by J. V. Jones
Tawl shook his head. “Megan, I—”
“You care too much, Tawl. You always live for others, never for yourself.”
“If I’d known you were in danger, I would have come.”
Megan ran her finger down his cheek. She smiled softly. “Don’t you think I know that, Tawl?”
She was so beautiful. More beautiful now than she had ever been. The bright curls she had lost were nothing compared to the sparkle in her eyes. He reached over and kissed her on the lips. “I have so much to thank you for.”
“You don’t owe me thanks, Tawl. You’ve been so hard on yourself for so long that you expect others to be, too. Telling you that my imprisonment wasn’t your fault isn’t a favor. It’s the truth. The archbishop threw me in a dungeon, not you.”
“But—”
“Tawl, you cared. If you’d known, you would have been there.” Megan’s deep green eyes looked straight into his. “That’s enough for me.”
It was enough. She wasn’t lying to spare his feelings. She was speaking the truth. Tawl felt a subtle shifting in his heart. A lightening. Perhaps there was something to what she said. Perhaps sometimes caring could be enough.
Megan was smiling like a wily fox. “Now, tell me about the woman you love.”
Tawl didn’t bother to hide his surprise. He did take a deep draught of ale, though, to give himself a moment to think. “What makes you say that?”
“Your kiss. It was sweet rather than passionate.”
What was it about this woman? How could she know so much?
Megan laughed. “You look quite indignant. I didn’t mean to offend you.”
No. She meant to let him off lightly. By bringing the subject up, she was relinquishing all claims on him, telling him he was free to leave. “You are a remarkable woman.”
“I’m glad you’ve found someone to love.”
Tawl took both her hands in his. “Wasn’t it you who told me it’s love, not achievement, that will rid me of my demons?”
Megan rested her head upon his shoulder. “You still have a fair distance to go.”
Jack lay on the bed but didn’t sleep. His head was bursting. His senses were overpowering him. He felt the rough wool of the blanket scratching his wrists, felt a droplet of sweat run along his cheek. He saw the air swirl and thicken in front of the fire, and the ceiling bear the strain of footsteps above. He heard everything: moths beating their wings against the shutter, worms burrowing into the wood, a man in the next room snoring, and the tide pushing its way to the shore.
Voices. He heard voices, too.
Fyler’s last words: “I’ve never seen the captain care for anyone the way he cared for you on the voyage home. Treated you like a son, he did.”
Quain’s last words: “Jack, next time you’re in Rorn be sure to come and see me. We’ve got a lot in common, you and I.”
Tawl in the tavern: “Everything is connected in the end.”
Voices, hundreds of them, buzzed across his mind like flies around a joint. Why wouldn’t they leave him in peace?
Jack tossed and turned in the bed. The blankets beneath him were wet with sweat. Outside someone was walking down the street—their footsteps pattered in time with his heart. Like a guard listening for intruders, Jack strained his ears to hear more. The fire crackled, the moths flew, the man in the next room snored, and the sea lapped against the shore—all in time with Larn.
Jack couldn’t bear it. He felt as if he were going mad. Larn was squeezing him from all sides.
“Did what she wanted, didn’t you?”
The voices grew loud again. Taunting, arbitrary, lashing against his soul.
Stillfox sitting by the fire: “I heard a tale about a girl who came from Larn once. Her mother was a servant to the priests.”
Falk talking about his mother: “It seems to me that she might have kept her past a secret to protect you.”
Quain before the storm: “She was adrift on a skiff with neither sails nor oars to get her moving.”
Jack clamped his hands to his ears. The voices still wouldn’t stop.
Stillfox again: “It was her mother—a woman so badly deformed that she could use no muscles on the right side of her face, nor lift her right arm—who saved her. With her help the girl was cast adrift on a small boat in the treacherous waters that surround the island.”
Master Frallit: “She was a foreign whore at that.”
His mother on the castle battlements each morning: “Keep your head low, Jack, you might be spotted.”
