Chapter 15: The First Eleven

The last tree in the orchard had been picked clean by mid-week, and it was time to take the harvest to the market. Some of it was kept by the family and turned into preserves that Mara and her youngest son stayed behind to work on. Another share was given to a family friend who sold the bushels in the village at his little shop. The rest were loaded onto a trio of carts to be taken the three days up north to the kingdom's royal marketplace. It was an annual trip Mr. Greely, and his boys took twice a year, once after the fall harvest and once after the spring. What they earned there each year was enough to support the family and occasionally a little extra to save.

Everyone was all smiles as that year's bounty was one of the best in memory and with Roy's help, they were able to pick it all with practically no spoilage. With all loads ready before the morning mist had lifted, they ate a large meal to amply fill their bellies as they were limited in what they could carry on the trip for food.

"How far is the marketplace?" Roy asked Zohn.

"Oh, about twenty or so miles I gather," Zohn answered as he checked the bindings on the pair of Ornoxes that were to pull his cart.

"It's going to take us three days to go twenty miles?" Roy pondered out loud as he found it hard to fathom moving so slow, even on foot.

"The beast can't move any better, but do not worry. We got the picking done before they fully ripened. They will be at perfection as we reach market. All is well." Zohn then went to check the Ornoxe's bindings on the other two carts.

An Ornox was a beast of burden that was about the size of a Hippo, with a turtle-like head and segments of shell around its body. To Roy, it looked like a kind of dinosaur. They were tame beasts with large appetites, often walking to the side of the road to grab grass or a root from a tree. Zohn drove the first cart, following in the second cart was Mican, his oldest son and taking up the rear was Orie, the next son, and Roy.

Roy had become quite fluent in their language and over the previous few days developed a rather chatty relationship with Orie, who was very curious about where Roy had come from and what he had seen on his journeys. Hoping to venture out on his own someday Roy's stories of other places and other people ignited Orie's imagination and excitement. Roy felt bad that the things he was telling were half-truths and fictional tales, but it did give him a chance to practice the language and keep their trust.

"Tell me about some of the oddest animals you have ever seen."

Roy thought for a moment. "Well, there's the Tasmanian Devil. It's a little creature kind of like your Lizards. When they get scared or angry, they jump up on their hind legs, extend two large flaps from their neck to make it look bigger and then run after you with its mouth open acting like it wants to eat you."

"Wow. What else?"

"The oddest is the Cuttlefish. It can change its shape and size at will. Even change the colors on its skin to make it flicker like candlelight."

"You're making that up." Orie scoffed.

"How could I make something like that up?" Roy said "Now I have a question for you. One of the reasons I'm on this journey is to rediscover our world's history." Roy was cooking up a lie that he hoped would make Orie explain to him who his people were, why they were so human and how some of the crystal stuff worked. He figured that a basic history lesson might answer a lot of those questions. "A few generations ago a great fire destroyed our library and killed many of our elders. A few stories survived, but we don't know truth from fable anymore. Could you tell me some of your people's history?"

"Okay, like what."

"Well, how about how your kingdom came to be?" Roy asked trying to come up with some starting point.

"You don't know the story of the First Eleven?" Orie asked somewhat surprised. "You are from a land of lost souls." Suppressing his laughter, he told the tale as it was told to him when he was a little child. "1500 years ago our ancestors all lived in a village in a place called the Highlands. One day the Serpent People came down from the sky and with an unstoppable power herded all the people of the village into great ships like livestock."

"Serpent People?" Roy asked wanting to make sure he heard right.

