A Sea of Shields

  But now he saw the others were right all along. He was nothing but a bastard. He had never felt so low.

  “How did you find me?” she asked.

  But Kendrick had nothing more to say to her. He could not reconcile the image he saw before him with the vision he had always held in his mind. This woman could not be his mother. It was not fair.

  “I’ve searched for you all my life,” he said slowly, his voice broken. “Unlike you—who never bothered to search for me. Now I understand why.”

  His mother’s face flushed with embarrassment.

  “You shouldn’t see me here,” she said.

  “You’re my mother,” he said, accusingly. “How could you do this? How could you live your life like this? Have you no noble blood running through your body?”

  She scowled, turning red. It was a look he recognized; he wore the same look when he was angry.

  “You don’t know the life I’ve lived!” she replied, indignant. “You are no one to judge me!”

  “Oh yes I am,” he said. “I am your son. If not me, then who?”

  She stared back at him, and her eyes flooded with tears.

  “You should go now,” she said. “You shouldn’t be in this place.”

  He stared back at her, his own eyes welling with tears.

  “And you should?” he asked.

  She suddenly broke into a sob. She held her face in her hands.

  Kendrick could not stand it any longer; he turned, drew back the velvet drape, and hurried through the tavern.

  “Hey!” a beefy man said, reaching out and grabbing Kendrick’s wrist roughly. “You went behind the drape and you didn’t pay. Everyone pays, whether you sample the merchandise or not.”

  In a rage, Kendrick swung the man’s arm around, twisting it behind his back, and brought the man’s face down on his knee, smashing it into the silver armor and breaking it.

  The man collapsed to the ground, and the rest of the men in the tavern froze, thinking twice about coming anywhere near him. The entire bar stood still, as the men stared, silent.

  Kendrick turned and strutted out the door, into the daylight, determined to wipe this place from his memory, and to never, ever think of it again.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Conven, finally home, marched into his village, ragged, weary, his legs numb from trekking all these miles. Conven had come all this way alone, on foot, walking ever since he had departed from the Legion, deciding he had nowhere left to go but here. Home. Still besieged by grief over his brother’s death, he needed the time to clear his head. To be alone from everyone and everything.

  A part of Conven felt he should be back in King’s Court, celebrating with his other Legion brothers; but another part of him, the bigger part, was still numb to the world. Thoughts of his dead twin brother consumed him, making it hard to focus on anything else. He was unable to shake his grief—and he didn’t want to. His twin brother was like a part of himself, and when he had died back in the Empire, the best part of Conven had died with him.

  Conven had been numb to the world the entire time he had marched here, trekking aimlessly, barely thinking of where he was going, not wanting to take part in any celebrations.

  Yet now that he had arrived, now that he stepped foot through the gates of his old village, for the first time in a long time, something within him stirred. He looked up, recognized the old streets, the old buildings, the place where he and his brother were raised, had spent so many years, and he began to remember why he had come back here. Something within him began to wake, and for a moment, he began to feel a sense of purpose again. For the first time, thoughts of something else, aside from his dead brother, entered his mind.

  Alexa. His wife.

  Throughout his journeys in the Empire, back when his brother had been alive, thoughts of Alexa had sustained Conven; he had thought of little but her, sad to have had to leave her. He had promised to return to her, to come back to this village when he returned from the Empire.

  Conven and his brother had gotten married in a double wedding, and ever since, each had talked endlessly about returning for their brides, starting life over in their village. Conven felt guilty to be coming back here without his brother; yet at the same time, as he looked through the streets, thoughts of Alexa rose within him, and he recalled why he came here. Thinking of her made him feel a spark of optimism for the first time.

  Alexa was the one thing Conven felt he had left in the world, the one thing left that he could cling onto, that made him feel he might have a chance to start life again. After all, Alexa always understood; she always had a way to make him feel better about everything. She knew his brother, she would understand, better than anyone. She would be able to relate to Conven’s grief. Maybe, just maybe, she could bring him back. She had the ability to. She always had.

  Conven walked through the village, ignoring the people bustling all around him, heading single-mindedly right for his old cottage, where he knew he would find Alexa. He turned the corner and saw it, the small, bright white cottage with the yellow door, which sat ajar. From inside he could hear a woman’s voice, singing joyously—and his heart lifted at the sound. Alexa. It was his wife’s voice.

  She was singing, and it brought it all back, Conven remembering her singing, as she always did, the sound giving him more joy than anything on earth.

  Conven’s heart beat faster, and he rushed forward, eager to see her face, to hold her tight, to tell her everything. He felt that once he got it all off his chest, he would feel better, so much lighter. Then maybe, just maybe, he would be able to start life over again.

  Conven rushed forward and pushed the door open further. He stepped inside, his heart pounding, so anxious to surprise her, already anticipating the joy he would find on her face. He stepped in without knocking and stood there, expecting to see her standing with her back to him, cleaning her bowls at the window, singing to herself, as she always had.

  But Conven stopped short in his tracks at the sight before him, unable to process what he saw. There was Alexa. Singing, smiling. Happy as ever.

