Moirai

Roughly half an hour later, we had put Flowerage behind us. The three of us had barely said a word since leaving the Dryad city, for which I was glad. Although I did plan on asking Mayran to tell his tale once we stopped for the night, I welcomed the silence until then.

The weight of the dagger at my belt was minimal, but I was highly aware of it at all times. When I had taken out of Luna’s hand, I had expected some sort of rush of power, but nothing had happened. It felt like nothing more than an ordinary dagger. But I could feel it somehow. The auras it had been fed for years were reaching out to my own. It was surreal, and not entirely comforting.

Thoughts of the next few days flew around my mind constantly for hours, frustrating me almost to the point of crying out because it seemed my mind just would not organise them into anything reassuring or coherent. It was like there was a cyclone of thoughts inside my brain and I couldn’t even find the eye of the storm to take rest in.

When we stopped for lunch, I decided that maybe conversation would actually help.

“So…how long will it take us to reach Druge?” I asked, biting into the sandwich I had just made from the bread, salami-type meat and meagre amount of greens the Dryads had given us. The coolness of the forest would preserve the latter two for around two days, and the bread and whatever else we could scrounge up would have to last after that.

Mayran and Loni both started at the sound of my voice, before the former answered, “Roughly four days, although it may take more. I’m sure Indina will try to scare us off, although she has had opportunities and hasn’t tried that hard yet.”

“Hasn’t tried hard?” I demanded. “What do you call Gould and the Erkings?”

“Well,” Mayran instantly adopted his ‘mentor’ voice and I got the sense that he was relieved we were having a conversation that did not involve his past. “The Erkings were a test. They weren’t really serious. She has thousands of Erkings at her command, by now anyway, so sending ten after us was just a diversion. And I’m certain Gould was under orders to bring you to her, probably hoping to prevent us from reaching the Dryads. Don’t you get it? She wants you to reach her. She wants a challenge.”

“Why?” I asked. “She knows about Kasanda’s vision, doesn’t she? Wouldn’t she be just a bit worried. Not that I’m saying she should be worried about me, but...”

Mayran sighed and hesitated before answering. “You must understand, Alnya, that Indina is power-crazy. Not just power-hungry. She is overconfident in her own abilities and holds little stock in the vision. If I had to guess, I’d say that because she has been biding her time for so many years, she’s gotten…bored. She thinks that you are just going to be an entertaining event to break up the boredom.”

I shivered. That was not reassuring at all.

“Don’t you see?” Mayran asked, shifting himself so his whole body was facing me. “This is her weakness. She won’t expect how strong you really are, and so she won’t try to hard to start with. You have the advantage of surprise.”

“Mayran.” I corrected sharply. “Don’t you see? She knows where we are. She knows what we are doing constantly. I don’t know how, but she does.” My voice began to rise as I truly realised how wrong he was and the truth of what I was saying filled me with terror. “She knows that I beat Centurion, because she was controlling him at the time! Mayran, she has appeared in my dreams, twice now, taunting me and speaking of the events that were going on at the time! So don’t think she is ignorant of whatever power I do have.”

I stared at him, breathing hard, annoyed that he thought he knew so much about Indina, fiercely curious as to why, and also annoyed at myself for letting fear create the appearance of anger.

He was clearly shocked at what I had said, for he said nothing for at least a minute. Loni spoke, instead.

“Why haven’t you mentioned the dreams before?” she asked quietly and hesitantly, as though worried I would snap at her. A wave of guilt fell over me for making her feel like that.

I turned to her. “Because after the first one, I thought it was just a dream. But when it happened again the morning of the Trial. I didn’t want to bring it up then. We were all worried enough anyway. I intended on telling you afterwards, but…” I struggled for a minute with how to express the past twelve hours, before settling on, “…everything else happened.”

“What does she tell you?” Mayran then voiced the question I was dreading.

I knew I couldn’t lie. “The first time, at Okanto, she…she warned me about you.”

Mayran paled slightly. “What do you mean?”

I sighed. “She said that there was a lot about you that I didn’t know. Things that would shock me. I didn’t know what to think at the time and pretty much didn’t worry about it until last night. The rest has been just her taunting me, although whether intentionally or not, she did lead to me working out that Centurion was her spy.”

Mayran looked down and started staring at the ground intensely. I wondered whether it was to avoid my eyes, or to hide what was in his.

“Mayran,” Loni began. “Instead of all this tension, why don’t you just talk to us?”

“No!” he cried, his voice rough and harsh; his eyes were wild and desperate. Then he softened slightly. “Not now. I will. I made a promise to Kasanda. But…later…please. Tonight.”\

*~*~*

The night came. I watched Mayran as often as I could get away with, noticing how stiff and jumpy he had become. His hands shook as he prepared our dinner and stoked the fire. He reminded me of an animal that had just been caught and knew they were trapped. I wondered what would cause such a reaction. I was curious, but I also started to wonder whether making Mayran talk about his past was a good thing.

