Page 16 of Veil of Vasara (Fate of the Five #1)

CHAPTER 16- ELIAS

“G et me more wine,” I barked at the serving boy standing outside my chambers. He looked at me as if a Chimera had entered the hallway, rather than a person.

“What is wrong with you boy? Wine. Get. Me. Some. Wine.”

“Yes, My Lord.” He scurried down the hallway like a field mouse.

I sighed and groaned as I lay back on my bed.

“Fuck!” I yelled as my leg was pierced with a knife-like pain again.

I sat up sharply and immediately sent the room spinning.

“Back down, back down, back down,” I chanted to myself as I braced one hand on my forehead and another on my thigh.

There was a knock on the door.

“Why are you knocking? Just bring it here,” I shouted at the ceiling.

The clipped measured steps that circled around my bed were not of the shivering servant boy.

“My Lord.”

I scowled into my arm. “What is it, Trenton? Aren’t you meant to be scoring potential brides on a scale from ‘ too opinionated’ to ‘ perfectly docile’?”

“I left that to the hands of the other Councilmen… as did you.”

“I make no secret of my feelings about the Council’s activities. You on the other hand…” I dropped my arm to look at him.

“I do what I must.”

“ Must you visit me now?”

“I needed to speak with you, My Lord.”

“About what?”

“About your responsibilities.” Trenton sounded as if he was approaching a child.

“What responsibilities?” I sat up more slowly this time. Trenton’s face was slightly blurry, but he wasn’t moving in front of me, which was a marked improvement from my last attempt at being upright.

“You and I both know my responsibility is for show, it’s non-existent and I have never minded that at all. You’re the military man, Fargreaves kisses the arse of the other Kingdom’s ambassadors to maintain alliances and trade. Raynard upholds the law…most likely while breaking it himself and Wayman, is it? What does he do again? Other than marry girls young enough to be his fucking granddaughter every two years.”

“He handles finances,” Trenton reminded me.

“That’s it,” I clicked my fingers. “So, you see Trenton, there’s nothing left for me to be responsible for is there?” I shrugged, “What a shame.”

“We have discussed it with His Highness, and he agrees.”

I closed my eyes and shook my head. “I don’t care what you bloody agreed.”

“We would like you to lead our armies.”

I was so stunned by his statement, I forgot about how drunk I was, swivelling my head in Trenton’s direction far too fast.

“This is low, even for you,” I enunciated slowly.

“You have much fighting experience. You are one of the finest swordsmen this Kingdom has ever seen.”

“Yes, and as well as my supreme experience I also have…one leg. One. Not two. In case you had forgotten.” I patted my prosthetic. “People usually have two and that helps quite a bit when they’re in the middle of a battle and trying to maintain things like balance and well…their fucking lives.”

“I had not forgotten, My Lord.”

“Well then, maybe you had forgotten how I lost it in the first place.”

“I have not.”

“You can see my reluctance then surely?” I smiled sarcastically at him. “I was done with fighting years ago. I told you and I told him that. I won’t be killing any more men and I’d quite like to keep my other leg actually.”

Trenton took a deep breath in. “We need you to train the soldiers.”

I stood suddenly. Fuck, the room started to spin again. I steadied myself against the edge of the bed.

“I said no Trenton. Do not ask me again. I have said no many times before. I’m not quite sure why an intelligent man such as yourself is finding one simple word so difficult to understand. I will not be training soldiers, I will not be joining an army, I will not be fighting in an army. If that means my place on the Council is forfeit, then so be it. You and I both know I couldn’t give a fuck.”

“Come to Council this Friday…Eliel will explain.” He spoke softly, like he was trying to tame a wild animal.

“Eliel is…” I cleared my throat trying to calm down. I started my sentence again. “You’ve fought before, haven't you, Trenton?”

“Yes, My Lord.”

“Eliel hasn’t. He doesn’t know what he’s asking of me. You do… and yet you are asking.”

“That is because we are facing a far greater threat than any of us have ever encountered in our lifetimes. Nobody wants to fight, My Lord, but we do not have a choice.”

I peered at him. “What threat?”

“Come to Council, we will explain then.”

“Council is far too early in the morning. I will not wake up at first light to hear something you could easily tell me now.”

Trenton silently looked at the door, then back at me.

“You know I won’t come, Trenton, so it’s now or never. I haven’t had any alcohol in about…” I stopped and pointed upwards, calculating, “An hour, so my patience is running out.”

Trenton opened his mouth to speak, when a knock at the door, and a frightened boy’s voice travelled through the door. “Your wine, My Lord.”

Trenton looked at me.

“Bring me the wine, will you?” I asked him.

Trenton narrowed his eyes at me, unhappy with my order.

“Oh, and give him the empty one back.” I waved in a perfunctory manner towards the table.

Trenton yanked the door open with such force, I was surprised it didn’t come off its hinges. He grabbed the jug of wine from the boy’s hand with equal impatience, then shoved the empty one into his arms.

He outstretched his arm towards me.

“I can’t drink it from a jug, can I?” In truth I would happily have taken it straight out of the jug, but seeing Trenton’s perfected role crumble at the hands of simple instructions was entertaining. A man who dedicated himself to the service of others, or so he said, was finding it impeccably difficult to pour me a drink.

