Wind Over Bone: The Estralony Cycle #2 (Young Adult Fantasy Romance)

by E D Ebeling

  Sarid held together her ruined dress. Yelse took off her cloak and gave it to her.

  “You did it,” said Sarid, wrapping the cloak around her.

  “That wasn’t my monster. You do seem bent on making me an enemy, though.”

  Sarid fought for words. “Leva––”

  “Leva! You think she ought to be Ravinya? People would blame you for what happened just because you’re a woman. If you must have rules, make your own. You’re welcome to my cloak.”

  Yelse walked down the path, her hair clinging to her gown in a mess of gold. Sarid just sat down on a stone and shivered.

  Gryka found her there––there was no sign of Dreida––and the two of them walked through the woods. The hound acted sad and sober, not lifting her tail, not chasing squirrels, as though she knew her mistress’s mind. Sarid suspected every tree of harboring black thoughts, and she went quickly along, convinced the oaks and beeches were coming up behind her in a menacing hedge.

  But they didn’t leave the woods for the rest of the day. The hall was worse, the people more wicked and capricious.

  It was late when they returned. Sarid slept that night in her own chamber.

  She went the next morning to Savvel’s rooms, and wondered, standing in front of the door, if he would even remember.

  She opened the door: Savvel looked up and burst into tears.

  Thirteen

  She stayed, of course. “He was weeping and weeping,” said Dreida. “Weeping and weeping.” She’d spent the night alone with him, and Sarid felt deeply guilty about it.

  “It was a mad spell,” Sarid said. She took Savvel’s hands away from his face. His eyes were their usual light gold. “You need a shave.”

  “Yoffin’s not coming back for three days,” said Dreida. “I don’t know how.”

  “I do. It can wait.” Savvel pulled his hands away from Sarid’s. “I’m not a vodlak.” He didn’t look at her. Dreida wasn’t looking at her, either, and Sarid thought that she might, in her Eldine way, have guessed at what happened.

  But Dreida caught her eye, and Sarid read something else there, saw the thin, hawk-like face and flashing look.

  “Leva,” said Sarid. “You found her in the woods.”

  Dreida’s eyes widened, and Sarid had a vision of Leva curled unnaturally against a big rock, hair matted with blood, neck broken. “She’s dead.”

  “No,” said Dreida, shaking her head. And Sarid had the same vision, except it was Leva’s horse curled against the rock, and Dreida nodded her head.

  ***

  “Beaten to death,” said Mari. “It’s true––I saw him. Welts all over. Hide foaming, made a mince of. With a switch, looked like.” She bent over her sister, who was asleep on a bed in the infirmary. “And Leva was dragged, foot in the stirrup, for I don’t know how long.” With a finger, Mari traced a long, deep cut showing through Leva’s robe. There were worse injuries; Sarid could see them like shadows through the thin fabric. Shame made it so she couldn’t look away. Small penance for her failure. She held her hands together, fingernails digging into her palms.

  “The Rileldine girl saw it,” said Mari. “She’ll have scars. She won’t care.”

  Rischa stood beside Mari. “What made her act so? You went with them?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did a blud get inside her, that she would treat her horse like that?”

  “She didn’t do it,” said Mari sharply.

  “Last autumn she wanted to burn Sarid alive.” He didn’t speak as though he were arguing, but rather more like he was lifting a sheet quickly to see if there was blood underneath.

  “She has a short temper,” said Sarid. “But she wouldn’t beat her horse or any animal. She loved her horse.”

  “Love doesn’t preclude ill treatment.” He regarded Leva as if she were a log. “And her temper is very short.”

  “She did not beat that horse to death,” said Mari. “You can’t love a horse and beat it to death.”

  “A husband will strike his wife.”

  “I hope you don’t do that and call it love.”

  Rischa flinched. “What was it, then? I understand––she’s your sister. But who beat the horse to death?”

  “A witch. It was witchcraft.”

  “You too? Well she’s right here. If you must accuse her, do it to her face.”

  “It wasn’t Sarid,” said Mari, and then she said very quickly, “It was Yelse.”

  Rischa laughed humorlessly. “Have you caught what my brother has?”

