Like one of the aspects of Estarre, Lin thought. The goddess was a fierce warrior, but in another incarnation blessed the land with abundant harvest.
She was tired, Lin realized, to be thinking this way. For her mind to drift to Estarre of all the gods. She accepted the cup and drank. It was sweeter water than from the pump in the tanning district.
“My father isn’t here,” Rianna said, and took a seat across from Lin at the table. “But won’t you stay a bit? I … I loved your song last night.”
Lin was puzzled. This girl seemed excited to meet her, or nervous. “I’m honored, lady,” she said. “I wouldn’t have expected my work to be memorable, after everything else that happened.”
Rianna nodded, as if she had expected that response. In the distance, Lin heard the faraway and oddly plaintive music of wind chimes.
“I came to apologize to you and your father,” Lin said. “I expected to be in the city for some weeks, but … my plans have changed. I will be leaving after the contest.”
Rianna nodded again. “I understand. It is a pity but—I was surprised when you agreed. Of course there are things you must do. Someone like you.”
“Someone like me?”
The girl’s eyes were intent. “Tell me … how did you learn? I’ve been told—I’ve heard women can’t be poets, or study at the Academy.”
So this, then, was the root of the girl’s apparent fascination. The freakish idea of a female poet. Lin smiled a little.“What you’ve heard is true. A woman would never be permitted to study at the Academy. Women are not even allowed to set foot on the isle, by law.”
Rianna raised an eyebrow. “But how—”
Again, Lin felt her lips curl in a thin, closed smile. “A man I knew,” she said carefully, “taught me some of the elements of poets’ lore. But I know very little. All the more reason that I’m flattered your father saw fit for me to teach you.”
Rianna shrugged. “I’m sure you can guess why he’d prefer a woman to teach me.”
“Because you might get to like one of the men a bit too much,” said Lin, and was surprised when Rianna bit her lip and lowered her eyes to the tabletop.
A memory: Darien singing a song to his lady, an unknown love. And across the room, Rianna standing as if heart-struck, the hand of her fiancé grasping at hers as if the man knew—consciously or not—that she was already far away.
“Darien,” Lin said, with a rueful grin. At least after all that had happened, she could still find some source of amusement.
Rianna’s eyes widened. “Did he—”
“Of course not,” said Lin with a wave of her hand. “We don’t speak. I’m far beneath him, you know. Valanir Ocune’s bringing me into the party was a great honor. No—only that you showed something in your face when he sang last night. And besides, it couldn’t be Marlen. Or, rather,” she amended, thoughtfully, “I’d hope it wasn’t Marlen.”
“Because you don’t like him?”
“Because he would hurt you,” said Lin. “And I hope Darien doesn’t do that. I think he wouldn’t on purpose, but … what are you going to do? You have a fiancé.”
Rianna fidgeted and studied her nails, looking very young. “When Darien wins the Silver Branch, my father … he will allow it then. For us to marry.”
Lin sat back in her chair. “Oh,” she said. Marry? It seemed … almost quaint. She realized, then, how even imitating the life of itinerant poets had changed her in the past year, with their ideas about transient love.
“The poet who taught you what you know,” Rianna said. “Where is he now?”
“Gone,” said Lin. “As you can see, we did not marry. But I’m not beautiful like you.”
“I’ve seen a lovely likeness of you,” said Rianna. She drew a breath, let it out slowly. “The way you are now—that is a choice. I’ve seen how you can appear—Kimbralin Amaristoth.”
It was a good thing, Lin thought, that she was sitting. Somehow she kept her voice casual. “It’s true that wealth can buy a woman some beauty. And a well-paid painter is liable to be kind with the brush. Choice? There I disagree, lady—I do not have a choice in the way that you mean.”
And now Lin saw that Rianna had been holding the tiny canvas all along, but reversed so that Lin couldn’t see it. She turned it over. “This came with a note, asking that we report to Vassilian immediately if we see you.”