"Aye, Serpent People" Orie said. Then held his hands up over his head to show height and made a face like a monster. "Twelve feet tall heads like a serpent, fangs and forked tongues." He laughed a bit at his own description then continued. "It's said that the Serpent People ate some of the people, but the rest were brought here and forced to work in the mines digging out the crystal that the serpents used to fly their flying boats and make their weapons throw lightning. At first, the people wanted to fight back, but could not because the serpent's lightning weapons could burn a person to ash with one strike. Then The Great Bry, who would later become our first King, discovered that he had the power to control the crystals, make them do things that no one else could, not even the Serpent People. But he was wise. He did not dare attack them alone. Secretly he went to each person and gave them a test with the Warrior's Stone that he had smuggled out of the mines."

"Warrior's Stone?"

"Aye, a Warrior's Stone, a stone of great power that only a warrior can use. After weeks he found ten others who shared the same power he had. During rest periods they secretly met and quietly developed their skills with the stones. Then on the day when the serpent's largest ship was full of crystal ore and ready to leave the eleven stood together, side by side and by using the combined power of the crystals they created lightning from the ground and from the clouds. They destroyed the ship and all of the Serpent People."

"Now who's making things up?" Roy said believing he was being teased.

"It's true." Orie insisted. "They knew the Serpent People would be back and with more than just one ship. Hoping to find other humans to join forces with, the eleven warriors each took a group of their people and headed off in different directions. They knew they were on a different world than the one they came from because their world only had one sun and believed that the monsters must have brought more than just their village to be slaves. Yet after years of searching, they found no other humans or Serpent People. But they did discover that different stones could do different things such as make water clean things and heat our homes. The children of the kings discovered that they could do even more like heal the sick, see the future and control lightning from both the stones and in the sky.

One day, The Great Bry's daughter, who was a future seer, saw a vision of the serpents coming back and the kings destroying them by holding onto crystals that grew out of the ground. King Bry sent word for each king to search for the large crystal deposits that would allow them to defend their people when the monsters decided to come back. They built each of the eleven kingdoms around those crystals that they called the Land Stones. Then, as it had been foretold, about ten years later the serpents did return with a ship nearly as large as the moon. They say the people could see it coming for them as it passed the fourth moon. The eleven warriors who by then had become the eleven Kings each gathered at their Land Stones and at great risk to themselves united the power. Great bolts shot out of the seas and the mountains destroying the Serpent's sky vessels, as well as the fourth moon, but there was a price to pay for using the power of God to smite their enemies. Nine of the eleven Kings fell over dead, and the other two became very weak, not living too long after. After that day the royal families vowed to care for their people and would be ready if the serpents ever dared to return."

The story seemed to confirm some of Roy's suspicions. Since the human race started exploring outer space, all of intelligent life forms they had met had always been extremely different than humans. They had never encountered a human-like race and the odds of finding one whose culture was so similar to theirs seemed to be astronomical. Having come from a village on earth 1500 years ago to be used as slave labor was not really that farfetched. Archaeologists had found ruins on Mars and a couple other planets that indicated that humans had been captured and used as slaves by alien races as far back as 3000 BC. Yet it was the first time he had ever heard of anyone overpowering their captors and building a new civilization. It also explained a little about the woman who rescued him and how she was able to help him recover so quickly.

The fact that they were aware of aliens and that they were descended from people from another world would make it easier to explain the truth to them when the time was right. Yet he still didn't know enough about their politics, judicial structure or even superstitions to reveal anything. There could still be an underlying fear of aliens that could get him imprisoned by their government or killed by a mob, so he continued with the deception, answering Orie's questions about the places he had been and the things that he had seen.