Jack felt as if he were suffocating. He was being crushed by the weight of the voices. The words were heavy, penetrating, persistent. They would give him no peace. Sweat dripped from his nose and into his mouth. It tasted of the sea.
Stillfox: “She swore a terrible oath that one day she would destroy Larn.”
Quain: “She was running away.”
Falk: “Perhaps she was afraid for you more than herself.”
“STOP!”
Jack sat up. His ears were ringing. His heart was racing. The blankets were ropes binding him to the bed. He tore them from his body. He had to get away.
The coolness of the wooden floor was a blessing. He dressed quickly, pausing only to splash water on his face. He took the stairs three at a time, and if a door wouldn’t open, he forced it. People tried to stop him, but he shook them off. Their voices were no different than the ones in his head.
At last he was outside. Taking a calming breath of the night air, he willed the madness to recede. The voices faded to whispers, to senseless humming, and then to nothing. Jack felt drained. His feet found their own way along the streets.
Prostitutes called to him, drunken men appraised him, old women crossed the street when he passed. The stars were out tonight. They glittered in time to Larn. Jack quickened his pace. No matter how fast he walked, Larn was inside him. No matter how hard he tried, things would never be the same.
Down toward the sea he walked. Across half a league of seafront, along the eastern quay, between row upon row of fishing boats, and up the gangway to The Fishy Few. Until he got there, Jack didn’t even know where he was going, but as soon as he saw the hull of the ship, he knew he’d come to the right place.
“Who goes there? Disturb this ship at your peril.”
“Carver. It’s me, Jack. I’ve come to see the captain.”
“Well, you’re in luck. He hasn’t left yet. He’s still in his cabin, making a log of the voyage.” Carver let him board the ship. “Hey! You best not be proposing to go on another journey, matey. Because if you are, I’ll throw you overboard right here and now. Ain’t never sailing to Larn again. And I’m prepared to commit murder to keep it that way.”
“It’s all right, Carver. Larn is just another barren island in the middle of the sea.” Even as Jack said it, he didn’t believe it. How could he? Larn beat in his heart and in his soul.
“Hmm. Just you watch it, matey.”
“I will, Carver. I will.”
Jack went belowdecks. The wood of the ship smelled sharp and confining. The low ceilings cut down the size of the night. The captain’s door was closed.
Jack didn’t knock. He pushed.
The captain was sitting at his desk, scribing in a ledger. He didn’t look up. “Come in. Sit down. I’ve filled you a glass.”
Jack stepped into the room. It was warm, but not too warm. Bright, but not dazzling. On the table lay two glasses: one was full to the rim, the other was short of the mark.
Quain swung around to face him. “I thought you’d be here by now.”
Jack sat. “You knew I would come?”
“Well, I had an inkling you might.”
“And if I hadn’t?’
“Then I’d have the second glass all to myself.” The captain smiled softly. “I’m rather fond of arrangements where I get to win either way.”
Jack took hold of the full glass. It was smooth and heavy in his hand. “What became of the girl from Larn?”
The captain spoke straightaway, as if he’d been expecting the question all night. “After The Bountiful Breeze docked, I took her home with me. She was still ill, and my mother and I looked after her for several weeks. I’ve never seen a woman so determined to get well—she near as willed herself to health. The day she was strong enough to walk was the day she left the city. There was no stopping her. She was afraid of Larn, afraid the priests would track her down and kill her. Though it broke my heart to do it, I gave her my savings and let her go.”
Jack felt as if the night itself was spinning, and he and Quain were the only stationary points. “Where did she go?”
“She wouldn’t tell me. She didn’t want to put me at risk.” Quain spoke in a whisper. “I think she headed north.”
“What did she look like?”
“Dark hair. Blue eyes, small bones, a heart-shaped face. Simply beautiful.”
Spinning. Everything was spinning. Jack heard the air rush past his ears. “What was her name?”
“Aneska.”
And then it all stopped. Dead.
