by A. H. Lee
Sairis grunted. He slid under the covers and relaxed. It felt delicious to be horizontal.
After a moment, Roland’s voice drifted out of the dark, “I thought you would hurt it more. The mouse, I mean.”
“I didn’t ask to torture a mouse,” growled Sairis, “only to kill one. Now it’s having an extraordinarily exciting mousy afterlife.” The words might have been a joke if he hadn’t said them so harshly.
Silence.
Is that really how I’m going to end the day? Sairis stretched his arm across the bedside table between them. The space wasn’t large, but he couldn’t quite reach Roland’s bed. He wondered whether Roland would even catch the movement in the gloom. Sairis was about to withdraw his hand when big, warm fingers wrapped around his.
Sairis shut his eyes. It should not be this easy for him to turn my innards to mush.
At least in the darkness, his response wasn’t so embarrassingly obvious. At least that’s what he thought until Roland said, with a smile in his voice, “We could do it again.”
Sairis wanted to say, “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” but he didn’t think he would sound convincing. He covered his face with his free hand. “Roland, as you have pointed out, I basically died yesterday. I am exhausted!”
Roland might reasonably have said, “You reached for me.” But he didn’t. He squeezed Sairis’s hand and let go. Sairis curled up on his side, away from Roland, and was sound asleep in minutes.
Chapter 27. Morning After
Roland woke at dawn out of habit, although there were no windows in the rooms of the Tipsy Knave. The rooms did not have fireplaces, either, as most visitors did not spend the night. The banked stove in the kitchen kept the living areas reasonably warm, and November usually kept a lamp turned down low in the hall. It shone under the door, providing enough light for Roland to find his clothes.
He paused beside Sairis’s bed and considered waking him up for a walk. Roland wanted exercise. But Sairis needs his sleep.
He was curled on his side, reminding Roland of a small animal, protecting his vulnerable parts even in slumber. His hair spread like ink over the pillow. Roland watched Sairis’s sleeping face for a moment—those long, dark lashes, mouth relaxed, his brow unfurrowed. Roland wondered what Sairis would do if Roland crawled in with him, gathered him up and said, “Shhh, I just wanted to hold you. Go back to sleep.”
Probably incinerate me. Roland had never met anyone so starved for touch and so afraid of it. He wanted to say to Sairis, “Just tell me everything—what happened to you, how you’ve been living, even Karkaroth—if he’s your mentor and you love him. Tell me, and I’ll try to understand. I’ll try to make it all better.”
Roland knew that was foolishness. Every time Sairis chose to share another detail about his life, part of Roland tensed, waiting for the offense that could not be overlooked, forgiven, or fixed. It hadn’t come yet, but he could tell there was plenty Sairis wasn’t saying.
Am I falling in love with him? Have I lost my mind?
Roland had enough experience to know the absurdity of becoming attached to someone he’d known for three days. Still... It felt so good to feel something again, even if those feelings might be in vain.
What if Sairis wasn’t a necromancer? Roland asked himself. What if he was just an ordinary man I’d met here at the Knave? An ordinary man who’d never had sex before and was all twisted up about himself. What would I expect?
Roland had no trouble answering that question, because he’d lived it. I’d expect to coax him out of his isolation, give him some good experiences, and send him on his way. Soon he’d find someone else—a better match for his temperament and for his station in life. Roland had always known that finding a permanent match for himself would be nearly impossible. Marcus, being another youngest son of a ruling family, had been a glorious exception.
Roland resisted the urge to stroke Sairis’s hair. That’s probably what will happen here. And maybe that’s what I need, too—someone to remind me that I can still feel things. Sairis and I will get this out of our systems, and then it’ll be obvious that we’re not a match. Maybe then the thought of watching Sairis walk away wouldn’t sit like a brick in Roland’s stomach.
I definitely want to give him a few good fucks—to show him that it’s not frightening, that he’s attractive, that there’s nothing wrong with him.