It had been painted three years before, when Lin turned nineteen. To send to potential suitors. In the picture she was clad in a violet so dark it was almost black, setting off the elegant pallor of her skin, her kohl-rimmed eyes. A corset cinched in her waist, a contrast to the billowing swirls of skirt that seemed to devour the rest of the canvas. A window sent in shafts of sunlight to touch one cheek. She recalled her brother’s instructions to the painter: Make her fit to be fucked, by all the gods, and you’ll be paid handsomely for it.
For three days she had stood for hours in that dress, before the open casement, with instructions to be still. The artist sometimes swore under his breath as he worked, especially if she dared scratch an itch.
Looking at it now, Lin felt worlds away from that time, from that room, from the shadows that closed in on the girl in the picture like a lingering caress.
“I haven’t seen this in some time,” she said at last.
“Last night I guessed,” said Rianna. “I don’t think anyone else has.”
“I very much hope not,” said Lin, wondering at the calm in her own voice. “My brother is looking for me.”
“You know a secret of mine now,” said Rianna. “I will trust you, and you can trust me. Only—why would you do this?”
She didn’t specify what she was asking about, but Lin knew. Why a life sleeping on straw, with no home and barely even a set of clothes? Why appear at a merchant’s party and pretend to be no more than the dirt beneath his shoe?
“Please keep this between us,” said Lin, letting the why hang between them. “Not even my partner knew my identity. If you want me to teach you in the time we have … if you want me to live … say nothing of this.” Her stomach was churning. No one had said that name to her, Kimbralin, in nearly a year.
Rianna was looking up at her. Lin had risen to her feet. In the younger woman’s eyes she read a kind of anxiety and excitement that struck at a buried chord in her. It was suddenly so familiar. And Lin knew Master Gelvan was not like her brother, and yet she was still afraid.
“In exchange for your secrecy, I will teach you more than poetry,” Lin heard herself say. She drew the knife from her sleeve and let it fly. Spinning, the blade thunked into the wood paneling of the wall.
Rianna let out a gasp.
“Don’t worry—it’s a thin blade, I doubt your father will notice the mark,” said Lin. Crossing the room, she drew the knife from the wall, held it up for inspection. Of her few possessions, her knife was the only thing she truly cared for. It could be deadly to do otherwise. Lowering it now, she looked at Rianna, saw shock and possibly fear in the girl’s face. She said, “Even a lady of Amaristoth learns the art of blades. You should know these skills, as well.”
CHAPTER
7
EARLY morning mist was stealing across the slate rooftops of Tamryllin, gently flooding the groves of pine, oak, and cypress trees beyond the city walls. Rianna’s father jokingly referred to her bedchamber as her “tower,” for the windows commanded the best view in the house. As a child, she had spent hours at a time gazing from the window, watching wind ripple the trees and birds cascade overhead.
Below, she could hear the song of wind chimes from the garden. It was the sound of home. The breeze, the chimes, the carpet under her feet—all of these were home. It was only now, at the thought of leaving these things, that she even noticed them.
But even without Darien, she had little choice about leaving. The box on her bedside table was a reminder of that.
Her father had never allowed her to go to the Midsummer Masque. It was a night of debauchery, and s
ometimes outbursts of violence. This year, Rianna would be going for the first time. But not alone. Nestled in the box beside her bed was a mask of exquisitely wrought gold, encrusted with sapphires and rimmed with blue velvet. Peacock feathers were caught at the top, to stream up and away from the wearer’s face.
It was breathtakingly extravagant, and the message could not be more clear. Yet Ned had not left her interpretation to chance, instead enclosing a note. In this color, I picture you Irine of the Lakes, he had written. You know the one.
She did. It was one of the most famous of the old ballads. In saving a prince from drowning, Irine of the Lakes, queen of the water nymphs, had joined the world of men.
And more practically, the color matched her eyes.