Quain brought the rum glass to his lips. He swallowed and then looked straight at Jack. “The day she left Rorn she said must go by a different name. A name that would go unremarked in every city in the Known Lands. I said she should call herself Lucy. Whether or not she took my suggestion, I’ll never know.”
All the time that Quain was speaking, Jack hadn’t taken a breath. He took one now, and the air crackled all the way down to his lungs. He was out of the chair before he knew it. He had to touch the captain and prove to himself that the man and his words were real. Quain was warm and smelled of rum: solid as the old sea dog he was. Jack knew he spoke the truth.
A tightness formed in Jack’s chest. He felt a world of new emotions pushing against his heart, causing it to ache with a sharp-sweet pain. There was relief, wonder, excitement, joy, and most of all there was sadness. How she must have suffered, he thought. How well she had hidden both her past and her fears.
Jack was grateful, too. Grateful that the man before him had been the one to reveal the truth. Coming to kneel at the captain’s feet, Jack said, “She did take your name. She called herself Lucy.”
Quain’s hand came to rest upon his shoulder. “Aye. You’re her lad. I knew it the moment I set my eyes upon you.” There was longing in his voice as he spoke. “She was a brave lass.”
Jack nestled close to him. Finally there were answers. He knew why his mother had changed her name, why she climbed the battlements every morning to search the faces of strangers, and why she lied about her past. Fear had been the one defining force in his mother’s life, and Larn had been the cause of it.
She lived with fear, but she lived for vengeance. The oath she swore to destroy the temple was so strong it had outlived her. Perhaps it had even destroyed her. Still, her work was done now: Larn was gone and she could rest easy in her grave.
Jack looked up at Quain. “Why did you wait to tell me this? I might never have come to you.”
“Jack, I know the sea. It can lull a man as surely as if he were a baby in a crib. When your eyes can’t see the shore and your feet can’t feel the earth, the only thing that matters is the journey itself. A man needs to get back on dry land again before he can see things in their proper perspective. I figured it would be the same with you. A few hours on solid earth and you’d work it out on your own.”
“But there are still some things I don’t understand.”
“I’ve told you all I know.” Quain patted Jack’s shoulder. “Pour us some more rum, lad. It’s time we toasted your mother’s memory—questions without answers can wait until tomorrow.”
Jack stood up, filled both glasses to the brim, and handed one to the captain. Quain was right: tonight should be a celebration.
So that evening aboard The Fishy Few two men toasted and drank, swapped stories and histories, and laughed and wept until dawn.
Twenty-four
It was dawn. The light coming in from the shutters was steaming with mist from the lake. It was bitterly cold. Melli didn’t think she had ever been so cold in her life. The winters at Castle Harvell were nothing compared to this. The storm had raged for six days. Today the sky was clear.
Ice had formed on the damp northern wall of her room. The cup of water by her bed was frozen. Her breath plumed white in front of her face and beneath the covers; her body wouldn’t stop shaking. Freezing gusts of air frisked around the room. Cold blasts from the chimney fought with thin drafts from the windows, lifting curtains, rattling furniture, and sweeping the dust from under the bed.
Melli was nose-deep in covers. She badly wanted to relieve herself, but she knew from experience just how cold it was out there. Besides, her waterglass wouldn’t be the only thing that was frozen, and she didn’t fancy peeing over a thin layer of ice. She’d wait until the guards brought her a new pot.
It was actually colder now than during the storm. Oh, the wind had blown up a terrible fuss, sending snowflakes flurrying down the chimney and breaking the catches on the metal shutters as easily as if they were wood. But at least while the air was moving it was too busy to freeze your toes.
And your nose and your cheeks and your eyelids. Could one’s eyelids freeze? she wondered. Might they just seize up, leaving one’s sights caught in midblink? Alarmed by this thought, Melli pulled the blankets up right over her face. Better to suffocate than risk freezing eyelids.
It was really quite amazing how much warmer it was beneath the covers. Her little pot-belly was as good as a stove. Nearly seven months now, she guessed—keeping track of time had never been one of her strong points. She’d always had servants to do that for her.
