Read an Excerpt
HOUSE OF MARLO
By ROY CAMBLIN
iUniverse, Inc.
Copyright © 2012 Roy Camblin
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4759-5113-4
Chapter One
"My lady, an urgent letter just arrived for Lord Marlo." Eve took the letter from the attendant. The seal was unbroken and bore the Marlo family crest.
"Please have him meet me in the Great Hall," she said.
Aaron Marlo entered the Hall, the doors closed behind him with a loud thud. Eve left the group of men standing by the fire and walked to the middle of the room and handed him the letter. He examined it briefly and broke the seal, read it once, and then read it again. His expression was chiselled in pain. His hands trembled.
"How and when did this arrive?" Aaron asked.
"An old man brought it to the Labeil Grotto two days ago," Eve said.
"He has urgent information he'll only share with you. He's being brought here now through the Dark Way. He asked the letter be sent ahead."
He handed it back to Eve. She walked to the fire to read it; Aaron followed.
My brother,
By the time you get this I'll be dead. Ten days ago Timora was attacked without warning. I'd made the evening rounds and found nothing amiss. But upon returning home, I found the entire household murdered in their beds. Similar scenes were discovered throughout the city. Each night the killings continue. The enemy is silent and deadly in their craft. Six days ago, what was left of the council voted to give up the city and flee east. We hoped the assassins would not follow; but we're still hounded. Every messenger I've sent to get word out has been found among the dead—no one has escaped. I hold no hope for rescue, but my man Jamson has a plan. If he reaches you, please avenge my wife and children.
In haste, Jacob
Eve motioned the letter toward her advisors. Aaron nodded. They took the letter and pressed together by the fire to read it.
"Who's responsible?" Eve asked.
"I don't know yet," Aaron said. "These are strange times; every allegiance will be tested. The East is rising; this is just the beginning."
Chapter Two
Eighteen years ago Aaron and Eve's story can only be told within the context of their times. The Great Alliance, which had kept a measured peace for more than two millennia, was dying—an era was coming to an end.
Their marriage was the union of two great houses. His was the House of Marlo—countless generations that controlled the commerce and financial houses ringing the Inland Sea. Hers was the House of Langdon—keepers of The Great Library on the Labeil River and guardians of the religious halls high in the Aubrac Mountains. Their wedding had an outward air of harvest, a late summer festival of warmth and gaiety. They spent the weeks that followed in the fields with their people harvesting the grapes, their bodies turning brown in the late summer sun. The wine from the first crush was given to them as a wedding gift from their people, to be put away and enjoyed in all the long years to follow, mellowing with age. A time of promise and plenty had its beginning.
But as that first summer passed, and the autumn winds stripped the trees bare, their relationship began to turn, as dramatically as the weather. A melancholy settled upon Eve, a malaise that chafed at Aaron's affections. Something deep within her rejected the demands this man's love placed upon her. The joy and vitality of their first months together began to fade. Tensions grew, and eventually they parted.
The oak casks containing the wedding cru were painful reminders of a love not returned in kind. Aaron had them taken away to a remote cellar, and was soon drawn away by the far-flung affairs of commerce and of state. The wine lay forgotten for fifteen years.
There were a few rare moments between their long separations, when they came back together—Aaron venturing into the mists surrounding her legend. These were times when this warrior Priestess from the mountain passes would let her guard down and take him into the warm folds of her affections, allowing his hard body to press against her flesh and root himself deep within her inner soil. This produced two beautiful, headstrong children, the product—or perhaps the purpose—of her flightful passion. But those moments always dissolved into tragic myth, a desperate attraction followed by Eve's violent rejection of Aaron's affection, and another long period of her indifference.
When his father died, by right of birth, Aaron Marlow became Chancellor of the Great Alliance. His was a world of hard currency and brute force, where everything had a price and men were bought and sold—or simply broken. But Aaron was a breed apart, a man with an uncommon sense of duty who went to the aid of those in need, often against the prevailing political tides, at great personal risk. A man of vision, a consummate statesman, he touched the lives of many. As a man of war he was a gifted strategist, fierce on the battlefield, a national hero who would abandon other pursuits to arrive in the hour of greatest need and turn the dark tides of despair.
Eve Langdon, by right of birth, became High Priestess of the Temple of Light, the oldest of seven which held sway over all the others. Her word was law in all matters regarding preservation of the vast stores of knowledge held in the Great Library, and the safety and freedoms of those houses of worship. Trained in the arts of war from the time she could first ride a horse, she governed fairly and was more adept with blade or bow or garrote than most men at arms. In a politic world that thrived on deception and murder, she survived through mastery. Hers was also a mystical world of seduction and enchantment where piety and knowledge were the currency, though gold also had its uses.