It seemed entirely possible, the more I thought about it, that some very traumatic things had happened to Mayran, and talking about them could affect him mentally. I definitely didn’t want to do that.

“Mayran,” I began quietly. Loni looked up, but I gave her a look to indicate what I was about to say. She nodded slightly, before looking down again. “I think, maybe…if you don’t want to tell us everything, just tell us briefly why you know so much about Indina. That’s really all we want to know, anyway.”

Mayran smiled in what I could only assume was appreciation, although he also slightly had the look of someone who was in pain. “Thank you, Alnya. It means a lot to me that you would say that…but I may as well tell everything. You have a right to know as my friends, and…well…maybe it will help.”

He stared into the flickering embers of our fire for a few minutes before continuing. His voice began quiet and flat, but slowly, over the next hour, grew in volume and filled with various strong emotions. Loni and I could only sit and listen, rendered speechless by what we heard and the mesmerising way in which Mayran told it.

“I wasn’t born here in Renenta, I have lived here for many years.” He began softly, without looking up. “I am originally from Azterka. You, Alnya, may remember hearing about it from Loni and her parents. A relatively thin channel of water separates the two countries, easily traversable in a couple of days. Azterka is a culturally rich country, but it is also rich in other ways. I was born to the most prestigious nobleman in its capital, Ignitur, and as such my childhood was full of luxury. Any toy or item I even slightly desired was granted me, but the thing I craved most was proper, caring attention.

“I don’t include this detail for pity, but because it is the truth and that is what you have asked for. My parents were always busy in the palace, carrying out the king’s wishes with regards to trade and other matters. They hardly ever had any time for me. Even when young I got the distinct impression that they viewed me as more of a burden than anything else. And so, not long after my seventh birthday, my carer, Eldaline, and I conspired to escape. She fully supported me and already knew that I loved her more than my own mother, and the feeling was mutual, so we became stowaways on the next boat out. It sounds crazy, I know, but however we did it and for whatever reason we did, neither of us have ever regretted it since, for Eldaline also had grown tired of the of the capitol and wanted to see more of the world in her old age.

“We didn’t want to move from one capitol to another, so after arriving in Nerome we acquired a map and discovered Okanto; a large enough city but full of Renenta’s own culture and right in the middle of the country. We settled there after a week-long journey. To its residents, Eldaline was my mother and my father was a sailor who perished at sea. Then, after three years, my life was turned upside down.”

Mayran paused and closed his eyes, as though in pain. I wanted to interrupt and tell him that, by this stage, we only needed to know about his connection to Indina, but I held back. It seemed as though he needed to tell his whole story, so despite the pity I felt towards him, I kept my mouth shut. After a moment, Mayran continued, though his voice was now lower, in an attempt to hide his sorrow.

“Eldaline grew gravely ill. No-one knew what ailed her and despite the best medical attention Okanto could offer, she began to slip away. You know, of course, that she survived but at the time I was terrified. Well, terrified and also quite angry. I became bitter towards the world because I believed that the only person who had ever genuinely cared about me would be taken. It was silly, but I had never been taught about fate and the reasoning behind things that happen to us in life. I sunk into a hard, cold mindset and began to resent everything around them. I would hide in the city and try to stay as far away from our house as possible because I had enough of seeing Eldaline so ill.

“I was incredibly stupid and reckless, for it was at this point that she found me. To this day I still don’t know why she was in Okanto or why she decided to take me, but Indina came across me huddled in a back alley one day. I was crying, for I had just been told that Eldaline had taken a turn for the worst. I didn’t realise who or what Indina was until a while later. She approached and asked me why I was crying. I told her, bitterly, about Eldaline. She knew, I think, that I was weak in heart and mind from what was going on in my life. Like a cat hunting a mouse, she pounced. She spun me a tale in which she was a queen of a small kingdom that she desired to grow and encompass all of Renenta. She told me of her castle and said that she needs a young pair of legs and a strong back to help her with various deeds. I won’t go into detail of everything she told me, but at my young age it was convincing enough. I believed that I would certainly lose Eldaline, so there was nothing for me in Okanto. I accompanied Indina on the long trek back to Druge. It was my greatest mistake.

“Over the next nine years, I became many things to Indina, each slightly higher in rank than the last. Slave, servant, helper, all the way up to practically her right-hand man. Constantly she kept me under the illusion that Druge was the centre of her small kingdom that had once been the whole of Renenta, but that had been cruelly reduced to a few hundred acres of land. I bought it, because her deception was so tight and I could never see any difference. Nine years I spent in her cold, dark castle. Though at times she made me feel as though she would never have accomplished anything without me, other times I would be no more than a prisoner. If ever anything went wrong, I would be the one to pay the price, even if it involved the various strange and terrible creatures she had under her command. By means both magical and conventional, I would be punished, so it didn’t take long before fear was added to the list of reasons why I never tried to escape.”

