Tapestry Lion (The Landers Saga Book 2)

by Nilsen, Karen

  The sunlit air shimmered like golden gossamer, so thick and warm it almost rustled over the wide streets. Merius had said it was the humidity. Midmarch was built over the Sebond River right before it joined the sea. Long ago, some ruler, upset at the number of boats slipping by his borders without paying tribute, had constructed a single tower on an arch directly over the river. This had grown into Midmarch, a cozy city of mellow red stone. The part of the city we lived in rose up a hill beside the river; it was the part nearest the palace, which sat on the hilltop. There were terraced gardens with babbling fountains, pockets of quiet green amidst the bustle of the streets. Compared to this place, so open to the sky and air, Cormalen cities were dark and dour. There didn’t seem to be a dark corner anywhere here.

  However, Lord Rankin, the ambassador Merius guarded, had warned us that not all was as friendly as it looked. The streets hid a seething warren of chambers beneath their cobbles. Merchants had once stored wine casks and other wares in these chambers before bringing them into the city proper or dropping them on to the boats and ships that passed below on the river. Some were still used for this, though most had been taken over by those too poor to afford rent and those who preyed on them.

  Even now, I glanced down as I walked, trying to glimpse the evil doings in the gutters. However, all that came from them was the echoing gurgle of water from yesterday’s rain, and I soon grew tired of looking at my feet. The street led steadily down, every once in a while abruptly curving in a switchback. I stayed to the far right with the other downhill travelers, keeping out of the way of the carts and carriages rattling by and the stream of people going up hill on the other side.

  There was chattering all around, servant girls gossiping to one another, merchants discussing business, children yelling after dogs, a din of conversations and exclamations in Sarns. To my delight, I actually understood it. Although languages were not considered a necessary part of a sparrow noblewoman’s education, our tutor had taught Dagmar and me Sarns so we could read the histories without his translation. Corcin, my native tongue, was thousands of years worth of mingling between the old ones’ tongue and the language of the Sarneth adventurers who settled Cormalen. Sarns had a sharper sound than Corcin, so although the two shared a good many words, the Sarneth accent had been almost unintelligible to me when we first landed. Lord Rankin, the ambassador Merius guarded, had been language master before he was ambassador and had given me lessons on the accent, and now I comprehended it almost perfectly. Merius had laughed when I asked about somehow repaying Lord Rankin for his help—Merius said that I had done Rankin a favor being such a willing pupil, one of Merius’s remarks that made me want to giggle and swat him at the same time.

  There was no open market here like the markets in Cormalen towns and cities. Rather, the streets near the river consisted entirely of shops, with a few outside peddlers too poor to afford a building. They pandered their wares in the alleys and breathed the fishy air of the locks. Also the street artists came here, so many more than in Cormalen. Mainly sketchers like me, but there were also a few rogue painters and wood and stone carvers who weren’t apprenticed to any guildsman or shop and had no other legal place to sell their work.

  As I did every day, I first examined the painters’ new offerings. Some of them, recognizing me from other days, smiled and tipped their heads in the way of Sarneth men greeting a lady. I smiled back even as I made certain both of Merius’s rings were clearly visible on my finger. They had better painting here, more colors and different kinds of brushes than in Cormalen. There was even some new-fangled way of mixing color with water instead of with oil, something I had never seen before. Only a few masters used it, and they weren’t sharing their methods. The few “water” paintings I had seen hanging in Lord Rankin’s embassy were paler and subtler than their oil cousins, capturing scenes and feelings in vague shapes rather than crisp lines. They made me feel sad somehow, the sadness of a beautiful melody only half heard.

  I longed to try painting, but the daughters of painters were the only women lucky enough to learn the secrets of mixing oil and color. I could learn on my own, but the cost of my inevitable mistakes before I mastered any usable color would be too dear for our budget at the moment. I sighed and moved on.

  I found a sunny spot on the river wall and laid out my sketches, weighing them down with stones I’d collected and kept in my pockets. I slipped into my smock, sharpened my charcoal pencil with the small knife I carried, and began to sketch. I never would have dared do so in the open in Cormalen, especially when my father had still been alive, but there were a few other women sketchers here, all I needed to make me feel safe enough to work in public along with the men.

