ONCE, A KING ADORED HER…
He stepped forward. “You know who I am?”
The black-garbed figure crouched like a spider before a blazing hearth. Roderic could hear the wind howl outside the building. “Who would not know the Heir of all Meriga?”
“I do not know you, Lady.”
She laughed, a hoarse, pitiful laugh. “You are the first to call me that in an age, Prince. I am Nydia, and this dark place is my home.” Her arms extended in a wide sweep. Where fingers should be, three curved digits ended in long claws.
“Strong Arthurian themes thread their way through this novel… an interesting story with intriguing concepts.”
—Kliatt on Daughter of Prophecy
“An engaging and powerful tale of kingship, prophecy and friendship.”
—VOYA on Daughter of Prophecy
ALSO BY ANNE KELLEHER BUSH
Daughter of Prophecy
PUBLISHED BY
WARNER BOOKS
Copyright
WARNER BOOKS EDITION
Copyright © 1996 by Anne Kelleher Bush
All rights reserved.
Aspect is a registered trademark of Warner Books, Inc.
Warner Books, Inc.
Hachette Book Group
237 Park Avenue
New York, NY 10017
Visit our website at www.HachetteBookGroup.com
First eBook Edition: September 2009
ISBN: 978-0-7595-2659-4
Contents
ONCE, A KING ADORED HER…
Copyright
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Epilogue
About the Author
For Josephine Putnam Vernon—
Josie, dearest of friends—
Your imagination fed my dreams.
Acknowledgments
The original incarnation of this book was the first thing I attempted after a writing hiatus of eleven years. My sincere gratitude goes to the members of the Stroudsburg Writer’s Group: Charlie Rineheimer, Pat Knoll, Mitzi Flyte, Juilene Osborne-McKnight, and Christine Whittemore Papa for their long-suffering patience with my numerous drafts while I struggled to get it right. Carol Svec, Lorraine Stanton, and Nancy McMichael were particularly generous with their time and unstinting in their constructive criticism. Without the support of their love and their friendship, this book would not exist, and I wouldn’t be a writer. Karen Lee, Lin Norsworthy, Betsey Massee, and Judith Warner were kind enough to give me readers’ impressions. Betsy Mitchell finally got this manuscript pointed in the right direction. Special thanks also to Kathy Tomaszewski, who helped me keep my house and my sanity while I rewrote the book, and, last, but never, never least, to my children, Katie, Jamie, Meg, and Libby, for having accepted the fact that their mother spends more time than they do playing make-believe.
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania
May, 1995
Prologue
Gost, 74th Year in the reign of the Ridenau Kings (2746 Muten Old Calendar)
The girl hovered, hesitant, behind the oak tree at the edge of the forest glade. Her patched tunic, all shades of green and brown and black, and bare, tanned legs rendered her nearly invisible in the shadows. She watched the wounded man lean his head wearily against the ribbed trunk of another ancient tree, his shattered leg at a rigid angle to his body.
The barest breeze ruffled his hair, gray as the steel of the dagger he clutched in one white-knuckled hand. Despite his age, which must be more than sixty, his back was as straight as the broadsword strapped across it. His leathery cheeks were pale, his lips thinned in a grimace, and he clenched his teeth to hold back another moan. It had been some time since his companion had ridden off in the direction of the fortress called Minnis Saul.
A black-and-yellow bee buzzed close to her ear. Thin needles of light penetrated the leafy canopy overhead, suffusing the whole glade with a green glow. A bird trilled once, twice, and was silent. Annandale gripped the rough bark. Life pulsed beneath her fingertips in steady, sweeping waves, and her heart slowed of its own accord as it adjusted to the tree’s rhythm. She breathed in the sweet scent of the sap and clung to the tree’s deep-rooted strength.
The man groaned, a low, animal sound deep in his chest, his brow furrowed with age and pain. She knew who he was. He was the King—the King of all Meriga. Abelard Ridenau. She had often watched him riding through the forest at the hunt. But this day, his horse had stumbled into a hidden sinkhole left by an uprooted tree, and the animal lay dead some feet away from the King, its neck broken in the fall.
She shifted uneasily as the echo of his anguish reached across the glade, licking at her like the tendrils of ghostly flames. A twig snapped beneath her foot and instantly he was alert.
“Who is it?” He pulled himself straighter and raised his dagger, the other hand reaching behind his head for the hilt of his sword. “Show yourself.”
She flattened against the trunk. Now what? Her mother had forbidden her to speak to anyone who might invade the forest. She could try to run, but she had often seen the King throw his dagger with frightening accuracy at even the smallest prey.
“Go on, child.” The rasp startled her even more than the King’s realization of her presence. She turned, back pinned to the tree, and gasped at the sight of her mother’s squat figure wrapped, as always, in dense layers of black veiling despite the late summer heat. Her mother never ventured so far from the safety of their remote tower.
“Mother?” she mouthed.
