Azelian wondered faintly how the city had been kept clean overnight before stepping on to the Demi Kind road. Fifty feet below was the Lower Kind city, a dirty place whose occupants rose before the sun and were working before the cock crowed. That road was plainly cobbled with the gentle sandstone and oak. The Demi Kind road was cobbled with pine and marble, a sensual pairing that evoked fanciful feelings of peace and prosperity.
He nodded slightly at his cousin, lord Nolan, who was showing a veiled woman the fine higher level of Ao's capital city. The Lady had ice blue eyes and dark blue lips. She was dressed in a fine blue silk dress. Nolan's maid, Fallen, followed close behind.
"Why do you separate yourselves from the ones down there? They seem like such nice people. I suspect they would be completely clean if those trash holes didn't empty over their heads." the Lady said. Her voice was familiar and seemed pained.
"Because they are simply not highborn. They do not belong here. They belong down there." Azelian said, moving between them. His voice was a soft baritone that showed his emotions sparingly. His hair was a dark silver, his eyes almost black. Compared to Nolan he was a snow cloud. Nolan's hair was dark dark brown, his eyes even darker. Nolan shot him a dirty look and shook his head.
"I still don't understand. Why wouldn't they belong here? They look like us, how are they not like us?" The Lady said. He couldn't see her face, though he still felt like he knew her.
Suddenly she bent over and her breath became labored. Her mouth, covered by a gloved hand, was pinched. Nolan held her shoulders until the fit had passed.
"I am truly sorry Azelian, but I'm afraid that we have to return to my estate. Could you drop by for dinner tomorrow?" Nolan said, as Fallen took the Lady by her hand and started leading her towards Nolan's estate.
"Of-course I can. I shall see you tomorrow cousin." Azelian said before returning to the Palace. He had overdone it by walking so far from his rooms. His Servant-Master would be angry with him.
Nolan winced as Asazin settled into his library's most comfortable chair. Her face was pained and sweat glistened in her long blue hair. Her veil lay on the ground besides her feet, a soft woven material that was heard of only in Ao. Once she was sitting firmly Fallen, his half-sister and maid, brought her a green syrup like potion.
"Who was that Nolan?" Asazin asked after drinking the potion.
"That was my cousin Azelian. He is the Prince." Nolan said. He watched as she untied the strings that kept her Flute in its case. She put it to her lips and then thought better of it. She put it back into its case and got out Kendal, her ivory harp. Her fingers started to pick out a solemn tune sung when someone died to protect a religious artifact or hallowed place.
*The dew does cover young child's face.
A wound opened upon her place.
Does splatter on Temple steps.
Virgin's Blood red, red, red.
Contorted figures step out of the mist.
To watch the passing of little Miss.
All falls silent breath is spent.
Quiet whisper heard by all.
'so much to do'.
Hushed chant echoes throughout the grove.
Freedom won with Virgin's Blood.
Souls lost through wars fought.
Peaceful nights
Moon light
Savaged thoughts of mother's Love.
The dew does cover not a smile for life, cut short but surely fun.*
Asazin ended the tune with a soft whispering breath, adding to the silence created by the tone of the harp. The harp returned to it's traveling case as Asazin moved to go to her rooms.
"Miss Asazin, I will be in your rooms shortly to change your bandages. They seem to have ripped in your earlier fit." Fallen said.
She wore yet another of her tiresome dresses. Made in a Cloth-Shop on the corner of Lower Main and Lower Oak below the noble estates, it was a dull gray color, much in keeping of the Lower City Denizen's beliefs, which was to make clothes so they could be kept clean in the dirt ridden streets. Her short red-brown hair was tied up with black cotton bands of seemingly frayed lengths. Her eyes were the same color as her half brother's, dark deep depth-less brown. Her rather plain face was unadorned by cover-up or blush and her small thin lips had no coloring.
Asazin barely made it known that she had heard before getting up and walking down a dark hallway.
