Canellian Eye, page 18
“Your throat will be sore, but will heal. Your spine is damaged. You’ll walk and run once the swelling goes down... but you’ll never be as flexible and, as you grow older, it’ll harden and cause you more pain. I’m sorry.”
Istran thought for a moment.
“Mother?”
Lis leaned in close, forehead to forehead, the scanner’s beams bouncing off her hair.
“We’ll be fine,” Istran told her, his calm tone of voice so reminding her of Milachay that she wanted to wail. “Take me back to camp.”
* * *
That night, the loss of her uncle and sight of her lover battered Drel’s soul into submission until she fell into an exhausted sleep. The following morning, she awoke feeling sick to her stomach. Rushing to the bathroom, she violently retched, but was unable to vomit as she had eaten little since the night of Mahan’s death.
She tried to avoid meeting Brewan in the dining room, sending word that she was unwell, but the king despatched Ilvaas to insist on her presence. Once she joined them, Brewan took one look at her face and wanted to send her to Cal, the Elyacian healer who had recently replaced Frayn as Head Physician to the king. Drel declined the examination, pleading the traumatic loss of Mahan as cause for her malady. Brewan kindly allowed her to return to her room to rest.
* * *
Quaylan also experienced a dark night, by reason of conscience. An unthinkable idea had now become an unspeakable necessity. The work details, the copying of the ship’s technology, the attack on the women and Istran’s injury, all conspired to bring him to a decision.
He was beyond anger at the treatment of his people and riven with guilt at having led them into this situation. Even so, he was about to set into motion a plan which troubled his honour and his spirit. Yet, it must be done, for the survival of his race.
He had always assumed that when the Prophecy spoke of a flight from fear and death, it was referring to the death of their planet. What if that flight was yet to come? Repairs on the ship would continue at a slow pace, but he must plan for the survival of this generation. It was time to utilise another Canellian ‘gift’; one their foes knew nothing about; a genetic feature that Frayn had taken great pains to conceal from Elyacian healers.
As the first rays of dawn stole over the horizon, Quaylan assembled his team: a new Council of Canellia; a War Council. Yix and Palaxa arrived first, the staunchest of colleagues. Lis joined next, having reluctantly left Istran asleep in his bed, being watched over by young Jelsi.
Quaylan’s tent was soon full of grim faced adults, all wondering what their Leader had in mind. Axil and Frayn were the last to arrive, together. They had grown into close confidantes since Quaylan began to waver; a fact which was not lost on their friend.
When all were present, their faces turned towards him with anticipation, Quaylan took a deep breath and began to relate the plan of darkness, horror...and savage murder.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Brewan’s two week coronation was celebrated with glee by an Elyacian people grown bored of a month’s worth of leisurely mourning. The Canellians were still doing the dirt-ridden, back breaking manual labour alongside the soul-destroyed lowest stratum of Elyacian society, leaving the city dwellers to the wheeling and dealing they so adored. The only Elyacians not enamoured of Brewan’s order were the nomads, who knew nothing of it, and the outer villagers, who were used to being on the losing end of ‘free market trade’. They scarcely noticed the change of monarch or labour circumstances.
As night fell on the final day of celebration, Drel retired to her bedroom and closed the windows against the sound of drunken debauchery emanating from the streets, below. Not that the ‘common’ people were the only ones indulging: Drel could hear revelry, singing, breaking furniture and sexual liaisons echoing from every corner of the Palace. In fact, as far as she could tell, Brewan was the only one, other than her, who was miserable that night. She had left her cousin playing with his new crown and drowning his fear of responsibility at the bottom of a third bottle.
Lying in bed, striving to ignore the noise, Drel felt another wave of the sickness that had plagued her all day. The nausea was horribly inconvenient and brought attention to herself, just when she would rather fade into shadow. Brewan and Ilvaas both assumed it was hysterical female grief for her uncle. She hated them for it.
How I’ve changed, she thought. I used to be so hopeful. Uncle Mahan would barely recognise me ... Would Quaylan?
