It was unfair, and Christian knew it, but he said the words anyway, not appreciating what would happen to her if he didn’t return. This was why they could not fail in their aid. This was why Aylen snuck away after her husband had departed for the border lands to find her own armor and join them.
Her only regret was not following through on her promise with Ember, to practice with her. But she would make true on it, when the war ended. She would put it before all else.
“Daughter.”
Aylen froze. Gretchen.
Aylen stood, straightening her spine. “Lady Gretchen. I was... I...”
“Tidying up?” Gretchen stepped across the dirt floor until they were side by side. “I would do the same, if I did not have the children. Even a year ago, I might have gone, when all my babies were still here. But now, there are two. And I cannot lose them.”
Aylen clasped her hands. “Someday, you will have them all here again with you.”
Gretchen squeezed Aylen’s hands and dropped them. “I believe they are out there somewhere, Aylen. But I am not so foolish as to hope for them all here again. That is not the world we live in. Not anymore.”
Aylen sighed. “This is why I must go.”
“It will not be me who stops you,” Gretchen replied. She dropped her eyes to Aylen’s belly. “Is there any chance?”
Aylen shook her head.
“Are you taking something, then?”
“An elixir I learned to make at the Sepulchre.”
“You want them. He doesn’t.”
“That’s close enough to the truth, I suppose.”
Gretchen nodded, surveying the wreckage left from the men who’d whirled in a short time ago. “Christian says a lot about what he doesn’t want. He has his reasons, and they are his own. He’s certainly never shared them with me. Yet, now that he is home, he is becoming precisely the man he believed he should not.” Gretchen exhaled. “And so, you must both return to me, Aylen, for the homecoming of my son and his wife has given me a hope I thought was lost forever.”
“He has been different since coming back,” Aylen agreed. “But I would caution you against hanging hopes on him resuming the mantle of heir, Lady Gretchen. He is a man called to service, and at present, he is serving his Reach. But when his banishment ends, he will be called to serve the one place he feels he is home.”
Gretchen’s smile was glacial. “We’ll see.”
* * *
“I have to go, Ember.”
“You say that as if I’m stopping you.”
Marsh tossed his satchel over his shoulder. “I know you’re not stopping me. How could you? I’m fighting for our Reach. Yours, if your mother does what everyone expects her to and names you heir in place of Brandyn.”
Ember looked up. “Is that your way of saying I should come and fight?”
Marsh rushed over and knelt before her. “No. You heard what the Rush Rider said. Blackfen. Your brother has ordered you to stay here, where you’re safe.”
She laughed. “My brother is eleven. Twelve. He cannot order me to do anything.”
“He’s not wrong, Ember. If something happens to him, it all comes down to you, no matter what your mother did or didn’t want.”
“Pfft.” Ember looked away. She’d been torn between two worlds since Arturo Blackfen arrived with the call to arms. The Northerlands were being asked to defend the borders between east and west, to contain the battles to each side. At last, the Westerlands had direction, and it was Brandyn leading them. Brandyn! He had help, of course, from their Uncle Khallum. That was good. Khallum was competent and would not be afraid to do whatever was needed to end this.
This was her fight. A battle for her own lands, her people, everyone she had ever known or loved. And yet, she was drawn here, eyes to the north, to her origin. Though she couldn’t explain it, she felt strongly that the two were inextricably tied together, and that she could not ignore what was happening to her here without also causing harm to the future of the Blackwoods and the Westerlands.
Where Marsh fit into all of this, she did not know. Or if he even did. But she couldn’t leave things like this. She might never see him again, and he deserved better than her confused indifference as he marched to war and an uncertain future.
Ember reached for him, fighting the thoughts and desires pulling her away from this moment and into another. With a small huff, he accepted her embrace and with his arms wrapped tight around her, she whispered the words he most needed to hear, despite not knowing whether they were true or not. “I love you, Marsh Tyndall. Be safe, and be brave.”
Marsh melted in her arms. Her heart sank. She hoped she’d done the right thing.
His kiss brought her back to him in his final moments in Wulfsgate. “I will come back to you, Emberley, I promise. And when I do, I’ll be worthy of asking the question you know I most want to ask of you.”
“One thing at a time,” Ember said, forehead pressed to his. She felt like crying, but equally felt like running until her legs gave out. A scream trapped in her throat.
“Will you be here? Do you promise you’ll stay in Wulfsgate?”
Ember tried to smile. “I can’t return to the Westerlands until you settle that matter, now, can I? Where else would I go?”
Marsh didn’t return the smile. His eyes looked north. “Not all answers are good for us,” he said.
* * *
Khallum eased his warhorse to a slower pace. The beast was meant to run, and run hard. It was used to a master who was all too happy to indulge this.
It was the snapping symphony of the two standards catching the wind that kept him from darting forward. On the left, the green banner bearing the Westerlands’ providing mother, arms spread; on the right, the dark orange of the Southerlands and the crested waves. Farther north, the blue fabric bearing the jagged mountain would be heading their way, though their paths would not cross unless something went wrong. The seer, Joran, advised against displaying their banners so openly, but they would discard them for secrecy soon enough. Until they crossed into hostile lands, they were one, and they were proud.