  But she was not cleaning her bowls. Rather, she was looking into someone else’s eyes. A man’s eyes.

  Alexa was leaning forward, smiling, and kissing a man, who kissed her back.

  Conven stood there, frozen, numb, wanting to curl up and die inside.

  How could it be? Alexa? His wife? With another man?

  Suddenly, Alexa turned, looked at Conven with a horrified expression, and screamed. The man next to her jumped back too, both of them startled.

  Conven just stood there, staring back, expressionless. He hardly knew what to say. He felt the ground sinking beneath him.

  “Who are you?” the man yelled out to Conven.

  “Who are you?” Conven yelled back, trying to control his rage.

  “I am Alexa’s husband. How dare you trespass into our home!”

  Conven felt his heart grow cold at the man’s words.

  “Husband?” he said, baffled. “Of what do you speak? I am her husband!”

  The man turned and looked back and forth between Alexa and Conven, puzzled.

  Alexa burst into tears, quickly covering herself with a shawl, and looked at Conven with a horrified expression.

  “Conven,” she said, “what are you doing here? I thought you were dead.”

  Conven felt himself unable to speak, too shocked for words.

  “They told me you had died!” she added, pleading.

  Conven shook his head.

  “No, my brother died. Though, seeing this, I wish it was I.”

  Alexa cried and cried.

  “I waited for you!” she yelled out, between tears. “I waited for you for so many moons! You never came home. They told me you were dead, Conven!”

  Weeping, she crossed the room toward him.

  “You must understand. They told me you were dead! I married someone else.”

  Conven felt his eyes welling with tears.

&nb
sp; “You must understand!” she pleaded, crying, rushing forward and grabbing his hands. “I had no idea! I’m sorry. I’m so sorry!”

  Conven snatched back his hands, as if they were bitten by a snake.

  “So is that it, then?” Conven asked, his voice broken. “Our marriage means nothing anymore? I do not return in time, so you run off and marry someone else?”

  Alexa burst into fresh tears, her face reddening.

  “I had no idea!” she cried. “You must believe me!”

  “Well, here I am,” Conven said. “Alive. Back home. I have returned for you. I am your husband, after all. This was my home.”

  Alexa closed her eyes and shook her head again and again, as if willing for it all to go away.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I had to move on. It was all too painful. I have a new life now. I’m sorry. But I can’t go back now. I have a new life. It’s all too late.”

  Conven lowered his head in despair, and Alexa approached and put her arm around him. He marveled at the injustice of the world, at how despair bred more despair. Hadn’t he suffered enough?

  Most of all, he felt like a fool, felt so ashamed. He had assumed her love for him was still alive, was as strong as ever. He had assumed that his journeys would not change that.

  Now, finally, he had no one left. Not his brother. Not his wife. No one.

  Without another word, Conven turned and walked out of the cottage.

  “Conven!” Alexa cried out behind him.

  But he had already slammed the door behind him, on her voice, on her world, and everything with it.

  *

  Conven walked in a daze through his town, not seeing or feeling the world around him. People bumped into him, and he bumped off of them like the walking dead, not realizing. How could it be? How could it be that everything he’d loved in the world had been taken away from him?

  Somehow, perhaps by instinct, Conven found himself entering a tavern, sitting at the bar. He didn’t even remember ordering mugs of ale, but they appeared before him, and he drank them, one after the next. He sat there, closing his eyes, shaking his head, trying to shut it all out.

  It couldn’t be. Just moons ago, Coven had had it all. He had been happily married, in a double wedding, with his brother. He had been offered a coveted spot in the Legion, along with his brother. They had a plan to return successfully from their quest of glory into the Empire, returning heroes, Thorgrin retrieving the Destiny Sword. They had a plan to become knights, to return home, and to live a charmed life.

  How had it all gone so wrong? Conven could not process it at all.

  As Conven drank another ale, he entertained thoughts of ending it all. After all, the way he viewed it, life held nothing for him anymore.

  Suddenly, Conven almost felt off his chair, as he was bumped by a big, tall fat man, who sat down next to him, his back to him. Conven regained his balance as the man turned to him.

  “Watch where you sit, skinny boy,” he said.

  Conven stared back at him, his mind seething with rage in his drunken state.

  “Don’t look at me like that,” the man smirked. “Unless you want me to knock that look off your face.”

  Conven stood there, seething, debating what to do, when the man suddenly jumped up from his chair, swung around, and before Conven could see what was happening, slapped him hard across the face with his beefy, sweaty, palm.

  The smack rang throughout the room, and the bar suddenly grew quiet, all heads turning.

  Several men slowly gathered near the big man, clearly friends of his, as if hoping for a fight.

  That was when it happened. Something inside Conven snapped. He became a man pushed too far, too close to the brink of despair, and he could not restrain himself any further.

  Conven lashed out like an animal backed into a corner, and he leapt for the man, grabbing his wooden chair, raising it high, and bringing it down across the man’s face.

  The man cried out, reaching up and grabbing his bloody face as he stumbled—but Conven did not wait. He jumped forward and kicked the big man in the gut so hard that he keeled over, then Conven reached up and kneed him in the face.

