Star of Silvaria: Chapter III
Illogical
“Get the door-”
A sound of a weighty slab of oak being slammed and a bar slipped into place followed, shutting out the rumbling of thunder and rattling of rain, and awakening me.
I must have been more worn than I had realized, to fall asleep on a galloping horse. Raphael was bearing me into a room of an unidentifiable construct, with matted walls of marbled gray stone, hung over by woven green grasses.
The lights were warm, and their crystal cases hid whether they were flickering candles or electricity. There were shields hung on the walls, of silver and an unidentifiable rosy copper metal. They were marked with a graven star over waves. Some had a great bird, swan-like, only its heart bled, and was colored by enamel, and the waves were colored blue. I stared at them as we passed, until I woke up enough to realize I ought to be walking myself, and felt guilty for having been so tired.
Raphael, however, didn’t listen when I gently pushed against his shoulder to be set down, and he carried me into another room. There were sofas here, and a bedroom beyond. All the windows were covered by wooden doors, coppered over, and bolted. Raphael deposited me upon the sofa farthest from the windows.
“Poor little one,” he said, seeing that I was only worse off at every lack of explanation. “You’ve had a day. We’ve reached one of our woodland garrisons, Tower Amarta. We’ll spend the night and go on to home tomorrow. Don’t worry, we’ll soon know about your family.”
“Do you think they’re alright?”
He paused, resting his hands on his knees, studying my face.
“They should be, Thérèse. Many strangers wash up on the shores, so we have patrols that run across the coastlands as often as may be.”
Raphael arose as Rolf entered the parlor, the latter shaking water from his hair with his fingers. He cast his cloak on the windowsill to dry.
“Nice job staying dry,” Raphael said lightly.
“Yes, it was an excellent job, considering I had to run across the yard twice. Nice job not waking her up,” and Rolf smiled at me. “Mother’s having dinner sent in. You’ll need to eat, Thérèse.”
I shook my head. I could feel the usual chill setting in, until my stomach felt like I’d swallowed ice.
“I feel sick,” I muttered, looking away. “I don’t think I can try.”
The aforementioned dinner arrived at that moment, brought by one guard, who set down the tray of bread, cheese, dried fruits, and tea, before departing.
Raphael glanced at it and looked back to me.
“Do me a favor. . . please try, at least a little. Your family would want you to, and it will help you more than to skip it. We won’t force you, but I wish you would.”
I half-wished he hadn’t used the same tone my mother used to, which I could never resist. I took the tea and fruit he asked of me.
“You and your being able to convince people,” Rolf laughed, pausing from restlessly drumming on the windowsill. “How do you do it, Raph’?”
“Oh, I don’t know – perhaps to make up for the fact that you’re never particularly persuasive.”
“Hey, watch it,” Rolf said, and smacked Raphael with a pillow from the other sofa. Raphael batted it away, and dodged a second which came flying past, forcing me to duck, and crashed into the wall behind me.
“What terrible aim!” Raphael threw it back onto the sofa.
“If you stood still-” Rolf exclaimed, and threw another.
“Hey, watch the tea-!” Raphael bounced out of the way, redirecting the miscreant pillow that had threatened to dump the tea over us both. “Rolf, you nearly burned Thérèse.”
Mirala appeared that moment, giving the boys a remonstrating glance. Rolf restored the pillows to the sofa.
Mirala was accompanied by a soldier, garbed in the olive, ochre, and russet of the forest, with a branching aspen and star marked on his jerkin.
“The northern road was scouted and gate-marked this morning,” the man was saying. “That should keep any suchides off it for a day or two. Your party will be safe to travel onwards on the morrow, Lady Castellis, providing this storm gives up.”
Mirala waved him to take a seat near the covered window, while she drew the restless Rolf onto the previously de-pillowed sofa.
“You have my thanks, Captain. These storms are sporadic at best, and don’t usually last for too long.” She looked to me, aside, and introduced the man as Captain Almèr.
The captain nodded briefly to me.
“Maybe so, but Typhon grows more mad by the day,” Almèr muttered, flicking his fingers against the barring of the windows. “It’s of good fortune that we strengthened the walls and tower, or the storm might be dealing us great damage.”
At this rate my lack of knowledge would soon exceed anything I actually knew, and might as well have numbered the same as the crashing raindrops outside. The tension was making my head and neck ache. I pressed my hand against my forehead for a minute, until the boys looked my way, and I hastily dropped it.
Well, the questions had to be asked, one at a time.
“What is Typhon?”
One question down, probably in the wrong order. But who ever thought of the right order, when their brain might as well have been a mess of scrambled eggs, for all the sense it made.