Both their worlds were wrapped in the same intrigue, where the point of a dagger or poison furthered many agendas while ending others.
Three years ago
On a warm summer's day, Eve was out riding and strayed into the old abandoned compound she and Aaron once shared. She tethered the horse to explore, and found a cellar door ajar. She went deep within and came upon the wine casks. Eve recognized them immediately—the long forgotten wedding cru.
One of the casks had been tapped, and beside it, a crystal goblet. She captured some of the dark fluid in the glass and carried it out into the sunlight. The sun's rays broke apart within the crystal, splintered shards of dark ruby color danced upon her face and hands, and on the ground about her feet. The wine was so dark, yet so clear; it had the illusion of endless depth.
She brought her face close to the rim and was overwhelmed by the aroma. It so unsteadied her that she sat down upon the grass. She touched the surface of the liquid lightly with her fingertip and brought it to her closed lips. The drop spread across the vermillion causing a warm sensation that brought moisture to her tongue. Her tongue drew the drop from lips to palate; she felt the warmth move down through her neck.
She waited for her courage, lifted the glass to her lips, and drank. A heady pleasure flooded her throat and moved out through all the channels of her being. No longer in its youthful form, the wine had matured into something far more sublime than anything she had ever tasted. She drank again, and felt the heat run down the front of her thighs, now stretched out upon the ground. This—forgotten artifact—of what might have been, kindled something deep within her. Long forgotten memories began to stir, and a thin hope began its resurrection.
After she discovered the wine casks, Eve inquired into Aaron's affairs, to fill the voids in their long separations. What she found both intrigued and amused her. Her perception of Aaron, formed early in their courtship and held through all the intervening years, could not have been further from the truth. She had misjudged him as a man of privilege, decadence, and masculine vanity, imagining him in usurious business dealings, frequenting the great bordellos of the cities. She never cared about his true character nor inquired into his affairs—Eve had simply been indifferent.
Soon there was no part of Aaron's history not known to Eve, including the occasional affair. Aaron had been discreet and showed good taste; his reputation was honorable and intact. Eve felt no jealousy or contempt for anything that came to her attention, just increased curiosity. Other women being attracted to her husband only increased Aaron's currency in her eyes.
She began to correspond with Aaron. He responded with rich seductive prose. His writings showed uncommon human introspection and touched her deeply.
Four months ago
As the first winter snows fell on the mountain passes, Aaron made his way on foot to join Eve in her ancestral family home, a Citadel deep within the Aubrac Mountains. It would be the first time they domiciled together in many years.
"My lady, Lord Marlo has crossed the chasm footbridge," said the attendant.
"Thank you. Inform me when he reaches the outer walls of the city." Eve's stomach was in turmoil. She made a final inspection of the rooms prepared for him, ensuring all the fires had been well tended.
It was still early evening, but hours after the light had failed—the night was cold and still. A heavy snowfall dulled the senses and deadened every sound. A small group of curious onlookers gathered at the gate. Eve whispered an instruction to one of her personal guards, ever present shadows since birth, and the group was quietly dispersed. She was alone in the glow of the torch lights when Aaron came into view.
Aaron's progress faltered at the sight of her. She rushed forward to steady him. "Let's get you to a warm fire," she whispered.
Two servants—a grave old man and a young girl—greeted them as they entered the Great Hall. They assisted Eve in removing Aaron's wet outer garments and overboots. After the servants left, they settled on a broad bench behind a screen facing the main fire. There were great hearths with tall fires burning on all four walls. The screen was an ancient tapestry that depicted a long forgotten coronation. It hung from the high beams of the ceiling on large iron chains shielding the bench from heavy draft.
Aaron's hand felt like cold granite in Eve's warm palm—wet, but not wet. She lifted it to her cheek, then her neck, where it began to warm. Tears welled from her eyes, and she moved now to press herself gently against the full length of his repose. They sat there well into the night holding one another. The candles danced in the drafts, until they guttered and went out. The old man appeared from time to time, unnoticed, to tend the fires.
They awoke from their separate dreams with the first grey light of day, as cold and stiff as the world outside. A dinner had been placed on the long table behind them, but remained untouched. Neither had moved the entire night.
Eve left him still in the grip of lazy awakening and instructed servants to prepare hot baths. She did not return to the Hall. In time, the old man came and led Aaron through the labyrinth of passageways to his quarters. His rooms were in a part of the old castle carved from the cliff walls at the beginning of time.