When she thought of Ned, she wondered why, for her, love had to be such a painful thing. But she was also a little angry with him. He had left her no choice. She knew it was not in the way of things for her to have a choice, and still, sometimes, she was angry.
She thought of Lin fleeing a home that was one of the finest in Eivar. The Amaristoth family in their northern castle were known for the vast extent of their wealth and their impeccable lineage.
Rianna had heard tell of other things too: that they lived in the far north, despite deriving their income from estates in the southwest, because icewater flowed in their veins instead of blood.
Lin did not seem like ice. She seemed wounded, even in the way she walked, as if she navigated carefully to avoid a pain. But her voice recalled the song of a caged bird. Rianna wanted to ask her so many questions—about her brother, about the poet who had taught her what she knew. She knew it would be rude to ask any more.
She thought of the knife that had thudded into the wall of her father’s solar, of the sudden flash in Lin’s eyes, the instinctive baring of teeth. Perhaps women did have choices sometimes. Rianna didn’t know techniques of the knife, but she would soon be hurting Ned just the same.
* * *
IN daylight, Master Gelvan’s study was revealed as surprisingly simple. The only evidence of wealth was in the rows of bookshelves that lined the walls, for which Marlen imagined he must have paid several fortunes. Otherwise, a serviceable desk and chair and some tapestries were the only adornments in the room. Master Gelvan had to call in a woman to bring a second chair for Marlen.
Marlen was careful not to look at the tapestry shielding the back wall, where he had discovered the shrine … and just as damning, the books written in a language that was not only extinguished in Eivar but forbidden.
Today Master Gelvan was attired without finery. Marlen would have expected a Galician to dangle jewels from every available limb, but realized that he had never actually met one before this. And perhaps their love of money was revealed in more subtle ways.
Marlen’s own father would have undoubtedly remarked that this lack of ornamentation could be attributed to the perversity of the Galician mind. Thwarting people’s expectations for hidden purposes.
“May I offer you wine, my lord Humbreleigh?” said the merchant.
“I will gladly accept,” said Marlen.
Again the woman was sent for, and returned with two glasses of wine on a pewter tray. It was a dark red verging on purple, Marlen saw; a taste confirmed it as an especially fine vintage of the south.
This gave him satisfaction. It meant the old man had taken note of Marlen’s lineage and was groveling in a predictably Galician manner.
“I know your father,” Master Gelvan said as he sat at the chair behind his desk and motioned to Marlen to take the second chair—which, unlike the merchant’s, was padded with an embroidered cushion. Running a hand through his greying blond hair, the merchant—who seemed perpetually weary—studied the garnet facets of the wine against the summer sunlight that streamed from the window. “And knowing him,” he continued, in an even tone, “I must say I’m surprised that you are here. To cross my threshold is to enter the lair of the Dark One himself, is it not? That enemy which, to my limited understanding, the Three are always battling?”
Marlen blinked. “I am … not my father,” he managed, and set down his wine. And then was immediately angry to be so abused by this—when all was said and done—exceedingly common merchant.
“Most of my family fell by the sword, in an attack led by the company of Lord Percy of Humbreleigh,” said Master Gelvan, in a calm, even monotone. “It was one of the last of the massacres, just as what was left of my people were crossing the border into Kahishi, attempting to escape. My mother did escape, after being raped. Thus do I have a dark-haired sister, the sight of whom reminded my mother every day of what she had lost. And yet I still found myself interested in what you might have to say to me, lord. Particularly since you included in your note that it is a matter of urgency.”
“I can’t help it if you’re bitter about the past,” said Marlen. This was just the sort of complaining—the endless whinging—for which Galicians had come to be hated in the first place.
A half-smile tugged at the corner of the merchant’s mouth. “Yes,” he said. “I suppose I am bitter about the murder of my father and the rest of my family. And all their friends. We Galicians are so odd in that way.” He took another, contemplative sip of his wine. His pale eyes fixed on Marlen. “So, before I decide that I’ve wearied of this encounter—to what do I owe the pleasure?”
