Hotspur became skilled at discovering Hal’s hiding places, for the heir to the throne tended to disappear when not nailed down by witnesses or specific duty. The Princes’ Gallery was a favorite, though others could find her there so it tended to be an escape when she had only a few moments to breathe. The secondary kitchens were another favorite, and once Hotspur even discovered Hal kneading bread with a cap holding back her hair, covered in sweat and flour. The prince fled to the kennels occasionally, to pretend she was checking on the dogs and considering a plan for a winter hunt. The worst were the nights—and days—Hal slipped her guards and vanished from the palace itself. At least she only went to the Quick Sunrise to find Ianta and lose herself in cheap sack.
None of it bothered Hotspur much, for a soldier needed her outlets, and there was no mistaking that being thrust into the role of Aremore prince had forced Hal to front herself as if at war. The prince did her duty, charmed those Celedrix specifically instructed her to charm, and played her part with beauty if not grace. It was only that Hal did not seem to come into herself or find any mask of princedom to inhabit fully. None of it satisfied her. Instead, as the winter passed, Hal grew more and more hollow. More and more restless.
Oh, Hotspur doubted anyone noticed but her, and perhaps Ter Melia, who had known Hal the longest of all the palace guard. Ianta, surely, could see the difference, but Hotspur did not ask the sloppy knight; she suspected Ianta was a shell of herself, too.
It had been a blow, losing Mora.
Hotspur did not blame the lady for going home to the March, for needing to get far away from Lionis and the ghosts of all she’d lost. Even if Mora had remained, Hal could not rely upon someone else for strength—not Mora, and not Hotspur, either, not forever. Someday Hal would marry, and Hotspur would leave. Thus, Hal had to find her footing alone. There was no choice, not for a prince.
“Hal, tell me what you want most,” Hotspur said one night—morning, truly—as she escorted the prince home from the market district off the river that once had been prosperous with merchant families but now had given over to sailors’ haunts.
“You!” the prince laughed, breath puffing hot into the cold winter night. She tugged Hotspur to a stop and grasped her face. Hal’s kiss was clean and firm, despite her inebriation, and Hotspur let her have it, melting closer for warmth and pleasure. They kissed in the street, witnessed only by other late wanderers and the two royal soldiers who followed behind.
Dragging her mouth from Hal’s reluctantly, Hotspur smiled and nudged her lover on. “I mean for you, for Aremoria. What do you want to be? Or to—to happen?”
“Seriously?” Hal glanced down at Hotspur from the corner of her eyes.
“Absolutely serious. You can’t want things to remain as they are forever.”
“Some things,” Hal said softly, weaving her fingers with Hotspur’s.
At such moments, Hotspur wanted forever, too.
That early in the morning, Lionis held itself quiet, the wind gentle, if crisp. Hotspur kept her gaze ahead, watching through the dark for danger and to avoid puddles of frozen shit. Beside her, Hal smiled, relaxed in her city at night. At least Prince Hal had that going for her: she adored Lionis, every piss-stained gutter and moonlit cobblestone, every tucked-away gable and blue-painted door, the blacksmiths and cobblers and milliners. All the people. Hotspur admired it, not knowing how to expand her own love for Perseria—the rolling farmland, the creak of winter trees, the hard humor and constant readiness of the folk—to a city so filled with strangers.
At a corner, just before they turned onto a broader avenue that put them in a neighborhood of spreading manors and walled gardens, Hal paused, tugging Hotspur with her to the dim red glow of a small street altar. Tucked in a narrow alley that hardly could be called such a thing, and beneath an arch buttressing the two tall buildings, the altar was little more than a barrel that smelled of old wine. Its lid was covered in soft wax, and three candles had nearly burned out, melting together. Set between them was a wooden slab carved with a crude woman’s face wearing a crown. The queen. These street altars were supposed to be easy blessings, to focus people on Celedrix’s power and status. But someone had smeared black down her cheeks to make her into a version of Saint Halir, who had cried tears made of mud for some trespass Hotspur couldn’t remember. She’d never paid much attention to the varied earth saints and wizards of Aremoria’s ancient past. Until recently, she’d never had reason to care.
