![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
k_a_webb“What’s happening in Haerith?” Felicia asked, and Calix could feel her eyes on him as he glanced at their brother. Apparently she hadn’t been told certain things, probably for her own protection, but the time had passed for that. “Why don’t I know what’s happening.”
“Father and I were doing our best to protect you,” Vance replied, sounding guilty. “Both of us were hoping you wouldn’t bloom and therefore wouldn’t need to know, but we should have told you anyway. You’re a princess and you have the right to know how the recent changed are affecting our world.” He bit his lip. “I’m sorry, Fliss, we should have known better, and I wish we had of told you what was happening before now.”
“Haerith is under attack.” Calix sighed. “The King there made the decision that his kingdom was going to be a safe haven for magic users, because he knew several of them personally and trusted them, but the King of Ialaera wasn’t happy. Haerith is one of the kingdoms that borders theirs and he didn’t think it would be safe for his people to have a sanctuary for magic right next door, so he sent in a group of soldiers to bring an end to the Royal Family, followed by the person he wanted to take the position of King. Right now they’re still busy killing off as many magic users as possible, executing them if possible, the same way they executed the King and his three advisers, all of whom were magic users and had children of their own that we haven’t yet heard anything about. The King’s wife and family, apparently, are somewhere safe.”
“I believe the King when he said he’d found somewhere safe for his family.” Vance shrugged. “Last I heard he sent them to Konir.”
“Seriously?” Calix shook his head. “I though Konir and Haerith were still on bad terms, and if everyone else thinks the same way…” He smiled. “No one’s going to think to look in Konir for them, even if they do hear the rumours, and last I heard one of the magic users there was busy setting up somewhere safe for his kind.”
Vance nodded. “He is. All I know is that it’s going to be underground and only the people who have been invited to enter can get through the wards. I have no idea how he’s done it.”
“We don’t know everything about magic.”
“I’ve found out why.” Vance shook his head. “About six hundred years ago something like this happened before, although not to the same extent, and we lost a lot of what we’d found out about magic, because it was destroyed. It happened before that as well, but none of the times before has it been this bad, so the time has come for you both to leave – head for the mountains with the information we still have left before someone destroys it. Calix….” Vance slumped. “I need you here, but I know too well that if you stay we will have to execute you, to protect the kingdom, so you need to go, with Felicia, tonight.”
“How is it going to work?”
“I’m not leaving,” Felicia growled. “This is my home, Vance. You can’t make me leave.”
Calix turned to look at Felicia. “If you want to stay here, Fliss, that’s entirely up to you, but if you do you won’t be able to learn how to use your abilities safely, and you’re a healer. You staying here would waste that, when there are people who need you.” He reached out a squeezed her shoulder. “Leaving isn’t a safe option, but it’s safer than staying, because if Tuula finds out you will be executed… and so, probably, will Vance, for hiding you from her. That will leave Father with no heir to the throne.”
“No, he’ll have an heir.” Vance sounded as though he was disgusted with himself. “Tuula’s with child.”
“Don’t.” Calix took a step closer to his brother. “You did what needed to be done, Vance, and I don’t want you to hate yourself for that.”
“How could I have done that with someone I don’t like? We made a child, Cal, one that I’m going to have to raise with her, and she’s already says she wants more than one.”
“Tuula isn’t a bad person.” Calix couldn’t quite believe what he was saying, although he knew it was the truth. “She’s simply been taught, from a young age, that magic is dangerous and she is doing what she can to protect you, this kingdom, and her unborn child. I don’t hate her for that, and I’m not going to say that I like her either, but what she’s doing makes sense to her, so, to be honest, I actually kind of pity her.”
“I really appreciate that, Cal,” a female voice said, making them all jump, and Calix looked over at Tuula. It was a surprise when she smiled at him. “The one thing I’ve always liked about you is that you’ve been fair to me, even though I’ve tried to make it obvious to everyone how I felt about you, because it was how I was supposed to feel. My father, fortunately, doesn’t know that I don’t believe magic is dangerous, so I’m guessing I’ve done my job right.”
“What?” Vance asked, sounding like Calix felt.
“I’m not the person you think I am, Vance, although I have done everything I can to make you think that, because it was safer for both of us, until today. Now that you’ve bloomed, Felicia, it changes things and we need to get you out of here as quickly as possible.”
“Why is everyone trying to make me leave?” Felicia sat on her bed, wrapping her arms around herself. “This is my home, sister-in-law, and I don’t want to go to the mountains.”
