Bishop, Anne - Dark Jewels 01 - Daughter of the Blood

by Daughter of the Blood [lit]

  Daemon, who had become more and more amused, frowned slightly. "The demons and the cook I understand. Why the merchants?"

  Saetan let out another dramatic sigh, but his eyes glowed with dark amusement. "I opened a blanket account for her in Kaeleer."

  Daemon sucked in his breath. "You mean . . ."

  "Yes."

  "Mother Night."

  "That's the kindest thing that's been said to me on that score." Enjoying the drama, Saetan continued, "And it's going to get worse. You do realize that?"

  "Worse?" Daemon said suspiciously. "Why will it get worse?"

  "She's only twelve, namesake."

  "I know," Daemon almost moaned.

  "Just consider what sort of mischief she'll have the capacity to get into when she's seventeen and has her own court."

  Daemon groaned, but there was a sharp, hopeful look in his eyes. "She can have her own court at seventeen? And fill it?"

  Ah, namesake. Saetan sat quietly for a moment, thinking of a politic way to explain. "Most positions can be filled then." Daemon's instant bitterness stunned him.

  "Of course you'll want better for her than a whore who's serviced almost every Queen in Terreille," Daemon said, refilling his wineglass.

  "That isn't what I meant," Saetan said, despairing that any explanation now might seem a poor bone.

  "Then what did you mean?" Daemon snapped.

  "What if, at seventeen, she isn't ready for a consort?" Saetan countered softly. "What if it takes a few more years before she's ready for the bed? Will you hold an empty office, becoming comfortable and familiar while lesser men intrigue her because they're strangers? Time has great magic, namesake, if you know how to play the game,"

  "You talk as though it's decided," Daemon said quietly, with only an aftertaste of bitterness.

  "It is ... as far as I'm concerned."

  Daemon's naked, grateful look was agony.

  They sat quietly, companionably, for a few minutes. Then Daemon said, "Why do you keep calling me namesake?"

  "Because you are." Saetan looked away, uncomfortable. "I never intended to give any of my sons that name. I knew what I was. It was difficult enough for them to have me as a father. But the first time I held you, I knew no other name would suit you. So I named you Saetan Daemon SaDiablo."

  Daemon's eyes were tear bright. "Then you really did acknowledge paternity? Manny said the Blood register in Hayll had been changed, but I had wondered."

  "I'm not responsible for Dorothea's lies, Prince," Saetan said bitterly. "Or for what the Hayllian register does or doesn't say. But in the register kept at Ebon Askavi, you— and Lucivar—are named and acknowledged."

  "So you called me Daemon?"

  Saetan knew there was much, much more Daemon would have liked to ask, but he was grateful his son chose to step back, to try for lighter conversation in the short time left to them.

  "No," Saetan said dryly, "I never called you anything but Saetan. It was Manny and Tersa"—he hesitated, wondering if Daemon knew about Tersa, but there was no surprise—"who called you Daemon. Manny informed me one day, when I pointed out her error, that if I thought she was going to stand at the back door bellowing that name to get a boy to come in for supper I had better think again."

  Daemon laughed. "Come now, Manny's a sweetheart."

  "To you." Saetan chuckled. "Personally I always thought she just wanted to avoid having both of us answer that summons."

  "Would you have?" Daemon asked warmly.

  "Considering the tone of voice used, I wouldn't have dared not to,"

  They both laughed.

  The parting was awkward. Saetan wanted to embrace him, but Daemon became tense, almost skittish. Saetan wondered if, after all those years in Dorothea's court, Daemon had an aversion to being touched.

  And there was Lucivar. He had wanted to ask about Lucivar, but Daemon's haunted expression at the mention of his brother's name eliminated that possibility. Since he wanted to know his sons, he would have to have the patience to let them approach when they were ready.

  2 / Terreille

  Jaenelle returned a teeth-grinding day and a half later.

  After a hectic afternoon of social calls with Alexandra, Daemon was prowling the corridors, too restless to lie down and get some badly needed rest, when he saw the girls come in from a walk in the garden.

