Chapter 43 | The Tale of Two Kingdoms

Fathers

"Awfully quiet, your highness," said Jenks. Temmin had had dinner alone with his parents, his sisters voluntarily banished to their rooms, and then an awkward evening drinking Leuteplum brandy with his father. Jenks helped Temmin out of his dinner jacket and into a soft, warm evening robe.

"It's been--Jenks, I just don't know about life here. Gods, I mean, just four weeks and--and all this stuff has happened. Some of it's been good. I mean, I think it's been good. Is it good? Allis and Issak and me? Sometimes I think I'm enchanted, it's so good. And I've had, what, a grand total of maybe two days with them?" Jenks made a non-commital noise. "I don't think as much about going back to Whithorse as I used to, but still--" He sat on the bed and let Jenks pull off his boots, then stood up and pushed his feet into his carpet slippers. "That's better--still, I don't feel at all comfortable here. If I could pick up the Temple and move it to Whithorse--say! Do the Embodiments ever decide not to live in the capital?"

"Never, your highness," said Jenks, stowing the boots. "Tremont is where they belong."

"Well, they're the only reason I'm here at this point," Temmin grumbled. "Otherwise I'd kick up such a fuss Papa would be glad to have me back home at Whithorse." He shuffled over to the green velvet sofa in the study and plopped himself down.

"That's extremely unlikely, young sir," said Jenks, handing him a cup of something hot and steamy.

"What's this?"

"A chamomile tisane, you are altogether too moody tonight for my liking, your highness. If you don't mind my saying so, there are at least five good reasons for you to be here, not even counting the Embodiments."

Jenks began ticking them off on his fingers. "One, your poor mother. She will need your support, your highness, as she mends a broken heart--now, even if you don't approve, you still love your mother, eh? Yes, of course you do. She needs you by her side. The coming months will be very trying for her.

"Which leads to reason number two: Sedra," he said, raising another finger. "Childhood is over for her soon."

"Sedra was never a child," snorted Temmin.

"She is and always was a serious young lady, your highness, but this is no joke. Very soon she will be leaving your life for good and all. You may very well never see her again. If you were to pack off to Whithorse--"

"I get the point. Continue."

"Right, then. Ellika. She may complain about her dull sister, but in actual fact they are each other's first support. Ellika will need you more than ever once Sedra is married. And you won't have much longer in her company either, your highness. She is well of age, and your father is seeking alliances."

"The Gods pity whoever marries either of my sisters," mumbled Temmin, running his hand through his hair. "Handfuls the both of them." Never to see them again, though, he thought. How sad that made him.

"Then there's your father, your highness. It's well past time the two of you became better acquainted."

"I don't really think I want to, Jenks. I'm finding more and more that I do not care for his majesty."

"Still and all, he's your father. And you are as much his son as you are your mother's."

"There are times, Jenks, when I do not care for you, either," he yawned, and Jenks grinned. "What exactly do you mean by that?" added Temmin.

Jenks put his head to one side and thought for a moment. "That may be a question you'd get better answered by the fifth reason, your highness, and that's the Teacher."

"The Teacher is a reason for me to stay here? I thought you didn't like him."

"I don't care for him, or his magic, that's true. But I cannot help but respect him, greatly. And I cannot help but think his tutelage has done nothing but improve you, your highness."

"Huh," said Temmin, yawning again. "And here I thought I was perfect."

"The perfecting of you, your highness, is still in my purview," sniffed Jenks. "Even so, the Teacher knows your father better than I do. He would be the one to ask about your similarities to your father." He looked down on the blond head wistfully. "More than either of your parents, though, you know you remind me of your uncle. And he would want you to face your future squarely. I suggest you turn in soon, young sir, it's late."

"You're only saying that because--" Temmin's face split in two with a last enormous yawn--"because you want to go to bed yourself."

"To be sure, your highness, to be sure," the valet said, gently shepherding him into his bedroom.

Temmin let himself be divested of his clothes, sending Jenks off for the night once he was down to his underthings. He stripped down the rest of the way, pulled on his nightshirt, and crawled under the coverlet, blowing out the candle and pulling the bedcurtains closed.

He lay there in the dark, drifting with his thoughts towards sleep.

Temmin was dreaming. He was a little boy again at Whithorse, no more than five or six, he reckoned. His pants were rolled up, his sisters had their skirts tucked up in their sashes, all their shoes and stockings were off, and they were splashing in the little creek that trickled through a particularly inviting bit of woods where they liked to play not far from the great house. Jenks was nearby with Mama, and they teased each other laughingly as they set out luncheon on a blanket.

This was very like a real memory, the dreaming prince thought, they had played just like this many a time. This was a time and place where he had felt completely happy and completely safe, surrounded by the love of his family.

