by S E Wendel
“Essa,” he said, “when I return, I hope we might talk of your home. I want you to have one.”
When she said nothing, he retreated into the house, back to its warmth and the spicy smell of hot cider boiling over the fire. But Essa lingered, three of his words caught in her mind, and not the three she expected. When I return. He would leave soon, to wage war on the Highlands. Returning was never a promise—Essa had watched her father and his army marching off in the name of King Dunstan enough times to know.
She knew she should wish he’d never return, that he die as far from the sea as possible. And a part of her did. Yet, another part, a small, fragile, defiant part ached to think he wouldn’t come back. Tears welled in her eyes at the thought of him never losing at Kingman’s Bluff again, never unleashing that booming laugh again, never seeing the sea again. She wanted him to return, for if he never saw the sea again, would she ever see the mountains?
Twenty-Five
While walking through her forest, Tamea happened upon a young hunter named Elak. She followed him quietly, her trees stretching their limbs to cloak her in shadow. She was enchanted by his beauty and grace, and when the sun set, she decided to reveal herself. Elak did not tremble in fear of her but loved her. For many years Tamea did not leave his side, until her brother Ma’an wondered at her absence from their Father’s table. “You are unwise to love such a creature,” Ma’an bellowed. “Give him up, Sister Tree.” Tamea denied her love, and to protect Elak she stayed away. They met again only after many years passed and it was time to bear him to Mithria. He was not angry but wept from happiness to see her again. And so Tamea placed him inside an oak tree deep within her forest so that he was of her realm and her Brother Mountain could never separate them again.
—Tamea and Elak
“Do you think it will take long?” Ennis asked. “That’s hard to say,” Manek replied as they trotted back to the Haven from the southern riverplain. “It depends on when Larn’s summon comes. And how many men come each day.”
“I thought more would come.”
“I’m happy with any help,” Manek said. “And many came. They’re worried about the Oltaraani coming back.”
“Still, you’re warlord. You shouldn’t have to ask them to help build the wall.”
He forced a laugh. “I’m not a tyrant.”
“So you keep saying.”
Dusk settled over Rising, the heavy clouds to the east streaked with lilac and blue. Manek said it would rain through the night. She was dismayed to hear it. She didn’t feel one way or another about rain, but whenever it did—which was often in the Lowlands—the Sisters spent an extra half hour offering up prayers and thanks. Renata insisted Ceralia was with them whenever the gutter was full.
She blinked hard several times to keep her eyes open. Having fallen asleep against Manek’s shoulder once already, she didn’t want to make it a habit. Days already started early in the Haven, but now hers began before dawn. It was Renata’s way of ensuring Ennis contributed to the Haven rather than shirking her duties. Though it prickled her already sore pride to admit it, Ennis understood the Sisters supported her without much recompense. Still, it had taken Lora’s intervention before she agreed to see to her Sisterly duties in the morning and evenings so that her time with Manek during the day wouldn’t become a burden to the Haven.
When they arrived, Ennis held in her sigh. They were lighting the candles in the front hall. She hadn’t missed evening prayers, despite stalling Manek over the thickness of the trees to be used.
After Manek reined in his warhorse, she touched his shoulder so that he’d listen when she said, “You don’t have to be a tyrant to command them. You’re their warlord whether or not you’re on campaign. And a leader must ask individuals to sacrifice for the benefit of the whole.”
Giving her his profile, he tried to grin, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Spoken like a true Courtnay,” he said, offering his left hand.
She took it, swinging her leg over the warhorse. Balancing on his foot, she let Manek ease her to the ground.
He kept her hand, saying, “You’ll be there tomorrow?”
“Of course,” she said, patting the warhorse’s large neck.
“Good,” he said with a smile. “I want you to see your plan come to life.”
“So do I, but you should know that if it collapses or something equally disastrous, I’ll blame it entirely on you.”
“And what if I say the plan was flawed?” he laughed.
She squeezed his hand. “It’s perfect and you know it.”
He squeezed back. “Quite so.”
“Ennis.”
They both looked, startled, at the door of the Haven, having forgotten it was there. Lora stood in the doorway wearing a worried expression.
Manek released her hand. “Good night, then,” he said.
“Good night.”
She watched him ride away, and Lora stepped from the Haven to join her.
“I must speak to you,” Lora whispered.
“Is something wrong?”
She put her hand on Ennis’s elbow and walked them a few more paces from the Haven.
“What is it?” Ennis asked.
“There’s talk.”
“What sort of talk?”
“They’re gossiping about you.”
Ennis was tempted to ask Lora to tell her something new. Of course they gossiped. For being sworn divine daughters who took vows forsaking earthly needs and interests, the six other Sisters were fast to indulge in tales, speculation, and all manner of gossip whenever Renata wasn’t within earshot. She held in her comment, however, knowing that no matter how unstable a foundation their friendship rested on lately, Lora was still her ally. Since she was away from the Haven as much as she could manage, it was invaluable to have someone telling her the news.
“What is it this time?”
Lora searched her face for a long moment. “They say you’re bedding Manek.”