Almèr stared at me, perhaps realizing for the first time that I was an outsider. He glanced inquiringly at Mirala, who hesitated while the boys held a strained silence. Sensing that it might be best for him to leave us alone, Almèr quietly took his leave.
“That’s a better question for another time, love,” Mirala said gently.
I looked from her to Raphael, who seemed to sympathize.
“Why aren’t you telling me? I’m so confused I don’t know if there’s something wrong with me, won’t anybody explain anything?”
It was beginning to feel like a high fever, or insanity, and that was hardly pleasant, to say the least.
Raphael looked at me tenderly. “Forgive us for letting you suffer, Thérèse. We were in a haste, and in honesty, some things may be better to know when you’ve rested. Typhon is a. . . creature, who has antagonized our kingdom over the past century. He breeds the suchides, such as the one which tried to harm you this morning.”
And there came more questions, again, why was I not surprised?
“Why?”
Raphael hesitated and looked to his mother, who, despite her misgivings, turned the matter over to him.
“I won’t tell you everything, not now, Thérèse. No one knows when or where Typhon came from. After the death of the last princess, a little over three centuries ago, darkness began looming, but it was only an off-sense until abruptly the eastern lands had been razed and Typhon had carved them into an insurmountable cliff wall. He’s been reigning there ever since, intent on remaining in the land as a virus.”
“And, Thérèse, Typhon doesn’t like outsiders, to put it mildly – each outside addition to our kingdom means he’d have to spread his power thinner and thinner. Hence why we have so many patrols on the coast, and why we have to protect you and not take you straight to find your family. Edessa is the one place where you’ll be safe.”
I looked at him for a few seconds, blinking because there was nothing that could be said to that.
Raphael turned to his mother.
“Speaking of Typhon. Thérèse is a name none of us know, Mother, but we do know how Typhon is with outsiders. If we change her name, she might be safer.”
“A wise thought, Raphael,” Mirala replied. She was watching as I repeatedly clicked my locket open and shut, open and shut, as was my wont when I was worried.
“That’s a lovely locket, Thérèse. The star is like that of our kingdom.”
I forced myself to stop.
“My mother gave it to me a few years ago.”
Mirala straightened.
“And your mother, she wasn’t with you today?”
I shook my head. Rolf seemed to understand, for at once he came and sat on the arm of the sofa beside me. He offered me his hand. For the first time I noticed the heavy gold ring with its etched, five-point star sapphire, the band marked by twisting waves and stars; something that was far more mature than his years.
“I’m sorry.” He pressed my fingers gently. “‘Essa’ means ‘Star’ in Estarin, our high Elvish tongue. Your mother might have liked that.”
“I think she would.”
I was grateful for their affection, but it was hard to focus on.
Yes, a deadly monster with a kingdom full of crocodilians that possibly, most likely, and inevitably wanted to kill me and my family enough for me to have to change my name, was just what I needed.
Not.
An involuntary groan escaped my lips and I rested my head in my hands.
“This is either a terrific nightmare or a birthday that could rank in the worst of history,” I mumbled, beginning to forget that anyone was around.
“Did you just say it’s your birthday?” Rolf repeated.
I immediately regretted my words.
“Is it really?” Raphael pressed, when I gave them a tired look.
“Yes,” I sighed. “We were off the coast of…” I trailed off, wondering if they’d even know what and where France was.
“I’m sorry, dear heart,” Mirala murmured, coming to kiss my forehead.
“That’s rotten luck,” Rolf sympathized.
It didn’t matter though. All that mattered was untangling this strangling web of confusion and finding Daddy and Joachim. And hoping that they hadn’t met a suchide like I had.
Rolf looked at me keenly. “What exactly happened? And who exactly are you, if you don’t mind our asking.”
I opened my mouth and shut it again. How was France going to make any sense if this place didn’t? And there was a new thought that hadn’t struck me before: how were we going to get back home from wherever this was?
“Do you mind if I ask you that first? Where are we?”
“Point taken,” Rolf admitted. “This is Silvaria, Essa. Our kingdom is not, I think, part of the world you know.”
“Silvaria is the land of the Star of the Sea, a place which once inspired your myths of Atlantis,” Mirala explained.
Atlantis? That was the last thing I had expected her to say, but at least that might explain what that copper metal was – possibly the true orichalcum, although they might not have called it that.
“However, contrary to the legends we’ve since heard, it was because the people were so good that God spared us, and hid Silvaria from all eyes, even within the Sargasso Sea it was once within. Now our land and the others surrounding her are separated from others on Earth. Ever since, our land has been consecrated to God’s Mother, and she’s been its highest Queen.”
That was hard to take, despite my many wishes growing up that I could visit some other world such as this. At least that explained why this place and its people felt like a fairytale collided with medieval times. Though, that didn’t promise me that it wasn’t my own mind. Whether that was better or worse, I couldn’t yet say.