Roland was about to turn and head for the door when he caught a gleam of silver buried in the tangle of Sairis’s fingers against his chest. Puzzled, Roland moved in for a closer look. Spectacles? Sairis was clutching them, practically curled around them.
Roland stared for a long moment. He supposed Sairis must have had to wake up and fight for his life before. Roland knew plenty of soldiers who’d become so paranoid that they slept with their swords clutched in both hands. When your only weapon was your mind and the ability to think and see... Oh, Sairis. I swear if I do nothing else, I am going to make you feel safe.
Sairis stirred in his sleep, perhaps sensing Roland’s proximity, and Roland stepped away. He retrieved his own sword from under his bed. He’d decided against going for a walk, but there would be plenty of room for exercise in the now-empty tavern. Roland stepped silently into the hall, thanking November for well-oiled hinges, and nearly ran into Daphne, tiptoeing towards the washroom.
Roland did a double-take. She was still in her clothes from last night, though they were rumpled and her hair was loose and messy. She smelled of cigar smoke and alcohol, though she wasn’t moving like a drunken person. She jerked back from Roland in a way that was not at all characteristic, and he was suddenly filled with alarm.
“Daphne, did something happen? Why are you... Where’s Anton? Did he...? Gods! I’ll—”
“Roland, hush!” hissed Daphne. “Everything is fine! Only I’d rather not be seen like this. Please lower your voice!”
Roland stared at her. “Did anyone hurt you?”
Daphne glared back at him, “No! And if I have to give an accounting, I’d like to know what you and Sairis were doing all night!”
Roland stared into her squinted glare and began to relax. He felt the beginnings of a smirk creeping over his face.
“Well?” demanded Daphne.
Roland crossed his arms behind his back in a parade stance and said primly, “We warded a sword, sent a mouse ghost into a mirror, and then went to bed. Your turn.”
“And how about in the palace earlier?”
Roland remembered Sairis’s blush in the kitchen. Daph doesn’t miss much. “We might have been kissing behind a tapestry.”
“Ha!”
“I said ‘might.’”
“Oh? Were you doing something else behind a tapestry?”
“Daphne!”
“Roland! You have had all the fun since we were children!”
Roland let the grin spread across his face. “I know.” He leaned his sword against the wall and pulled her into a hug. “I’m glad you had fun last night.”
Daphne gave a shaky laugh. She spoke against his chest, her tone softer, more hesitant. “We just talked mostly. We talked all night, Roland. We only fell asleep about an hour ago, and then I woke up all stiff in my clothes in his bed—”
She broke off as though suddenly uncertain.
Roland gave her a squeeze. “Sounds like a good date.”
“It was so much fun! You left before it really got good. There were games and dancing. We met some people. Anton got so many compliments from the other men, he was bright red for half the evening, but he wasn’t...bad, you know? He wasn’t angry. He even danced with one of them after he had a few drinks.”
Roland’s grin faltered. “Did you tell him about me?”
A long silence. “I want whoever I marry to love you as much as I do,” she whispered. “If someone can’t do that, I need to know because it’s important.”
Roland tried to swallow the sudden lump in his throat. He couldn’t think of anything to say and just stroked Daphne
’s hair.
“So, yes,” she continued. “I told him about you a while back, but I had to make sure.”
“I love you, Daph.”
“I love you, too. How’s Sairis?”
“Kind of a mess.”
“But you like him?”
“I do.”
“You know how I said I’d marry you to a prince if I could?”
Roland started to laugh silently.
Daphne grinned against his chest. “Well, I could also use some really good magicians.”
“Shall I tell Sairis that you will trade my hand in marriage for an undead army?”
“Sounds fair.”
Roland laughed harder.
Daphne let go of him. She was grinning but promptly gave him a little shove on the shoulder that meant, “Pull yourself together.”
Roland subsided with an effort.
“Father’s funeral is today,” she said.
Daphne had always had this way of switching topics in the blink of an eye. It made her a good politician. Roland had never been good at it. He nodded, feeling suddenly cold. “Are we going to miss it?”