Trenton walked over to my desk, took one of the unwashed glasses from it, and threw it on my bed.

“Come, Trenton,” I mocked him, “I thought we were friends.”

“Must you always act this way?”

“And which way is that exactly?”

“Like an impudent adolescent, My Lord,” he droned. “You are twenty-eight.”

“Act this way as opposed to what way exactly?” I poured some of the wine into the glass and began to drink. “How everybody else acts? Acts. You’re all acting.” I waved my hands theatrically. “You’re all pretending. You’re all snakes, shedding different skin, taking on new patterns around different people. You’re all poisonous… fucking… snakes.”

The alcohol was as usual, loosening my tongue far too much. I, as usual, didn’t give a shit.

“Like I said, I do what I must, so does everyone else.”

“Only that’s not actually true is it, Trenton?” I swallowed another glass. “Not everyone does this to survive, some people do it because they actually like it. They enjoy it. They feed off it like a disease that spreads to the minds of others. They crave it like…well like wine.” I tapped the side of my glass. “I’d much rather crave this, than power.”

“Power can protect you. Alcohol will only kill you.”

I scoffed into my third glass. “It didn’t protect my dear aunt and uncle, did it?”

Trenton stiffened up.

“So, you’re wrong. That’s…” I sniffed. “That’s what's so fucked about it don’t you see? You all convince yourselves you’re going to be untouchable if you can justtt get your hands on that piece of land, that mount of gold, that…bride.” I thought about the sixteen-year-old girl who had been at the ceremony earlier and grimaced.

“But you’re not untouchable Trenton, nobody is,” I finished.

“Wielders killed your aunt and uncle,” Trenton replied.

I stopped pouring my wine. “What?”

“It was sorcery. That is how they died.”

I stared at the wall. My mind gifted me with flashbacks to the day I lost my leg. Not even the wine could stop those glimpses now, only dull them. But I remembered. I remembered the way the earth had moved, the way the branches had circled around my thigh and broken my bone and…

I swallowed a fourth glass.

“Shit,” is all I could say.

“We anticipate more attacks. We assume they are regrouping, in much larger numbers this time.”

“Well, we’re all fucked then.”

Trenton grabbed the glass out of my hand before I could drink a fifth.

“Is this your plan? Drink yourself into oblivion until the sorcerers are knocking down our doors, killing innocent men, women, and children?”

“It’s quite hard to have a plan of any kind, when you’ve only just told me about the sorcerers less than a minute ago.”

Trenton went to reply but I continued. “Buuut…I do like the sound of tha…particular plan.” My speech was beginning to slur.

“Your adamance at drowning in self-pity serves no purpose, and it most certainly does not garner the sympathy you expect," Trenton said with contempt.

“Ha,” I bit out a laugh, raising a brow. “Is that what you think it is? You think I want your sympathy?”

Their sympathy, their sorrow, their remorse. I wanted no part in it.

Trenton ground his jaw. “You could be the difference between us having armies that could win this war or armies that don’t stand a chance.”

“Trenton…we don’t stand a fucking chance anyway. We don’t stand the tiniest, teeniest flicker ova shance.” My speech continued to become more incoherent.

“I know what happened there but—"

“You know, yessss. But you were not there.” My teeth were gritted now. “Were you?”

I stood very close to him, slightly towering over him. “Why… would I spend… the final few months of my life… sweating… and, and listening to the sound of dying men’s screams? When I could be listening to… altogether different screams and sweating for an… altogether different reason, right here.” I pointed at my bed, “In the comfort of my own bed…with wine.”

“Does it work?” Trenton asked, looking at me with disapproval.

I grabbed the glass from his hands and took a sip from it.

“Does it matter?” I mumbled, after swallowing.

“I should think so?”

“No Trenton, it doesn’t work. But…” I tapped my eyelids. “It stops me from dreaming.” Then I tapped my thigh. “And this from hurting.” I sighed, looking behind his shoulder. “Which… is reason enough.”

“What a sorry figure you have become,” he said quietly.

“Would you look at that?" I threw him a false grin. "I garnered your sympathy after all. Feel free to feel sorry for me… as long as you never disturb me again.”

“Do you have no honour? No sense of duty? Of loyalty?” Trenton hissed.

“Not anymore,” I grumbled.

“Then did you ever have it in the first place?” Trenton sounded disappointed.

I stepped closer to Trenton again. He flinched. “I should think my lack of a limb would answer that question, wouldn’t you?” I didn’t hide my anger at his ridiculous question.

Trenton backed away. “Your Council seat remains yours, Lord Elias, should you change your mind.”

“I won’t. You can fuck off now.”

“My Lord,” he groaned and walked out.

As soon as he did, I roared and threw my glass at the wall. It smashed and sank to the ground in pieces. I rubbed both my hands over my face and stared at the shards.

Well, that had done it. I had tried my best to not think about that day, every waking second for the past five years. And there had been Trenton, who had become a walking, talking reminder of it just now.

Fucking prick.

I wouldn’t sleep tonight. There was no point in even trying. There was only one reasonable solution to this utter travesty of a day. A place where I could forget about everything for a short while.

I grabbed my coat and coins and headed to the Solar Inn.