Promises of Glory

“Watch who you make enemies of, you never know who will make a loyal ally.”

-Proverb

Rhode had gotten used to walking up to the front door, at first it was weird and she felt out of place. She’d never gone through the front door of a previous target. And the guards, despite their looks of confusion, always let her in without a fuss, just like Livinus had promised her.

She thought about the client she had to let down gently, she told the client that the drawer had contained no such box. The client was mad but they didn’t take it out on her. She wondered why they wanted it so badly. Perhaps she would see today.

“Hey there,” Livinus greeted her pleasantly when she met him in the library. He was lounged out on a chair, flipping through a book that he had rested on his legs. Today he looked just as relaxed to be in her presence as he days before. Like she was no danger to him. She rather liked the idea that she could relax next to him. “You know, I think this paper is a lot older than we think. Here, come tell me what you think about this book.”

“Is that the book we found the other day?” She remembered the second day she had come to his house, the way they were fighting about who was going to get the crown. It was the oddest fight she had ever had. But she had pushed him into a shelf when he refused that he was a genius and said that they’d never discover what was on the paper. She had pushed him and he had fallen right into a bookshelf, way back near their little hidey-hole. A bunch of books had fallen on him, clattering onto him with thuds that echoed across the huge room. He groaned and when she held out a hand to help him up, he took it, letting the books on his lap fall to the floor. When he began to pick up the books, he noticed one of them had the same symbols as the paper, or at least similar enough. He had said that this was their chance to translate the paper. But that was days ago now, she had no idea what he had found out.

“Yeah it is, come take a look at it.” She came up next to him, looking at the book in his hands. She took one look at the strange characters and shook her head. He laughed, “I didn’t mean if you could read it, I meant if the symbols looked like the ones on the paper.”

“Oh,” she tried to recall what the letters looked like. “Yeah, I think they do.”

“This is a novel by a commoner, so there’s a lot of slang and impolite speech. It’s written with the same characters as the old Fae language, but they are used in totally different ways. So it’s no wonder I couldn’t read it with my limited knowledge of the Fae language. In fact, I think this is the most useful book in this entire library.”

“But what did the paper say?” Rhode egged.

The boy dropped the book onto the table next to him. “Come with me,” and he took her hand. She trailed along behind him as he walked his way around and around the tall shelves. Their hidey-hole was a tucked away area with a small desk and sitting area that the servants can’t even find, judging by the layer of dust. “I’ve hidden the paper so that no one finds it. I don’t think anyone could understand its true value anyway.”

Livinus laid his hands out over the paper, stretching it tight. “It says, roughly, ‘‘The path before you, is only for the noble and true, if you come forth with virtue, the crown will choose.’”

“Is that all?” Rhode asked, already pulling apart the words and trying to discern their meaning. She looked at the paper but all the strange letters made her head spin.

“What’s this about a crown anyway?”

Livinus’ eyes lit up, “That’s the best part. I was looking up legends, trying to figure out if there were any connection, and guess what!” He was speaking so fast it was almost hard for Rhode to follow. “There’s this tale about an iron crown and that whoever wears it has the only right to the throne. So like, whoever is currently king, has to step down!” He giggled, “Could you imagine that? What a spectacle that’d be!”

She laughed with him, “Boy, I want that crown. Could you imagine me queen?”

He smiled at her, almost with a reverent awe, “You’d make a wonderful queen.”

“Hey, what would you do if you were king?”

He stood up and spread his arms wide, “I’d lower the taxes on the poor so that they could invest in their futures and raise their status, I’d marry a beautiful woman who was kind and virtuous, and I’d try to give all the orphan children a home.” She knew what he was thinking then, about how long he’d been dreaming of being king. He was high in the aristocracy, surely he’d been around the princes and the king and had day dreamed about it. And if anyone was the right person for the job, he was. After all, who was more virtuous than the boy that welcomed a thief with open arms as a friend. She knew what she would do then, she was going to get him that crown.

Rhode knew of the current king and how he’d turned a blind eye on the poverty and the hunger that she’d so often seen. She sighed pleasantly, “That’d be great.”

“But I can’t be king if you’re queen,” he remarked.

“Sure you can, we just got to get married.” Rhode put on a big smile, like it was the greatest idea ever. Sure, there were no feelings between them, but royals always got married without emotions. They could do it.

Livinus raised his eyebrows at her, “Is that a proposal I hear? You’re not even of age yet.” She rolled her eyes because technically she was. How would she ever break that news to him.

“You aren’t either.”

“True, but I will be soon.”

The layer of dust in the air didn’t bother the two as they rolled around, laughing. The world was bright for them, a whole land of wonder that was theirs for the taking.

“Perhaps there’s more than just our piece,” Livinus had said one day. “Do you see the way the edges are ripped, like there used to be more. Besides, it seems like the message we’re getting isn’t completely full. Like there’s a part missing.”