Ennis took half a step back, scoffing.
“What’s worse is Renata’s caught wind. It’d be naïve to think she doesn’t have her own suspicions.” Lora closed the distance between them. “Ennis, if she thinks you’re unchaste, she’ll throw you from the Haven. And we both know she’ll do it loudly.”
Ennis sucked in a breath, her nostrils flaring. She found it difficult to tamp down the rage boiling in her heart, and she didn’t know if she’d ever hated anyone as much as she hated Renata.
“Who even made such a rule for a Ceralian Haven?” Ennis asked. “Ceralia is the divine consort! She has three children!” She began pacing, and she pointed her finger at Lora as she continued. “Renata made it up, I promise you. She thinks she can control every aspect of our lives! Mark me, she can’t tell me who I will or won’t—”
“Ennis,” Lora said, “answer the question.”
“You haven’t asked me one,” she hedged.
Lora made a face. “Are you bedding him?”
“No.”
Lora looked unconvinced. “You spend an awful lot of time with him.”
“He asked for my help!”
“Ennis, what do you know of building a wall?”
She put her hands on her hips. “I’m a fair planner, Lora. And what’s more, I can draw and write. If Manek thinks it helps him, why should I say otherwise? It gets me away from this sham of a religious house.”
“Fine then,” Lora said with pursed lips. “But you must understand how this looks. You run off almost every day, finding any excuse to be with him.”
“Don’t say it like that,” Ennis said. “I’m not trying to be with him, I’m trying to get away from here. We’re using each other.”
“And what Essa said to you has nothing to do with it?”
Her eyebrows shot up. She’d honestly forgotten Essa’s suggestion to make Manek love her. “Of course not,” she said.
“Is this a game to you? Just politics?”
“No!”
Lora heaved a si
gh. “You swear you aren’t bedding him?”
“Yes.”
“And you swear you won’t?”
The second, “Yes,” came a fraction of a moment slower than the first, and both Ennis and Lora caught it. She forced her face to remain neutral, though she worried Lora knew her well enough to read her anyway.
Ennis would be lying if she said she hadn’t thought about it. She chalked it up to spending long hours with him and missing the intimacy of having a friend. Most of her conversations with Lora ended like this one, and Irina barely spoke two words a day to her. Kenna was either hard at work at her oven or spending time with her family before Taryn had to leave with the fast-approaching spring. That left Manek.
“I don’t feel that way about him,” she said. “And besides, he helped destroy our home.” Over the past days, she’d told herself both these things over and over again.
“All right,” Lora said finally. “I believe you. But please, Ennis, for me, be careful. Don’t give them more reason to talk.”
“They’re going to talk no matter what I do.”
“Fine, then don’t give Renata a reason to banish you.”
Ennis nodded, and the two women turned back towards the Haven without saying another word to each other.
When they entered the Haven, Renata spied them from the front hall. “Ah, Ennis, so good of you to join us.”
For Lora, she swallowed the retort that jumped into her throat, instead slinking to the corner of the room furthest away from the fire and Renata.
With Lora and Ennis returned, the evening prayers began. Renata seemed to have guessed it would rain, for the prayers lasted well into the night. As the silence stretched, Ennis thought she owed Lora her thanks. She knew she did her best to shield Ennis from the worst of the Sisters’ slanderous talk, and she’d no doubt risked Renata’s disdain for holding up evening prayers.
She couldn’t catch her friend’s eye, however, until dinner. A meager soup and dry bread was passed around. She would have said something over the meal, but Renata approached just as she sat down next to Lora.
“You left so quickly this morning I hadn’t time to give you the sewing,” said Renata.
Ennis replied only after dipping the bread into the soup and biting off a large hunk. It took several moments to chew. “I didn’t know there was sewing to do.”
Renata smiled serenely. “There’s always sewing to do.”
“I’ll see to it tomorrow before I—”
“You’d best see to it now, while your fingers are warm.” She moved away before Ennis could reply.
With Renata gone, Ennis could see all the other Sisters furtively glancing at her through their lashes. She glared at all of them while she finished her dinner.
Gathering all the clothes that needed mending, Ennis set to work. She tried not to look at the pile, for it only made her want to cast everything into the fire. Concentrating hard on the stitches, as she was a rather poor seamstress, she barely noticed when the Sisters slowly slipped from the hall up to bed.
“Do you want me to help you with that?”
Ennis looked up from Sister Kanna’s nightgown to see she and Lora were the only two left in the room. Judging from the remaining height of the candles, it was past midnight.
“No, I don’t want to keep you up. One of us should get some sleep.”
Lora gave her a small, tired grin. “Good night, then.”
“Lora?” she said before she reached the threshold. “Thank you for telling me.”
“Of course.”
With that, Ennis was left in the cold, quiet hall to mend clothes. She toyed with the idea of doing a terrible job, of making sure each stitch had an inch between it and the next, but in the end, she gave it her best effort, telling herself she would sabotage the next one.
She mulled over Lora’s question for some hours as the needle went up down, up down. It was a problem she’d started to think about often. Like she told Lora, she credited her softer feelings towards Manek to the large amount of time she spent with him. Each new day made him seem more a man than a demon in the night, and she wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.