  “Yelse hates my sister.”

  “Why? Why should she hate her?”

  “Because she––Gods, Rischa, what do you think?”

  “I can’t imagine.”

  “You’re thinking ill of the wrong girl. You, who never think ill of anyone.”

  Rischa left the room, and Mari started to cry. “What’s wrong with him? He never hated her before. She looks like a smashed gourd––all green and yellow––” Mari laughed and wiped her eyes. “It was a stupid match. But Lorila was ready to split apart, and old Eliav threw him at Leva to see if he would stick. No one thought he’d be Ravyir. And now my sister’s being dragged about by horses.”

  “She should be sent away,” said Sarid. “The next time’ll be her death. Has she woken?”

  “No. Not that I’ve seen.”

  “I’ll talk to Rischa. He’s acting very strange.”

  But Sarid didn’t talk to Rischa, not that day. It unnerved her: how he’d accused Leva of beating her horse to death while looking down at her broken body.

  ***

  Later that day she was reading aloud to Savvel, who was sitting in a chair and examining his hands. Sunlight streamed through the window behind him, making his hair blaze.

  The door opened, and Yelse stepped into the parlor. She must have bewitched the guards, thought Sarid, and she set her book across the arm of her chair.

  “Sarid.” Yelse’s hair glinted in the dark of the doorway. “I didn’t think to find you here.”

  “Don’t come nearer me,” said Savvel.

  “Strange words from you,” said Yelse.

  Sarid didn’t get up from her chair. “You thought to run all three of us through with the same spear,” she said.

  “What?”

  “Did you put powdered Kelimondra into Savvel’s orange juice, and then run poor Shasi into the ground with an invisible switch? And why didn’t you kill Leva? Will I find her dead tomorrow?”

  “Why do you care about Leva?” said Yelse. “About Lorila? Corrupt, rotten Lorila, an oak so ancient only one branch puts out its diseased leaves every spring. It must die and allow other trees to take root.”

  “You see Lorila,” said Sarid. “I see the people you’re torturing.”

  “Inbred, feeble-minded people, sick of life and the waste of wealth laid before them every day.”

  “What do you know about it?” said Savvel.

  “Be quiet, madman.”

  Savvel snorted and sat upright; his hair in the sunlight seemed twice its size. “You’re not fit to call me mad. Your view of reality is so stark, so devoid of experience and history, so twisted, it’s a wonder your skin is still right side out. Now get out of my apartment, witch.” He unfolded and stretched his long legs out before him.

  Yelse stared at him, licking her lips, and he stared back. “Come with me, Sarid,” she said.

  “No,” said Sarid.

  “Speak with me in the hall, then.”

  Against her wishes Sarid found herself getting up, putting her book down, and following her sister.

  When she stepped into the hall she saw the two sentries sitting against the wall, leaning on each other, smiling in sleep.

  “Why do you have to meddle?” Sarid said, closing the door behind her. “Why can’t we just live out our lives the way we want?”

  “We aren’t allowed.” For the first time Sarid saw real anger in her sister’s face. “We’re a quarter faerie, trapped between fear and
madness, evening and night. Forget the day––it isn’t for you. Folk of the liminal places, folk like us, have two choices. Go laughing mad or crying mad.”

  “You’re bleak as a winter bog. The sun shines on us same as anyone else.”

  “I can’t feel it.”

  “You might at least try,” said Sarid. “And I’m putting it straight for you. You’ll find no ally in me.”

  “So be it.” Yelse said it so softly it might have been a breath of wind. She turned and walked away.

  ***

  Sarid heard the rumors everywhere: in the kitchens when she gathered scraps, and the cellars when she fetched wine, and the spinning room when she collected thread and buttons for mending. The cooks and potboys, the seamstresses and gamekeepers and gardeners whispered and stifled their laughter, and one afternoon Dreida, her mouth full of pins, said, “They all say he’s going to refuse her.”

