The Crystal Chalice (Book 1) (52 page)

 He swung round to face
her, genuinely startled. “I have not lied to you.”

 “Perhaps not directly,
but you conceal from me much about yourself. For instance, why did you not tell
me the truth about what really happened at the Serpent’s Throat? You told me
that you fell in, that the remnant of the bridge that you had been standing on
had given way and you had no choice but to follow me into the Harnor, but that
was not true, was it? “

 He stared back at her,
saying nothing.

 “All these months,” she
continued, “you let me believe that you followed me because you had no choice -
but you did have a choice. The bridge did not collapse. Instead, you made the
deliberate decision to leap in after me.”

 His eyes narrowed. “How
did you know that?”

 But she did not answer
his question, instead she posed one of her own. “Why did you do that? The drop
into the Harnor is truly terrifying. There was a very strong chance that you
would have been killed. So why did you do it?”

 “I.....I saw you
surface in the Harnor after your fall and I knew that the current would sweep
you to the northern side of the river, to the Forsaken Lands. I couldn’t leave
you to face that alone. The only way to protect you was to.....to do what I
did.”

 “You could have been
killed.”

  He turned back to the
window and said very quietly: “Better that, than living without you.”

 He felt her hand touch
his sound shoulder. It felt cool and smooth against his skin.

 “Tell me, Celedorn.”

 “Must I say it?” he
asked in an agonised voice. “Could you not have guessed? I swore to myself I
would never tell you. Must I say it?”

 “You must.”

 He turned to her, his
eyes dark and haunted. “I love you, Elorin. I have always loved you. Ever since
that day at Ravenshold when you had a little too much wine and dared to say
things to me that no one else had ever dared to say.” A slight smile of
recollection briefly softened his face before fading again. “I didn’t want to
love you. I knew from the beginning that you could never feel the same. I knew
that it could never be, but I couldn’t help myself. The more I fought it, the
stronger the feeling grew, until for the first time in my life I surrendered.”

 She reached up and
gently touched his cheek with her hand, tenderly tracing the line of cheekbone
and chin. The expression in her eyes was so gentle and loving that his heart
almost stopped.

 The longing she evoked
in him was so intense, that he felt he could hardly bear it. In a voice that
broke with emotion, he said: “When you look at me like that, all my wildest
dreams start to seem possible.”

 She moved still closer
to him, knowing that the moment had finally arrived. “When I look at you like
that, what I’m trying to tell you is that I love you.”

 She heard his sharp
intake of breath. He was staring at her as if he could hardly believe what he
was hearing.

 “But.....but the
Prince?”

 “It was never the
Prince. It was always you,” she told him, unwittingly repeating the words she
had spoken in his dream. “When Relisar made me appear in the stone circle at
Addania, I was lost and frightened. I had no past, no name, no friends. The
Prince was kind to me, gentle and thoughtful. He is also brave, handsome and
noble - a combination very hard to resist. What I felt for him was a kind of
hero-worship which I mistook for love. Now I realise that I care for him just
as he cares for me - as a friend. You see, I have only ever loved one man, and
he isn’t a Prince but a stubborn mountain brigand.”

 “Elorin....” he started
to say but could get no further and caught her into his arms, holding her so
tightly that she could hardly breathe.

 “Your shoulder!” she
protested.

 “Damn my shoulder,” was
the dismissive response and he buried his face against her chestnut hair. “My
beautiful Elorin,” he whispered. “I never thought you would ever say those
words to me.”

 He leaned back from
her, his grey eyes ardently scanning hers, and encouraged by what he saw, he
took her face between his hands and kissed her with such passion that it made
the kiss in the tavern seem tame in comparison.

 When at last he drew
back, he said: “When did you know?”

 “That day in the
Kingdom of Adamant, in the stables, when you held me to comfort me the first
glimmerings of enlightenment began to dawn.”

 He groaned. “If only
I’d known. I nearly told you the truth that day.”

 “I’m not sure how I
would have reacted then. How could I have been so blind? I had to nearly lose
you before my eyes were opened, but looking back it explains a lot of things.
The day after I was rejected by the Prince, all I could think of was you, of
how I had hurt you and must ask your forgiveness. That should have told me
something, but instead, I had to wait until it was almost too late before I
realised the truth.” Her voice sunk. “If anything had happened to you, I
couldn’t have gone on. I couldn’t.”

 He tightened his arms
around her and began to kiss her again. He felt one of her hands travel down
the skin of his back, while the fingers of the other ran gently into his hair.
He unmistakably sensed desire in her response, a need for him that grew like
power between them. He sat down on the bed and drew her down beside him. Gently
pushing her back, he began to press lingering kisses against the smooth skin of
her neck. At the same time, he slowly started to unbutton her shirt. Her chin
tilted backwards and she made a soft little sound of pleasure. Tenderly, his
lips began to follow the path opened by his fingers.

 Then suddenly he
stopped, and abruptly sat up.

 She opened her eyes.
“What’s the matter?”

 He bowed his head in
his hands. “All my life I have taken what I wanted, often by force, without
thought for the consequences, without thought as to whether it was right or
wrong. I have destroyed everything I have ever touched, ruined and tarnished it
- but not this time. Not with you. If things were different, if I were not who
I am and had not done the things that I have done, I would be on my knees
before you, begging you to marry me, but....but it cannot be. What sort of love
would I show you if I dragged you down into the mire with me? How could I ever
ask you to become the wife of a brigand, a criminal, hunted in two countries? I
would ruin your life, bringing you only unhappiness and shame. It would end by
you having to watch me hang from a gallows - for that is how it will end, do
not mistake the matter. I cannot give you a home, or a decent life, or a future
worth having. I can give you nothing but pain.”