“Many come to us by the sea,” Mirala continued. “Those lost in the Atlantic we were once in are often rescued to this land, by the hands of the Star of the Sea, and thus you will find many elements of cultures you’re familiar with. Some have been shipwrecked, marooned, thrown into the sea, or encountered some accident on the water. You, Essa, are unusual in your coming. In all the records of which I know, none have come by tidal wave on a peaceful day. But perhaps it was only a natural disaster after all.”
“As for who we are, I am the protectress of the throne, for our land has been without a ruler for over a century. You might call it a stewardship. I act in the princess’ stead until she comes.”
“You’re unofficially queen, then?” I guessed.
Mirala shook her head.
“No, our High Queen, our Esta, is always present, for Queenship is reserved for the Star herself. Our visible ruler is always, and only, the princess. I cannot bear the full power and authority she would have. All I can do is guide and keep the people together as best as I may.”
She gestured to Rolf and Raphael.
“My eldest and youngest sons each have their own role, perhaps more ceremonial in this interregnum. Raphael is the Stellan, Guardsman of the lands surrounding our royal city of Edessa. Until he is of age, it’s ceremonial in nature, save in his training.”
“As for my little hothead here -” she tousled Rolf’s hair affectionately as his eyes laughed. “His ought to be an earned title, hence its something he may grow into, as the Žvaigdė, the warrior counselor of the Royal House. Growth couldn’t suit him better, for he has a mind to repel all of Typhon’s evil, thus he is the most serious of my sons when it comes to combat.”
“You’ll meet my other son, Gabriel, and my daughter, Bryoni, when we reach Edessa. If we make good time, we should reach home tomorrow evening.”
She knew my next question before I asked it.
“We’ll have reports from all our watchtowers and garrisons within seventy-two hours of our arrival,” she promised. “Now, Essa. Who are you?”
Rolf cocked his head and seemed the most curious to know.
“Do you…know anything about France?”
“Mm, lots of people have come from France, and many other places,” Raphael replied.
“We were making pilgrimages for my birthday,” I faltered. “I was trying to get an internship - like an apprenticeship - so I could have a purpose, but we had to wait a long time to hear back.”
This was beginning to remind me eerily of the present waiting.
“We went out on the bay to go diving, when the tidal wave came.”
It didn’t really answer their question of who I was, but I didn’t have much else to say. I wasn’t much of anything.
“But how old are you?” seemed to be the only question they still wanted to know, so I told them I was fourteen.
“Oh joy! finally someone I’m older than, other than Blossom,” Rolf said with satisfaction. “We always get stuck being the youngest in a group. I mean, Bryoni. We call her Blossom.”
As it turned out, Raphael was nearly Joachim’s age, for he was nineteen, and Rolf only made my elder by a year.
It had begun to strike me, as I had listened to all these explanations, that the Silvarian language was English. Silvaria had certainly not been English in its beginning, and surely there ought to be a great deal more French, Spanish, Portuguese, even African languages blended in.
“You must have mostly outsiders from England and America,” I surmised. “Your language has become almost identical.”
Well, apparently that was as silencing as the name Typhon, because I could have heard a pin, even a seed bead, drop.
Rolf facepalmed.
“How,” he moaned, and I couldn’t tell if he was frustrated or bemused. “How did we not?”
“What?”
Raphael was staring at me, dumbfounded, and Mirala was shaking her head.
“This isn’t English,” she said. “It’s Westin.”
“Okay…”
To which the boys looked further puzzled.
“Okay?” Rolf repeated.
“I mean alright? . . .But it sounds like English.”
“If she’s an outsider, how is she speaking Westin?” Raphael asked his mother..
“And why didn’t we notice?” Rolf groaned.
“What are you talking about? It’s my language.”
“You don’t understand, Essa,” Rolf insisted. “It’s not English. You’re not speaking English. It’s WESTIN.”
“But it sounds like English!”
This was becoming frustrating that they didn’t get it.
“It doesn’t sound anything like English!”
“But -”
“Alright, look!” Rolf snatched up a book from the shelf. He opened it to a random page and set it before my eyes.
“This is Westin.”
He flipped to a set of translations at the back of the tome, finding one that was English.
“This is English.”
He flipped again and my eyes went back and forth. There was a ghost of something different about Westin, but I was still reading it as English.
“I’m sorry…it’s still English to me,” I said meekly.
Rolf shook his head, obviously as bewildered as myself. Mirala laid her hand on his shoulder.
“It would seem we have a mystery on our hands. There must be more to you than meets the eye, little Star,” she murmured. “Let us all get some rest. I sense we’re going to have an interesting time ahead of us.”
Read the next chapter.
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