That first night they had traveled about a third of the way to the market and had found a clearing on the side of the road to camp for the night. It wasn't like the campouts of Roy's youth. They didn't sit around the campfire telling stories or making s'mores. Instead, they dug a shallow hole in the ground and put in it three rocks pushed together. After a few minutes, the rocks started to give off a soft glow and some heat. They then each took out some strips of dried meat and opened a jar of last year's preserves. Each man had brought enough to have one jar each day. That would be their only food until they reached the market, aside from the occasional nuts and fruit that they could pick alongside the road, so they ate slowly and diligently, making sure to take in every bit. As soon as they finished eating, they each put wool like blankets on the ground and had another for a covering. Each of the Greely's laid down and quickly went to sleep, as they had planned to rise in a few hours when the largest moon came up, that would give them enough light to travel by. However, Roy didn't find it as easy to fall asleep, for there was too much to see in the night sky. He just laid there looking up. Prior to their trip, Roy had spent all of his nights either in the barn or in the little cottage where the woman had saved him. The sky seemed to be as full of life as the planet was. Because the planet's own moons had not risen as of yet, everything else in the solar system was very visible. There was a large ringed planet that was so big in the sky you could just make out its moons and a couple of gas-giant planets that were close enough to look like beach balls. Yet the real show was the glowing pieces of the moon that had been destroyed a century and a half ago when defending the planet from the Serpent People. Large and small chunks still orbited the planet making a kind of ring. It appeared to be made up of more energy crystals then rock. Flashes of blue and purple lightning would jump from one to the other and back again at random like lightning in a thunderstorm. It was a clear night, and Roy watched the show for a long time, partly out of fascination and partly from frustration. It had been one of those energy bolts that had disabled his ship and trapped him on this planet.

~~~

The morning was rainy as it commonly was in late spring, but on special occasions, the rain would not do. After the morning meal, King Wholdorn went to the Land Stone that the Great Hall was built around and placed his hands on it. With a bit of concentration, the rain stopped and the clouds cleared. When that happened the people knew that the King would soon speak, so many gathered in the courtyard between the castle and the marketplace.

Katreena picked at the buttons on her dress as she waited in the King's study with her aunt the Queen, the King and Queen of New Wall and their nephew Aradorn, the Duke of their land. Being a formal occasion, everyone was dressed in elegant attire, and the ministers of each royal family were making sure that each detail was proper and true to tradition. The King entered and first went to Katreena.

"Are you ready?" he asked in a gentle voice.

"I am Uncle," she replied putting on her best smile despite the knot in her stomach.

The King then went to his wife and extended his hand at chest height. The Queen put her hand on his, and they crossed to the middle of the room facing the door to the balcony. This signaled the staff to open the two doors. The King and Queen walked to the front of the balcony to the cheers of the mass of people in the courtyard. Katreena followed and stood to their right, and the other royal family stepped out and stood to the Kings left. She wasn't nervous. Ceremonies were a part of her life and could often be comforting in their predictability. But this time was different. Her father's absence was like a great void that everyone could feel. It was also the first time she had hidden a truth from anyone. She felt a sickening sense of shame, guilt, and sadness. The only thing keeping her from making an excuse to leave the ceremony and sequestering herself in her room was the fear of disappointing the spirit of her father.

"Good People of Bryerstone. I have wonderful news." The King announced. "Our beloved Princess Katreena has chosen to marry. Her groom is Duke Aradorn of the New Wall Kingdom, a man who has proven his worth with his own people and who is ready to take his place as your future King."

The people cheered because only a King could use the Land Stone to protect them, control the rain to guaranty a bountiful harvest, protect them from great evils and maintain their way of life. Having a prince ready to take the place of the King, for when the unfortunate time should come, was a good thing; but their true hope was that the marriage would bring children that would keep the royal family line going for generations to come. Both royal families stood on the balcony smiling and waving for a few minutes as the people cheered and chanted "Long Live the Kings! Long Live the Kings!" Then, on the cue of their ministers, the Royals turned and went back into the study.