This particular passageway was tiled in a mosaic of red shades. On the walls were large charcoal sketches of former De Vis Lords and Ladies. Her favorite was of a young couple, they couldn't be more than fifteen or sixteen at the most.
The Lady's curly hair was in a bun at the base of her neck. The Lord's hair hung free to his shoulders. On the lady's lap sat a young boy, his hair was in tight ringlets around his beaming face.
This sketch was of Lady De and Lord Vis, the boy their only child, Lord Gamin, who turned his parents' names into his family name. De and Vis died when Gamin was eight. He, having no other family, was Lord for fifty five years. He died a year after his eldest daughter, Emil, was anointed Lady at twenty five.
It was the traumatic life they had led, the only members surviving from a once huge and bustling culture, that had drawn her to them.
She stopped outside her silver Oak door and allowed a slight laugh directed at Azelian, he had thought himself so smart, explaining why Lower Kind did not belong to a rich, but overly ignorant foreign Noble.
She entered her room and set about readying her fiddle, Gerik, for traveling. She had a plan for later that night. Picking the dullest dress she had, a simple cotton singled dress of dusty green made for winter in the Aka forests, she sat down to wait for Fallen to show to change her bandages.
Fallen arrived shortly after and changed her bandages quickly. She had a child at home that had been left in the charge of her identical twin sister Kallen. The eight year old was named Vera, after Fallen's nurse when she was a child. They had grown much apart, Fallen and her sister, one had been raised as a servant, the other a degenerate prostitute.
"Good Fog fall, Lady Asazin. Be the best for you." Fallen said as she left for the night. She had put on a river stone bonnet so as to keep her hair from dirtying as she walked home on the Lower City's dirt roads.
Asazin put on her dress quickly and hurried down the vine trailing the back wall of the De Vis estates. She was on the ground in a few moments and over the gates before the sound of her muffled fall on the cobblestones even sounded halfway across the garden. She slid down the ivy on the side of the road and landed in a relatively clean spot in the center of the Lower City.
Working her way over multiple debris piles she got to the exact center of Lower Square. As the sun rose she lifted her fiddle to her shoulder and put the bow to the strings. She was halfway through the beginnings of a merry festival song as the first of Lower City's citizens wondered into the Square. Her voice, strong and true, filtered throughout the square, giving hope to the weary people of Lower City.
*Sun is rising orange and red.
Sleep is over out of your beds.
Come on children dance in the streets.
Happiness shows where feet are fleet.
Busy mothers, don't fret.
Children safe now and then.
Wild child green and brown.
Blue and red the little Crowned.
Heir of Forest and Heir of Gold.
Dance together ever now.
Happiness shows where the crops are Old.*
Children ran between the stalls and danced along to the fast pace of her fiddling. Weavers struck a happy little back drop and held it out for long. A rare smile flickered across Asazin's somber face. A child ran up and handed her a wilted rose.
" It's fresh from me mum's patch, Miss. 'Tis the best one I could find." The girl said, her tightly spun golden hair falling from her bonnet. She wore an ivory colored dress and was obviously from a well-in family at the outskirts of town where it was the cleanest, or she wouldn't be wearing such a delicate dress. Her eyes were deep green that matched her bonnet.
"It's the best rose I have ever seen. Thank you little one." Asazin said holding the rose to her bosom.
When she returned to Nolan's estates that evening he was fuming. His anger elevated when he saw she was dirty with Lower City dust and grime.
"What exactly were you thinking Asazin! You think it is okay for someone of your status to go and play street fiddler with the common folk?" he shouted. Vera looked up from where she was playing with tiny figurines. Her wavy hair, not as tightly curled as most Aoians' hair, was a light shade of auburn. Another hint that her father had been foreign were her gray eyes. She wore a gray velvet dress.