  "But you must remember how funny it was," Wilhelmina said as he approached. She looked bewildered. "It only happened yesterday."

  "Did it?" Jaenelle replied absently. "Oh, yes, I remember now."

  Daemon gave them an exaggerated bow. "Ladies."

  Wilhelmina giggled. Jaenelle raised her eyes to meet his.

  He didn't like the weariness in her face, didn't like how ancient her eyes looked even though they were the dissembling summer-sky blue, but he met her steady gaze. "Lady, may I have a word with you?"

  "As you wish," Jaenelle said, barely suppressing a sigh.

  They waited until Wilhelmina climbed the stairs to the nursery before going to the library. Daemon locked the door. Before he could decide what to say, Jaenelle grumbled, "Don't be scoldy, Prince."

  Hackles rising, Daemon slipped his hands into his pockets and leisurely walked toward her. "I haven't said a word."

  Jaenelle removed her coat and hat, dropping them on

  the couch. She slumped beside them, "I've already had one scolding today."

  So the Priest had gotten to her first. Just as well. All Daemon wanted to do was hug her. He settled beside her, perversely wanting to take the sting out of the very scolding he had wanted to administer. "Was the scolding very bad?" he asked gently.

  Jaenelle scowled at him. "He wouldn't have scolded at all if you hadn't told him. Why'd you tell him?"

  "I was scared. I thought something had happened to you."

  "Oh," Jaenelle said, immediately chastened. "But I worked so hard to create that shadow so no one would worry, so there wouldn't be any difference. No one else noticed the difference."

  They noticed, my Lady. They were grateful for the difference. It amused him—a little—that she was more concerned that her Craft hadn't been as effective as she'd thought than she was about the worry she'd caused. "It took the Black to notice the difference, and even I wasn't sure until a whole day had gone by."

  "Really?" Jaenelle perked up.

  "Really." Daemon tried to smile but couldn't quite do it. "Don't you think I'm entitled to an explanation?"

  Jaenelle ducked her face behind her golden veil of hair. "I was going to tell you. I promised I'd tell you. And I had to tell the Priest because he has to arrange some things."

  Daemon frowned. "Promised who?"

  "Tersa."

  Daemon counted to ten. "How do you know Tersa?"

  "It was time, Daemon," Jaenelle said, ignoring his question.

  Daemon counted to ten again. "Tersa's very special to me."

  "I know," Jaenelle said quietly. "But you're grown up now, Daemon. You don't really need her anymore. And it was time for her to leave the Twisted Kingdom ... but she'd been there so long, she couldn't find her way back by herself."

  The room was so cold—not the cold of anger, the cold of fear. Daemon held Jaenelle's hands between his own, taking small comfort from their warmth. He didn't want to

  understand. He truly did not want to understand. But he did. "You went into the Twisted Kingdom, didn't you?" he said, trying desperately to keep his voice calm. "You walked the roads of madness to find her and led her back to sanity—at least as far as she can come."

  "Yes."

  "Didn't you think—" His voice broke from the strain. "Didn't it occur to you it might be dangerous?"

  Jaenelle looked puzzled. "Dangerous?" She shook her head. "No. It's just a different way of seeing, Daemon."

  Daemon closed his eyes. Did she fear nothing? Not even madness?

  "Besides, I've traveled that far before, so I knew the way back."

  Daemon tasted blood where his teeth had nicke
d his tongue.

  "But it took a while to find her, and it took a while to convince her it was time to go, that she didn't need to stay inside the visions all the time." Jaenelle gave his hands a little squeeze. "The Priest is going to buy a cottage for her in a little village near the Hall in Kaeleer. She'll have people there who will look after her, and a garden to work in, and Black Widow Sisters to talk to."

  Daemon pulled her into his arms and held her tight. "You convinced her to live there?" he whispered into her hair. "She'll really be in a decent house with decent clothes and good food and people who will understand?" Her head moved up and down. He sighed. "Then it was worth the worry. A hundred times that would have been worth it."

  "That's what the Priest said—after the scolding."

  Daemon smiled against her hair. "Did he say anything else?"

  "Lots of things," Jaenelle grumbled. "Something about sitting down comfortably, but I didn't understand him and he wouldn't repeat it."