The Citadel was perched on the edge of a wide chasm. It provided protection for the monasteries and temples in the canyons and outcroppings high above—and had done so for more than four thousand years. The stories of this ancient place played a role in the histories of all people.
Aaron's bedchamber had a small balcony, an eyrie that jutted out over the chasm. He stood there, looking north. In the far distance he could see the footbridge he had crossed the day before, the only public way into this sanctuary. The western side was bright with fire from the rays of a rising winter sun. The eastern side was obscured in mist, still hidden in the mountain's early morning shadow. The storm had passed and left a foot of fresh snow. It was a long trek from the footbridge to the Citadel along a wooden causeway that hung from the cliff walls on huge iron chains.
The narrow canyon at the end of the causeway had been carved from the mountain in primordial times by water and winds that had left vast formations of natural rock and exposed mineral, unworldly to behold. The ancients believed these formations were created by some divinity at the beginning of time. Since those ancient times, these outcroppings had been places of mystique and worship, and over four millennia, the seven great temples were built.
On the far side of the bedroom was a bath chamber, the doorway covered by thick pelts sewn together and trimmed with brocade. It was illuminated by a single oil lamp that hung from the ceiling, giving off the heavy scent of cedar. A steady stream of hot water, diverted from a natural source deep within the mountain, poured through ancient pipes into a large cistern in the floor. It was full and the overflow disappeared through iron grates, melodious as the waters played down long, narrow passages, emptying into some abyss far below.
The old man helped Aaron undress then assisted him into the bath, the flat stones of the floor hot beneath his bare feet. Aaron lay back in the water and closed his eyes. Sleep quickly claimed him.
Aaron sensed Eve's presence before he heard or saw her. Perhaps it was the scent of her hair in the thick wet heat. She stood on the far side of the cistern in a thin gown of soft white linen, open at the front, holding a round silver flask with a glass stopper. She placed the flask near him, stood back, and let the gown slide off her shoulders onto the floor.
He was not sure what he felt in that moment: a confusion of passion, pain, and regret for so many lost years. His need for her had always been too great. She was still beautiful and as desirable as ever, her breasts round and full, her face youthful and alert. She looked at him with bemusement. He felt an old panic stir and started to rise, but Eve reached out and placed her hand gently on his chest. "No, don't move," she whispered.
He watched as she retrieved the flask and sat on the small wooden stool pouring hot oil into her palms, rubbing it into her body, working from her neck to her feet. Aaron could barely breathe; a great weight pressed upon his chest. Eve sat down behind him, cradling his head against her breasts, her supple thighs closing around him. She anointed his head and torso with the oil. Aaron relaxed into her, surrendering to her touch.
The winter nights that followed were long and cold, the days short and dark with frequent storm. Ice and snow collected on the causeway making it impassable until spring. The walls and outlying buildings of the Citadel were buried in high drifts, the exposed turrets and gables coated in thick, clear ice—a menagerie of glass houses placed by some giant hand on a high shelf, at the edge of the chasm. Messages and news from the outside world continued to arrive, through a complex network of caves, caverns, and underground river passages that lay beneath the Aubrac Mountains, collectively known as the Dark Way.
Each evening, after the day's work was done, Eve would shed the entourage of personal servants, guards, and advisors dedicated to her welfare, and join Aaron in his chambers, simply appearing from one of the many hidden passageways within the castle. They would talk long into the night, make love whenever passions were aroused, and spent hours in the baths exploring the boundaries of what might now be possible between them. Many of their conversations were politic. Eve sought Aaron's counsel on a steady stream of information that came to her attention that winter, news of disturbing events and rumors from the many agents she had abroad. Dark forces were in motion that would not go unchallenged.
One evening in the baths, Eve was examining the many scars on Aaron's body—the jagged one beneath his abdomen, several small scars on his upper torso, another set on his left thigh where arrows or a pike had found their mark. Running her lips along the length of a scar on his forearm, she said, "My spies have told me stories about your fearlessness in battle, and lack of regard for your own safety. Much in this world depends on you, how can you be so reckless? Why do you have so little regard for your own life?"
He took her face in his hands and turned it up toward the light, looking into her eyes—dark pools where the lamp flame danced.
"I had nothing to live for and everything to die for," he said, and kissed her on the lips.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from HOUSE OF MARLO by ROY CAMBLIN Copyright © 2012 by Roy Camblin. Excerpted by permission of iUniverse, Inc.. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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