  “He can’t.” Savvel lay on the grass, his head on Gryka’s stomach. Dreida and Sarid sat a few feet away on a bench beneath a big ash. “He’d alienate half the country. Leva’s the darling of Dirlan. In person she’s Queen Djain, but if Rischa snubs her he’ll have insulted the whole eastern half of Lorila. My family has ignored the Caveiras and Pashes and Eianhurts too long. So. My cousin Rochel was all set to marry Cai Eianhurt, but five years ago she dashed off with her baronet. Selya was meant to marry Rokal Caveria, but she’s gone, Ayevur rest her soul. I was betrothed to Leva, as Maryena was expected, as is the custom in the north, to marry her cousin. But then I went mad––not on purpose, I assure you! So now we’re down to the very last––Leva and Rischa, and the eastern provinces have grown used to the idea of Ravinya Leva, who will remember them.”

  “But Hilloweg,” said Dreida, “he said Dame Haek’s wits are snapping, because Rischa gave his mother’s old broach to Yelse, and that’s serious.”

  “Hilloweg?” said Savvel. “Tall footman, with the wild hair? He’s got eyes for you.”

  “It’s true, though, about the broach,” said Sarid, looking up from her notebook. She’d been writing about the restorative properties of hartstongue fern, which at the moment seemed a dull and unnecessary endeavor. “I saw her wearing it.”

  Savvel sat up and twisted to face her. “What’d it look like?”

  “A dragonfly. Silver with diamonds.”

  Savvel turned all the way around. “That was my mother’s.”

  “That’s what I said,” said Dreida, jabbing a pin into a shirt.

  “Perhaps he was careless,” said Sarid. “Has it been in your family long?”

  “No,” said Savvel, “but it was Virnrayan. Made by that Dravadha fellow. Folded an enchantment into it––it’s a proper bit of magic. You don’t give those away to your mistress. My little brother’s gone silly with love––I must talk with him.”

  ***

  So determined was he to do this that they left the little courtyard and went inside, where they learned from a page that Rischa was in the conference hall with the blue tiles.

  They came to a tall door carved with ostriches and azaleas. Standing at the door, as if to complete its theme, was a tall Southern man in a white kaftan. He’d a satin purse in his hand.

  The porter, a liveried servant with yellow stockings, bowed the Southern man inside. And then he closed the door in Savvel’s face. “I am sorry, my lord, but I cannot let you in.”

  “Why not?” said Savvel, who’d been looking hard at the Southern man.

  “There’s a lady within whose delicate constitution requires some discrimination.”

  “You discriminate in a bewildering fashion. You just let in that tall fellow with the wicked eyes––”

  “If you will pardon me saying so, sir, you have been mentioned specifically.”

  “It’s always a delight to be personally received. Tell Rischa if I can’t go in he’d better sashay his eminent arse out here.”

  The man raised his brows. “Perhaps later.”

  “You’re not going to ask him?”

  “There are rather important people in there, my lord.”

  “Gods.” Savvel sat on a bench against the wall and put his head in his hands.

  “I’ll go in,” said Sarid.

  Savvel started laughing. “You think he’ll listen to you about Yelse and Leva?”

  “We’ll find out, won’t we?” said Sarid, and Dreida sat down next to Savvel to wait.

  ***

  Slim columns rose from a blue tiled floor so that the room looked like a grove of trees standing in a pool. There must have been a function of some sort going on, because the room was packed with people, most of whom were milling about, talking. Rischa was sitting in a window with Yelse. Sarid waded through the groups of lords and ladies, and heard Yelse say to Rischa: “Have you heard what that man is selling?” She pointed at the Southern man.

  “Something exotic, by the look of him,” said Rischa.

  “Flower seeds.”

  “Flower seeds! It must be a strange, rare flower. Shall I buy you some?”

  “I don’t think so. They’re rather sinister flowers.”

  Rischa frowned. “I think I’ve heard of them.” He stood up, and Yelse too, and they walked over to where a small group of people had gathered round the Southern man. Unnoticed, Sarid went around to the other side of the group.

  “One touch,” the Southern man said, “and it creates a perfectly obedient servant.” He spoke good Lorilan. There was an unconscious arrogance in his handsome face. “We have armies of them in the South, called Anurida.”

  “We don’t need slaves,” said an old lord leaning on a cane. “Our peasants are content.”

