Royal Outlaw: (Royal Outlaw, Book 1) (7 page)

Sometime later, Darren returned. Everyone watched as he dismounted and walked directly to his daughter. “I will meet you in two weeks and take you to Fintel. After that I’m leaving the kingdom.”

More anger and disappointment was in his voice than Mariel could bear. Knowing that if she asked if he was coming back she would start crying and give everything away, she nodded in acquiescence. She wanted to tell him how much she loved him, how sorry she was for what she had done. But she could not.

He turned his back to her and stalked over to the edge of camp where he began thrusting with his sword and cutting the air with angry slices. Mariel knew a dismissal when she heard one. She saddled Iyela and mounted. Without being given a command, her unicorn friend took off running into the forest.

Mariel could fight back the tears no longer and she leaned down and wrapped her arms around the neck of her friend as they raced across the land at the flying speed. Her sobs were strong and powerful and the tears were hot and unfamiliar to the girl who could not remember the last time she had cried. She had made her decision though. She had chosen to become the one thing she loathed most. There was no going back now.

Nightmares were something that Mariel was not supposed to have thanks to the special potion she used to protect herself from them, but that potion did not help now, not when she was living a nightmare.

Princess? What has my life come to?
she thought angrily as she lay on one of the stargazing platforms in some of the highest branches of a xanlor tree. The bows of the living tree, woven together to create the platform, were damp from the afternoon rains, but Mariel did not care as the water soaked through her thin dress and chilled her body. She wanted to be able to feel physical misery, to help her forget the emotional pains and to prove to herself that she was different than all the other aristocrats.

A shifting sound came from nearby and Mariel glanced over to see Anoria attempting to find a drier spot in the boughs. Mariel wanted to tell her sister that she did not have to be here, but she knew it would do little good. Anoria had been trying to make the unfortunate princess feel better about her choice, telling her that she did not hate Mariel for picking to become what zreshlans hated to save her papa’s life. Most of the Ambras Añue zreshlans had told Mariel the same thing: although they did not believe it was right to rule others, Mariel had made a choice they accepted because she had done it for the right reasons.

Mariel did not agree. She had chosen a life that she had always been taught to hate. Her mother had spoken of her cages, zreshlans loathed it, and her papa sought to tear it apart, but she had decided to become it.
Princess
. The very thought of it sent a shiver down Mariel’s spine. She convinced herself it was the cold. Certainly it was not fear, it could not be fear. Mariel had bowed to someone else’s demands, something she had never done before. She was a girl who hated authority, did not respect nor accept it, and she had never done anything that she did not want or felt she should do before.

Had she picked the right path, choosing to become what she most hated? Or would things have been better if she had allowed Dreyfuss to kill her papa.
No
, Mariel thought,
I would never let Papa be harmed.
The very thought of Darren dead sent a more powerful pain coursing through Mariel than she felt in choosing to bow to the king’s demands and become his heir.

A horrible lump lodged itself in her throat again, but she thrust it away. She had only allowed herself that first night to cry. Crying was a weakness, just like fear was. Mariel blinked back the tears gathering in her eyes, glad that Anoria could not see in the darkness, and focused on the stars above her.

The
seÿas
stared back. This stargazing platform was a zreshlan temple, a place where they could be close to the gods and worship them. Zreshlans found no use in building large extravagant temples, filled with rich silks and precious gems and metals. The gods had no need for such things. Unlike most humans, zreshlans did not have one or two patron gods for their people while they also prayed to multiple other gods when they felt in need of their help. These ancient, striped people prayed to only two gods: Yinay, the mother goddess, and Throvim, the god of the afterlife. Life and death were the truly important gods, they were the ones who controlled what people could not, and they were the beginning and the end, the light and the dark. They created a perfect harmony, where no other deity was necessary.

As Mariel picked out the familiar constellations of the two oldest gods who zreshlans prayed to, as well as the other constellations of the many gods the humans prayed to, including Natric’s major god Valmir and his sister Narel, she thought that zreshlans’ religious beliefs made more sense than humans, although she did not believe in any god at all.