Hal touched the image, not quite lifting it out of the wax. “A story.”
“What?”
“That’s what I want. Is it too much to ask? I want to make a good story, one that will serve everyone. Make my mother proud, and my people, too.”
“I think you should work to make your family and people proud, and let historians worry about telling a good story.”
Hal shook her head. “I think we shape our own stories. We must. Especially if we don’t fit into stories as we’re supposed to.” The prince kissed Hotspur lightly, and Hotspur understood with a weight in her stomach what Hal meant: her. Them, together. They didn’t fit as they were supposed to. Women in love with each other.
But Hal continued, “My mother returned home after ten years, and she used that—she was unknown, but she made that an advantage by setting it against Rovassos. She had a blank page with which to reinvent herself. But I don’t. I have to work with what I have, and I’m just a knight. A rather wild one, with a reputation for plenty of flaws. But my best skill is making people listen to me. So I should be able to make people listen when I say I can do this.”
“You don’t believe it yet, so how can you convince anyone else?” Hotspur put her arm around Hal’s waist.
Hal hugged her, then turned her rosy cheek against Hotspur’s. “It’s my fault Mora left. I drove her away with my—with a moment of weakness. I’d had a bad dream, and was hung over, and sometimes I am … just like that. Morose. Afraid. There’s something wrong with me.”
“Oh, Hal.”
“I told her I couldn’t do it, and I didn’t want to. She told me to get my shit together, and then she left for the March before I could do anything.”
The soft tremble in Hal’s voice brought out an answering tenderness in the Wolf of Aremoria. “You should be able to say such things to your friends,” Hotspur whispered. “You can say it to me, and know I believe in you still. I won’t stop believing in you, Hal, and you can use that.”
Hal shivered and kissed Hotspur again, there by the makeshift altar.
In retrospect, that early morning conversation should have warned her.
On the third Threesday in a row the prince was utterly impossible to find, Celedrix barked at Hotspur that if she could not keep track of her royal ward then perhaps another security captain ought to be appointed. Hotspur gritted her teeth and when she had the chance, she yelled at Hal until the prince grimaced and flirted and distracted Hotspur with those very skillful fingers. But the next week Hotspur followed Hal as she slipped out of the palace and casually made her way to a star chapel hidden between two taverns and a flower shop. There Hal joined in a small congregation of earth saint worshippers.
Hotspur could not believe her eyes. The chapels of Lionis maintained themselves well enough with birth chart commissions and provided services to foreign believers, and of course the Lionis Cathedral had once been the grandest in all the neighboring countries, including Innis Lear. But Aremoria itself had shed its devotion to small gods and stars generations ago. The people looked to the monarch to lead them, in body and spirit; to the Blood and the Sea.
Being herself, Hotspur did not wait for the end of the prophecy casting, but burst in, shoving people aside until she got to Hal, and roughly grabbed the prince’s arm. “You are mad!” she cried, drawing attention. “Come with me, now.”
“Hotspur,” Hal said, not pulling away, though she cast an apologetic look at the gray-robed priest.
Hotspur growled and dragged the prince out into the snowy
street.
Furious, Hotspur’s pace was clipped and fast, and Hal dashed around her, flinging herself in Hotspur’s way. “What’s wrong with you?”
“You hide away every week to do this? Your mother needed you, and it reflected badly on me, Prince, to not know where you are! And—and here is where I find you! With star priests? Earth saints!”
“You saw the ghost!” Hal hissed, putting her face right in Hotspur’s. “You heard the prophecy!”
“Why does it matter? It doesn’t need to shape our choices.” Hotspur tried to scoff, but it came out demanding.
“How can it not matter? I love you, Hotspur, but sometimes you baffle me.” Hal stopped, panting.
On the street, folk stared at them, giving a wide berth to the two women. Hotspur didn’t know how to care, and she didn’t know how to respond. Except there was one phrase ringing in her ears.
“I love you, too,” Hotspur said.
They stared at each other in stony silence, Lionis City pulling and shifting around them like a river.
Then Hal grabbed her hand and ran toward the palace; Hotspur dug in her heels, afraid suddenly as she’d never been in her entire life.