Katreena smiled at the Duke, and he smiled back in the sweet way he had. She found herself growing quite fond of him and could envision a pleasant future with him. With a thought, she started to cross to him, for she wanted to ask him if he would like to take a ride out to the Sateen Lake later that day. Her hope was that spending more time with him would help grow affection between them, yet before she could, one of his aides ran up to him and handed him a note. After reading it, he took it to King Rysom. It was clear from their faces that there was something wrong. As soon as the King read it, he and his party turned and quickly left the room. Aradorn then turned to King Wholdorn and said. "My apologies Your Highness, but there is an urgent matter at home that we must attend to."

"What is it, my boy?" The King asked.

"It's unclear Your Highness," Aradorn answered. "Some citizens claimed to have seen a monster and that there are some animals missing. It's probably nothing, but our duties require us to be there until the matter is resolved."

"Of course." The King replied understanding the responsibility to his people.

"With your permission Your Highness, I would like to have Chief Minister Barker, and his staff, stay here to help see the details of the wedding. I expect I shall return in time to keep the occasion of the wedding prior to the Sky Festival." The Duke then turned to Katreena and kissed her hand. "I will see you again soon," he said slowly as to give it importance and then turned quickly to leave the room.

The King then stepped up to Katreena. He could see conflict on her face. Assuming it was just the anxiety of taking a new husband; he stood tall and in a fatherly tone said, "A man who is so quick to put his people's concerns before his own needs will definitely make a good king, and a good husband. Would you not say?"

The comment caught her off guard. She quickly changed her expression to a proper smile and said, "My thoughts exactly."

Katreena wanted to hug her uncle as her father would have done to her, but he was not her father. He did not let himself, or others, show such familiarity in any public arena. Even in private he was completely reserved and kept his actions and comments measured. Yet in his own way, his words demonstrated a deep affection for his niece. She knew that. Out of respect and appreciation, she gave the proper nod and bowed to him before making her exit.

As she walked to her room, she thought of Aradorn and tried to imagine what their future would be like, but her fantasies were overtaken by worries. Her mind raced with questions, concerns, doubts, and fears. As she entered her room, she crossed to her dressing table and sat at it, looking at herself in the mirror. The image reminded her that she was not as young as she was at her first wedding. Her eyes looked as tired as she felt. She wondered if she was masking her emotions as well as she had been trying. Her mind continued to pose questions she had no answers to. What if Aradorn was just acting the way he was expected to act? What if he was not as good of a man as they believed him to be? If he discovered that her child was not his, what would he do? What if they were not able to have any more children? What kind of baby was she having from a father of another world? She looked down at her belly as her thoughts became more of Roy. What if her soul was connected to Roy forever? Where was he? Had he continued to heal? Did he find a way to get back to his home in the stars? Would he ever come back? Could he feel the connection between them the way she did? Did he feel for her the way she did for him? With each passing day, her thoughts were of him more and more. Not just because she was carrying his child, but because there was something about the connection between them that made her feel a longing to be near him. It was as if a part of her was missing and she was incomplete without being with him. She wasn't sure how to describe it as she tried to rationalize it to herself. It wasn't like a childhood crush or fascination, nor was it like falling in love. She had something of Roy's spirit within her. It wasn't just the sharing of memories and knowledge. It was more like sharing a lifetime with someone and understanding that person better than they understood themselves. The bond had created a type of intimacy that took lovers a lifetime to achieve and was like nothing she had ever known before. As she moved to sit at the foot of her bed, the rain started up again outside her window. The sound washed away the rest of the world. As she closed her eyes, she tried to remember the serenity that she had when at the cottage. For a moment she could, but she couldn't help but think of Roy as well. Then she remembered the coin. As she thought about it and about what Roy said about his father giving it to him, she felt something more. She felt the love that he had for his father and how much he missed him. Much in the same way she missed her own father. The Boto stone may have created a bond between them, but it couldn't create a common history of emotions. In many ways, they were very similar people long before they had ever met. Opening her eyes, she stood and pulled out the bag that she used when traveling. In it, she found the coin and held it in her hands. "Well Roy, I guess it will be passed on to your first born after all," she said to herself. Then she pulled out a loose stone from the wall where she would hide things when she was a girl. Putting the coin there she planned to save it for their child and give it to him or her when the truth about the father would no longer pose a danger to anyone.