How he, his father, and his father before him had fantasized about this. A kingdom united, marching against the line of kings that had turned this realm broken. He pushed down the niggling anger at how it had taken the Westerlands crying for help; how none had come when a Warwick had called.
Aye, but ye have never had a reason for them to fight. A king worth following, and a hope to go with it.
Darrick fell to the middle of the pack, riding with the other men led by Law. None but those most trusted to Khallum and Brandyn as yet knew his secret. They’d keep it from Duncarrow as long as the Guardians allowed, and not all men who started with them on this journey would end it with them. The time would come to reveal to the rest of the kingdom what he, Khallum Warwick, had known and done. With that would come the respect the Warwicks deserved but had never harvested.
“Ye reckon Hamish has them all headed north yet? And Nye, west?” Rutland asked, from his left.
“Aye,” Khallum said, squinting against the noonday sun. It was unseasonably warm, even for the southern part of the kingdom. Beads of sweat cut down the filth in his forehead and cheeks. “They would’ve left the moment the order reached them.”
“We’d never know if they failed. Least not until it was too late.”
“Hamish willnae fail. Nor Nye,” Khallum said. “Byrne told me once that Asherley had a clairvoyant in her employ. One who could share and read thoughts across the kingdom. No mere seer like that swindler riding with us.”
“Hogwash. Do ye not think that if such a magic existed, we’d know? Think of the advantages. Wars would be over before they started.”
“Aye? Byrne wouldnae lie about it. ’Tis possible the magician embellished their skills.”
“And the Northerlands? Will they come?”
Khallum inhaled a mouthful of the fresh breeze passing over. An image of Gretchen, hair catching the wind, f
ace fierce with a power no one could take from her. She would have joined his war in Termonglen had he a plan then. Holden, too, maybe, though he had no kind thoughts to spare for the coward.
And she had his Ransom. His heir. He trusted her to do right by his boy, and by their alliance. “Aye. Tis no longer a lost cause in their eyes.”
“Even if we deal with Quinlanden’s men, and the sorcerer holding the Medvedev in sway—”
“When. When we deal with them.”
Rutland sighed. “Aye. When. Then we have the Knights of Duncarrow and the Rhiagain Guard to contend with.”
“And?”
“And no one knows their true size, Khallum. Do ye not think this to be intentional on the king’s part?”
“First, ye can call me Khallum by a fire over ale, but not when my men are armored up and ready to fight at my command, aye?” He waited until Rutland nodded. “Second, I donnae care about the size of the ratsbane’s army. I’ve sailed near the Isle of Belcarrow. ’Tis not so large an isle that it could house the number of men required to take on a kingdom. A Reach? Aye, perhaps. But it cannae stand against the all of us.”
“There are rumors that a new army is being raised. In the Wastelands.”
Khallum laughed. “The waning, failing men working the mines? Poor lads couldn’t swing a sword any higher than their waist.”
“No,” Rutland said. “You remember, Kh—my lord. The rumors? That they were killin’ the men off? And then, our... friend, Godfrey, he confirmed it for us. There’s not many left. Maybe the camps are for something else.”
“Hmph.” Khallum dismissed the conversation, but Rutland’s words stuck with him. It hadn’t made any sense, what Darrick had said about the men dragged from their beds, the pits of the dead. Diamonds, the king was mining there, which was no great surprise, but if they’d ceased operations, there must be something more valuable than the most rare and precious rock in the kingdom.
Whatever it was, it could wait. It had to.
The task ahead required all of them.
32
Aimed True
Alasyr waited until he was certain no one had followed him, and then he quietly slipped into the room.
Asherley’s voice made him jump. “Who are you?” She approached him so quickly he almost tripped. “What do you want?”
He held his hands out, bidding her to lower her voice. “My name is Alasyr. I am the eldest son of Varinya and Argentyn. And no one knows I am here right now.”
Asherley regarded him with hard suspicion. “You answered one of my questions. Now you’ll answer the other.”
Alasyr was taken back by her commanding manner. She was quite confident for a woman who was a prisoner with no reasonable means of escape. But he could see Emberley in her. In the high swell of her cheeks as she held her head aloft; the burning darkness behind her eyes. Both women had learned to turn their fear to power. Emberley thought she could learn from Alasyr, but this he would like to learn from her. He imagined it could prove quite useful.
“I have met your daughter. Emberley.”
“And are in love with her, I can see.”
“No!” Alasyr exclaimed, disgusted. “I am not in love with her. I would not even call her friend.”
“I have read your whispers. You would do well to hide them from others who would do the same.”
“You’ve what?”
“Why are you here, Alasyr?”
“I wanted you to know that I’m going to tell her you are here and let things happen as they will.”
“Why would you do that?”
“The Derehams believe you are dead. Ember knows you are not. It drives her to madness.”
“So now she is Ember to you, and you have care for the state of her mind.”
Alasyr shook his head in frustration. “Stop attributing words to me that I have not said!”