  Daemon coughed. Jaenelle raised her head, eyeing him suspiciously. He tried for a bland expression. She looked more suspicious.

  Passing footsteps in the corridor made him turn, his body tensed, his eyes fixed on the door.

  "You'd better join your sister." He handed her the coat and hat. Before he opened the door, Daemon paused.

  "Thank you." It was far from adequate, but it was all he could think of to say. Jaenelle nodded and slipped out the door.

  3 / Terreille

  Daemon had just finished brushing his hair, ready for another day of Winsol activity, when Jaenelle tapped lightly on his door and bounced into the room. He wasn't sure when his room had become mutual territory, but he was much less casual about the way he dressed—and undressed—than he had been.

  Jaenelle bounced up beside him, her eyes fixed on his face. Daemon smiled. "Do I meet with your approval?"

  She reached up, brushed her fingers against his cheek, and frowned. "Your face is smooth."

  One eyebrow rising, Daemon turned back to the mirror to check his collar. "Hayllian men don't have facial hair." He paused. "Neither do Dhemlans or Eyriens, for that matter."

  Jaenelle still frowned. "I don't understand."

  Daemon shrugged. "Differences in race is all."

  "No." Jaenelle shook her head. "If you don't have to take the hair off the way Philip does, why did Graff say you might serve better if you were shaved? Philip does it hims—"

  Daemon's fist hit the top of the dresser, splitting the wood from end to end. He gripped the edges while he fought for control. The bitch. The bitch, to make such a suggestion!

  "It means something else, doesn't it?" Jaenelle said in her midnight voice.

  "It's nothing," Daemon growled through clenched teeth.

  "What does it mean, Daemon?"

  "Leave it alone, Jaenelle."

  "Prince."

  Daemon's fist smashed the dresser again. "If you're so curious, ask your damn mentor!" He turned away, struggling to regain control. After a moment, he turned again, saying, "Jaenelle, I'm sorry."

  She was already gone.

  4 / Hell

  Saetan and Andulvar sat around the blackwood desk, drinking yarbarah while waiting for Jaenelle. Saetan had returned to the private study beneath the Hall in order to have some private, concentrated time with Jaenelle for her lessons after discovering that all of the Kaeleer staff seemed to make their way into his public study on some pretense or other just to say hello to her.

  "What's the lesson to be today?" Andulvar asked.

  "How should I know?" Saetan replied dryly.

  "You're the one in charge."

  "I'm delighted that someone thinks so."

  "Ah." Andulvar refilled his glass and warmed the blood wine. "You're still annoyed about Tersa?"

  Saetan studied his silver goblet. "Annoyed? No." He rested his head against the back of his chair. "But Hell's fire, Andulvar, trying to keep up with these leaps she makes . . . the enormity of the raw strength it must take to do some of these things. I want her to have a childhood. I want her to do all the silly things young girls do, whatever they are. I want her to be young and carefree."

  "She'll never have a normal childhood, SaDiablo. She knows us, the cildru dyathe, Geoffrey and Draca—and Lorn, whatever and wherever he may be. She's seen more of Kaeleer than anyone else in thousands of years. How can you hope for a normal childhood?"

  "Those things are normal, Andulvar," Saetan said wearily, ignoring Andulvar's grunt of denial. "Do you wish you'd never met her? Don't scowl at me that way; I know the answer." He leaned forward, resting his folded hands on the desk. "The point is, a child plays with the unicorns in Sceval. A child visits friends in Scelt and Philan and Glacia and Dharo and Narkhava and Dea al Mon—and in Hell—and who knows how many other places. I've listened to her stories, the innocent, albeit nerve-racking, adventures of young, strong witches growing up and learning their Craft. No matter where she is when she's doing those things, she's a child."

  "Then what's the problem?"

  "The only place she never mentions, the only place that doesn't figure into these adventures of hers, is Beldon Mor. She says nothing about her family."

  Andulvar thought about this. "SaDiablo, you're jealous enough as it is. Would you really want to know that the people who have more claim to her adore her as much as you? Would a child as sensitive to others' moods as she is be willing to tell you?"