“No one does.” Tuula stepped across the room. “If I was in your position I would feel exactly the same way, so I’m very sorry for doing this, but you have to leave today. So far I’ve heard of three other people who have unsuccessfully gone through the blooming process today, all of who were given the berry that Calix currently has in his pocket, and there are three others due to bloom at some point in the future, although I can’t tell you exactly when.”
Calix stared at her. “You can feel bloomers.”
“It’s something I kept from my father. He would have used me to make certain that we killed all magic users before they could bloom and I didn’t want that, so I convinced him to marry me off instead, but I have no idea exactly how I ended up here. When I told him I was ready to be married he said he could use me and as I found myself marrying your brother I knew what I was meant to do, so I did it, while helping as many magic users as I could live through the blooming process.”
“Before sending them to me.”
“Of course. I trusted you to get them to safety and I swore them to secrecy, which was easier than I expected it to be,”
“You saved their lives and the lives of their families.”
“At home I did the same thing…” Tuula blinked away tears. “My sister died, because I couldn’t help her, and that was when I decided it was time to move away. I have three other sisters who might also go through the blooming process, so I wanted to be far away if it happened, as I couldn’t go through that again, especially when Father set light to her body without seeming to care that she was his daughter. As she’d died on her eighteenth birthday it was obvious what had happened and he disowned her the moment he realised.” She wiped obviously unwanted tear streaks off her cheeks. “The annoying thing is I’ve now realised that I will have to go through the exact same thing with my children.”
Vance rested a hand on her shoulder. “We’ll go through it together.”
“It’s not that simple.”
“Of course it is, Tuula.”
Tuula shook her head. “Have you ever lost anyone to the process?”
Calix and Vance looked at each other. “Three cousins, one older brother, and our mother,” Calix said, trying not to think of the day when their brother’s failed bloom had killed their mother. She’d taken him somewhere safe and it had gone wrong, although no one was quite sure what had happened, so it had left Calix alone when he went through the process, terrified that something would go wrong for him too. “I visit their graves every year, on the day that they died.”
“That’s something else Father and I didn’t talk to you about, Fliss,” Vance said, sounding as though he felt guilty about that.
“Cal did.” Felicia sighed. “When I asked what happened to Mother about six years ago Cal told me the whole story, and about our cousins, because he thought it was important that I knew. I’m glad he did, now, as it helped me through the process, the same way him telling me what happened when he bloomed did.”
“It’s different for everyone.” Calix smiled. “I didn’t go blind, unlike you, and I ended up setting fire to one of Father’s favourite book cases. You just had to cut me a couple of times.”
“Healing is a difficult ability to learn how to use safely,” Tuula said, as she sat down next to Felicia. “It was one of the abilities my mother bloomed with and I know she was still learning until the day she left us.”
“What happened?” Calix asked, without really thinking about it, before realising what he’d asked. “That is if you want to tell us.”
“Of course I do, Cal. You’re family now, my brother, and I want you to understand why I’ve made the choices that I have, why I’ve found it so easy to pretend to hate you, and why I’ve decided that now is the time to be honest with you all.”
“If it’s because you want to give your father time to get here so he can execute all three of us I’m not going to be happy,” Felicia said, and Calix found himself wondering what Tuula’s answer to that could possible be.
Her laughter seemed to surprise them all. “I promise you that is the last thing I’d do, Felicia. Having my father here… no, I’m much happier not having to deal with him and his irritating paranoia on a daily basis.” She squeezed Felicia’s hand. “Darlings, this is the first time I’ve felt like I can be honest, and not have to pretend with you all, because I am pregnant with your brother’s child. I don’t want him to grow up in a household where his parents hate each other, especially if Vance blames me for the two of you leaving, when the only reason I’m here is to protect myself as best I can from the pain of losing another sister.” With her free hand Tuula stroked her stomach. “I was using contraceptives, because I didn’t want to get pregnant, but… it’s happened, so I’ll deal with it as best I can.”
“You said you wanted three girls and three boys.”
“I told you what I was supposed to say, Vance.” Tuula shook her head. “We’ve all be playing our parts, husband, and I don’t think you understand quite yet what mine has been, because it’s much easier for you to see me as the person I’ve been pretending to be for so long. I don’t blame you. Being her made much more sense to someone like you, as you expected me to be her, rather than me, due to the kingdom I grew up in and the father who raised me, when really I’m not that person and I never will be. Maybe, if my mother hadn’t been who she was, I would have been, but I am who I am thanks to her.”
Mirrored from K. A. Webb Writing.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
Feedback
Date: 2014-04-15 05:46 am (UTC)Tense family scene!