No servants now, though. She had two, sometimes three, guards and old no-teeth herself, Mistress Greal. Metal-helmed, foul-smelling, and blade-brandishing as the guards were, Melli infinitely preferred them to Mistress Greal. The guards were silent, courteous—if you could call a man pointing a spike at your throat courteous—and blissfully disinterested. Mistress Greal, however, was like a dog who’d got a bone and wouldn’t let go. She sneered, prodded, insulted, and was constantly on the lookout for some other luxury to take away. It seemed that candles, heat, floor mats, supper, and fresh water just weren’t enough. Now Melli had to wear the same clothes for weeks on end, wash in freezing lake water, gnaw bones that looked like they’d been chewed on by packs of dogs, and sleep under blankets coarse enough to try a saint.
Melli had found she could adapt to anything that Mistress Greal threw at her. Despite everything her pregnancy was going well, and except for a little swelling in her ankles and a back that constantly ached, she was actually growing stronger by the day. Weeks merged into months and autumn gave way to winter, but every time she felt a tiny shift within her stomach it gave her reason to carry on.
Melli liked being pregnant. It meant she wasn’t alone. She hugged her belly and talked to her child and promised him or her that she’d escape before it was born. It wasn’t an idle promise, either. She knew exactly what Kylock wanted from her and she wasn’t prepared to give it. She wasn’t going to let Kylock use her body to wash his sins away. What he had done could never be forgiven. Seven days ago he had ordered the massacre of five thousand men. The Highwall army was beaten, and he could have disarmed or imprisoned them. But no, their throats had been slit, their bodies mutilated, and their remains left to freeze upon the southeastern plains of Bren.
Kylock was a monster and he should have been strangled at birth. Melli was sick of playing his twisted games of sin and repentance, sick of being the apple of such a distorted eye. She was going to escape. She knew her child was marked for death: Baralis would never allow Bren’s rightful heir to live past the birthing. Kylock wasn’t interested in the child—he wanted her—but she was damned if she was going to wait around for the next two months and then just deliver herself up like a gamebird on a platter. She would be no one’s rite of absolution.
A sound came from behind the
door. Melli pulled back the covers in time to see Mistress Greal make her entrance. The good lady was dressing like a queen these days: furs, brocaded silks, gold chains around her scrawny neck. She probably looted the chambers of all the noblemen Kylock had tortured then killed. Anyone in the city who spoke a word against Kylock was likely to end up dead.
“Any news of my father?” demanded Melli.
“M’lady,” countered Mistress Greal sharply. “Any news of my father, m’lady.” She took off a glove and stuck one of her bony fingers in the air. “Colder, but not as drafty.”
“Why don’t you just knock down the wall and throw me in the lake? Seeing as you’re so intent on freezing me to death.”
Mistress Greal shrugged. “You’d be going the same way as your father, then.”
“Have they found his body”—Melli grit her teeth—“m’lady?”
“After the storm that just passed, do you really think they need to look? Your father might have run like a coward from the battle, but the mountains would have got him in the end. After all, he was hardly in his prime.”
Melli ignored the speculation and jibes. They hadn’t found his body, so that meant there was still a chance he was alive. “How many other men are unaccounted for?”
Mistress Greal approached the bed. “Nosy, aren’t we?”
“You mean you don’t know.”
“There’s nothing that goes on in Bren that I don’t know about, missy. Nothing.”
“Has my brother asked to see me?” Melli knew her brother was in the city, but did he know that she was?
“The king has told him you’re dead. You died of a fever three months back. No one knows you’re here, missy. And no one cares.” Mistress Greal spoke with relish. “Anyway I’d hardly set store by that brother of yours. I heard he sent his special guard onto the field to kill your father.”
“You’re lying.” Melli wanted to slap Mistress Greal’s toothless face. She wanted to tear her hair from its roots and ram her head into the chamberpot. Melli had tried the slapping thing before, though, and it had taken Mistress Greal less than a second to call the guards.