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CHAPTER 44 - GuilT

“From dust we were made by the gods, and to that dust we return.Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, from now until the end of all ages. Amen.”Alec bowed his head in prayer, hoping that none of the few mourners

who had assembled for Aahron’s funeral noticed how much he was dg

-eting during the service. He desperately hoped that he was able to keep hisanxiety in check; that anyone who saw his nervousness would pass it off toeither his long life apart from formal religion or to his years of friendshipand camaraderie with the now deceased Baron.

Would that I could stay so lucky forever.

Life, it seemed, was playing yetanother cruel joke on him. With the death of the Baron, command of thegarrison had fallen to him.

Not,

he mused,

that I ever wanted it to come to me this way – if at all.

Happily, Sir Morris seemed to be recovering quickly,so he’d been able to delegate large portions of his own duties to that youngman. Even better, all of Aahron’s small council had made it to safety insidethe Keep, and he’d been able to leave the day-to-day duties of running thecastle to them. He was especially grateful for the presence of the merchant Joran Thule, who had stepped effortlessly into the position of castellianand assumed most of Aahron’s personal duties around the castle. Dutiesthat until now, he realized, he’d had no idea needed to be done.He turned his head sideways, away from the other mourners and towardAahron’s grieving wife and child. Aahron’s lady wife, Imelia, seemed to beholding up fairly well, at least in public, but their young daughter, Alyson, wasn’t doing so well, and it tugged at his heart. He’d always been close tothe little girl…And why should she be? First this war, then a siege of her home – andnow her father dead, murdered by his most trusted companion? Thank-fully, that part was not known to anyone but himself. If anyone had any

idea of the ght that had occurred two days ago in the tower stair well,

he would now be in the stockade. Or perhaps rotting down below in thecastle’s dungeon, waiting for the orcs outside to storm the castle to claim what was not theirs. Either way, he knew he had murdered his friend andliege lord in cold blood.Ever since the “incident,” as he now made himself think of it, he’dbecome increasingly worried that someone had seen him; that somehow,someone knew what had happened. Or, more accurately, someone woulddiscover what had happened to him out there on the plains and knowthat he had sold his soul to Grummish in exchange for a respite from thebeatings. More importantly, that as a result of those beatings, the personcharged with the safety of over three thousand human souls was a servantof their enemy, whether he liked it or not.Fear gnawed at him, eating away at the very core of his being withevery passing moment. He felt his muscles twitch uncontrollably at strangemoments. Whenever he walked down a corridor, he couldn’t help but feelas if every set of eyes was staring at him, boring holes into the back of hishead. Every noise made him jump. Gusts of wind made the hair stand up

- 223 -on the back of his neck, and people calling out his name earned the fullfury of his wrath.He saw Lady Imelia walk toward the lectern at the front of the smallchapel. She appeared composed, but he could see the redness in her cheeks,the bags under her eyes, and he could tell she had been crying instead of sleeping. That tore at his heart enough; when he looked at the little girlclinging desperately to her mother, he couldn’t maintain his composureanymore. He put his head between his hands and began sobbing himself.Imelia stepped up to the small lectern and wiped her face with a silkhandkerchief, swallowed as she cleared her throat before she started tospeak. “My friends,” she said slowly. “It is not right that we are gatheredhere to grieve. My Aahron would not have wanted this. Especially,” shepaused as she dabbed her eyes again. “Especially not now, while we areat war, with so much death and sadness all around us. No, he would haveus celebrate life. We are all alive and well, my friends. The forces of theorc lords outside our castle can not harm us here. We are yet free, free tocelebrate the life of my husband, and all the things he did for his people,free to celebrate all that which makes us human, and free to celebrate thelove we all share for each other, the same love my lord husband showed toall of our people.“We will grieve him, all of us in our own way; of that much I am sure. I would not ask you to do otherwise. The twelve gods know that I myself feelas if I am lost without him.“But know this, my friends. The priests tell us that a better life awaitsus – a life with the good gods for those who follow the path of light. MyAahron always strove to follow the good gods in all that he did. The factthat so many of you are here, even now in this time of sadness and despair,tells me he succeeded in this, and now dwells with the good gods. Of thatmuch I am sure.“So I ask you again: Do not grieve this day for my Aahron. Rather, I ask

