“Arrogant ass,” the watchman muttered, “telling me how to perform my duties.”
“What was that, my good man?” Rankin asked placidly, his restraining hand on my shoulder.
The watchman straightened. “Nothing, my lord.”
“It’s obvious the girl is no conspirator--she came running out of the crowd for all to see and threw herself at our feet. What kind of criminal does that?”
“But my lord . . .” The captain started.
“I appreciate your help, men, but I was the one who was almost assassinated. By all means, question her, but do it here, not in the lock-ups.” Rankin sounded distinctly crisp.
“Yes, my lord.” The captain nodded and turned to the girl.
Cedric returned then, drenched in sweat. “I lost him,” he panted. “He had a rope ladder going up to one of the roofs. I tried to follow him, but he cut the ladder down when I started climbing it.” He leaned against the wall.
I straightened then, remembering my side hurt. I looked down. The lower part of my tunic was brown with drying blood. I tugged at the fabric around the wound, trying to get a better look at it, and my hand came away sticky. My legs suddenly felt unsteady again, like I‘d had too much to drink, and I swallowed, reaching for the wall.
“Here, Merius.” Lord Rankin guided me over to the wall. “Perhaps you should sit. Cedric, summon a carriage.”
I held my side, trying to staunch the blood flow. “It’s not too deep, just long. I should have been faster.”
“We’ll get one of the palace healers to see to it.”
“I’d rather go home to my wife.”
Rankin cocked a brow. “Are you certain you want her to see you now, before it’s been bandaged? My dear lady wife would have a vaporous fit.”
“Not Safire. She has some skill with wounds.” I smiled to myself, then winced as I tried to uncross my legs.
Rankin began to pace, his hands behind his back. Some of the watch hauled off the body, while the rest jerked Bahir to his feet. Rankin observed this, shaking his head. “I’m going to write to the king tomorrow--this custom of ambassadors not carrying weapons may be more diplomatic, but I felt like a trapped hare.” He paused. Bahir had recovered consciousness and was now struggling against his bonds, his mask ripped off by one of the watchmen. He was young, not many years older than me, olive-skinned, with a black beard that had evidently been neatly waxed to a point but was now mussed and bloody with battle.
“Marennese, possibly Numerian, if that star is any indication. I wonder why he’d want to assassinate me?” Rankin asked, a scholar pondering an intriguing question.
“Perhaps he mistook the figurehead for the real thing,” I said.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Safire whisked a pile of coin off the table the instant I came through the door. I caught the glimmer of gold before it vanished into her pockets. What was she up to?
“What are you doing home . . ?” She trailed off, noticing the blood on my shirt. Her face blanched so pale her freckles, usually barely noticeable, stood out. “Dear God, what happened?”
“It’s all right. I can take it from here,” I told Cedric, who had followed me up the stairs. “Thank you. Tell Lord Rankin I’ll return tomorrow.”
“If you need a day or two, you know Damon can take your duty.”
“I know, but I’ll be fine. It’s pretty shallow.”
“Liar,” Safire muttered, already examining the wound. “Cedric, I’ll send word later tonight, if I think he can resume his duties tomorrow.”
Cedric grinned. “All right. Have a good evening.” He turned then and started down the stairs.
“But . . .” I began.
“Get in here.” She tugged me through the door with surprising force and led me to the bed chamber. Sunlight poured in golden pools through the open windows. Her hands quick, she removed the remains of my shirt and loosened my belt. She spread a towel on the bed and made me lie on it, my wounded side up. I took a quick breath as she gently probed the cut with her finger.
She sucked air through her teeth. “Oh, dear heart, this is even nastier than I thought. What happened?”
“At practice,” I said without thinking. “We were . . .”
“Merius.” Her voice was implacable, a single word of warning.
I sighed. “All right--we were attacked on the street. Three men.”
“Assassins?” She brought the washbasin over to the bed, her thin arms straining.
“I think they mistook Lord Rankin for someone else.”