  I had been working for about an hour when a shadow fell over my parchment and something tickled my neck. Startled, I jumped.

  “It’s all right, sweet,” said a young peddler in a blue tunic. He had dark, sly eyes, the sort that sparkled and darted when he laughed. And he looked like he laughed quite often. One of his brown hands was on my loose hair, which explained the tickling on my neck.

  I jerked my head away, grasping my hair. Redheads were rare in Sarneth, and our first day here, I had had children (and more than a few men and women) reaching out to touch my hair. I knew it had only been curiosity on their part, but I had still clung to Merius every time someone had brushed against me. I glared at the peddler, trying to swallow back the unreasonable tingle of fear inside. His aura glittered and shifted around him, a translucent seal skin in sunlight, not a typical peddler’s aura at all. Perhaps he wasn’t a peddler. My fear faded, replaced by a wary interest.

  I held out a lock of my hair for emphasis. “Not for you to touch. Only for my husband.”

  He grinned. “I don’t see him anywhere about.”

  “How do you know?” I shut my portfolio, preparing to flee.

  “Because the tall Cormalen pale-eyes watch their women like hawks. I see no hawks here.”

  “He went to buy spices. He’ll be back soon.”

  “He’s been gone a long while then, since you’ve been here alone for at least an hour.” I inched away from him. He noticed and grinned again. “You have no need to fear me. I only touched your hair to see if it would burn like all the legends say.”

  “Only when I get annoyed. Then it burns. Right now it‘s hot as a branding iron.”

  Untroubled, he heaved himself up on the wall beside me. I hopped down and started to gather up my drawings. “Are you leaving?” he asked.

  “I’m sorry--I didn’t realize this was your wall.”

  “Your tongue burns even if your hair doesn’t.” He frowned. “That’s bad--I‘ll appear a fool, sitting for a portrait when there‘s no artist here to draw it.”

  I paused, my portfolio under my arm, and looked him up and down. “Show me the coin.”

  “I’ll do better than that. I’ll give you half right now. My name is Falken.” He tossed me a silver dolven with a tree on it, chuckling.

  I lifted myself back up on the wall and sat cross-legged, my portfolio spread across my knees as I selected my best charcoals. Then I made him sit cross-legged too, facing me. I suspected he would be a challenge to capture on parchment, one of those mercurial, laughing sorts who would enjoy distracting me as often as possible. Merius was like that sometimes. I had only finished a couple portraits of Merius because we had either ended up laughing or arguing halfway through. The ones I had finished were a disappointment, at least to me. My pencil had outlined his features fair enough, but his silver aura, the vast spirit that lit him and warmed our rooms even when he wasn‘t there, kept eluding my parchment. An old artists’ adage said that perhaps it was because I loved him too well to see him, but I thought it was more likely the other way around--I saw too much of him for my poor mortal skills to capture it all.

  “Your husband--he leaves you alone here?” Falken asked.

  “That’s none of your affair.”

  “Sorry.” He was quiet for a minute. “It
’s just that if I’d caught a true Cormalen fire selkie, I wouldn’t leave her alone with all the peddlers.”

  The part of me that relished danger liked him so far, his rich, sparkling aura, but I didn’t know him. He was a stranger, an interesting stranger who was willing to pay good silver for my drawings. There was a certain freedom to confiding in him--we had no history together. And it was pleasant to have a conversation of more than five words with someone besides my husband. Merius himself worried about leaving me alone during the day--he had even wished for my sister this morning to keep me company, and he didn‘t like her. Of course, when Merius mentioned finding suitable company for me, he was thinking of another woman, not a man his age. A flirtatious, attractive man no less.

  I bit my lip and concentrated on the sketch. Falken’s lips on the parchment parted slightly, as if he were about to speak or laugh. More likely laugh, I decided. He had just made a jest, and it seemed he found his own jests funny. All the lines for his jaw and chin and nose slanted up in sharp merriment--he had his face tilted up and slightly to the right as he watched a bird swoop over the river.