that you leave this place and live your lives with the condence that thoselives, while eeting and short, have purpose. That those lives are not our

own, but that we belong to each other – every one us, both god and mortal – and that the twelve gods will judge us on how we live those lives. Nowplease, go, leave this place, and remember that my Aahron is still watchingover us from beyond this mortal realm, and remember that someday, we will all be reunited with him if we live life as the good gods would have us.”With that, she stepped away from the lectern and sidled back toward

her seat. Alec watched her as she sat down, and then her tears nally started to ow, no longer hindered by the need to maintain her composure.

Father Ullast sat beside her as he scooped little Alyson into his arms, whis-pering words of comfort to them both. He looked away from his charges for just a second, and Alec found himself staring directly into the cleric’s eyes. The holy man looked as if he wanted Alec to say something, but all thetired knight could do was bury his face in his palms and lose himself in hisgrief once more.It didn’t matter, he realized, that he wanted to say words of comfort tohis friend’s wife. It didn’t matter for all the gold in the world, or pious words

- 224 -or righteous actions. No, none of it mattered at all. No matter what anyonesaid or did, the facts were the same.He was a murderer.* * * The

funeral ceremony for Baron Mournfell lasted only a few moreminutes after Lady Imelia delivered her eulogy, and for that Alec wasgrateful. He tried to remain in the chapel after the service, to both see andbe seen, but found he could not do it. His conscience was attacking him in ways worse than any orc ever could.Muttering words of farewell to Imelia and the other guests, he bent down

to the ground, sweeping little Alyson into a hug. He clutched her ercely asher tears started to ow unbidden once again, and whispered soft words of

comfort in her ear.“Shhh, it will be alright, little one. It will be alright.”She stopped crying for a moment, nearly choking on her tears, andlooked up at his face. “No it won’t! Daddy’s dead, Uncle Alec! Dead! He’s notever gonna’ wake up!” She wiped her face with the sleeve of her dress andpulled back from him, squirming. “You were there when Daddy fell, UncleAlec! Why didn’t you help him? Why did you let him fall?”She looked at him with her bloodshot blue eyes as if she was unsure

whether she wanted to hug him again, or hit him with her sts in frus

-tration. She hung there in limbo for an eternally long moment before shesquirmed free and ran to her mother, clutching desperately at the older

woman. Alec looked away, his horried anxiety reaching new levels, and

he was relieved when the little girl’s governess came and took her away, thesounds of her sobs echoing down the hall.Imelia stood and watched as Tawnya escorted her daughter down thehall, and after they had passed out of earshot, she turned to face Alec,smoothing the wrinkles from her long dark mourning dress. Alec tried tothink of something to say, something comforting, but words failed him, andall that came out was a simple “How are you, milady?” He hoped the tremorin his voice wasn’t too obvious.She forced a smile. “Oh, as well as can be expected, Alec. But I supposea better question is: how are you? After all, with Aahron’s death, commandof the castle falls to you.”Alec felt himself blanch at her statement. “Surely not, milady! The castleby all rights is yours!”She shook her head. “No, I think not. I myself remain the simple peasantgirl I was born, and while I might remain here as a dowager baroness, thecastle and Aahron’s title will eventually go to Alyson. In the meantime, we

have a war to ght, no?”

That was Imelia; ever practical.

He could see why Aahron had beenattracted to a woman of her grace and intellect. He spoke softly, withmore modesty than he felt. “Milady, I am unworthy of such an honor. I liveonly to serve the kingdom, not seek titles or power for myself. Surely Sir