"In my country it is. In Aka common and noble live together. I saw nothing wrong spending some time with people, if not shown that you nobles care, will light their houses on fire while everyone is sleeping and watch the Lower City burn as they climb through the ladders and get arrested and killed for treason. Those are people down there. You act as if I went to wrestle in the blueberries with a bear." Asazin said when she came back out in a clean cotton dress the color of straw. Not that she hadn't wrestled a bear over blueberries once or twice.
"Untie Asin!" Vera said as one of her dolls rolled against her slippered foot.
"Vera! Darling! Where have you come from?" Asazin said picking the child up and hugging her.
"The Lower City Untie. Where else?"
"The tailor's perhaps. That is a very nice new dress you have there."
A commotion outside the main entrance drew their attention. A small boy with a bloodied head ran inside.
"Lord Nolan. There has been fighting in the streets. The King demands your sword. The maid Fallen has been captured under crimes of treason. The child Vera will be taken as inducement for confession. She will die on the morrow." the boy said. His hair was golden thread, his eyes green. He could have been the rose girl's brother.
Nolan's eyes widen and he looked at Asazin as if she knew what to do. She did.
"Vera, dear get your toys. We have a trip to go on. Come on, we're going to Untie Asin's home."
"Is mum coming?" Vera asked, a frown started on her fully shaped lips.
"She'll catch up with us. Don't you worry yourself love. Your mom will be fine. Nolan, I need a spelled room please." Vera gathered her toys and gave the bloodied boy a peck on the cheek before following the adults to the De Vis spell room.
The spelled room was made of plain granite, for granite was the only known material that could keep a permanent travel spell in working order. It was barely five feet across and little under ten feet lengthwise. In the center of the room was an area where the floor sloped down for about two feet. From underneath the room, you would seen only a faint impression that looked as if a giant had poked his thumb through wet sand.
Asazin took her flute, the best instrument for calling on spells, especially traveling spells, and blew a low long howl-like sound. A chant escaped from her pinched lips and the room flew about. Nolan, recognizing the beginnings of a travel spell, carted Asazin's and Vera's baggage into the room and left, closing the door behind him.
*Controlled winds take me here. Where the houses sit in the branches of great trees. Forest green with summer's life. Transport us gently here, below the great birch of tears*
Vera gasped as she looked about her. Towering above her a huge white birch. Called the birch of tears, legends say that when the first Empress of Aka cried for the lost of her only child below the third branch of the birch a magicked hill nymph told her the secrets of talking to the numerous Aurorain, sometimes called Aurora's children, so that she could fill the space left by her son's death.
An Aurorain, light gray in color, spiraled down from the third branch of the birch and floated just over Asazin's shoulder. A chirping sound chimed throughout the woods as Asazin's bond partner, Anderea, welcomed her enthusiastically.
:Who is this lovely child? She has not one of my people.:
:This is the niece of the king of Ao. Her name is Vera.:
:Asazin, I understand that you would not bring her here unless it was of great importance but why is she here?:
:I will tell you when we get to my rooms at the palace. Come she is tired.:
"Vera, follow me." Vera was busy dozing on the tree when Asazin called for her. They both looked up as a small purplish Aurorain floated from the fifth branch of the birch. It floated right above Vera's head before moving to her shoulder and staying there.
:Vera, my name is Freya I am your Aurorain. I have waited a long time for you dear.:
:Why have you waited a long time?:
:I am over six hundred years. It has been a difficult time for me youngling.:
:Freya. That is a pretty name. I think Untie Asin is getting impatient with us.:
:Come.: Freya thought back after a pause in which her presence faded.
"Vera, you need to stay close as we travel. There are many net traps here and the lifts are very difficult to find." Vera noticed for the first time that her aunt had piercing blue hair and eyes. Every thought about the past was cleared from her mind, it was as if she had been reborn. "My home might be a bit overwhelming. Vera, are you listening?"
Anderea fluttered and chirped about her head. A sound-light that seemed to be laughter twinkled between the two Aurorians. They had closed their conversation to their partners.
"Fine, Fine," Asazin nearly shrieked. "I'll make sure she receives schooling right away. We have to get there first."