“Really? With all that green and gold--your guard is more festive than a Cormalen royal procession. They must be awfully stupid assassins.” She dipped a clean cloth in the water, wrung it out, and wiped the crusted blood off my skin.
“Contrary witch.” I watched her as she turned to rinse the cloth out and drape it over the side of the basin. Such simple movements, yet for some reason they left my throat tight. She could make anything into a dance, with her long, graceful arms and swaying hips. “Is that a new frock?”
Although she didn’t look directly at me, I noticed the slight smile curling up the corners of her mouth. I reached out, fingered the lacy cuff of one sleeve, brushed her wrist.
She caught my hand in hers and squeezed. “Now don’t move anymore.”
“Where are you going?”
“To find the whiskey.”
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, listening to the rattle of glass in the other room. And the clink of coin. Her pockets--I had almost forgotten.
“That coin you were counting when I returned--where did you get it?” I asked.
“Oh, I sold a few drawings,” she said airily as she came back in the chamber, sloshing the whiskey on to a cloth.
“Have you raised your rates?”
“Why do you say that?”
“It looked like gold . . .” I trailed off as she rubbed the spirits directly on to the cut. “Son of a bitch,” I hissed, trying not to flinch.
“Shh, my love.” Her voice was low, soothing to me as the coo of a dove. “Shh.” She splashed some of the whiskey on to her fingers, dried them with a clean cloth, then placed her hands over the cut. She closed her eyes, her entire body so taut it was almost vibrating. The tension left me and with it the burning of the raw wound, replaced by a blessed coolness where she touched my skin.
When she finally lifted her hands from me, I was half asleep, the pain a fading memory. My eyes slowly opened, and I raised my head, looking at the cut. It was a thin red line above my hip, the edges already beginning to knit together.
“Don’t move yet--it might open again,” Safire said.
She pressed a thick piece of muslin, folded several times, over the wound. I rested my head on the pillow, my eyes closing. None of the palace healers could have done what she just had. None of them had witch hands.
A brief vision floated across the back of my eyelids--my father, the last time I had seen him, still pale from the wound he had inflicted upon himself, a dagger in his chest, almost in his heart. It should have killed him. It would have, but for Safire and her hands. I wondered suddenly what he had told all the servants, my cousins Eden and Selwyn, the others who had seen it. What she had done was a miracle. It was also witchcraft to most in Cormalen. There had to have been talk, speculation, possibly dark rumors and wild stories. Unless Father had somehow quelled it. If anyone could quell something, it was Father. Still, though, uneasiness nagged me every once in a while, an uneasiness I had yet to mention to Safire. She had enough to worry about now, with the baby and living in a foreign land. And Cormalen was a sea away--it would be at least a year before my assignment was completed and we returned there. Perhaps by then, time would have taken care of the rumors. One could hope.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
When I awoke a few hours later, the cool, blue light of early evening filled the chamber. “Safire?” I called. The bandage tightened around my middle as I sat up, reminding me not to stretch too much.
�
��Don’t get up,” she said from the other room. “I’ll be there in a minute.” Soon she entered, carrying a tray. She brought it over to the table beside the bed. Steam curled up from the bowl, a whiff of something rich and meaty. My stomach growled.
“What’s that? It smells good.”
“Stew.” She sat at the foot of bed.
I grabbed the bowl and bit into a gravy-soaked piece of onion. A tad salty, just a tad. I swallowed quickly and reached for the water.
“How’s the cut feel?” she asked.
“Fine. A little itchy maybe.”
“That’s good, a sign of healing. I wasn’t able to completely close it, though, so be careful.”
I grinned. “Best keep the bandage on it awhile anyway--Cedric and them will think I‘m some kind of fortunate freak, healing in less than a day.”
She didn‘t seem to hear me. “I hope you don’t get any more like that.”
“I hope not, either, but it’s a part of my duties.”
She rose and paced over to the windows, her arms crossed. “It still seems strange to me. We’ve barely been here a month, and already . . . and I thought Lord Rankin was a mere diplomat. Why does he need six guards?”