He was nothing like the lordlings back in the Highlands. He wasn’t even that much like Colm Dunstan, a man she thought she’d had strong feelings for. But here she was, sewing away in the Lowlands, not thinking of Colm—indeed, she hadn’t spared Colm a thought in sennights—but Manek. What did that say about her feelings? About her?
Manek was kind, a hard worker. He didn’t lie, didn’t boast. If anything, he was self-deprecating. And he was perhaps the most unwilling warlord she’d ever met. This hesitation to actually command his people vexed her. He was perhaps too patient, though she knew a wicked temper flared in him now and again. It was an interesting mix of traits all bottled into one man, and Ennis admitted—only to herself—that she liked more than she disliked.
Except, of course, being his warprize. Now that made her thoughts turn sour. There seemed to be a set of Midlander slave laws that even the Lowlands abided by. Manek rarely spoke of it.
Or the Haven.
He was free. She was not. She pursed her lips, happy, in a way, at that final thought. It made things easier. Nothing would happen so long as they were unequal.
Leaning her head against the wall, Ennis took a long breath and closed her eyes. She would give herself a few minutes, put another log on the fire, and continue.
“Ennis, wake up.”
She started, stunned for a moment by the delicate daylight seeping into the window. She blinked, rubbed her eyes, and groaned. The needle, just threaded, still lay on her lap.
Renata stood above her, arms crossed.
Ennis looked down at the pile and gave a sigh of relief to see that the last chemise sat in her lap. She’d almost finished.
“I was going to have you weed the garden this morning.”
“I weeded it two days ago. If there’s anything large enough to pull up this morning, then we’ll need something stronger than my hands to save the garden.”
“You’re in fine spirits this morning I see.”
Ennis grinned viciously, making sure her eyeteeth showed.
“You’ll be going with him today?”
“Yes. We start on the wall.”
Renata let out a little laugh. “I see. How patriotic of you.”
“A wall is good for everyone, Sister. You more than anyone in the Haven should know what a danger these raids are.”
Renata shrugged. “They come from the south. We’re on the northern edge. They’ve never reached us here. The Mother protects us.”
“More men will go this time. We’ll be defenseless unless they finish the wall. Then we might stand some chance.”
As she spoke, a grin grew on Renata’s face. Ennis resisted the urge to wipe it off.
“‘We might stand some chance?’ You’re beginning to sound like him.”
Ennis’s nostrils flared. “My ancestors built the greatest wall history has ever seen. I would feel better even with a few wooden poles between me and an attack.”
“And you think your wooden wall will defend where Highcrest’s crumbled?” Renata smiled to see Ennis’s mouth agape.
Ennis swallowed hard, the words a slap across her pride.
Glancing at the pile of mended clothes, Renata said, “Finish up then be off.”
“What,” Ennis said, “no floor scrubbing to do?”
“If you wish to scrub the floors before you go, by all means. But I wouldn’t keep your warlord waiting.” And with a swish of her skirts, she was gone.
Ennis had the chemise balled up and raised above her head, ready to throw into the fire, before she got hold of her anger. Taking a deep breath, she retreated across the room and smoothed out the cloth. Picked the needle back up. Sewed.
She almost twitched with impatience, wanting to be out of the Haven. She needed to leave before Renata realized she was letting Ennis go so easily.
Thoughtlessly
throwing the chemise on top of the pile, Ennis ridded herself of the underclothes and hurried down the corridor to the washroom to do her morning ablutions. She shivered when cold droplets ran into the back of her dress.
She practically ran back down the corridor, ducking into the hall for only a moment to retrieve her cloak, then was out the door into the crisp morning. Frost lay like a veil over the hills, and a thin mist was receding back towards the river. The town was quiet, many still enjoying their last hour of sleep.
Drawing the fur collar of her cloak closer to her neck, Ennis made for the southern side of Rising where they had piled the first logs. She wasn’t the only one making their way there; several sleepy men came from their homes and fell into step along various paths.
As she crested the southern hill looking down onto the narrow riverplain, Ennis saw the thick cut in the earth they had made. The past few days had been spent marking the tallest and widest trees for the wall, and several woodcutters were enlisted along with their saws and axes.
She waved and started down the hill when she saw Manek, already atop his horse. When he saw her he turned to make towards her. With the soft morning light at his back, Ennis thought him striking, moving with his horse with fluid grace. She didn’t think she’d ever met a better horseman than Manek; terrifying and bloody as the fight against she Oltaraani had been, she vividly remembered his deft command of Oren, often using just his legs to direct the warhorse, leaving his arms free.
“Good morning!” he said with a wide grin.
She greeted him with a smile and nodded behind him. “More than we thought.”
A hundred men had agreed to come, gathering around the first stack of logs while chatting and rubbing the sleep from their eyes. When she spotted Taryn, she waved to him.
“We should make a fair start today.” He noticed her blinking the grit from her eyes, and no doubt the dark circles beneath. “Are you all right?”