But the prince dragged her on, gasping, laughing, putting on a massive clownish frown, in through the barbican and under the outer curtain wall, through the People’s Courtyard and into the palace, up the stairs and down the hall until finally they burst into Hal’s room.
A few months ago, this room had been a royal study, and it held still the wall-to-wall shelving, the tall windows that opened up onto a broad crescent balcony, the grand desk beside the huge stone hearth. But since Hal had claimed it, small indications of her presence had appeared: sword belts hanging from the back of a tall chair; open sketchbooks piled on the floor beside the balcony windows where the best light could be found; a half-empty bottle of wine sitting open on the hearth beside elegant silver candlesticks. It smelled like her, too, all leather and oil and the plain tallow soap she liked best.
Hal took her through the small arched door, down two shallow steps into the bedroom. “Hotspur,” she said, almost like a warning, and then whirled around. She kissed Hotspur hotly, and began tearing at the buttons of Hotspur’s leather coat.
“Hal!”
The prince reluctantly disengaged, though she brushed her lips to Hotspur’s, and walked backward until her calves touched the short foot of her bed. She fell dramatically back, arms spread, and hit flat onto the puffy mattress hard enough the ropes beneath creaked. “There’s a drink in that flask on the chair,” she said.
Hotspur fetched it and uncorked it to the smell of sharp liquor fumes.
“It’s Ianta’s whiskey, so caution,” Hal said in a laughing tone, her eyes on the whitewashed ceiling.
Being plenty reckless when there was need, Hotspur knocked it back: the shit threatened to burn her eyes out of their sockets.
Gasping hot, pricking air, she sat on the bed and thrust the wooden flask at Hal.
The prince sipped.
“This would strip bloodstain out of leather,” Hotspur hissed.
But Hal’s smile as she tossed the flask aside was incandescent. “Come here,” she said, pawing at Hotspur’s belt.
Hotspur unbuckled her sword and carefully placed it beneath the window, then bent to slowly untie her boots, all while eyeing Hal sprawled on the mattress. Once her boots were kicked off, she rushed two steps and flung herself over Hal’s hips with the ease of a young knight vaulting onto her favorite horse. Hal laughed and bucked under Hotspur, and Hotspur leaned forward eagerly: their mouths met, tingling with liquor, and it wasn’t long before Hotspur was stripped from the tight leather of her vest, loosing her breasts beneath the folds of linen shirt. Hal pushed the shirt up, grasping at Hotspur’s ribs and clawing gently at her back.
All muscle, Hotspur moved easily as she liked, forcing her lover’s hips down into the bed with her own thighs, feeling the strength in Hal’s stomach engage. Hal raised her arms to her sides, then over her head, and opened herself up to whatever Hotspur wanted.
Hotspur wanted everything. Even if only for a little while.
It was a relief, in that moment, for Hotspur to give herself entirely to Hal, unthinking, just feeling and reacting, grasping her blanket, Hal’s hips, Hal’s hands. Hotspur flushed, shivering and ticklish, the slightest touch putting a gasp in her mouth. She bit her lip as Hal bit her ribs, trailing kisses to her hipbone, and biting there, too. This was Hotspur’s favorite: urgent sex, both of them sweaty and naked and eager, but nobody in a hurry. Hotspur put Hal where she wanted her, then gave over control when Hal pulled her hair, and they were sideways on the mattress, full of laughter and wet cries. When Hal slid fingers inside her, Hotspur arched and maneuvered to her knees over Hal, pressing down on Hal’s hand. Hal said her name, again and again, the sound running together until it meant nothing, but was everything to Hotspur.
Hotspur always collapsed when she finished, melting into a contented daze, though she rarely slept. Empty humming songs wandered her mind as she drifted, until she returned to some sweaty awareness. Hal’s head rested on her shoulder, her leg across Hotspur’s, her hand flattened against the curve of ribs under Hotspur’s right breast. She breathed deeply, rather dissolved herself, and Hotspur closed her eyes again. Contentment lifted her high, spreading Hotspur out like a subtle warm wind, a glow of sunlight melting this frosty winter.