Once she had asked a zreshlan whether they believed the humans were stupid for praying to so many gods and choosing a patron god for their kingdom, but the zreshlan had shook her head and replied, “The seÿas live in the sky and we are all the children of the gods. Praying to a specific god makes that god a protector. The gods fight over which kingdoms and which peoples they have the most influence over because prayers make the gods stronger. When the major god changes in a kingdom it is because the gods have fought and the one who was the kingdom’s god lost. This happened in Natric when Herold de Sharec overthrew the Nería
royal
family. At the same time, Valmir and Narel overthrew their sister Serpía, goddess of serpentramel and cunning. Humans want a protector, so they pray to a particular god, while we zreshlans feel that we do not need protection. In the end, even the heavens are ruled by Yinay and Throvim, for nothing can exist without a beginning and an end, without life and death.”

Mariel still did not fully understand why humans could not be like zreshlans and feel that life and death was all that was truly inevitable. The humans needed protectors because they were too afraid to stand on their own, they could not be like the far wiser zreshlans. Zreshlans would never threaten her into doing something she did not want to, force her to become something she hated, or intentionally do something to make her miserable. Many zreshlans in Ambras Añue were her family, the de Sharecs were not.

“Reya roshel jeu seÿas leía hy nosí hilan.” 

Mariel started as Anoria’s lilting voice broke the still night air. The girl struggled to her feet as she watched Anoria and a male zreshlan, one of Mariel’s tutors, bow to each other and exchange the traditional greeting. She also bowed to Molentre and spoke the familiar words before returning to her spot, staring up at the stars.

“Do not fear the decision, Greslina,” Molentre said in Zreshlan. “Every choice we as mortals make affects lives, even the simple ones. You made a sacrifice to become Natric’s
princess
”—he used the Natrician word, since no word existed for princess in Zreshlan—“and you do not desire to rule over others. That alone makes the
decision you made acceptable.”

“I still chose to be
royal
.”

Molentre shook his head, “You are not
royal
. Not in the sense that you mean. There are different connotations and interpretations to nearly every word that exists in any tongue. You are not like the other
royals
, since you do not desire the power or the privileges. It is not the title that defines the person, it is the person that defines the title.”

Anoria agreed with the tutor, but Mariel ignored both of them and returned to staring up at the stars. Molentre and Anoria lay down on either side of her and remained silent for a while.

Finally, Molentre spoke again,
“What is the greatest enemy?” 

Mariel did not respond automatically, she had learned years ago that a question could have a thousand meanings and she must try to discern the particular meaning that the questioner intended. The first thought that came to mind was the de Sharecs, but she doubted that Molentre considered any person the “greatest enemy.” It had to be something more abstract. He probably wanted something more general.

“Hatred,” she finally said. 

“A valiant try, but no. The greatest enemy to every being that can use its mind is fear. Fear is what spawns hate . . . fear of losing power, of not achieving, of death . . . the list is endless. The object that is part of all beings’ nature—zreshlan, human, serpentramel, ogre, unicorn, and even the gods—that breeds more hatred and wreaks more havoc than any other thing in the past and future is fear. It is a part of us all. I have it, you have it, everyone has it. It clouds logic and corrupts minds. It is an enemy so powerful, so vicious that every year countless people die because of it. The only thing we can do is try to master it, so that others are not harmed. We must try to push our fears aside when it is necessary to benefit the greater good. Fear does not render people helpless. They choose to be helpless and blame it on fear.”

Mariel began to understand this lesson. “The de Sharecs and the
nobility
are corrupted because they allow fear to govern them. You tell me this so that I know what to be aware of, so that I know what to watch for in them.”

“No,” Molentre and Anoria said so forcefully Mariel thought they were human for an instant.

In the dim light the stars cast on the platform, Mariel saw Molentre close his eyes and calm himself, while Anoria just glared angrily at her. When the old tutor, who was somewhere around four-hundred years old, recovered from his brief lapse of control, he bowed his head in apology. “I beg forgiveness.”