“I don’t think so,” said Daphne. “I need to take the blood oath. If I don’t do it, and Uncle Winthrop does, I think there’ll be trouble. I’m the first queen of Mistala. If they get a king, I think they’ll decide I was never meant to reign, even if I turn up.”
Roland nodded. While the succession and all its attendant duties and privileges passed to the heir instantly upon a monarch’s death, the blood oath was an ancient ritual performed only at the funeral. It was the symbolic transfer of power, and Roland was sure Daphne was right. She needed to be there to take the oath herself and leave her own blood on the stone.
“Anton has promised me five thousand mounted knights,” she continued.
Roland sucked in his breath. “That’s...generous.”
“I intend to meet with the dean of magical studies from the university,” continued Daphne. “I’d like him and his colleagues to deal with the demon in the palace. I don’t want to risk Sairis right now. Some people may still believe he was involved in Hastafel’s attack. Let him stay out of sight. Soon everyone will have bigger things to think about.”
Roland looked at her critically. “You’re going to follow Uncle Winthrop’s advice? Throw everything at the pass before the snows come?”
Daphne’s eyes gleamed. “I don’t want to fight and fight and fight, Roland. I want to win.”
He nodded. Daphne had always been a risk-taker, willing to use bold strokes.
“I intend to send Uncle Winthrop to rally the border garrisons and lead them into battle. It’s what he wants. I hope it will be a salve to any ambitions he’s harboring.”
Roland frowned. “We still don’t know who colluded with Hastafel to kill us. What about Uncle Maniford?”
Daphne was busy trying to brush out her hair with her fingers. “We have a demon in the palace, Roland. I think we can assume it was Hastafel’s accomplice.”
I don’t think that’s what Sairis assumes. “We don’t know—” he began, but Daphne shook her head.
“You and I will be riding to the border, Roland. No one in the palace will get a second chance to kill us. It’s possible that Norres was involved. He and his people are hiding something, but at this point, I don’t care what. They can send troops to the pass to be part of our victory or they can cower behind their walls and enjoy the contempt of a united Mistala and Lamont in the coming years. As for poor Uncle Mani, he will have to be locked in the dungeons until we figure out how much responsibility he bears and whether he poses a danger in the future.”
Roland blinked. “Wait a moment... You’re riding to the border?”
“With Anton’s troops, yes. They’re already on their way. He sent for them as soon as he got my message.”
Roland’s mouth fell open. “But—”
“Roland, Hastafel himself showed up in my strategy room! I am not safe, not even in our own palace. I intend to see this through myself, and you cannot argue that I’m safer here.”
Roland took a deep breath. “Yes. Alright. Just...”
“You’ll be coming with me. You and Sairis. We’re meeting Anton’s troops on the road. I’ll send messengers and pigeons to the garrisons as soon as I’m back in the palace. Uncle Winthrop can bring them and meet us on the road. This is my kingdom, Roland, and I won’t have it said that I stayed away from the battle because I’m a woman.”
Roland considered. Well, at least I’ll be with you. “Alright.”
Daphne started forward. “As you can see, I have a lot to do today, and I’ve hardly slept, so please move so I can bathe and change clothes!”
Chapter 28. Marsden
Sairis woke to the unpleasant, prickling sensation of alien magic. He was up in a heartbeat, sliding his glasses onto his face, scrambling out of bed to put his back against a wall. The room didn’t make sense. Everything was in the wrong place. There were two beds, no windows, plaster walls instead of stone...
Sairis shook his head. I’m in the Tipsy Knave. Embarrassment hit an instant later. He was glad to see that Roland’s bed was empty. And yet that prickle over his skin continued. Not a dream. There’s another magician in the building.
Magicians were as territorial as cats. They could get used to each other, but there was generally a lot of hissing and spitting first. Sairis dressed with practiced speed, his eyes on the door, but nobody charged into his room. Hastafel’s sword was quiescent in the corner within its circle of salt and runes. Nothing stirred in the mirror.
Sairis looked around for his shoes and realized he’d left them beside the stove in the kitchen. A few days of other people watching my back and I behave as though I’ll never have to run again.
