of them.”

Kestrel’s voice trailed off as he relived the memories. Before that moment, Memory Magic had been little more than a theory. An exercise. But seeing people die at the hands of a Mage changed everything.

Kestrel cleared his throat, choking back the emotions that were vying to break his composure. “I’ve never felt more shame in my life,” he said.

Sephira reached to grab Kestrel’s hand and comfort him, but a loaded glance from Aris stopped her. He turned those eyes on Kestrel. What had caused him such shame?

Kestrel’s eyes caught Aris’ unflinching gaze and he took a deep breath to give himself courage before answering. “I couldn’t do anything. His power overwhelmed me. I felt crippled. I couldn’t even think to move. His magic enveloped every other thought that I had in my mind. I could only feel its touch and nothing else.”

“Magic?” Sephira asked.

Aris glared at Kestrel. His fierce look scared the younger man. It was clear that he wanted to keep Sephira out of that world and Kestrel, like an idiot, had opened the door to his niece.

Sephira looked at the two. Her eyes were full of questions, but her uncle stopped them.

“That’s better left for another time,” finality rang in his tone. “What happened after Kestrel froze?” Aris then asked pointedly.

“Treall somehow pushed through the visions that that monster used and fought back. He was able to break the hold of the visions just long enough for us to regain composure. Kestrel rushed to my side and grabbed me. He pulled me out of there and we tried to escape, but the visions came back worse than before and stopped us in our tracks,” Sephira said. “That freak was able to destroy Treall’s right hand but Treall still shattered the assassin’s ankle and unmasked him. He was barely older than me.”

Barely older than Sephira? Aris’ skin prickled at that.

“Treall went to question him, but he had a dagger hidden in his cloak and before we could even see what had happened, he was dying,” Sephira choked up at the memory and Aris put his arms around his niece again, holding her close.

“I couldn’t do anything to save him,” Kestrel’s voice was gravely with despondence.

“I saw that he was reaching for another knife in his cloak and he was gonna murder Kestrel, so I dove at him. I didn’t want to see anyone else die,” Sephira said. “The next thing I knew Kestrel was there and wrestling the knife free. I don’t understand what happened next, but it seemed like the moment that Kestrel touched him, his whole demeanor changed and the next thing I know, he goes crazy and stabs the knife into his own neck!”

They talked a while longer, and Aris asked many more questions until the duo was too tired to continue answering.

Things had just gotten much more complicated.