Focus, Marlen urged himself. It would not do to allow this man to provoke him. He was no more than a pawn in a larger game. And if Marlen chose, he could see the merchant drawn and quartered in the streets of Tamryllin.
Out in the garden, a bird was singing.
“I know your secret,” said Marlen, without the preamble he had been planning.
The merchant didn’t react. He simply waited.
“If you do as I ask—a small request—I will hold my silence,” said Marlen. “If not, I will reveal to the authorities that you continue to worship your false Galician god.”
Master Gelvan leaned back in his chair. “And how would you prove such a charge?”
“I have proof,” said Marlen. “You would find out what it is in due course, should you force me to exercise that option.”
“And what do you desire in return for this—secrecy, Lord Humbreleigh?” said Master Gelvan. In only one way did he seem changed, in that he appeared more tired than ever.
Now it came. Marlen had pictured this moment many times in his mind, but now … He clutched his wineglass in an unsteady hand, without the graceful precision in which he took pride, and drank deep until it was done. Feeling greater resolve as he set the glass down again, he said, “You are one of the judges of the contest, are you not?”
“Yes,” said Master Gelvan. “Let me guess: you want to win.”
“Indeed,” said Marlen. “But for that, I need nothing from you nor from anyone—except, of course, the grace of our goddess Kiara. If I may invoke her name in this house.”
“Your sarcasm is tiresome,” said Master Gelvan. “Please proceed.”
Once more, Marlen hesitated. Later, he would remember that he had done so, cling to it as if it were proof of something that mattered. But it was only a hesitation before he told the merchant, clearly and with his accustomed precision restored, what he would have to do to avoid being torn apart by galloping horses outside the high court of Tamryllin.
The merchant listened without expression. Only when Marlen was done did Master Gelvan say, almost conversationally, “It is well for you that the faith of Galicia prohibits me from the sin of murder. Something you Ellenicans would have done well to adopt.”
Marlen could have told him that the idea of a middle-aged merchant killing a swordsman of Humbreleigh was a joke, and in poor taste at that. But in assessing this man, who had taken a threat to his life with such composure, he did not. Instead he rose to his feet, bared his teeth in a smile. “On the contrary, merchant,” said Marlen. “Killing is all too rare a pleasure as it is.”
* * *
WHEN he stumb
led out of the merchant’s house moments later, Marlen knew he would not be returning to the Ring and Flagon, at least not yet. His steps took him away from the broad streets of the city center, from the roses and the jasmine and honeysuckle that seemed to spring up around the smooth white stone in such abundance.
It was a dark warren of streets into which he ventured now, where rickety structures blocked the sun. Most were of wood, a danger if a fire were to break out in the city, as one indeed had a century earlier. It was here, in streets such as these, that corpses had lately been discovered, their blood drained. At last he came to a house with no door, where he was free to enter and ascend the creaking stairs, two at a time.
She opened the door for him immediately. Her full lips curled in a satisfied smile—or triumphant, he thought, which made him angry. Coils of dark hair framed her wide cheekbones, spilled over her half-exposed breasts. “I knew you would be back,” she said.
He slapped her face.
Reeling and laughing at the same time, Marilla drew Marlen into the room, kicked the door shut. Her kiss was warm and urgent and sharp with her teeth. When she drew back, he saw the red imprint of his hand on her skin. She was milky white as a demon-woman, he thought, not for the first time.
Marilla’s nails dug into his neck. “Show me you still have it in you,” she murmured.
And for a long time after that, he did.
* * *
IT was like Marlen to disappear for a day—sometimes even days at a time—but his vanishing so close to the contest irritated Darien. While they enjoyed maintaining the illusion that they did not practice, the truth was they had played together most nights since arriving in Tamryllin. And to be sure, they sounded perfect. But never had it mattered so much.
He was sitting in the Ring and Flagon, ignoring the tumult of excited poets around him.
Last Song Before Night Page 7