by Melanie Rawn
“What Chiana proposed just before you entered the pavilion. Kill him.”
Rohan stopped and turned on her. “Pandsala—”
“Hear me out, my lord! Please! I have killed using faradhi means before, we both know it.”
“So has Sioned,” he snapped. “That doesn’t mean either of you will do it again, and especially not now!”
“She has?” This was news to Pandsala, who reminded herself to rethink her opinion of the High Princess. “Then she will understand. I will do it, my lord, you can blame it all on me—and punish me as you see fit afterward. Masul is no son of my father—and even if he were, I couldn’t endure seeing him in Pol’s place at Castle Crag.”
“Stop this! No more!”
“My lord, it is the only way.” She grasped his arm, feeling the strong muscles beneath the shirt. “All of this is my fault. Chiana was right about that. If I had not conspired with Ianthe and then with Palila, none of this would be happening. The responsibility is mine. I accept it freely. I will kill Masul by Sunrunner means in full sight of everyone. You and Andrade both will have the punishment of me—and if it’s death, then so be it.”
For a wonderful instant she thought he was tempted. But then he snarled, “I won’t hear any more of this!” He pulled away from her, boot heels crunching angrily in the sand.
“Rohan, please!” She caught up again, seizing his hand in both her own this time, so hard that his topaz ring dug into her palm. The noon sunlight swept across his hair and brow, gilding his already golden fairness, sinking his eyes into shadow. “With Masul dead, and with me punished however you like, there would be no more danger to Pol!”
“With Masul dead, there would always be doubts! If this were a viable alternative, I would have done it myself. Do you think I require others to do my killing for me? I managed quite well enough killing your father!” He wrested his hand from hers, closed both palms on her shoulders. “What you’re saying is madness. You know it, I know it. Goddess witness that I’m close to a kind of madness myself. Listen to me, Pandsala. Masul cannot die until everyone believes not in him but in Pol! Once that happens, his death is certain—but not because he challenged me. I can’t be the one to kill him, and neither can you!”
“What difference would it make?” she cried. “I’ve killed for Pol often enough before!”
For a moment Rohan did not fully comprehend. Then, slowly, he searched her desperate, passionate dark eyes, and the gold of his face paled to gray, like ashes. His fingers dug painfully into her flesh. “What are you saying?” he breathed. “What have you done?”
Pandsala faced him, excitement like strong wine in her blood, and told him the truth of the last fourteen years.
Rohan listened, unbelieving, to the frightful catalog of her crimes. In growing horror he heard the words pour forth, Pandsala’s feverish voice and wild eyes giving frantic reality to things out of nightmares. At last she panted to a halt, hands clenched on his chest, Sunrunner’s rings and his own gift of amethyst and topaz winking mockingly at him in the sunlight.
She had killed for Pol before. Not just that archer, living torch on the battlements of Castle Crag. Oh, no. And how efficiently, how logically she had chosen whom to kill, and how.
Naydra’s unborn son—her own sister’s child—had been the first, murdered in the womb a year after Pandsala had become regent. Naydra had nearly died of the miscarriage. But with no heir, Port Adni would revert to Kiers on Lord Narat’s death. And Kierst was ruled by Pol’s kinsman.
Another sister, Cipris, had been murdered by slow poison lanced through the parchment of her private letters. Proposed wife of Clutha’s heir, Cipris had died before she bore a male of Roelstra’s line who might one day challenge Pol.
Then Obram of Isel. Saumer’s only son had married Volog’s daughter Birani; there had been no issue of the marriage before his drowning off the Iseli coast one spring. His sister Hevatia, wife of Volog’s heir, had already borne the child who, with Obram’s death, became heir to both princedoms. A united Kierst and Isel would one day be ruled by Pol’s kinsman.
Lady Rusalka had died in a hunting accident shortly before her marriage. Lady Pavla had succumbed to a necklace with poison-tipped prongs barely a year after her marriage to Prince Ajit of Firon. Both women had been Pandsala’s half sisters, and both had been killed for the same reason as Cipris.