“Maybe the Fae have it.”

Rhode brought up the race like it was nothing, but Livinus knew that the Fae were not to be messed with. They were small but deadly. They ruled most of the land on the world, and they ruled it with an iron fist. “I don’t think we want to be wrestling it out of their hands, if they have it, that is.”

“What, are you afraid of a little Fae?” Rhode teased, but the feeling was half-hearted. Truth be told, she didn’t want to have a run in with any Fae she didn’t personally know. Fae were often out for blood, despite their docile appearance.

“They may be small, but they are ferocious!”

Rhode fingered the small point of her ears. “They aren’t all bad.”

“Whatever, I believe what the stories say, and the stories say pretty terrible things.” He huffed, like that was the end of the discussion.

The girl stood up from her seated position on the dusty chair, “If we all believe what the stories say, then I wouldn’t be here right now. I would’ve walked out the door on the day you caught me, and I would’ve never come back. Because the stories say that aristocrats are scoundrels that are only after looking after themselves. And I would have not known that was false, when it came to you, if I hadn’t come back.”

“Okay, I guess that’s true, but why are you standing up for Fae anyway?”

“I happen to know one.”

A smile broadened itself on Livinus’ face, “Really? What is that like? What do they look like? Are they really that small and mean? Do they owe you a life debt? I heard that Fae are very honorable and when they owe someone a life debt, they follow them for life.”

Rhode laughed, “Does it look like I’ve got a Fae following me around? No, I haven’t saved any Fae. I haven’t met her in many years, not since she died.” Her voice dropped the excitement, “There’s not much I can tell actually, the Fae I knew had disguised herself as a human and lived peacefully with her daughter until she died.”

Livinus seemed oblivious to the words and their meanings, but his mood did somber, “I’m sorry, if I had known I wouldn’t have asked.”

“It’s not big deal, it’s been a long time since she died.”

“What about your family? What’s that like?”

She struggled to remember the lies she had told him days before when he caught her under the desk. She decided it was best to just go with the truth. “My mother passed away many years ago, I went to live with my half brother, but he was very protective and almost creepy in his affection, so I left. I started living on the streets about three years ago, doing odd jobs.”

He narrowed his eyes slightly, “I thought you said your mother made you break in.” Rhode started to sweat until he smiled and said, “Well it’s not like I can expect a total stranger to tell me the truth on our first meeting.” He held out his hand, “Why not this time we make a promise not to lie to each other ever again.” His pinky was raised and Rhode took it in her own. “Excellent, now, about getting the rest of the pieces, we need to try and figure out who has them.”

“How?”

“Well, how about that Fae’s family, do you know any of them? We can ask them if they know anything. After all, the old language is derived from the Fae language. They might know something.”

“Okay, I know I said that not all of them are bad.” Rhode twisted some of her red hair around her fingers, “But I only know of one other Fae and I can tell you that he is not very helpful. Ever.”

“What’s his name? Where can we find him?”

The girl sighed in defeat, “How do we know he’ll listen to us? It’s not like Fae are that helpful to humans. That Fae woman I know, she was kicked out when her family found out she fell in love with a human. They kicked her to the curb and made her fend for herself.”

Livinus made a face that Rhode couldn’t quite put her finger on. “I’m sorry but I think we really need his help. Do you think you could contact him anyway.”

“Yeah, okay.” She pouted, “But only because it’s you asking.” The past week had been full of the two of them vividly daydreaming about the world that they thought would open up if they had the crown. The two had gotten particularly close the previous day when they shared stories of their families. Rhode had learned that Livinus’ mother died very early in his life so he never knew her and he had grown very close to his father. She felt for him when he talked about his death, it was most likely an assassin from a corrupt group of aristocrats.

He hugged her, “You’re so sweet.” She smiled at him, “Now tell me about this other Fae that you know of.”

“He’s that Fae’s brother, and one of the main people that urged to kick her out, so I don’t like him very much. I remember him coming years later, asking her to come back, that the family would welcome her again, but she refused when she learned she couldn’t take her daughter with her. Apparently they found something really big in their estate and wanted her to take a look at it.”

“Maybe it was another piece of the puzzle.”

She leaned back on the couch, “Hmmm, I don’t know.” Rhode didn’t like talking about that man, if she could call him a man at all, and thinking that he had something to do anything with this fantastical dream was almost disturbing. “I’d rather think that they found an old book that was so old that they couldn’t read it.”

“Maybe, but it would be better if it was part of the paper, because then we could get another clue. All I’m saying is that we need to think about the future and getting that crown. And that might mean to talking to people we don’t like, but in the end, all that matters is that we get it, and we rule the country together.”

Rhode smiled, liking the idea a little more than she’d admit.