章 21: 12: Revenge
As soon as I approached the doors to my mother's tea room, the guards at the door bowed and then wordlessly opened the doors for me.
The room was made warm and beautiful by the golden carvings, grand pink furniture and the light that was streaming through the room from the large windows. It seemed that large windows were quite fashionable in the palace.
"Mom!" I called out excitedly as I saw her sitting on a pink armchair in the centre of the room, while pleasantly chatting to her handmaid behind her.
"Oh, my Rory's here!" She gave me the biggest smile and I saw her blue eyes sparkle as I came skipping over to her. Even though Lord Leopold had told me that a prince should always remain calm and composed, I couldn't help but B-line straight for my mom at a pace that would make Leopold frown.
I giddily wrapped my arms around her waist and felt her arms wrap around me. My mom was so warm and gentle, kind of like my dad back on Earth. Even though I had known her for such a short time, I already felt a familial bond with her.
"Did you hear the bells, Rory?" She whispered softly into my hair.
I nodded my head while still pressed against her, letting her know I had heard the bells.
"And how do you feel about it?" She talked into my head again.
"I don't feel particularly bad about it..." I sighed as I moved my head off her chest to look up at her. "But at the same time, I know I don't feel good about it..."
My mother smiled down at me with bright intelligent eyes, that made me wonder how old she was. Actually, she seemed way too young to be the mother of a soon-to-be seven-year-old.
"Well, it's absolutely alright to be confused or unsure. Whether you have realized your true emotions on the topic or not is irrelevant. What is important is whether or not you will let your conflicted feelings affect the other parts of your life."
At that moment my mother felt so wise and steady. She was like my teacher/therapist and I was so glad. I was right to come here straight after hearing the bells because at that moment I had wanted clarity and my mom had just given it to me. I felt like a weight had just been lifted off my chest. I was suddenly free from my conflict and I could focus again.
"Thanks, mom!" I cried out before diving back into another hug.
She giggled in response and chided me softly. "Silly child. A prince should be more composed!"
"Miss Hargrove, will you please bring out the tea." I sat up when I heard my mother command her handmaiden.
"Rory, I had the cooks make these dishes especially for you. I want you to try them all and tell me what you think."
I nodded enthusiastically at the thought of filling up my belly with food.
It only took a few moments before maids came rushing in and laid the table before us with a pristine white cloth and placed table settings on it. Immediately afterwards, plates and plates of mouth-watering foods were placed on the table in front of us.
There was quite a bit of seafood, which I guess made sense since Azlantean was located right next to the ocean and had a harbour.
The food that had been served in the forest village had been quite bland so it was such a joy to eat the castle's food. Even a few desserts were set out, all of which looked so good.
For the next hour, I sat there with my mom, chatting and eating and just enjoying each other's company. I couldn't help but think that my mother was so young. She only looked like she was in her early twenties but she did seem wiser than the twenty-year-olds I knew back on earth. Then again, she was a queen. My father, on the other hand, did seem quite young for a king but he was definitely older than my mother, maybe early thirties.
I wanted to ask my mother's age but I knew it would be rude to ask her directly. Zelda would probably know anyway, so I would ask her later. What I was more interested in was how such a kind beautiful woman like my mom ended up with a dark stern man like my dad.
"Mom," I asked after taking a sip of the tea that was provided.
"Mmm?" She smiled looking up from her strawberry cake.
"How did you and the king meet?" I asked curiously, hoping she wouldn't be put off by my question.
"Your father and I?" She seemed taken aback by the question but then chuckled as she looked down at me. She then reached out to me and patted my silver head affectionately.
"It's a long story..." she sighed as she looked past me out of the large silver windows.
"I have time." I pleaded to her with my amber eyes. It was a story I really wanted to hear.
She looked a bit reluctant for a moment and I could only think that the story was a bit more complicated than she cared it to be, but I still wanted to hear it badly. My mother nodded to me with a melancholic expression and then turned towards her handmaiden.
"Mrs Hargrove, please leave us." Mrs Hargrove promptly curtseyed and then quietly left the room. A dutiful quiet woman who seemed quite used to following my mother's orders. She stuck out to me for some reason.
"I wasn't born a noble like the usual marriage candidates for the royal family. I wasn't even born in Azlantean."
"Oh?" I hadn't expected that at all. Mother wasn't even a noble before she became queen, I had thought that being a noble was kind of a requirement for marrying a prince of Azlantean. But then again, my fiancé wasn't a noble either, she had been chosen on the grounds that her family-owned lots of gemstone mines, a resource that Azlantean had been lacking. Perhaps mother's family also harboured an invaluable resource that allowed her to be queen.
"I was in a similar situation as Aurora is in now. You see, my family was not particularly rich, nor did we have any material things we could offer Azlantean, in fact, we were just a family of healers that had been practising the art for thousands of years on the sacred hilltop..."
"Sacred Hilltop?" I had definitely heard that term before from my teachers back in the forest town, but I was having trouble recalling exactly what was taught to me.
"Ah," she sighed, "Yes you might have heard of it before. But 'Sacred Hilltop' is just its nickname the locals of that area call it. Its real title is Holy Lucresia peak. Have you heard of it?"
