Excerpt: Broken Glass/Kingslayer

(Broken Glass)
I wake up, to my intense surprise; and am even more surprised by where I am.

I'm lying in a bed, first of all; a beautiful canopy bed with white blankets and a white canopy and white curtains made of a gauzy material. I can see into the room, thinly, through the gauze. The walls are white as well, and white curtains - thicker than the ones on the canopy, interestingly enough, are drawn back from a window to my left. On the opposite wall, down a ways to my right, is a door - painted white. I'm beginning to sense a theme to this room. The oak dresser across from me is not painted, however; it's beautifully finished. Atop it is a giant mirror, reflecting the bed and the wall behind me; also white. Out of curiosity, I pull up the fluffy white blanket to see if I can look at the carpet: it's white, and looks exquisitely soft to walk on.

I think I'd like to press my feet into it, see if it's as soft as it looks; but the slightest movement sends pains shooting up my right side. It's so intense I nearly burst into tears. I remember my accident with more clarity than I did a moment ago. I place a hand to my forehead; it's bandaged. My left arm is immobilized in white bandages and what looks like a splint runs along the forearm. I move my right hand to my side and feel thick bandages underneath the clothes I'm wearing. This awakes an interest in what I have been dressed in, and I lift up the quilt and sheet. I'm dressed in - what else - white: a white nightdress - long enough that if I were standing it might reach to the floor, past my feet.

Questions begin to bubble to the surface of my thoughts - questions like, 'Where am I?', 'How did I get here?', 'Who took off my clothes and put on new ones?' and 'Do my parents know what happened to me?' Questions that force me to sit up, in spite of the excruciating pain that follows, and swing my legs - with much fear and trembling - over the edge of the bed and attempt to stand.

My legs are very wobbly - more wobbly than I realize. I start to fall, but I manage to catch myself on the bed; realizing my mistake only after my left arm screams. I try to cushion it on the bed and bear my weight with my legs and good arm, but it only hurts more. "Help," I say, but it comes out weak and strangled. I'm in an odd position, half bent over and supported only by the mattress, and it hurts. I try to lower myself to the floor, but the pain intensifies. Tears sting my eyes and my head starts to ache. "Help," I cry, louder this time. "Help!"

The door opens, very slightly, and I can't see who is looking in. "Help me," I plead, catching myself on my knees. Everything is hurting now, and all I can think about is making the pain stop. I barely take in the person who enters. I hear no footsteps or squeak of the door, but suddenly gentle, strong hands are under my arms and helping me stand. In another moment, I'm lying on the bed again and hands are covering me with the blanket.

"You should not have tried to stand. Lay back." I obey, closing my eyes in relief as the pain subsides. The owner of the voice takes my good hand, opens it, and places a few pills in it. I can tell by the feel. "Swallow these. I have a glass of water here if you need it." Before he finishes speaking my hand is to my mouth and I'm trying to swallow the pills. My mouth is too dry, however, and I start gagging. I feel the cool touch of glass against my lips and I gulp down the water almost without thinking. "There, there you go. Do you need anything else?"

"Juice," I whisper. "Apple juice."

"Apple juice?" I can hear the smile. "Very well. I will get some for you. Anything else?"

I open my eyes, and blink until my blurry vision focuses on his face. It is an odd face; all angles and corners, casting shadows over his eyes and his mouth. His nose is very long, jutting out nearly six inches off his face. His eyes are a clear blue - crystalline, like the water in a swimming pool as the sunlight dances and refracts through the waves. Curly brown hair drops over his face, casting even more shadows. His entire face is like a birds-eye view on a cloudy day: you can see the shadows without being darkened by them, and the sunny places without being blinded.

His skin is horribly pale, though. He looks ill; or he would, in good light. In this room of pure white, he looks a ghastly shade of greenish pale. If it weren't for his complexion and the strange smile on his lips, I might trust him.

"My name is Darien," he says. "Yours?"

"Katherine," I say. It sounds more formal, and until I know more about this odd young man with the sick color and strange smile, I think I will prefer to keep things formal.

His smile tightens. I like it even less now. It looks forced. "Welcome to my house, Katherine," he says.