“Some of the others have six guards--it’s protocol, depending what court they‘re at.”
“Which ones?”
“I don’t know. SerVerin, I suppose. Maybe the ambassador to Marenna.” I set down my bowl. “Listen, it was likely a mistake--maybe they thought he was some other Cormalen official. It was along that street where all the courtiers walk to the palace, so that’s not so far-fetched.”
“No, I don’t suppose.” She stared out the window, her arms wrapped around her like she had taken a sudden chill.
“Come here.” I patted the bed. She snuggled up beside me, and I put my arm around her, offered her a bite of the bread. She shook her head so I finished it off. We sat there together in silence for several minutes, listening to the clop of hooves on the street below the windows, the fading cries of hucksters going home, water from the nearby well splashing as people filled their buckets for the night. I could feel the rise and fall of her breathing, smell the mysterious charred cedar scent of her hair. I kissed the crown of her head and ran my hand down her arm, my fingers coming to rest on hers. Her skirt pocket, still bulging with coin, was within reach of my fingertips. I idly reached down and pulled out a gold lupin. And another. And yet another.
“What‘s this?”
She bit her lip. “Merius, I’ve sold more than a few sketches.”
“Obviously. Your pocket seems made of gold.”
“Almost every day since we came I’ve been going out and drawing portraits for people, selling my landscapes. There’s so many more street artists, so many more styles of drawing and painting . . . it’s fascinating to see. Especially those water paintings.”
“I know--you showed me those at the embassy. So where have you been selling your sketches?”
She paused, looked at me. “Down near the locks mostly.”
“Safire, I warned you not to go down there alone. It’s dangerous.”
“Not during the day.”
“People have gotten robbed and worse down there, even during the day. Don‘t go back unless I‘m with you. I mean it.”
“I wouldn’t go down there, except . . . I make so much coin, and there are so many other artists down there. It’s the only place to show your work, if you’re not in a guild.”
“We don’t need coin--I earn enough.”
“I know you do. I just like to go down there, see how the painters work with their oils. I can almost feel the brushes between my fingers, the color flowing out of my hand on to the canvas.”
I picked up her hand and spread out her fingers, always smudged with charcoal even after she washed them. Then I brought her hand to my lips, tasted the acrid charcoal, the cool sweetness of her skin underneath. “Never go down to the locks again without me. I forbid it.” I groaned inwardly--I should never have used the word forbid.
She stiffened against my arm. “I’m not the one who almost got killed today.” She shifted away toward the foot of the bed, the back of her neck red.
I reached out and fingered the thick rope of her hair, heavy as braided copper wires in the damp August heat. “Come back, sweet. I want to mend it.”
“Ha,” she scoffed, crossing her arms as she shot me a look over her shoulder. “I know how you like to mend things. We never finish an argument, Merius. We always end up mending the seam before we‘ve even begun to rip it.”
“This is hardly an argument.”
“It could be.”
“Only if you’re contrary enough to make it one. I’m not arguing with you about this, Safire.” I leaned forward as far as I could with the bandage. “Whether I forbid you or not, you’ll have to stop going down to the locks. You have to go into confinement when you start to show--we don’t have a choice, if we want to hide that,” I paused, stammered, “that Whitten sired this baby. I thought you understood that . . .”
“Of course I understand that. I’m not an idiot.”
“I never said you were.”
“Sometimes I feel that way, when you start talking about me getting into trouble, about confining me here like a naughty child. I know you only want to protect me, but you’re taking it too far.” She stood up and strode over to the table, where she picked up the tray with the empty bowl.
“That’s not fair. I’m only doing what I’m supposed to do.” I winced as I pulled myself up and followed her into the other room. I braced myself on the wall as I watched her carry the tray over to the dishpan.
“You shouldn’t be out of bed,” she said, refusing to look at me as she stacked the other dishes in the pan and filled it with water from the kettle over the embers.
“I feel fine,” I said curtly. “It’s my duty to protect you, Safire.”