I nodded enthusiastically remembering the lessons my teachers from the village had burned into my head after mother the told me the place's real name. My teacher had taught me about Lucrecia peak in detail. It was considered a holy land by all kingdoms on the continent because of the area's amazing healing powers. I had read that people who drink the water of Lucresia's waterfall could be cured of any sickness and would be blessed by the gods/ be given lots of luck. It was said that eating the crops grown on that mountain would restore any man to health. It was a sacred place blessed by the gods. A blessed sanctuary.
"Lucresia is actually home to a small village of people, very few are permanent residents, the rest are travelling scholars and healers who came to the mountain to gain wisdom and learn the art of healing, in fact, my brother and I were the only two children in the village."
I had already had my share of small villages having lived the last six years in the forest town, but to be the only two kids in the entire village...
"Wow, you were pretty isolated from the world then..."
Mother giggled down at me. "Yes, I definitely was."
"My family, the Bedelias, were one of the few permanent residents and were the Keepers of Lucresia. A family tasked with looking after the mountain and passing down the art of healing to those who wished to learn. Perhaps it was the thousands of years of service my family had provided to the mountain or the prolonged exposure to the power of the mountain, but my brother and I were born with the power of the mountain. The power to heal and replenish people just by willing it. Of course, our family had always been talented healing mages, but my brother and I had the been born with unheard-of healing power equal to that of the mountain. The ability called 'perfect restoration' capable of bringing those back from the brink of death, with no costs to our own health."
It was then that I realized why my mother was so valuable to Azlantean. The ability to completely heal others was quite astounding, quite unbelievable but most of all extremely valuable. What kingdom wouldn't want to snatch her up if they knew about her and my uncle's power? In spite of what she just told me, I watched concerned as a wave of sadness washed over her.
"Mom are you alright? Should I call Mrs Hargrove back in?" I asked, reaching for her hand, worried that she had fallen ill.
"Look at you, my baby boy..." her happy smile came back to her face and I felt relieved but unconvinced that the underlying sadness had completely gone.
"You're not even seven years old. How are you so mature?"
I could only smile awkwardly back at her and tell her that I had always been this way...
"As per tradition, once every ten years, the King of Azlantean goes to visit Lucresia peak as a sign of respect to the gods and to be cleansed by the holy water and eat the crops of the mountain to be rid of any impurities of the body. The ritual lasts three days and was carried out by the keepers of Lucresia, my family, the Bedelias."
I gulped uncomfortably as I began to catch on to how the story would unfold.
"It was the time before your father's rule when your grandfather was the King." She added softly.
My grandfather, the man who probably bent the laws of Azlantean and disinherited his first son of the throne and gave it to my father instead.
"On the last day of the ritual when the King and his guards were at their most relaxed, assassins who had been waiting patiently for the opportunity to strike ambushed the king while he was alone and unarmed, bathing in the waters of the waterfall. Of course, Kings of Azlantean are highly skilled and capable, so with his magic alone the King was able to kill all of the thirteen assassins, but not before taking a poisoned steel arrow to the chest."
I understood that a poisoned steel arrow to the chest was a fatal wound, but surely if he was in the waterfall he would have been healed right away...?
"But since he was in the waterfall wouldn't his wound be healed easily?" I frowned, wondering how someone like that could be a threat.
"Although people think Lucresia is a place that offers accelerated healing, which it does, but not to the extent of being able to heal a poison arrow in the time it would take to kill the stricken person. Although the waters can heal superficial injuries in a matter of moments, it takes much longer to heal deeper wounds like the kind the king had. Lucresia peak is a safe haven of nature and only
Relies on the excess amount of magic in its surroundings to heal, so the mountain would not flood a foreign body with healing Magic. The king would have died before the waterfall could have healed him."
Mother seemed to abruptly lose her appetite as she placed her plate of cake back on the table and lost her smile.
"Even though my parents had told us to keep our powers hidden, my brother and I were young and naive. Moreover, the king had been very kind to us and had told us stories of the 'great Kingdom of Azlantean' that he ruled. To your uncle and I who had never left Lucresia, his stories were just jaw-dropping and epic. He made our dream of a strange but brilliant place that we longed to visit."
A gentle breeze swept through the room from the open windows. The wind flowed through my mother's hair and made the white strands dance elegantly. Her story didn't seem very sad, but her face told me that it actually was quite sad.
"Your uncle and I rushed into the water and used perfect restoration on him. Naturally, the King was healed in a matter of moments. We were so glad and proud that we had saved him, the wonderful storyteller that my brother and I had come to admire. We didn't quite understand yet that our wonderful storyteller was also a king of a powerful nation. A powerful nation that had survived and thrived for thousands have of years by taking what it found valuable and making it its own. Little did my brother and I know that we have just become something valuable..."
I suddenly felt a bit guilty, ashamed of what I guessed my grandfather had done.
"My grandfather... He forced you and uncle Savras to come back to Azlantean... didn't he?"
My grandfather had been a very tricky scheming man it seemed.
Mother nodded, this part of her past obviously still bothered her.
"How old were you then?" I asked, knows no that my mother was quite young. It must have been even more traumatic for a young girl to be separated from her parents.
"I had just turned fifteen."
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