An image arose of his naked emerald skin and a wave of longing flooded her body. It was immediately followed by a deeper surge of nausea. Unable to smother the vomiting, Drel rolled out of bed and flung herself into the bathroom, depositing what little she had eaten into the toilet bowl. She felt hot, sick, weak and distraught. She rinsed her mouth, pressed a cool, wet cloth to her forehead and waited for a few minutes, but she still felt horrible.
Maybe that annoying, jolly healer can help me. What’s his name? Cal.
She would normally have sent for him, but every servant had disappeared into a sea of debauchery. Apparently, she would have to make her own way to him, assuming he wasn’t comatose.
Trying to stagger out of the bathroom was an ordeal in itself, but she managed to drape herself in a soft robe, open her door and stumble into the hallway. Passing the mumbling bodies of drunken Palace staff, Drel swayed along corridors lit by random bursts of fireworks from outside the windows.
She held tightly to the bannister as she slowly made her way down the staircase, heading for the lower level quarters. The route to healer Cal’s room took her past the concealed entrance to the tunnel and she was almost tempted to enter it, once again. She was tired, sick and grieving and her heart longed to be with Quaylan.
But it can never be. He would die.
Gathering the last of her resolve, she passed the secret door and pushed onwards. She was turning into the healers’ hallway when, out of the corner of her eye, she caught the movement of the tunnel door as it swung open. Hiding in deep shadow, she peeped around a pillar and watched a figure emerge from the darkness. Despite his tattered clothing and hood, Drel recognised him instantly.
What is he doing here?
* * *
Quaylan was also listening to the distant sound of dissipation. Although the behaviour of the Elyacians was playing directly into his hands, he experienced no exultation. His personal order would be carried out this night and he, and those he had commissioned, would have to live with it for the rest of their lives. The honour of Canellia was about to be blighted with the taint of blood.
The members of the War Council prepared to leave camp. Nothing was said to the Eye. There was little that could be said. They all understood the consequences of this night’s work and had no desire to discuss them again; it was hard enough to carry them out.
Frayn offered his hand to Axil.
Your death is set for tomorrow,” Axil told him.
Frayn nodded and moved on to Quaylan. The two stared at one another for a long moment. They would never, openly, meet again. Frayn shook Quaylan’s hand, searching for words, but none came. He left, with one final nod to Axil.
Axil’s loss was not limited to his sparring partner. As Palaxa hugged him for the last time, Axil thought his miserable heart would break. From this moment on, his great unrequited love would be a stranger to him.
“Jehul go before you, Axil,” she whispered.
Yix forced a smile as they left. His child-like giggle had been scarce since the death of Milachay, so far away in space. After he carried out what needed to be done this night, Palaxa feared that Yix would never laugh again.
Quaylan stood still, frozen in time, watching his people melt into darkness. He was still there, long after Axil left him alone to his thoughts... and guilt.
* * *
Frayn made his way along the tunnel, heart pounding as he closed in on his unsuspecting target. Although the route had been meticulously described by Quaylan, the journey seemed both interminably long and frighteningly short. He carried a dim torch which lit very little except dark, dusty walls and floor. When he finally reached the end, he was almost relieved.
Almost.
Although the door opened into the Palace with a delicate whoosh of air, it sounded horribly loud to the ears of the shaking healer. He needn’t have worried; the Palace’s residents were in a deep stupor. Frayn sidled into the corridor and quietly closed the door behind him, scanning the hallway.
No-one. Silence.
He crept through the Palace, heading for the Chief Physician’s quarters. Unlike the new resident, Frayn had never slept in those rooms, but they had been made available to him for study during the reign of Mahan.
Stepping around drunken bodies, Frayn slowly and quietly edged the door open a few inches and peeped through the gap. His heart was racing; he could be caught at any moment from within or without. He wasn’t even sure that capture wouldn’t be preferable, given the nature of his task.
It wasn’t to be.
His surreptitious glance into the room revealed a young man, fully clothed, lying on his back on a large bed, snoring loudly.