“Protect me, yes. Stifle me, no.” Her hands shook, the dishes clacking in the water. “Sometimes . . . well, sometimes, Merius, I get the feeling that you wish you could lock me up here, keep me safe from everything . . .”
“Like I kept you safe from Whitten?” The bitterness hung in the air like acrid smoke, sour on my tongue. Her hands froze, and she slowly looked up, met my gaze.
“You were on campaign, a thousand miles away,” she said hoarsely. “How were you to know what would happen? But you’re here now, and all that’s past, and we’re fine. We’ll be fine, Merius.”
Fine until you give birth. The rogue thought almost made it to my tongue, but not quite, thank God. Later, perhaps, when she was calmer, whenever that would be. As if she heard my thoughts somehow with her witch ears, she started scrubbing at a plate with furious energy. Then her breath hitched. She kept scrubbing. Her breath hitched again, and her shoulders heaved as she dropped the plate back in the water. It slowly sank under the suds as she stumbled into the bed chamber.
She lay down, crying quietly. I stood in the doorway and watched, not knowing whether to go to her or leave her alone for awhile. A few months ago in a tavern, I had overheard a sailor tell his comrade, “Time for another voyage--Elsie’s weeping every day now. Either that, or yelling.” “Ahh, with child again, is she?” his comrade had asked, leering.
Unable to bear doing nothing, I left the safety of the doorway and took a seat on the bed. Cautiously, I put my hand on her heaving back. “Sweetheart?”
“What?” She raised her face, gleaming in the twilight shadows.
I wiped away her tears, then leaned over and kissed her, the best kind of comfort I knew to give. After a moment’s hesitation, her lips opened under mine, and we kissed in the dark, holding each other as close as we dared with my bandage. Her fingers combed through my hair, tingling against my scalp. When I reached for her bodice laces, she rolled away, giggling.
“You need to rest.”
“What I need is you.” I grasped her in my arms.
“You have me--now go to sleep.”
�
�I slept a good two hours before, in the daytime no less--I can’t sleep yet.” I kissed her neck, nibbled the tender shell of her ear.
“That feels nice,” she murmured. I heard her breathing slow and grow softer. She already dozed. Healing sometimes exhausted her--she’d slept a whole day and night after saving Father’s life. I closed my eyes and tried to follow her, but all I could see on the insides of my eyelids was the silver flash of a rebel scimitar. Finally I got up with a sigh and padded toward the other room where my ink and foolscap lay on the table.
At the doorway, I paused. When we had first met, Safire had given me one of her sketches I admired, a picture of the sea cliffs near Landers Hall, silvery under the night sky. There was an ancient path cut into those cliffs--it was a path the old ones had followed when they took their firstborn sons to the shore caves as sacrifices to long dead gods. Safire had drawn several hooded figures on the path, one carrying a struggling baby. This sketch hung near the doorway, caught in a stray beam of moonlight.
I examined it now, the way the bluish light fell across the dark shape of the cliffs, the single, twisted cedar tree marking the top of the path. I shook my head, marveling for the umpteenth time at her talent. No formal lessons, discouragement from her sister and tutor, punishment from her father for soiling her hands with charcoals, and still she had learned. Somehow, we had to save enough for her to study painting. We wouldn’t even have to find a master willing to take a female student. I knew that if I could just buy her enough paints, she would be stubborn enough to teach herself. I grinned in the direction of the bed, then turned my attention back to the sketch.
A sense of movement made me turn around again. A quick glance, and I ascertained that everything was still in its place. Yet it felt as if the chamber had heaved a breath behind me, settling back into motionless sleep only when I turned around. I shook myself and drew closer to the charcoal sketch. Her skill was such that the figures seemed to stride down the path, their robes flapping behind them. I smiled to myself--today’s attack had clearly unsettled me. I even imagined I heard the wail of the baby, distant and haunting over the roar of the sea.
Tapestry Lion (The Landers Saga Book 2) Page 5