  “You think so,” said the Southern man, nodding his head, “but they rebel in their heads. It is far better that they be consenting in the mind.”

  “A macabre idea,” said a little lady in a wimple that stood out like a sail from her head.

  “It is a beautiful idea. Fields farmed, great works built, all by useful people, happy people. Rilelden, Aindelden, humans––”

  “Girelden,” finished the old lord, sounding bored.

  “Macabre, horrid.” said the lady, shaking her head.

  “Not Girelden,” said the Southern man. “The flowers don’t work on them. An unnatural people.” He spat to the side.

  “Really?” said the old man, laughing. “I should feel marvelously lucky if I were Gireldine.”

  “Not so lucky.” The Southern man shook his head. “The flowers kill them.”

  “The flowers kill everyone,” said a lady in a snakeskin riding jacket. “I’ve heard of these. Cam Belnech. Pointless things unless you want hard work done quickly. The slaves in the South build marvelous palaces, but the workers don’t last five years.”

  “Cam what?” said Rischa. The old lord smiled, and the little lady gasped and ducked out of the circle. “What’s your name?”

  The man bowed deeply. “Namb Champorel of Miachamel, Exellency.”

  “Who would buy such a thing?”

  “My uncle, the lord of Kuli, bought some seeds,” said the lady in the snakeskin jacket. “He was curious––wanted to see what the flowers looked like.”

  “Tell the Lord of Kuli,” said Rischa, “that he’s to bring the seeds to the justice in Dagona. If he doesn’t do this within a week I’ll see him publicly whipped.”

  The lady stared at him. “A week is too short, my lord. The message wouldn’t reach him in a week.”

  “Good.” Rischa turned back to Namb Champorel of Miachamel. “You’ve one month to leave the country. Your wares are evil.”

  The man twisted his hands, and said in a meek voice, “I beg you reconsider––”

  “I won’t say it again.”

  The Southern man left with a bow that seemed more ironic than sincere, and Yelse looked after him.

  She whispered something in Rischa’s ear. He nodded and she walked towards the door.

  He looked as though he might go after her.

  “Ca
n we talk briefly?” Sarid asked, stepping in his way.

  He looked at her in surprise, and gave Yelse another glance. “What about?” he said in a cheerful voice.

  “Your behavior toward Leva has grown rather odd.” The cheerfulness slid off his face, and Sarid’s ears grew warm. “She’s laid up in the infirmary, not an inch of her without a bruise, and you’re waiting on a beggar princess.”

  “Well, Bones.” He wasn’t outwardly perturbed. Not yet. “Bolder than usual.”

  “I’m filling in for your brother.”

  “Oh.” He scratched his ear. “That makes more sense. So he’d have me give up the beggar princess and lay down where my silly uncle promised I should? Tell him that a country held together with a marriage contract isn’t a country, but a dog pit, rather.”

  She opened her mouth, shut it. “You can’t do this, Rischa,” she said finally. She wondered how far she should go. “You can’t disregard half the country’s wishes. You’ve too much responsibility. One misstep can crush cities.”

  He took a long breath. “Tall words for a girl who hasn’t traveled fifteen miles from her birthplace. At least I’ve seen the cities I’m crushing.” A note of malice had crept into his voice, and Sarid decided she ought not to try him further.

  ***

  “Well?” said Savvel, when she stepped into the quiet of the hall.

  “He won’t listen to me. Has sense enough to send away a peddler of spirit-breaking flowers, but then he turns around and talks of dog pits and his silly uncle.”

  Savvel laughed––he hadn’t laughed in a while. “I suppose I’ll have to lay a trap.” He looked past Sarid’s shoulder and stopped smiling.

  Rischa had come out just after Sarid. His eyes widened, and he turned to go back, but Savvel leapt up and caught him by the arm. “What? Won’t say hello to your brother?”

  The servant at the door made a motion toward them. “Shall I fetch––?”

  “No,” said Rischa. “Leave.” He saw Sarid and Dreida. “You too.”

  Sarid pulled Dreida around the corner, and stopped when she heard the arguing. It got louder, echoing off the stone. Dreida looked sick, so Sarid sent her back to Savvel’s apartments.