A Distant Tomorrow Read Free Page A

with the small bathhouse after telling her he was building a new cattle shed. He had imported the marble tub from the Coastal Kingdom, along with several carved stone benches. A small sob escaped her. Had she loved him? Oh, yes! With every bit of her human heart. Now she could feel that part of her hardening again as her faerie nature took over. To be strong, to follow her destiny, she knew she had to be faerie.
    Hearing a familiar clap of thunder—considerably softened, she noted—Lara looked up to see her mother, Ilona, the queen of the Forest Faeries. Ilona held out her arms to her daughter, and rising from her seat by the fire Lara rushed into them. “What has happened?” Ilona said to her daughter, and Lara told her. “Then it is time,” the queen replied.
    “I know,” Lara responded. “I have already begun making arrangements for Dillon and Anoush.”
    “I will take them!” Ilona said imperiously.
    “Nay, I want Liam and Noss to raise them. They are Fiacre, Mother. One day Dillon might be chosen lord of his people, like his father and grandfather before him.”
    “Or Liam and Noss’s lad might be chosen,” Ilona said softly.
    “If that is the will of the Fiacre then so be it,” Lara answered her mother. “But you must visit them. Promise me! Dillon has been exhibiting certain instincts that must not be stifled. Anoush is too young for me to know. Tell me, how are Thanos and Cirilo?” she asked after her mother’s consort, and her half brother.
    “Thanos is Thanos,” Ilona said dryly. “As for Cirilo I must admit he is everything I could want in a son, Lara. He will be a fine king one day. For now he is a typical faerie lad, getting into all kinds of mischief. He particularly enjoys teasing the Forest Lords. They have lost some of their territory on the border with the Midlands. Gaius Prospero is buying up the smaller farms and blending them into great ones. It allows him to control the price of the crops he grows. The rumor is growing again that he would be emperor of Hetar.”
    “I am going to the coast,” Lara told her mother. “I feel it is where I should be now. But it has been so long since the voice within spoke to me that I am not certain I am hearing it correctly. Could I be wrong, Mother? Should I remain with the Fiacre and my children? I am suddenly unsure.”
    “I am not surprised,” Ilona remarked. “It has been but hours since your husband was murdered before your eyes, since you slew his murderers. You are suffering shock, but your first thoughts are always the best ones, Lara. It is time for you to leave the Fiacre. If the voice says the coast, then that is where you must go. Do not be afraid, my daughter.”
    “When you said I had time,” Lara began, “I never thought it would end this way. I expected that when the knowledge came to me, Vartan would fuss at me and try to prevent my going, no matter he said he wouldn’t. I did not expect him to die. Am I responsible for that, Mother?”
    “Nay,” Ilona replied. “Vartan’s fate was his fate. His jealous younger brother was destined to slay him, for that was Adon’s fate. That you gave your heart to Vartan for a brief time, that you gave him children, had nothing to do with his end, Lara. You may believe that I speak the truth to you.
    “Now I must go. Your faerie family will be here for Vartan’s departure ceremony. What did you do with Adon and his wife?”
    “The ultimate shame for Outlanders. I had them buried in a secret and unmarked place,” Lara explained. “They will have no funeral pyre, or family and friends to sing their souls to the Celestial Actuary’s kingdom. They will lie beneath the earth until the flesh rots from them, is eaten by maggots and beetles, and finally their bones dissolve into the earth itself. Their souls will wander in the Limbo forever. Even Bera dare not mourn them publically. I am just sorry they have left a child.”
    Ilona put a hand on her daughter’s hand. “For whatever