Asherley shrugged. She looked half as calm as he felt. A storm raged within him, and he hated this woman, that she could see it and he could not stop it. But it had been raging far too long. Since before he was aware of it. And now it could not be quieted.
“Very well. I’ll ask the question another way. Why betray your family for a girl you claim is not even dear enough to be called friend?”
“How are you so... so like this? So unafraid?” Alasyr challenged. His eyes burned hot with tears he would use every last drop of his power not to spill. The words of Corridyn flamed high in his mind.
“I wasn’t always,” Asherley said, her voice kinder, less defended. “Unafraid, that is. But the greatest skill one can learn is to surrender to that which is beyond our control, and then to search for that which is. As you are well aware, I am powerless to leave here. So to think on it, to dwell on it, is a wasted energy better spent elsewhere.”
“She is much like you. Your daughter.”
This elicited a smile from Asherley. “She is most like me, of all my children.”
“She is coming into powers she doesn’t understand. She nearly spent the entire forest in her rage.”
Asherley’s smile died. “Why are you here, Alasyr?”
“As I said, I’m going to tell her you are here. She deserves to know.”
“No. That is not why you are going to tell her.”
Alasyr ground his tongue into the roof of his mouth. “My reasons are my own.”
“I sense revenge in you. Ire. And if this is what guides you, you will falter, and you will take down those you love with you.”
“The only one I love is lost to me,” Alasyr said. One hot tear escaped and he smacked at his eyes to stop others. “My mother and father have lied to me all my life. My siblings will do as tradition demands and never question it, just as I would have! I would have. I cast my lot for my own sister not only because I loved her but because it was expected!”
“Would you like some wine?”
“What?”
“Your face is flushed so red I fear you’ll pass out,” Asherley said. She stood and, sighing, went to the table in the corner to pour him a glass. “What did they lie to you about?” she asked as she handed him the glass.
Alasyr just stared at it and then set it aside. But he was no longer crying. Perhaps that had been her aim, to redirect him, to allow him to collect himself. “Everything.”
She nodded. “This entire kingdom is woven together by lies. Why should Midnight Crest be any different?”
“We are different. This is why we are feared.”
Asherley shook her head. “You are not feared. You are protected, by these mountains. By the men at the base of them. The kingdom does not fear Ravenwoods, it only lacks the means to come and take them.”
“That isn’t true.”
She lifted her shoulders.
“Emberley deserves to know you are here.”
“Your life will be forfeit.”
“My life?” Alasyr laughed. “I don’t even know what my life is. But I begin to understand Ravenna a little better. I cannot stay. I cannot leave. I cannot do a thing except live in this misery, wishing I hadn’t let the illusion fade so I could live in the unwitting bliss all other Ravenwoods spend their lives in.”
“Take me to her instead,” Asherley said.
He shook his head. “There is only one way off this mountain, by flight. I could not take you safely. Not on my own.”
“Your father brought me here on his own.”
“No,” Alasyr said. “I don’t believe he did it on his own.”
“Oh?” Asherley’s eyes widened in interest. “So there are others who have joined him in his strange treason?”
“I don’t know who they are. But I saw at least one other watching you, when you were in the cave.”
“You were watching us, too, then.”
“I was watching my father. I wish now that I’d left it alone.”
“If he finds you here, there’ll be no words or magic to get you out of the trouble awaiting you,” Asherley said. She stepped to him and touched his shoul
der in a gesture that was almost motherly. “If you cannot stop yourself from sharing with Emberley what you know, then the least I ask of you is that you tell her something for me.”
“What?”
“That she must not attempt to come rescue me. It would mean certain death for her.”
“You’re still alive.”
“I don’t trust your father,” Asherley said. “And neither do you.”
* * *
“Wyat. Please listen to me. We cannot stay here.”
Wyat paced the small room. The deep worry creasing his brows, spreading out to his stiff, tired limbs hurt Anabella’s heart. Once again, she was reminded of the burden she and Stefan had become, which was what she was, no matter how he objected to her thinking as such.
“Perhaps Stefan heard wrong. He wasn’t even supposed to be on that floor.”
“He told us why he was. He may not have understood what he was hearing, but it scared him, more than the consequences of being where he was not allowed. He had no guile in him when he shared this with me. He does not understand the implications of what he heard.”
“There is nowhere to go, Anabella!” Wyat’s anger faded immediately to sadness as he melted against the wall. “If only there was. There is nowhere else in this kingdom where I can keep you safe. This was it, my only idea. I’ve spent our time here searching for answers that simply do not exist.”
“This isn’t your fault. But we are not safe here, Wyat. The Head Magus cannot protect us from the elders who would see the trouble swept from their doorstep.”
He tilted his head at her, regarding her through bleary eyes. “Perhaps it is time to go to Darrick, then.”
“To Darrick?” Anabella’s breath caught. “Do you know where he is? Precisely, I mean?”
Wyat nodded. “One of Lord Warwick’s scouts slipped when delivering a message. He’s in Whitecliffe, at the pauper’s surgery run by Stewardess Rutland. Christian Dereham caught it. He told me.”
“But... why would Christian tell you?”
The Broken Realm Page 38