The Exiles

26. Messengers

"How do you want to proceed, brother?" It was not Rea Anteri who asked this of Ovek, but Orsana. "Are you a man of your words, like all Chymer men have been before you? Or are you a shadow of those men, too weak to do what's right, again?"

Her words were meant to sting, and boy did they sting Ovek Silvertongue like a sharp barb to the heart, precise and painful. His older children looked on — the youngest three having been sent off with the nursery maids and tutors, to be the innocent children they were — for what, Ovek couldn't tell.

He closed his eyes, recalling Rita's face as she was driven away in that cage like a wounded beast, conquered. Find me. Her words haunted him, and finally, Ovek the Merciful said, "Call the Council of Lords. We are going to war."

"You sure?" Uncle Rea asked, though his voice was resolute as well. He did not wish for Ovek to rescind his word. He wanted to go to war. For his pride, for his sister, but mostly for vengeance if he could seek it. His hand itched towards the ornate hilt of his ceremonial, curved scimitar at his hip, wishing for it to kiss Rava's neck with one swift blow and rid the world of the disease that had festered in it for too long. How many Ryes and Rodins had lost their lives or their weaves to Rava the devourer? How many walked the streets a shell of what they used to be, unlike his own children? He saw it every day, on his streets, the refugees flooding in from the north, running for their lives, running for mercy, and that mercy had never come, until today. So, yes, Rea looked on at his merciful brother, who'd bound him with an oath to never go against Chymer until his return. Yes, Rea looked on at Ovek the Merciful, who finally was ready to live up to that name. Mercy for the people wronged. Mercy for the land... but not Chymer's throne. At least not the men who protected the abhorration that sat upon in it. A man who'd done the unthinkable and used his weave to do harm, to serve himself.

"We require you to confirm your order, My Lord. Are you sure?" Rea asked once more, his hand gripping the hilt a little harder. Say yes. Say yes.

"Father." Amer pleaded.

Ursa, who would normally never hurt a fly, stepped forward, joining her brother's stance. "I've seen the people down there, Father..." She eyed the window emblazoned with morning light. "Our people, living at the mercy of this land and its people, are lost. Broken and hopeless. Life for them has been ... the same as life for us on Earth. You know what we've been through, so you know how they are feeling, that sense of losing everything they once knew, of being helpless... just surviving day to day. You've always said, even on our little farm, those we take in, those that we look after, those who look up to us, they are our responsibility, Father. They are our responsibility, yours and ours" — Ursa grabbed Amer's hand in unity — "we are not children anymore and you're not alone. We are here with you and we will help you return them to their homes. You have my voice, and you have brother's words."

"And you have me too, Father. We have to bring them back home." Attin joined his older siblings too, shoulder to shoulder, and took Ursa's hand. "We have to."

"Home, Father," Amer said quietly, reverently. "It's not just a word. We must do what we can. We caused this – I caused this – this unrest ..."

"It wasn't you, Prince Amer." Uncle Rea let go of his hilt and turned. His demeanour softened. "You were a pawn. This unrest started a long time ago with a seed."

What seed? The children's brows knitted.

Attin braved the roomful of elders: his Granny who stopped rocking and turned, his aunty, who sat quietly with her head down, looked up, and his father tilted his in curiosity. "What seed?"

"Who wants to tell them?" Granny scoffed, eyeing the older men in the room, men who uncomfortably faced the roaring fire in the hearth that could fit the entire little cottage the Silvertongues' called home back on Earth, than answer the boy. "No one?" Granny pushed herself off her chair, leaving it rocking behind her, and approached the table. "Your grandfather, my dear departed husband, had two wives. I'm the younger and Ovek and Orsana are mine, but Rava, he's not."