“Go on.” The figure gestured awkwardly beneath her wraps. “You’re eighteen. The time has come for you to meet your father, and for him to understand what you are.”
Annandale peered around the tree. The King had risen into a partial crouch on his uninjured leg. His eyes darted back and forth.
“My father? The King is my father?” This time she spoke more loudly, and beneath Abelard’s repeated command to show herself, her mother answered.
“You know he needs you.”
Annandale swallowed hard. Questions swirled through her mind and were discarded, meaningless, as the tendrils of pain twined ever more insistently about her, as if she were caught in a spider’s web. Uncertainly, she sidled around the sheltering tree. She glanced back at her mother, her heart pounding in expectation. Only once before had she healed—a messenger, riding hard and alone, who had begged for a drink of water, and a bandage to bind his arm. She would never forget how she had been drawn to that man, just as she was now to this one, not simply by the pain, but by the sense of brokenness, the overwhelming knowledge that something was out of order and the certainty that she, and she alone, had the power to set things right. But at what cost? whispered a voice in her mind. At what cost to you? Her gaze dr
opped from the King’s rigid face to his leg, where the broken bones gleamed whitely through the torn skin and the fabric of his riding breeches was dark with clotting blood.
Abelard frowned as she appeared. Wary amazement washed over his face, but he did not relax his guard. “Girl. Who are you? Where did you come from?”
She pushed a lock of her long, dark hair back from her face, wishing suddenly she was dressed like her mother in protective wraps, or anything more substantial than her ragged, shapeless tunic. “From our tower in the forest.”
“Put down your dagger, Lord King. He who lives by the sword, dies by it.” Her mother’s voice was a guttural croak. She stepped into the center of the glade, her black draperies slithering through the underbrush. “Would you cut your own daughter’s throat, Lord King?”
At that, Abelard fell back, but he still clutched the dagger defensively. “This is my daughter? Who are you?”
“Don’t you remember me, Lord King? You knew me well enough, once.”
“Nydia?” he whispered. “Is it you?” The dagger fell to the ground as he extended his hand. “Why are you veiled so?”
“To spare my daughter—our daughter, Lord King—from the pain of what I’ve become. But no matter. I thought it time you learned what she is.”
“Have you forgotten my name in all these years, Nydia?” Regret and something that might have been hope flickered across his face.
“Your name? Your name’s nothing but a curse. Annandale will help you, and then we’ll be on our way.”
“Help me?” he repeated. He looked at Annandale. “Come closer, child. Let me see you.” He spoke more gently this time, but his authority was clear.
Annandale advanced. The strands of pain felt as if they had turned to shards of glass, which burrowed deeper the closer she came. Her own leg began to throb; her own bones seemed to be perilously close to splintering beneath the fragile skin, where it seemed her own blood bubbled at the bursting point. Part of her recoiled from the pain, scrabbling back like a hunted animal. Mother, let this pass, she screamed silently, let me turn away, let me go home. What is this man to me?
But something else kept her walking forward, her shoulders squared, her chin high. It didn’t matter that he was the King, or her father. Misery was stamped in every line of his body, and she could feel that misery, that pain, as though it were her own.
She sank to her knees beside him, more from need than from choice, and scarcely noted his reaction, though she thought he studied her face. He glanced up at Nydia and brushed one finger down the curve of Annandale’s cheek.
She never knew what he meant to say. The agony overtook her instantly at his touch, racing through her body from her face to her leg. The pain was a communion more intimate than anything else she had ever experienced. She gasped and clutched for his hand. A thin blue light flared between them, clearer and purer than starlight, and in that momcnt, she knew her leg shattered, and her skin split. Her blood spilled out onto the mossy ground, even as his bones knit and his sinews healed and his leg was once again made whole.
As the light faded, her pain ebbed.
The King sagged against the tree, breathing hard, and Annandale released his hand. She rocked back on her knees, testing her leg, and found it, too, was whole. She felt curiously lightened, purified, as though she had walked unscathed through searing flames. The pain was truly gone, and with that knowledge came an exuberance so great, she looked at the King, her father, and laughed.
“Child,” he whispered, tears gathering in his eyes. “What did you do?”
At once, she felt another pain, but this time a different sort. This time it was like a thin stream of water leading to a great pool. It tantalized her, unmistakably seductive, and slowly, she reached out to take his hand.
“Stop!” Nydia stood over them poised like a hawk. “You cannot, child. You’re too young yet. Such a thing would kill you. His grief goes too deep.” With her black-wrapped hands, she pushed Annandale back from the King.
Annandalc scrambled to her feet, while Abelard and Nydia faced each other like a pair of old adversaries.
“Now do you have some idea of her worth?” Even muffled by the black shrouds of her draperies, Nydia’s voice was venomous.
“Let me take her with me.” Although the words themselves were a request, his tone shaped them into a command.
“The time is not yet.”
“Then why did you allow her to help me?”
“I wanted you to understand.”