Mayran’s eyes were black as night. He seemed to be in a far off place and I feared that my initial concerns were correct and that he was reliving whatever tortures Indina had inflicted upon him. I reached out towards him, wanting to shake him out of these waking nightmares, but before my hand touched his arm he shuddered and continued talking as though completely unaware of Loni’s and my presence.

“Despite all of this, Indina tutored me in the ways of the aura, delighted when she discovered that I was an aurae as well. It was what led to her ‘using’ me for various tasks and…I hate myself for some of the things I did under the false belief that I was doing right. There was a town, once…I do not remember its name, but I am sure of one thing; its people were innocent civilians who had never wronged anyone. Yet Indina convinced me that they were traitors of her crown and several of its people had tried to assassinate her.” Mayran closed his eyes and a tear trickled down his cheek. “I destroyed the town. A few escaped…but…”

It seemed he truly couldn’t go on any more. He buried his face in his hands and his shoulders shook with silent sobs. I stared at him for several minutes, in shock at both his words and his abrupt break-down. I tried to picture Mayran committing such an evil act, and couldn’t. It was a different man than this self-loathing, sad soul who sat before me.

I succeeded in placing my hand on his arm this time. When he didn’t flinch or move away, I inched closer so I could wrap my arm around him completely. His sobs quickly died and he gasped, “Wh-what are you doing?”

I shushed him, holding back my own tears. “You looked like you needed a hug.”

On cue, Loni also moved around to his other side and embraced him as well.

“How do you not hate me?” Mayran whispered.

I frowned down at him and spoke the conclusion I had come to. “The Mayran who did those things under Indina is long gone. I would have to be blind to see how much you regret it, so I hold nothing against you. You were under Indina’s control. You couldn’t have helped it if you thought you were doing the right thing.”

“But how could I have thought that killing people was right?”

“Mayran, you lived with her since you were ten. Still a child. All you knew was the way her evil mind worked. How did you know it was wrong?”

He didn’t have an answer to my question. After another couple of minutes, he said, “I…I will finish.”

Loni and I waited patiently while he composed himself, then continued.

“Towards the end, Indina’s…punishments…grew more severe. I think it was because she could see how guilty I felt after destroying the town.” He stopped there, realising what he’d just said, and Loni and I smiled at him. He briefly returned the smile. “Then, one day, Kasanda turned up. I found out later that Eldaline had travelled back to Nerome and searched for many years to find someone who could go after me, for all she knew was that a strange woman had kidnapped me while she was ill. Of course, I did not know that until Kasanda told me. It was hearing that Eldaline was alive that made me rebel against Indina and leave with Kasanda. Indina didn’t, of course, just sit there and let us leave, but Kasanda was able to subdue her long enough to transport us many miles away before we could start our way back to Nerome.”

He sighed. “The rest, I guess is easy enough to work out. Kasanda righted the wrongs that Indina had fed me and helped me to realise that I wasn’t as much of a bad person as I thought. Actually…that’s the reason why I’m here.” He looked up and stared directly into my eyes. For the first time, I felt as though he was showing me his true self. His soul. Through his own eyes, I could see what made up Mayran, and what I saw there brought tears to my eyes that I struggled not to let fall. He regretted his actions far more than he was revealing in words, but I could easily see that he shouldn’t. That it wasn’t his fault.

“I offered to go with you in the hope that it might help me redeem myself. I figured, if I had even the tiniest hand in taking Indina down, I would finally be able to live with myself.”

He fell silent. His shoulders slumped forwards, as though the telling of the tale had exhausted him. I looked at Loni and saw the same pity and understanding in her eyes that I felt. We both knew that everything we had thought about him was wrong.

What could you say to that? I felt guilty for thinking anything evil of him, as I now knew they were not true, yet it was clear that he thought those things of himself, and worse. At the moment, I didn’t know what to say to make him feel any better, but I also didn’t want to just let things stay quiet.

“Thank you for telling us.” I said. “It means a lot that you trust us enough to do so. Never did I imagine anything like it. I…” I trailed off, not knowing what else to say. I wanted to tell him again that it was not his fault, that he did what he did under Indina’s control, that I knew him to be a good person. But I didn’t, because something told me that it would not make any difference…yet. So, instead, I murmured, “I’m sorry for doubting you.”

He looked up, clearly surprised. “Don’t be. I would have done the same in your situation.” The tiniest of smiles crossed his face, and I relaxed. For now, at least, Mayran was back.