There were more. Lord Tibayan of Lower Pyrme, resisting cooperation with Davvi on regulation of port fees and other matters along with the Syrene border with Ossetia, had paid for his intransigence with his life. So had Lady Rabia of Catha Heights, whose death in childbed delivering her third daughter had come just after her husband had blocked construction of a port at the mouth of the Faolain, a primary trade objective of both Syr and the Desert. Patwin had been much more pliable since his wife’s death. Doubtless Pandsala had had this in mind when she’d killed another sister.
And yet another, two years ago—Lady Nayati, who had fallen to the knife of what had appeared to be a common street bandit in Waes while on a visit to Kiele. She, too, would produce no male heirs to challenge Pol.
This very New Year’s Holiday, while Rohan and Sioned were planning the progress through a Princemarch conquered by Pol’s smile, Pandsala had been busy conquering Firon through Ajit’s death. She had grown impatient; she could not wait for the old man to die a natural death, and had hastened him to it with poisoned wine that had seized his heart and stopped it.
Finally, this spring, there had been Inoat and Jos of Ossetia. Dead in a boating accident on Lake Kadar, leaving Chale’s niece Gemma the only choice as heir to the princedom. And with it rumored that Kostas would wed Gemma, was it any wonder that Inoat and Jos had died? Small matter that Tilal and not Kostas would be Gemma’s husband and prince; the effect was the same, another princedom ruled by another of Pol’s kinsmen.
Pandsala had set her sights on Kiele this year. Unable to prevent the marriage to Lyell, which had occurred before Pandsala’s regency, for some reason Pandsala had let Kiele live long enough to produce a son and daughter. But this year she had been singled out for death when she had championed Masul.
And other proposed murders? None other than Ianthe’s sons. Their names were known, but not their location. Though nothing had been heard of them since Feruche had burned to the ground, Pandsala was convinced that they lived. She had sought Ianthe’s sons for years, would search for them as long as she had breath—until or unless proof positive came that they were as dead as their mother. For these three, more than any other of Roelstra’s grandchildren, would crave lands, castles, princedoms, power—and Pol’s death.
Eleven deaths accomplished in less than fifteen years. And not a hint, not a breath of rumor, had ever been heard that they had been anything other than sad accidents or natural deaths. Nothing had ever connected them with the woman who looked up at him now, her fists pressed to his chest.
Rohan stared into Pandsala’s fevered dark eyes. Sweat dappled her forehead. It was hot here in the sun, but the fire raging in her was even hotter.
Rohan tried to breathe around the horrible constriction in his chest. “Oh, sweet Goddess—why?” The question was a deathly whisper, harsh and hopeless. And with all the other truths revealed, he now heard the most terrible of all.
“For the son she gave you—the son that should have been mine!”
Panic leaped up and was beaten back with violent speed—for if she knew, he had to keep his wits, not give in to fear or rage or anything else that might destroy the sudden balance he sensed between them. It was a sick and twisted equilibrium, with Pol as its fulcrum: Rohan’s love weighted against Pandsala’s lies. But in understanding it, he found strength to preserve it.
For he must protect that balance at all costs. He had given her power and Princemarch and her pride, and she had responded with unswerving devotion to depleting the ranks of those who might oppose Pol. That this loyalty had taken so hideous a form was his payment for having used her so well,
for having been so blind.
Blazing from Pandsala’s dark eyes was hatred that had never been directed at Rohan. It was not directed at him now. By rights his rejection of her for Sioned ought to have earned her hatred. It had not. How could she hate the man who had given her a life, the man whose son she had worked for these many years? No, Rohan did not figure on the list of her hates.
Her father, yes, for exiling her to Goddess Keep. Sioned, who had Rohan’s heart and body and mind. Ianthe, who had borne his son. These three she hated. But Rohan saw something more in Pandsala’s eyes. She hated them because he had spent more of himself on them than he ever had on her. Jealousy was the core of her hate. Jealousy of Roelstra, whom Rohan had battled; of Sioned, whom he loved; of Ianthe, who had carried his child. They had claimed him and Pandsala could not.
So she had claimed his son’s future. Murdered to show her love, twisted other lives to keep him safe. Created much of the world Pol would inherit, a legacy of blood and hate.
Roelstra’s daughter.