Maybe the pills are acting already, but it sounds like a threat.
~~~~~
(Kingslayer)

On this particular morning, I would gladly have given up [my name and title] if someone were to offer me a blanket and hot meal in exchange for them. I did not, however, mention this to my mother, though I did try to persuade her to return to the Frolicking Unicorn.

"I hear there are b-b-brigands on the road to Dover," I said. I rubbed my trembling arms and threw an anxious look over my shoulder. I think I overdid the anxious, but not the trembling. It was cold that morning.

But my mother would not be taken in that easily. After years of wandering with me, she knew my games well. "We are not returning to that pig barn, Alastríona Mórríghan, no matter how hard your teeth chatter; and if there were brigands on this road, and they were so lacking in basic civility that they would attack two helpless women without two pennies to rub together, they would hardly be likely to come out in this weather."

"Then why are we?" I muttered. It's a bad habit of mine, and the wind had died down just enough at that precise moment that my mother heard my words.

"Be quiet, you ungrateful child. If I had known you would be this much trouble, I would have left you with that insufferable cousin of your father's."

I know when I am defeated. "Well, where exactly are we going?"

"Your father has an uncle in Dover; the steward of the duke of Dover."

I had never heard of any such uncle, but I knew better than to say such a thing outright. "Will he accept us in, do you think?"

My mother maintains she has never done anything unladylike in her life; otherwise, I would have sworn I heard her snort. "I would think, Alastríona, for all your proclaimed cleverness you would know the answer to that. Family is always to be welcomed warmly, particularly during the holy days. If you don't drag your feet, we should be there before Michaelmas."

"All the same, it would seem to be the polite thing to do would be to write first."

My mother slapped me across the ear. "Write? Oh, saints above, why in heaven's name did you send me a daughter with addled shells for brains?"

"Forgive my question," I answered stiffly.

Time is a hard thing to keep track of under the best of circumstances; though I know it was still morning, I cannot precisely say when we first saw our fellow traveler. At first we thought he was a farmer; we had passed by any number of farms since leaving the Frolicking Unicorn, and he certainly was dressed like one. He walked slowly with his shoulders drawn forward and his hat pulled down tightly over his head. As we neared him, I decided it couldn't hurt to greet him. This morning, a stranger was far more likely to give me good conversation than my mother. "Hallo, wayfarer! What takes you to Dover?"

For a moment, I thought he hadn't heard me; that seemed unlikely, as we were quite near to each other at this point. Then he stopped, turned a little towards us, and said, "Could you tell me, please, what is the fastest road to London?"

It was at this point he became the most singularly unforgettable person I had met in a long, long time (not counting myself). There were a number of reasons for this. The first was, his voice betrayed him to be young - my age at most, even younger more likely. The second was, despite being young, he was nearly as tall as I was, which is unusual even in fully grown men. The third was, he knew nothing of this area; a large farming community that had held little attraction to any outsider of any kind for quite some time, probably since its very beginnings. The fourth was, despite his young age and ignorance of the area, he was traveling through it alone without any idea of where he was going.

And the last reason was, when he turned to look at us, I caught a glimpse of his eyes; which were blue, by the way, though that wasn't what captured my attention. He had the most piercing eyes I had ever seen on a person: they cut through flesh and bone straight to the soul, like a bolt of lightning to your very core. At the same time, I could see part of him too - and what I saw was a young man with a deep, festering wound to his heart; deeper than any I had ever seen. On the road you meet many strange people, but I had never seen anyone like him.

Some say I have a gift for seeing into people. I think it comes from experience, though I admit with practice and time it might become something more. My mother, however - God bless her - sees only the surface, though she wasn't any slower than I in noticing the odd bits in his situation. "London? What possible reason can a boy like you have for going to a place as far distant as London? Are your parents still living?"

"I don't know, ma'am; I've never known them."

That made me even more puzzled, but it had little effect on my mother. "Then who has been looking after you?"

"Family with the name of Renatus, ma'am, near Cornwall."

"Do they know where you are?"

"I doubt it, ma'am."

"Won't they be worried about you?"

"I doubt that even more, ma'am."

This at last stopped her; literally. This entire time we had continued to walk, but now she halted and studied the young man closely. "What's your name?" she said at last.

"Mordred, ma'am."

"Mordred? I don't believe I've ever heard that name before."

"No ma'am."

"Listen here," she said, suddenly exasperated. "Can't you say anything more than 'Yes ma'am' and 'No ma'am'?" He opened his mouth, then shut it again. He nodded shortly.

I thought she might unleash another frustrated cry to the saints about the endlessly trying situations she found herself in, so I interjected graciously, "It happens my mother and I are traveling to Dover, to stay with family there. Perhaps we could travel together that far, and my uncle might provide you with a method of continuing on to London?" Mordred considered this, then nodded. "Wonderful," I said before my mother could object, as I saw her prepare to do. "Let's continue then."

I knew we would not be returning to the Frolicking Unicorn that day; which was just as well. In truth, I had had enough of their pea porridge to last me a lifetime.