Frayn swiftly entered the room and closed the door behind him. This was the point of no return; there would be no going back on this moment, either for himself or his people.
Reaching the bedside, he forced himself to look down at the sleeping Cal. Caramel skin was marred by a thin line of drool seeping from his open mouth and pooling on the pillow, below. Wisps of black hair fell across one eye and blew up and down in the breeze from his nose. The young Elyacian’s child-like expression burnt itself into Frayn’s memory. For the rest of his life, when he closed his green eyes, he would see that face awaken and stare at him, accusingly.
I am a healer!
Frayn’s tortured conscience screamed inside his skull.
How can I do this?
For the first time, Frayn experienced something he would have believed impossible: hatred for his beloved Quaylan, and Jehul.
How dare you ask this of me?
Pulling a knife from within tattered layers, Frayn leaned over the unsuspecting innocent, drawing back as the young man groaned in his sleep. Knowing he must do it now, or never, Frayn closed his eyes and plunged the knife directly through Cal’s heart, killing him instantly.
With the foul deed done, a wave of nausea swept over Frayn. Staggering into the bathroom, he vomited, as though trying to purge himself of the bloody poison of murder. Scooping a little water into his mouth, he swallowed hard and forced breath into his lungs. He washed the blood from his hands and soaked his face, avoiding looking at his reflection in the mirror.
This night’s work was still not complete.
Frayn re-entered the bedroom and sat beside the corpse, taking his hand as though comforting his young victim. Closing his eyes, he concentrated on accessing that special part of his mind, the part that controlled his body, its chemistry, its genetic code. The ‘gift’ that had once enabled Canellians to mirror their aquatic residents and flourish in any environment was now being ruined and warped into something horrible and evil.
Sweeping up from where green fingers met brown, Frayn’s skin took on the exact hue and texture of Cal’s. With only a slight sheen of sweat bearing witness to the effort involved, Frayn’s body underwent metamorphosis, inch by inch, changing into an exact replica of his victim, stealing his form as cruelly as he stole his life.
When the transformation was complete, Frayn covered Cal’s body with a sheet and prepared to carry it to the tunnel for disposal. Yet again, he would have to brave the possibility of discovery, but this time it would not be as an intruder, but as a murderer.
Heaving the body into his arms, Frayn turned. Drel was leaning against the doorway, staring at him in total bewilderment. She had followed Frayn into the room, only to find herself staring at Cal, carrying what appeared to be a body.
“Cal, what have you done? Did you hurt Frayn?”
She fell into the room and slumped against him. Her appearance was so swift and unexpected that Frayn instinctively tried to save her from falling and half dropped the body as a result. When the sheet pulled away from the face, a trembling Drel stared at two identical versions of Healer Cal, except that one was quite dead.
Left with little choice, Frayn dropped Cal’s body and yanked Drel fully into the room, slamming the door behind her. She crumpled to her knees and dry retched.
“Quiet,” Frayn whispered. “If you care for Quaylan, you’ll keep silent.”
His words were perfect Elyacian and delivered in the voice of Cal, yet Drel instinctively knew that the real Cal was the one lying dead on the floor, beside her. She tore her eyes away from the blood, still soaking into his clothes.
“Who... who are you?” Drel stammered. “What’s Quaylan got to do with this? If you come any closer, I’ll scream.”
“No, you won’t,” Cal replied. “You’ve seen what’s happening to the Canellian people...”
“Why would you care about Canellians?” Drel asked, groping her way towards the truth. “Who are you?”
Drel sat back against the bed as another wave of nausea swept over her. She remembered why she had come to this room, to see the healer.
Healer.
“Frayn?” she asked, having had an epiphany.
Frayn looked away, giving the truth to her observation.
“Quaylan never told me you can change,” Drel snarled.
Why didn’t he tell me they can do this? Why? Didn’t he trust me?
“A child was severely injured in our camp and it’s only going to get worse,” Frayn told her. “You know that.”