  “You’ve hardly looked at me,” he said, and I started, for it seemed as if the sketch turned to me and spoke as he spoke, as if the sketch Falken and the real Falken were one and the same.

  I shook myself and glanced up at him. “Quiet for a moment--I have to concentrate.”

  “You’ve been concentrating for a half-hour, Selkie.”

  “Just a bit longer--I want to get your eyes right.” I stared at him for a moment before I dropped my gaze to the parchment.

  “It’s like you’re seeing through me,” he muttered.

  “Shh.” I bore down hard on the charcoal--his irises were so brown they looked black. Then, with the lightest touch I could manage, I drew tiny birds reflected in his eyes with my white pencil, so faint they appeared as ghost birds, only to be discerned by the most careful of observers. Suddenly I could see his aura shifting, glittering on the parchment, and I knew I made a good portrait. Likely only I could sense it, though maybe if another witch looked upon it, she might sense it too. Or a warlock might sense it. For all his talk of selkies, Falken didn’t seem like a warlock. My mother and I were the only ones I‘d ever known with dark talents.

  “My husband doesn’t know I come here,” I said finally, hardly realizing I spoke until the words were out of my mouth.

  “Why not? Would he beat you?”

  “No.”

  “Some husbands would, if their wives were keeping secrets.”

  “He’s not that kind--he‘s a good man, the best.” I smiled softly to myself. With a few swift strokes, I defined Falken’s forehead and cheekbones, then selected my darkest charcoal to fill in his hair. It stood in uneven spikes all over his head, as if he chopped it off with a dull dagger.

  “Why don’t you tell him then?”

  “I don’t want to worry him.”

  “He’d be right to worry--women get robbed here.”

  “Men get robbed too.”

  “Women can get worse than robbed.” His sparkle faded for a moment as he suddenly turned serious.

  “Not in broad daylight.”

  “My cousin thought that too, but she found out there’s all kinds of things that can go on in the gutter chambers even in daylight. You’d best watch yourself, Selkie.”

  I quickly glanced down at the sketch, my hands trembling. It had, after all, only been four months. All I had were flashes of disjointed memory, just enough to know what had been forced on me. “I’m sorry. About your cousin, I mean.”

  “Her betrothed and brothers, they handled it, if you know what I mean.” I swallowed, nodded. He continued, “Thank Aesir there wasn’t a child. She’s married now.”

  Thank Aesir all right. I touched my belly. Was I asking too much of Merius, to accept this child? Of course, I hadn’t asked, he had offered, and it was only at moments like this that I remembered its origin. I loved it, when society told me I should hate it. I looked back at Falken. “What do they do here, with such children?”

  “Some would throw a cursed child over the river wall in the dead of night. Others would give it to the walled virgins, in hopes of it being purified through prayer.”

  The charcoal in my hand froze in place on the parchment. A convent--could I do that? I pictured my little boy (for I thought it was a boy) being prayed over every day for being something impure and cursed. No, there was a reason for him to be here, to be born to me. But a son, Safire--how can you ask Merius to raise another man’s son as his firstborn?

  “Selkie?”

  “Oh, pardon me.” I resumed sketching, my hand a trifle jerky. Falken, unperturbed, kept talking. I often noticed that people posing for portraits would begin talking about things they might not even tell their confessor, like Falken telling me of his cousin’s rape as casually as if I were an old friend. Perhaps I tapped into a hidden part of them by drawing them.

  After I’d smudged a little here and drew a sharper line there, I showed Falken the final result. He reached to take it, and I held it from him. “Not yet--it‘ll get all over your hands. Do you like it?”

  He nodded. I spread the parchment out on the wall and pulled a glass vial out of my smock pocket. Holding the end of a narrow, dried reed in my mouth, I drew some of the clear mixture from the vial into the reed. Then I exhaled through the reed, blowing the mixture on to the parchment, careful not to smear the charcoal.