Andrade had warned him, all those years ago. So had Tobin, and Chay, and Ostvel. But Rohan had been too sure of his own cleverness. Too arrogant in his own power to consider what use she might make of hers. Too willing to believe that she would work to the best of her abilities for Pol’s cause in Princemarch.
Oh, yes, she had worked. To the best of her considerable abilities.
He could not speak, mortally afraid of saying anything to upset this terrible balance between them, which if overset might turn her against him and Pol. She held power over him that terrified and infuriated him. But he was as incapable of killing her now as he had been of killing Ianthe years ago at Feruche. Coward! he accused himself, and had to answer, Yes.
Pandsala’s low, intense voice clawed at him. “His eyes—they might be mine, you know, in shape if not in color. There’s something about him—things that don’t speak of her but of me. I saw it in him from the first. He should have been ours, Rohan, not hers! She doesn’t deserve him. I’ve seen how he looks at her with such love—love that should have been mine—”
“She—” He choked and like a swordstroke to his heart the knowledge was in him: She doesn’t know. And abruptly the balance shifted to him. That one truth was more powerful than all her lies. She believed Pol to be Sioned’s son. She did not know about Ianthe. And as the power surged in him, strong and deadly as Sioned sometimes described the flare of Sunrunner’s power, he knew he would use that truth as ruthlessly as Ianthe herself would have done.
“I’ve thought of him as ours,” Pandsala went on softly, almost dreamily. “When she’s not nearby I can believe he’s yours and mine. No mother in blood could love him more, want more for him. If you think what I’ve done is horrible, then think what his life would have been had I not acted. All those rivals that might have come from my sisters’ marriages—I rid him of most of them and I’m glad! He’ll be High Prince and faradhi and the most powerful man who ever lived! Think what I’ve done out of love for him, Rohan, things she would never have done!”
Her eyes glittered with enchantment at her work on Pol’s behalf, actions that would haunt his manhood as High Prince and faradhi. The balance between that clean, proud boy on one side and this terrible blood-soaked woman on the other was suddenly intolerable.
“Sioned would never have done such things,” Rohan said quietly. “But Ianthe would.”
Pandsala stared at him without comprehension.
“Your sister! Pol’s mother!” he shouted, shaking her until her head lolled on her neck, long hair tumbling about her face. “Did you think she lured me to Feruche and kept me there to indulge in common torture? Why do you think she let me go? She was pregnant with my son! The child you claim to love is the child of the sister you hate! Pol is Ianthe’s son—and mine!”
Pandsala let out a keening moan and crumpled to her knees, huddled over, rocking back and forth with her arms clasped around her chest as if to hold her body together. Rohan stood over her and spoke words that splintered even the broken shards of her.
“The first time, I thought she was Sioned. The second time it was rape. I knew exactly who she was and what I was doing. She kept me there until she was sure, and then laughed and let me go. I went to battle, knowing that my son was in her belly. Sioned knew it, too—she waited, waited—and then went to Feruche to take the child, and razed the castle to the ground. How does it feel to know you’ve worked and schemed and murdered on behalf of Ianthe’s son?”
Pandsala had killed children. Naydra’s unborn son, Jos of Ossetia who had been only a little boy. She had left other children fatherless, motherless; she had taken children from old men, and women who could bear no more.
She had done it for hatred of Roelstra, rejoicing that a prince not of his blood would rule his lands, that heirs of his line would never sit at Castle Crag. She had done it for love of Rohan, rejoicing that the man her father and Ianthe had hated would rule Princemarch. And now she knew that the boy who had been her revenge was of Roelstra’s blood and Ianthe’s bearing. She gave a sob that sounded like her last breath and sank her fingers into her coiled hair, rocking from side to side.
“What you’ve done—Goddess—what you’ve done will burden him for the rest of his life,” Rohan said. “But you will burden him no longer.”
She looked up at that, face swollen with congealed horror and the tears that welled in her eyes but did not fall. “If I have to die, let me die for a purpose,” she choked.