“I’m sorry for the child, but this is murder,” Drel hissed. “What are you trying to do? Take his place?” A cold, terrifying thought suddenly occurred to her. “Are you going to kill Brewan?”
“No,” was Frayn’s emphatic response. “I’m replacing Cal and that’s as far as it goes.”
“As far as murder. Why couldn’t you kill Ilvaas and replace him? He hates your people.”
Drel felt a trickle of guilt at her last statement, but it soon passed.
“I know a healer’s job and nothing about Ilvaas,” Frayn explained. “Cal has... had... no family, few friends. Less people to give me away.”
“Do you stay like that?”
“I can hold this shape for days, even sleeping, as long as I regenerate when I’m tired.”
Drel pulled herself up from her knees and perched on the edge of the bed.
“Tell me why I shouldn’t give you away? I’m Elyacian and this is treason. Will you kill me if I try to leave here?”
Frayn peered at her through another man’s brown eyes.
“No. Leave here as you will; I won’t hurt you. Not just for Quaylan’s sake, but because, whatever you think of me, I don’t want to hurt anyone. Quaylan’s done this to safeguard our people and it’ll go no further than tonight. If you give us away, you’ll be killing him.”
Frayn cringed at his own words. The emotional blackmail was cruel and placed Drel in an impossible situation, but he needed to extract a promise. He certainly wasn’t going to silence her himself.
Drel’s mind spun with the unexpected turn of events. She should tell Brewan immediately, protect her own people, but she also knew that Frayn was right. Discovery would bring a death sentence for Quaylan and cast the Canellians into agony. It was an excruciating decision, but her secret lover won out.
Does Frayn know I’m Quaylan’s lover? Would he kill me right here if he did?
“I’ll keep quiet,” Drel whispered, “...but Frayn, I hate you for this and always will.”
As though judgement for her decision was racking her body, another wave of sickness swept over Drel and she leaned forward to retch. Her head spun and sight blurred. Frayn caught her in his arms as she toppled off the bed.
“Get away from me,” she murmured, peering up at his stolen face.
* * *
The house of General Klay and his wife, Lara, took pride of place within the city’s inner circle, befitting the head of the military and right hand man to the monarch. Although Ilvaas was clearly hoping to usurp that place with the young King Brewan, it had not yet filtered down to the perceptions of the populace. Thus, the building was both respected and given a wide berth by any who ventured into the area. Not that the average worker would dare saunter along the street; they would be confronted by trigger-happy guards within moments.
The Klays’ home was large, comfortable and constructed for maximum utility, much like its occupants. In truth, Klay spent very little time there and his wife had grown used to passing most of her days rattling around inside empty rooms. If a visitor had ever ventured within its pollution stained walls, the most striking feature would have been the silence.
But not this night.
In their bedroom, Klay was engaged in doing something he had never done before; he was comforting a distressed Lara. The trembling woman would have been extremely shocked by his actions, only she was no longer capable of being so.
“It’s going to be alright,” Klay told Lara, in perfect Canellian. “It had to be done. Had to be. Really. Quaylan said so. Palaxa?”
The Canellian with the face of Lara looked away from her borrowed husband. She wasn’t concerned for herself, so much as for Yix. He was trying to comfort her, but he was the one who would have to live with his recent actions. Palaxa knew him well; eventually the horror would hit him, hard.
Thinking to shield her, Yix planned to carry out the unthinkable murders alone, but Palaxa refused, intending to kill Lara herself. They crept into the building, camouflaged in the garb of domestic servants, moving from shadow to shadow with the peril of discovery in every moment. The fact that patrolling guards had never caught anyone trying to intrude in their General’s house worked in the couple’s favour; the guards were lax in their attention and, on this night, were more than a little inebriated.
Palaxa and Yix found their way inside with little difficulty, praying that their unsuspecting targets would already be asleep. Unfortunately, the teetotal Klay was still working in his study, whilst Lara was standing at her bedroom window, watching the fireworks explode into splashes of colour and, ironically, experiencing a rare moment of joy.