  The man’s nose broke with a cracking noise, then he fell down to the floor, like a dead tree, shaking it.

  The man’s friends, as big as he, each rushed for Conven, clearly itching for a fight.

  Conven, eager to wreak more havoc, did not wait; on the contrary, he leapt for them first.

  The first man came at Conven with a club, and Conven snatched it from his hands, backhanded him, then used his club to crack him across the head.

  Conven then spun around and clubbed the other three men, knocking crude knives from their hands and forcing each down to the ground.

  A dozen more men, clearly all friends of these people, charged Conven, surrounding him.

  Conven fought like a man possessed, kicking and punching and elbowing and clubbing his way through the room, taking down one man after another after another. He picked up one man and threw him high over his head, across the room, breaking a bar table in half. He head-butted another, elbowed another across the jaw, and threw another over his shoulder.

  Conven was a one-man wrecking machine, not caring, prepared to throw himself recklessly into death. He had nothing left to worry about, and nothing left to live for. He would gladly die in this place, and take as many men as he could with him.

  Conven drew on his skills as a Legion member; even when drunk, he was a better fighter than the best man in here, and before he was through, Conven had managed to knock out nearly every patron in the place—when he, out of breath, heard a metallic sound behind him, of shackles.

  Conven glanced back over his shoulder, but too late—he saw a dozen lawmen leap on him from behind, raising clubs, bring them down on the back of his head. He fought with these men, too, despite the odds, kicking and struggling.

  But he was already spent, and there were just too many of them. One after the next, the blows rained down him, and in moments Conven felt himself shackled from behind, first by his wrists, then his ankles.

  Unable to move, more and more blows rained down. Soon, his eyes were closing, heavy with bruises, and as his world went black, he heard the sound of soft thumping. His final thought, before his eyes swelled shut, was that he wished his brother was here to fight beside him.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Matus, annoyed, marched into his father’s former castle, clenching his jaw as he prepared to confront his two brothers. He marched through the corridors of this place, a place that used to be filled with his father’s presence, used to be the gathering place of the Upper Isles, but was now used by Matus’s two brothers, Karus and Falus, as a gathering hall, a place to foment revolution and rebellion since their father’s imprisonment.

  Matus just did not see the world the way his brothers did. He never had. He was cut from a different cloth than Karus and Falus, who were nearly clones of his father in every way—even physically, tall and lean, with the same intense, shining black eyes and straight hair. Matus, by contrast, was shorter, with the brown eyes and curly hair he inherited from his deceased mother. Being the youngest, he’d always been somewhat apart from them, and ever since his father was in prison, he’d never been more estranged from them than he was now.

  Matus had never agreed with his father’s actions, with his duplicitous betrayal of Gwendolyn. If his father had disagreements, Matus felt, he should have aired them openly—and if he could not come to terms, then he should have taken his cause openly to the field of battle—not in a sneaky way, not in an act of betrayal. It was wrong for his father to violate the code of honor, for any reason. In his family’s eyes, the end justified the means. In Matus’s eyes, it never did. Honor was more sacred.

  In Matus’s eyes, his father deserved to be imprisoned, which was a generous act on Gwendolyn’s part.

  His brothers, though, could not feel more differently—and as Matus marched into the room, he was met
by the hostile glare of Karus, who sat around their long, wooden table, scowling, debating with several other soldiers sitting with them. Scheming, as usual. Matus wondered where Falus was. Surely, he assumed, up to no good.

  “Why did you attempt to poison Srog?” Matus demanded.

  “Why are you loyal to that fool?” Karus shot back.

  Matus grimaced.

  “He is the Queen’s regent.”

  “Not our Queen,” Karus countered. “Your judgment has become clouded. You do not know where your loyalties lie. Your task is to defend your brothers. Your father.”

  “Our father rules no more,” Matus said. “It is past time you faced the times. Change is here. Srog is our ruler now, and he answers to Gwendolyn. Our father sits in prison, and he will never rise again.”

  “Oh, he will,” Karus said, determined, standing, pacing, as he walked over and tossed another log on the fire. He threw it with such anger that he just missed a dog, who jumped up and ran out of the way as sparks flew all over the stone floor.

  “If you think he’s going to sit there, rotting in jail for the rest of his life, you’re entirely wrong.”

  Matus looked back in shock. His brothers never stopped.

  “What are you scheming, exactly?” Matus asked.

  Karus turned and looked knowingly at the other soldiers in the room, crude men, mercenaries who were loyal to his father. Karus hesitated, as if withholding some secret and debating whether or not to let Matus in on it, too.

  “I have plans,” he answered, cryptically.

  “What sort of plans?” Matus pressed. “You’d be foolish to risk any sort of rebellion. Gwendolyn’s army, the Silver, the MacGils, are far more powerful than we. Have you not learned your lesson?”

  “Are you with us or against us?” Karus demanded, slamming his fist on the table, stepping forward. “I need to know.”

  “If you advocate defying the crown, I am against you,” Matus replied proudly.