The King rose, cautiously testing his weight on his now-sound leg. Annandale was struck by his height, by the breadth of his shoulders, undiminished by age. Only the wrinkles which ringed his eyes and the lines which extended from his hawkish nose down the sides of his mouth betrayed that the King was long past his prime. “What will I tell my men? A rescue party should be coming along quite soon now.”
“Tell them anything you like.”
“Any suggestions?”
“Tell them you met the witch.”
“I asked you all those years ago if you were a witch.” His smile reminded Annandale of an old lycat she’d seen once, set upon by a younger male, too weakened by age to defend itself, too battlescarred not to try.
“I never lied to you.” It was as much an accusation as a statement.
“When will you send her to marry my heir?”
“You won’t be there to see it.”
At that, he raised his head. “Will you tell me what you can?”
Nydia threw back her head and stared just over Abelard’s shoulder. The glade darkened imperceptibly as a stray cloud wandered across the sun. “You’re planning a journey south.”
“Yes. Next month. First to Arkan, then on to Ithan Ford in Tennessey Fall. There’re rumors of rebellion among the Mutens in Atland—I intend to cement certain alliances.”
Another long moment passed, and finally Nydia shrugged. “I see nothing. Nothing you don’t already know. Come, daughter.”
“Wait.” The King’s voice was hoarse with emotion. “Tell me how it will end.”
Nydia shook her head. “It ended nineteen years ago, with the choices you—we all—made then.” Decisively Nydia turned her back and grabbed Annandale’s wrist.
“What happened to you?” he called when they were just at the edge of the clearing.
Nydia paused, and Annandale thought she might turn to face the King and throw back her ragged veils. Instead she spoke over her shoulder, and her muffled voice was thick with unshed tears. “I’ve but paid the price of the Magic, Lord King. As did your Queen. As did Phineas. As will you.”
Chapter One
Sember, 74th Year in the Reign of the Ridenau Kings (2746 Muten Old Calendar)
Snow fell, white as the wings of the gulls which huddled beneath the gray stone battlements of Ahga Castle, steady as the measured paces of the guards who kept the watch. Bounded by walls of crushed rubble, five towers rose twenty-five stories above the cobbled courtyards, black against the pale gray sky, their squared precision testimony to an age and a knowledge long lost. Within the wide inner wards, the sound of the sea as it washed against the foundations was only a muted roar, and even the wind was still.
Peregrine Anuriel eased her way through the massive doors of ancient steel and stepped out onto the terrace of the central tower. With a deep sigh as the air cooled her hot cheeks, she ripped the white linen coif off her head, revealing her dark brown braids. She mopped at her forehead, then let the cloth flutter heedlessly to the pavement. Sweat stung her armpits, and her green woolen dress itched through her chemise. She balled both fists into the small of her back and arched backward. The low swell of her belly was thrust forward, and her pregnancy was abruptly more obvious. She stared up at the structure looming overhead, the downy flakes of snow feathering her dark lashes and thick black brows. The twelve days of New Year’s were less than ten days away, and it seemed as if every resident of the castle, like a hive of mindless hornets, swarmed through the gr
eat hall at the bidding of Gartred, King’s Consort and the First Lady of the household.
A sudden gust made the snow swirl about her. Its fresh salt tang was a welcome relief from the cloying odors of the evergreen boughs, the bayberry candles, and the dried herbs used to decorate the hall, the rancid smell of sweat and manure which clung to the grooms who had been pressed into service, and the heavy aroma of the roasting meats and baking breads which wafted up from the kitchens. Under ordinary circumstances, the sights and sounds and smells of the preparations would not have bothered her at all. But this year was different. She was five months gone with child, and the baby was not her only burden. Gartred cared only that the work be done.
It mattered nothing to Gartred that the child Peregrine carried had been fathered by Roderic, Abelard’s only legitimate son, the child of his dead Queen and the King’s acknowledged heir. It mattered nothing to Gartred that the child, if a boy, could, quite possibly, one day reign in Ahga. And it certainly mattered nothing that Peregrine herself might one day enjoy the very same honor Gartred enjoyed now. Gartred only cared about the King and the power her position enabled her to exercise over everyone in the castle.
“Peregrine? Lady Peregrine?” The stealthy voice pierced the quiet twilight, and Peregrine jumped, feeling a stab of guilt. If Gartred had noticed her absence, someone else had suffered the bitter side of the First Lady’s tongue.
The door swung open smoothly on well-oiled hinges. An older woman peered out, her furrowed brow wrinkled, her round cheeks flushed, her hair swathed in a white coif and a pale blue shawl held close to her throat. Peregrine breathed a sigh of relief as she recognized Jaboa Ridenau, wife of the King’s eldest son, Brand. With the exception of the Consort, Jaboa was the lady of highest rank at court. When she caught sight of Peregrine, she beckoned with one hand. “Whatever are you doing out here, child? You’ll catch your death, and Lady Gartred—“
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