  “What is that?” Falken examined the portrait as it darkened from the liquid.

  “Resin and knacker‘s glue, thinned out and mixed. As it dries, it’ll fix the charcoal so it won’t smudge.”

  Falken’s coin pouch clinked as he took out another dolven as well as several thick bronze coins the Midmarchers called suters. “What are all these for?” I asked as he dropped them in my palm.

  “A tip for a job well done. You should charge more, Selkie.”

  I tucked the coin away. “That’s a custom for the great court painters, a tip on their commissions. Have you been to court, Sir Falken?”

  “You mock me, but you might be surprised. Even the great ones at court need a simple peddler once in a while.” He gave an exaggerated incline of his head, and I giggled.

  “Falken,” came a grumble behind us. I spun around, my arms clutched tightly together over my smock. A man in dark red hooded cloak stood there, his face in shadow. I stepped back, against the wall. A cloak on a warm day? And such a cloak--under the mud stains, I could see the fine weave of the best northern wool, the intricate brass fastenings. Perhaps he was hiding other wealth under there--the tip of his sword sheath, peeking out from under his cloak hem, had to be tooled silver. And his boots were fine, supple leather, freshly polished. Quite unusual to see a nobleman down here. It wasn’t like the Cormalen markets where everyone high and low gathered--Sarneth nobles almost always sent their servants to purchase things for them.

  “My lord.” Falken straightened.

  The man’s eyes gleamed under his hood, giving me a cursory glance before he turned back to Falken. “I’m not accustomed to waiting, particularly for a tinker woman‘s baseborn. Break our meeting again, and I’ll break you. Do you understand?”

  Falken nodded, but his eyes flared. “Sorry, my lord. I thought our meeting was tomorrow.”

  “No excuses, Falken.”

  “Yes, my lord.”

  “Now that I’ve found you, come walk with me.”

  Falken shot me a look. “I have to wait for my portrait . . .”

  “Did you hear me? I‘ll not waste the whole afternoon on you.”

  “If you want, I’ll be here for awhile longer, long enough for it to dry,” I said. “You could come back and get it, Falken. I‘ll hold it for you.”

  “No, Selkie.” His voice hardened. “Tinker’s bastard I may be, but this man can’t order me about. I’ll wait, and if he wants to talk to me, he can wait too.”

  The man swore. “Fool boy.” He threw his hood back, revealing
a head of close-cropped black hair, tipped with silver in spots, and a narrow, craggy face. His hazel eyes had a bright watchfulness, the sort of eyes trained not to miss much. Like Merius’s father’s eyes. A swordsman, then.

  “Come now, my lord, could you leave such a fine portrait if you were me?” Falken mocked the man. “Selkie here is quite an artist--you should appreciate that.”

  My Lord growled, “I won’t forget this, Falken, and neither will my lady. We aren’t in the provinces anymore--memories are longer here, and tempers shorter.”

  A shadow crossed Falken‘s face. “My lady ought remember that she’s not the only one with a short temper.” Then the shadow was gone, and he smiled, all easy charm again. “Now my lord, look at the portrait. Do you think my lady will like it?”

  My Lord spared an impatient glance at the portrait. “Too dark,” he muttered.

  “It’s still drying. Good likeness, is it not?” There was a double edge to Falken’s sharp merriment.

  “Watch your mouth, boy. Charcoals are fit for peddlers, but . . .” The man glanced at the portrait again, then started, a brief ripple down the muscles of his neck. He stared at the charcoal, squinting first and then reaching out his finger.

  I made an involuntary lunge to stop his hand. He turned his head and those sharp eyes on me. “Sorry--it’s just you’ll blacken your hands, my lord. It’s not fixed yet.”

  “Is that so?” he asked quietly. “You’re from Cormalen?”

  “Yes.”

  He turned on his heel and began to look at the other sketches I had spread out. “Are these fixed, as you put it?”

  I nodded and watched as he picked up one after the other, in turn staring intently at each of them. Some, especially the landscapes, he set aside quickly--others he gazed at so long I thought he would burn holes in the paper with his eyes.