“What purpose? Killing Masul?” He wanted to demand why, if she was so loyal to Pol, she had not killed Masul long before this. But he knew that if she could have, she would have. “Oh, no. He lives until he’s proven a liar. I’ll not spend the rest of my life hearing doubts of Pol’s claim to Princemarch.” He smiled thinly. “And it’s rather a good claim, don’t you agree?”
She slumped, her hair straggling about her, and in the sunlight he saw the streaks of white through it. “Then kill me now,” she said tonelessly.
“Pol can’t afford it. If I put you on trial and you’re condemned as you deserve, the burden on him will be the greater. So I won’t kill you.” But, Goddess, how I’d like to, and with my bare hands. . . . “Perhaps I’m the coward Chiana thinks I am. But after what you’ve done—I think the better death for you is the kind your father condemned you to years ago. I won’t send you to Goddess Keep. You’ll retire quietly to a manor somewhere—perhaps I’ll rebuild Feruche for you,” he suggested viciously. “Would you like to supervise its reconstruction, Pandsala? Would you?”
A shudder of loathing went through her. Still, she had courage enough to meet his gaze. “Whatever you wish, my lord. I am yours now, as I always have been.”
“I don’t accept such gifts as you offer. Do you even understand what you’ve done? Do you?”
“I know that I did it all for the best, for Pol. For you. I loved you both. Goddess help me, I still do. I regret nothing.”
“You will. Believe me, in the years ahead, while you watch the Long Sand from Feruche, you will know what regret is.”
He knew it now himself, for he could not kill her even though every fiber of him screamed for her death. It would be nothing more than justice for all the murders she had done, all the men and women and children she had destroyed in Pol’s name. He was momentarily tempted. But the barbarian in him was the victor, pulling in harness for once with the civilized prince. Condemning her to a living death immured at Feruche was infinitely more cruel than if he had indeed thrust a knife through her heart. More vicious, and more practical.
No, he would not kill her, and he could not expose her crimes. He would have to live with this. And so would she.
“Get up,” he ordered. When it seemed she had no strength to rise, he took her by the elbows and yanked her to her feet. She stumbled, scraped her hair back, and went down to the river to wash the stains of emotion from her face. Rohan watched impassively, wanting nothing so much as her death. He now understood the impulse as
his own shame at having been so wrong, so fatally wrong. Was that truly what he couldn’t stand? That he could make so hideous a mistake? He wished he could seek Sioned’s counsel. But he forbade himself that comfort, that sure understanding. Forever.
When Pandsala had tidied her hair and smoothed her skirts, Rohan started back to the encampment. He heard her half-stumbling footsteps behind him. Wherever he was, whatever exile he condemned her to, he knew he would hear those footsteps behind him for the rest of his life—tripping over corpses.
Prince Lleyn required not only the support of his cane but that of his son’s strong arm as he made his way into Rohan’s pavilion. Chadric settled his father in a chair and stood beside him, his face carefully schooled to neutrality. Lleyn’s expression was perfectly easy to read; he voiced both annoyance and curiosity at once.
“Very well, I’m here. Now tell me what it is that can’t wait another instant.”
Rohan stood before the old man. “Forgive me for summoning you here,” he began quietly.
“You wouldn’t have made it an order from the High Prince unless it was necessary. Tell me, damn it!”
“I need a great favor from you, my lord. From both you and Prince Chadric.” He hesitated, then cast a glance at Sioned. Her head was bent, her fingers laced tightly together in her lap, her body utterly still. He had kept his promise to himself, had told her nothing. And how she resented it.
Returning his gaze to Lleyn, he went on, “Firon desires a prince descended from its own royalty. I ask you now if you would do me the favor of considering your grandson Prince Laric for that position.”
Lleyn’s parchment skin flushed slightly across the cheekbones and he fixed Rohan with a hard, questioning glare. But it was Chadric who spoke, his voice as bewildered as his expression.
“Laric? Why? Your son’s claim is much stronger, coming through both you and Princess Sioned—”
“Be still,” Lleyn whispered. His gaze now read into Rohan’s soul. It was a very long time before he spoke in a voice like the rustling of dry leaves. “I thought Firon settled on Pol. Something has changed your mind. Something that occurred today. I do not believe it was the vote, but if that is the reason you wish to give, then I will accept it.”