  "Jealous?" Saetan hissed. "You think it's jealousy that makes me want to tear them apart?"

  Andulvar eyed his friend before saying cautiously, "Yes, I do."

  Saetan snapped away from his desk, rose halfway out of his chair, then reconsidered. "Not jealousy," he said, closing his eyes. "Fear. I keep wondering what happens when she leaves here. I keep wondering about some of the things she's asked me to teach her, wondering why a child wants to know about some things, wondering why I sometimes hear desperation in her voice or, worse, a chilling anger." He looked at Andulvar. "We survived brutal childhoods and stayed true to the Blood because that's what we are. Blood. But she . . . Oh, Andulvar, in a few short years she'll make the Offering, and when she does, she'll be beyond reach. If she feels isolated from us ... Do you really want to see Jaenelle in her full, dark glory ruling from the Twisted Kingdom?"

  "No," Andulvar said quietly, a faint tremor in his voice. "No, I don't want to see our waif in the Twisted Kingdom."

  "Then—" There was a quiet knock on the door. Saetan and Andulvar exchanged a look. Andulvar's face settled into a frown. Saetan's became neutral. "Come."

  Both men tensed when Jaenelle walked into the room, the set of her shoulders all the warning they needed.

  "High Lord," she said, giving him a regal nod. "Prince Yaslana."

  "A bit formal, aren't you, waif?" Andulvar said with good-humored gruffness.

  Saetan pressed his lips together, gratefully dismayed. Trust an Eyrien to push a battle into the open. What made him wary was Jaenelle's lack of response.

  She turned to Saetan, her sapphire eyes pinning him to the chair. "High Lord, I want to ask a question, and I don't want to be told I'm too young for the answer."

  Saetan could see Andulvar become very still, gathering his strength in case it was needed. "Your question, Lady?"

  "What does being shaved mean?"

  Andulvar stifled a gasp. Saetan felt as if he were falling down a bottomless chasm. He licked his lips and said quietly, "It means to remove a man's genitals."

  For a brief moment the room felt the way a sky full of lightning looks. Saetan didn't dare take his eyes off Jaenelle's, didn't dare miss whatever he might read in them.

  It made him ill.

  After the flash of anger, he could see her considering, weighing, deciding something. Even though he knew what she was going to say, he dreaded hearing the words.

  "Teach me."

  "Wait a minute, waif!"

  Jaenelle raised her hand. Not even the Demon Prince would challenge that imperious order for silence
. "High Lord?"

  This was how it must feel to be a dried-out husk. "There are two ways," Saetan said stiffly. "The easiest way requires skill with a knife. It also requires physical contact. The other way is subtler but requires knowledge of male anatomy to be effective. Which would you prefer to learn?"

  "Both."

  Saetan looked away. "May I have until tomorrow to prepare?"

  Jaenelle nodded. "High Lord. Prince Yaslana."

  They watched her leave. For a while they said nothing, neither willing to meet the other's eyes.

  Finally Andulvar said tensely, "You're going to do it, aren't you?"

  Saetan leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, rubbing his temples to ease a searing headache. "Yes, I am."

  "You're mad!" Andulvar roared, leaping from his chair. "She's only twelve, Saetan. How can she understand what it means to a man to be shaved?"

  Saetan slowly opened his eyes. "You didn't see her eyes. She already appreciates the ramifications of shaving a man. That's why she wants to learn how to do it."

  "And who is to be the first victim?" Andulvar snarled.

  Saetan shook his head. "The question, my friend, is why is there going to be a victim? And where?"

  5 / Terreille

  When Surreal realized what sort of party this was going to be, she almost told her escort she wanted to leave, but she'd extracted his promise to take her to a Winsol party under the most distracting—and persuasive—circumstances and didn't want to give him an excuse to bolt. At another time, it would have been amusing to watch his flustered cockiness as he tried to seem nonchalant about the woman he'd brought, a woman whose name would never be mentioned in any family of good repute—at least not while the women were in hearing. But this . . . Surreal itched to call in the stiletto and slip it between a few ribs.