Sairis shrugged on the coat he’d been using and filled his pockets with his few possessions. He considered taking the sword, but discarded the idea immediately. If he truly needed to run, it was more likely to hurt him than help him. Someone else would just have to deal with it. Sairis activated his cloaking charm and moved silently down the hall in stockinged feet. After a moment’s hesitation, he nipped into the washroom. No sense running with a full bladder if he didn’t have to. He took advantage of the luxury of an indoor pump, indulged in a savage scrub that he was too distracted to enjoy, and was back in the hall in moments, tiptoeing towards the kitchen.
Sairis caught the low murmur of voices, a clink of dishware. He wondered what time it was. Surely he hadn’t slept that late. Even if the effects of his fight with Hastafel were still with him, surely it couldn’t be later than mid-morning. So someone was having breakfast with...
Sairis eased his face around the door. Queen Daphne was sitting at the kitchen table cradling a cup of tea. The man sitting across from her, his back to Sairis, was not Prince Anton. Sairis recognized him at once from numerous scrying exercises. Lord Marsden, the dean of magical studies at Mistala University. He was contemporary with Karkaroth, although he didn’t look it. His thick hair and beard were still dark brown with a distinguished peppering at the temples.
Marsden had sprung from the nobility, and could trace his line to royalty some three or four generations back. Before the Sundering, he’d specialized in glamours—little magics to alter and improve a person’s appearance for a limited period of time. He’d disappeared from sight when Roland’s grandfather began hanging magicians, but had been one of the first to reappear and offer his services when King Arnoldo asked for help to defeat the necromancer. Marsden had led the group of magicians who’d put down Karkaroth’s servants, warded his lands, and cut him off from most of his sources of magic.
Afterward, Marsden had been awarded the title of earl and the leadership of the new magical studies program. The university practiced what Marsden called “clean” magic. They did not traffic with inhuman creatures except to destroy or banish them. They never sent their own spirits into lands where man was never meant to walk. However, they would not hesitate to collar
a “tainted” magician and use such a person for tasks beneath them. What was more, Marsden was quite good at fire magic. He was old and crafty, and Sairis had no wish to spar with him.
Has Daphne betrayed me?
“We can deal with it, my lady,” Marsden was saying in an earnest, fatherly tone. “I entreat you in the future never to make common cause with dark powers. Such people often do ill even when they intend to do good. It seems suspicious to me that this demon’s appearance corresponds with a visit from a necromancer.”
Daphne sipped her tea. “I have asked you for a service, Magus Marsden. I have not asked for your counsel.”
Marsden’s back stiffened. Sairis had not missed the significance of the honorifics. “My lady,” not “Your Grace.” “Magus Marsden,” not “Lord Marsden.”
“I realize events have moved rapidly,” continued Daphne, “but I intend to take up my father’s mantle in every way. He assigned you delicate tasks. I hope I may continue to trust you as he did. And though you are my elder, I am your liege, and I hope you will not forget it.”
Sairis had the satisfaction of seeing Marsden’s ears turn a shade of puce that surely indicated a bilious liver. Sairis couldn’t tell whether the man was embarrassed or angry or both, but Sairis suddenly felt a good deal more confident of his own position and a touch of anxiety for Daphne. Does she understand the pride of an alpha mage? Marsden was not accustomed to reprimands, especially from a woman. At least it wasn’t before an audience. As far as he knows.
After a moment of stillness, the magician bowed his head, and said, “Yes, Your Grace.”
“Go talk to your people,” said Daphne. “Do not underestimate the demon. I want it eliminated in one stroke.”
“Yes, Your Grace.” He rose as though to leave, then turned abruptly towards the interior of the building.
Sairis jerked back, flat against the wall behind the door. He didn’t see me. He didn’t.
After what seemed an eternity, he heard Marsden say, “With respect, Your Grace, I entreat you to honor your father’s memory with regard to the servants of dark magic. On this day of all days. On the day of his funeral.”