“There is nothing to forgive,” Mariel replied with the traditional saying.

Molentre looked into Mariel’s eyes so long and intently, that she turned away first. “Greslina, I tell you this, not so you will know the de Sharecs and the
nobility’s
weakness, but so that you will know the weaknesses you have.”

Mariel swelled with anger. “I do not have fear!”

“We all have fear, sister,” Anoria told her softly.

“I do not.”

The tutor shook his head sadly. “By not admitting fear, you cannot learn to accept it, and be aware of it. The fear that you do not know is far more dangerous to you than the fear that you have met. You cannot be afraid of fear, it makes you blind and it gives you the same flaw that your grandparents possess.”

The unhappy princess jumped to her feet, and glared angrily down at the zreshlans. “I am not like them!”

“But you will be,” Anoria said, “If you do not first accept fear.”

“Fear is a weakness and I am not weak!”

“Fear is a weakness only if you allow it to be. Do not pretend you are not afraid, Greslina, for you will become the same as all the other de Sharecs if you do.”

Mariel had heard enough. Without giving the traditional goodbye, she marched off the stargazing platform in a most un-zreshlan like way.

“Fear,” she fumed to herself in Natrician. “I’m not afraid. I’m fearless. And I’m not like the de Sharecs, even if I do share their blood and have agreed to be their heir.”

A little voice in her mind asked her if she was lying to herself. The rest of her pushed that voice away. 

* * *

After a restless night sleep, filled with nightmares when she was awake and sweet oblivion the few hours she did sleep, Mariel dressed in human leggings and a shirt. She took a long time saying goodbye to the room that she had used for so many years.

She touched the carvings etched into the few, simple pieces of furniture. The intricate map on her wall was what stole her attention the longest. She traced the familiar lines of the many human kingdoms, lines that had never held nor bothered her, but now would consume her life. She had never needed to respect those lines, but now she had to. The freedom that had once been hers was gone. She could no longer choose to step into another kingdom when she felt like it, nor could she go wherever she pleased, whenever she wanted.

Mariel stared long and hard at Parloipae. She memorized the familiar symbols of its mountain ranges and the extent of the vast forest where Ambras Añue was situated. Her eyes followed the full length of the river that had brought her into the world of the zreshlans which began in the mountains of the northwest and ended at the southeastern edge of the kingdom dumping into the ocean. The river was almost entirely contained in Parloipae, except for the small portion that flowed through a high dessert in Natric. It was there, Mariel knew, although she could not remember, that she had somehow ended up in the river, the river that had undoubtedly saved her life in more ways than one.

“
Greslina
. River-emerald.” She spoke her zreshlan name aloud, just to feel the taste of it and to remember it.

The human who had lived with the zreshlans committed the portion of the map that depicted Parloipae to heart because this land was unknown to any other humans. No maps where she was going would show this land with more detail than a grey-shaded area titled:
Zreshlan Land
.

Mariel buckled her sword to her waist and was cheered slightly by its familiar weight, glad to have a memento of her zreshlan family and friends. With one last, long look at the room, she turned and stepped out onto the tree-city platform and headed toward the stairs. She descended slowly, trying to commit the texture of each plank of wood to memory.

Many zreshlans waited for Mariel at the bottom of the xanlor tree. Anoria stood beside the tacked and ready Iyela. Mariel swung into the saddle and looked back at the zreshlans who had allowed her into their home and loved and raised her like they would one of their own.

“May the seÿas be favorable,” Anoria said and the other zreshlans repeated the farewell.

The lump in Mariel’s throat kept her from replying. Without a kick or a prod the unicorn leapt into a canter. Mariel did not look back at the place that had been her home and the people who had been her family. She knew she would never see any of it again, could not see it again, would not be permitted to see it again. Although she wanted to brand the images of the place and people to her memory, she knew that looking back would do no good because she could see nothing through the curtain of tears, and she did not want anyone to see her crying.