 She sat up and gently
laid her hand on his dark hair. “Celedorn, you can give me the only thing in
life I really want - and that is your love.”

 He shook his head, but
said softly and somehow finally: “Bless you for saying that. I will remember it
always.”

 “I don’t care about
what you have done. The person you describe is not the man I know. I love you
and I know you and that is all that matters.”

 He stood up and began
to pace the room. “You don’t know me, Elorin. I have told you that many times
and I don’t think you believed me. You don’t know some of the things I have
done. You don’t really know who I am.” He stopped pacing and halted abruptly
before her, his face pale but set. “You don’t even know my real name.”

 She stared at him. “But
I do,” she contradicted. “It is Berendore.”

 “
What!”
he
gasped. “How did you know that?”

 “I have it on very good
authority.”

 “Who told you?” he
demanded.

 “You did.”

 He looked
thunderstruck. “
Me
?”

 “Yes, when you were in
the grip of the fever, you became delirious and began to talk. That is how I
learnt your real name. That is how I know about the Serpent’s Throat.”

 “What else did I say?”
he asked suspiciously.

 “Nothing coherent.
There was a lot about Ravenshold and the Turog but it was so mixed up that I
couldn’t make any sense of it.”

 A silence fell between
them, and she knew he was thinking deeply about what she had discovered.

 After a moment she
said: “I think it is time to stop concealing your past. The Prince once said to
me that there was nothing I could do that you would not forgive.”

 “He said that?” asked
Celedorn, touched by the Prince’s perception

 “Yes, but more
importantly, the reverse is also true. Nothing you have ever done, or ever
could do, would make me stop loving you. You must not be afraid to tell me the
truth.”

 He relapsed into
thought again for a moment, before giving a soft sigh. She knew by the sound
that he had come to a difficult decision.

 “Perhaps you are
right,” he conceded. “I have not deliberately lied to you, but there is much
about myself that I have concealed. Perhaps it is time to face my past. Perhaps
it is time to do away with all pretence, and confront the truth. But if I tell
my story, I feel I owe it to the others to tell them as well. Over these last
few days, I have come to realise what good friends I have - something I have
never possessed before in my life. I also know that unless I am honest with
them, then I do not deserve their friendship.” He picked up his shirt and began
to put it on. “It is time to face what I have avoided for so very long.”

 They found the others
in the large room set aside for their use by the brothers. It was another
pleasant room, with white walls and windows open to the gardens. Seated in the
sunlight by the window were Andarion and Triana, engaged in playing chess. From
the number of Andarion’s pieces sitting by Triana’s elbow, it appeared the he
was being comprehensively routed. Relisar was surrounded by piles of books and
manuscripts that he had shamelessly purloined from Master Galendar’s library.
They all looked up when the door opened and everyone exclaimed to see Celedorn
up and about again, but they soon sensed something important in the atmosphere
and conversation began to falter. Elorin seated herself by the table and rather
unnecessarily, given the look on Celedorn’s face, informed them that he had
something important to tell them. A hush fell on the room, the air was suddenly
a little tense, and every face turned expectantly to Celedorn.

 Looking somewhat pale
and worn, he sat down opposite them, but he seemed, once the point had actually
arrived, to be at a loss to know how to begin.

 Relisar, observing his
troubled expression, leaned forward kindly and said: “I know this is very
difficult for you, Celedorn, but perhaps you should begin by telling Andarion
and Triana who you really are.”

 Celedorn, who had been
studying his hands clasped between his knees, straightened up abruptly and
stared at him in astonishment. “You know?”

 “Yes, I have known for
a long time that you are Berendore.”

 “How?”

 “The day before we
reached Kerrian-tohr, you were sitting on the beach cleaning your sword and I
asked to see it.”

 “I remember.”

 “You told me your
father had given you that sword, and it was that which revealed your true
identity to me.” He paused. “You see, I was the one who gave that sword to your
father in the first place. He was a very dear friend of mine, in fact, I valued
him so highly that I gave to him one of the very few remaining swords of the
Old Kingdom. It was unmistakable - the three chalice flowers engraved on the
blade are unique. You and I have met before, you know, long before Sirkris. You
will not remember, but I held you in my arms when you were only a few months
old, and already your father’s pride and joy. Then the scales fell from my eyes,
and  I suddenly realised what it was about you that intrigued me so much -
it was the resemblance to your father. You are like him, you know, as dark as
he was, but with your mother’s grey eyes.”

 The Prince interrupted
at this point. “Would someone please tell me what is going on? Who is
Berendore?”

 It was Relisar who
answered. “Berendore is the only son of Calordin, last Lord of Westrin and his
wife, the Princess Ressinia. Celedorn and Berendore are one and the same, and
he is thus the rightful lord of Ravenshold and of all the Westrin Mountains.”

 All faces round the
table went blank with shock.

 “But.....but the last
Lord of Westrin and all his family were killed by the Turog twenty years ago,”
objected the Prince.

 Celedorn looked him in
the eyes, and Andarion read such desolation there that he almost recoiled.

 “I did not die that
day, but there have been many times since then that I wish I had.”

 The Prince made to
speak but Relisar silently held up his hand to check him. They waited patiently
as Celedorn arose and crossed to the open window.

 “Twenty years ago,” he
began, “my father had to travel to Addania on his yearly journey to take the
oath of loyalty to the King. Normally he went alone, but a victory had recently
been won over the Turog and they were thought to have retired across the
Harnor. So that year, by way of celebration, his family was to travel with him
- my mother, younger sister and myself.