Hal whispered, “Nothing matters more than this, Hotspur. As long as I have you, I’ll survive. We’ll get older side by side, in matching armor. I can see us at Annyck, kissing under the shadows of that goblin tree. Two ancient old ladies, arguing probably: you want to take horses out for a race, despite the aching in your joints; I want to have sex, despite my dried-up, wrinkled well.”
Hotspur stroked Hal’s black hair; she did not take the words seriously, only the sentiment, for Hal was engaged to a foreign prince, and this would not last. Nothing lasted in war.
The prince nuzzled her mouth against Hotspur’s collarbone. Hotspur murmured, “All right, my lion.”
Hal pinched her hard. “Don’t even say it.”
“Ouch! Hal, you’re ridiculous. You don’t need earth saints or star priests; you don’t need anybody else to tell you what you are!”
“You really don’t care about it, Wolf of Aremoria? The end? Choosing the end?”
“I know all that matters is my heart, and yours.” Hotspur shoved at Hal in order to put her hand against the prince’s chest. The skin was chilled again already, and Hotspur hugged Hal tighter against her. “I believe you can do this. Yourself. You don’t have to be a lion, just Hal Bolinbroke.”
Hal said nothing, and they fell into quiet. How wonderful it would be, Hotspur thought suddenly, to go home to Annyck, like Hal said. To bring this woman, this prince home to her mother and father, to her people, and introduce her like a husband. The Wolf of Aremoria married to the Lion Prince, raising royal babies together. Then they would not need a foreign prince for security. The thought was so large, and so useless, Hotspur said, “I would make you Hal Persy, if I could.”
“Oh, worms.” Hal laughed awkwardly.
Some catch in her voice opened Hotspur’s eyes just in time to see a tear spilling down Hal’s cheek.
Both shocked and affectionate, Hotspur kissed the tears away, nibbling with her lips, and flicked her tongue out to delicately fan Hal’s long eyelashes. Hal kissed her mouth deeply, clinging to Hotspur’s head.
Finally Hotspur pulled back. “It would be so much easier if one of us were a man.”
Hal groaned and flopped onto the bed. “No, that wouldn’t work.”
“Oh?”
“If you were a man, I wouldn’t desire you—where would be your mysterious depths, these the only soft pieces of you?” Here Hal touched a finger to Hotspur’s bottom lip, then to the tip of her nipple, then danced those fingers lower along Hotspur’s belly to the start of her riot of dark orange nether hair. Hotspur wrinkled her nose and gent
ly slapped Hal’s hand away.
“And if you were a man?” Hotspur asked primly.
“Why, I’d waste away for want of being a woman!” Hal put that same dramatic hand to her forehead.
“Can’t you even imagine it? If I were a man my desires would be the same. All for you.” Hotspur glanced her nose against Hal’s nose.
“I can imagine.” Hal grimaced. “It’s just a terrible fantasy to indulge. I am a woman, and anything else displeases me. Why, even if I were a sexless tree, I’d still be a woman.”
Hotspur laughed, entirely free of worry, truly joyful.
Silence gasped between them as Hal stared at her, suddenly still. She whispered, as if afraid to speak aloud.
“Hotspur, you make me feel so alive with rushing blood, with a lightning heat, and awe enough to fill an entire ocean. I want you for my partner. I want it so very badly, and I hate that I don’t know how to tell a powerful enough story to make you my king.”
“Maybe you’ll think of a way,” Hotspur said, not believing it, but neither caring. She slid a hand from Hal’s knee, along her strong thigh, to her hip, and Hotspur knew she could live in this moment for the rest of her life.
BANNA MORA
The March, spring
BANNA MORA OF the March and Aremoria faced the massive bear of a man that was Owyn Glennadoer; sweat and blood slicked the grip of her sword, her throat was raw, and she limped from a bone-deep bruise down her left hip and thigh, received hitting the ground when she was unhorsed.
Glennadoer’s armor was a terrifying patchwork of blackened steel and spiked leather, edged in tattered fur. His helmet had been covered over with black fur, and a necklace of bear teeth smiled across his broad chest. Blood striped his beard, and his sword was so gore splattered Mora wouldn’t have been surprised to hear Glennadoer had driven his blade down the gullet of a bear and torn the beast in two.
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