The dappled light reflected on Ellika's golden hair, and it was obviously later in summer because Sedra, so fond of walks and heedless of her complexion, was nut brown from the sun, her arms bare. The girls smiled at him and went back to floating flowers in little boats made of leaves. He felt the cold water tug at his feet, flexed his toes in the mud with satisfaction, then crouched down to look for little fish or pretty rocks.

A shadow fell across him. He looked up. It was Harsin, the sun directly behind him so that he was a great black mass; he couldn't see his father's face. That was odd, thought Temmin, Papa never once came down to the creek with them in real life. "Papa?" the dream-boy said in confusion. "What are you doing here?"

"We are not your Papa, we are the King. Girls, fetch your shoes. It is time to go. Say your goodbyes to your brother and mother. You are leaving forever." The girls each gave Temmin a long, sad hug, tears streaking their cheeks. Ellika clung tightly to Sedra's hand, trembling with repressed sobs, but both girls dutifully moved behind the black shadow that was Harsin.

"What d'you mean, you're sending them away?" said Temmin, frightened and squinting against the light in hopes of seeing his father's face. "Don't send them away, Papa!"

"They are ours, and we have sold them. They must go." He turned away, hands firm on the girls' necks as he led them crying from the stream.

"But Papa--!" Temmin ran after them, frantically tugging at the king's sleeve.

Harsin whirled, and Temmin saw his face clearly. It was Hildin's. "I said we have sold them," he hissed. "Let go my sleeve, boy." Temmin fell back, terrified, as a wall of flame sprung up, separating him from the dark man and his sisters. He screamed.

"Temmin, it's all right!" He turned and Jenks was there, gathering him up in strong arms. "It's all right, I'm here, son, it's all right, there now."

Temmin woke up bolt upright, shaking. It was just before dawn, but he got up anyway, afraid to fall back asleep.

"Are you like your father?" said the Teacher later that morning. "Which one?"

Temmin turned white, then flushed. "What d'you mean, which one?" he demanded from the corner of the couch. "Don't be cryptic, Teacher, it's very tiresome when you act oracular."

"I'm not being oracular, you have two fathers for all intents and purposes."

"A person can only have one father," said Temmin angrily. "Stop talking riddles. I'm asking you about the king. In what ways am I like my father?"

The Teacher paused, and studied the young face. "You have the shape of Harsin's face, his stature, his build. You have some of his natural imperiousness, but it is tempered with your mother's empathy. If you ever applied yourself, which will never happen," the Teacher noted sardonically, "you'd be his equal in intellect. But he is not the father of your spirit."

Temmin snorted. "I suppose that would be you?"

"I am no one's parent, body or spirit," said the Teacher sternly. "No, I don't mean myself. I mean Standfast Jenks."

Temmin gave a small considering huff. "I should've preferred that, actually, having Jenks for my father." The dream came back to him, Jenks holding his little boy body safe, Jenks, who'd been with him since he could remember--how much he loved the man even when he was being nagged into overly formal clothes or dunked in a bathtub or even knocked to the ground. "Actually, it does feel as if he's my father. He was always there for all of us, even Mama, sometimes it seemed especially--oh, you're not trying to tell me--Teacher--" A horrible dawn crept closer to the horizon.

"No."

"--that Jenks is--"

"I said, no."

"But are you sure? How can you be sure? Mama and Papa never did enjoy being together, but Mama has always loved Jenks, she's even said so, and I just now realized the way they look at each other, it just never occurred to me that--oh, gods!"

The Teacher sighed in exasperation. "Your mother was careful to come to her marriage a virgin."

"So there was an attachment?"

The Teacher considered, then nodded. "A juvenile one, long, long ago, long before your uncle died."

"But I'm the third child, it doesn't matter what condition she came to the marriage in!"

"You are the king's son, I assure you!"

"I don't want to be the king's son!" yelled Temmin.

"Mind your tone!" said the Teacher in a stentorian voice, and then more quietly, "do you really wish every servant in the Keep to hear you?"

"No, Teacher, I'm sorry. But how do you know?" Temmin said earnestly.

"I instantly know the men of the Tremont line, and how close to the throne they are. It is unavoidable for me to know, it's instinctive for lack of a better term. You are the Heir. It is a fact precisely because I know it to be so. You are your father's son. If you were not, I would not recognize you as the Heir."

Temmin deflated, and his eyes stung. "Why don't I feel like his son?"

The Teacher put the table between them and sat on the far edge. "Jenks is the father of your heart, which is what was intended."

"How d'you mean? Intended by whom?"

The Teacher sighed again. "Suffice it to say you were not meant to have the typical royal upbringing, and the good colonel's influence was a part of it. He's done his job well, and you are right to love him as you do.

"And now, your highness, we have a new story to begin. Go fetch your book."

Temmin got up from the couch and picked up "An Intimate History of the Greater Kingdom," its gilded title raised under his fingers against the smooth, dry, dark red leather of the cover. He sat down again in the library table chair and opened it.

"I'm ready now."

End of Book One