She cleared her throat. “He wants to challenge you and Merius, bring about the downfall of the House of Landers.”
“Does he somehow want to use the knowledge that you’re a witch to bring about our downfall?”
She shook her head, biting her lip. “He doesn’t want to endanger me,” she whispered, knotting and unknotting her fingers. “He doesn’t want anyone to find out I’m a witch. He wants to protect me. I'm the prize to him. He thinks . . .” she trailed off.
“Go on,” Father prompted. “We need to know whatever you can remember, sweet.”
“He thinks Merius somehow blackmailed me into marriage, that he found out I’m a witch and used to that to coerce me . . . but that’s so twisted,” she burst out, suddenly looking at me. “I mean, that’s what Peregrine would have done himself if he’d found out before . . .”
“Men often mistakenly perceive their own actions or intents in others.”
“It’s like looking at another, and instead of seeing him for who he is, seeing him as a mirror.” I clasped my hands under my chin and stared at my murky reflection in the tabletop.
“But how can someone that wicked and base want to protect me?” she demanded, then put her hand to her mouth as if trying to keep more stray words from falling out.
“Just what you said. He sees you as the ultimate prize, Safire,” Father said after a long pause. “His obsession with you has shackled Peregrine in ways I’m sure he lacks the self-awareness to realize at the moment.”
A tear and then another glistened down Safire’s cheeks. She impatiently swiped them away with her napkin. “Why, why did he have to fixate on me?” she asked the air. Suddenly there came the scrape of her chair as she pushed it back and fled the room.
The silence hummed for a moment before Father sighed and tossed his crumpled napkin on the table. “She shouldn’t go near him again--even with the assassins guarding her, he’s too dangerous and unpredictable. Perhaps she could write him a letter . . .”
“What?” I shook my head--I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “This ends, Father. This instant.”
Father met my gaze, his eyes a stolid slate. “It can’t end, Merius. Not yet. Not before we have the evidence we need to expose his treachery to the council. He has to believe that he has some chance with her, and the only way to keep a practical man like him believing that is for her to string him along with some tangible means.”
“We need to find another way besides Safire to distract him. Look how upset she is.”
“She’ll be a damn sight more upset if something happens to you.” He leaned forward, his hands fisted around the table edge. “Listen to me--if this was just about distracting Peregrine, perhaps we could find a different way. But it’s not. It’s about the fact he’s a ruthless scoundrel who’s obsessed with your wife. If he realizes that there’s no way he’s getting his hands on her except by killing you, he’ll risk it. However, if he continues to believe she has feelings for him and might eventually be tempted from your side, he’ll keep trying to seduce her so that he can humiliate you before he kills you.”
“Say she sends him a letter to string him along. What’s to stop him from using a letter like that to ruin her reputation when he realizes the truth?”
“Nothing, unless we write it in such a way that it implicates him as much as her. I’m not worried about a letter, not when he has that traitor Whitten there, telling him she’s a witch.” An odd look crossed Father’s face--his eyes glinted like blades, but one side of his mouth twisted down in a lopsided frown. He looked ready to murder someone--and embarrassed about it. I had seen him look murderous before but never embarrassed. An awkward silence ensued.
A muffled thump came from outside the door, then the shuffle of slippered footfalls and the scrape of something heavy dragging over the floorboards. “Damn it,” I heard Safire exclaim. “Maybe Jared can help us.”
I flung my chair back and raced for the door. “Merius . . .” Father said as he rose and reached for my arm. I shook him off as I threw open the door. Safire bent backwards, her arms taut with the strain, her white-knuckled hands curled around one handle of her trunk as Elsa tried to push it from the other end. Both of them slumped and turned their heads to look at me. Safire’s face was flushed, her hair in tiny wispy ringlets all around her forehead from the humidity. Her eyes glimmered like green glass in bright sunlight, a hard, defiant light that blinded me when I tried to breach the wall she had built between her mind and mine.
“What are you doing?” I demanded.
“Going home,” she said.
“Safire, this is home.”
“It was. Until this afternoon, when you declared it a prison.”
“Sweetheart . . .”
“Don’t try to charm me, not after what you said earlier.”
“I was upset when I said those things.” I tried to keep my voice even, calm, even as the floor seemed to shift under my feet.
“And I’m upset now.”
I clutched the door jamb. “I didn’t mean what I said. You can go anywhere you want, and I won’t stop you. But damn it, I don’t want to be away from you, especially not now, not with Dom . . . with the baby coming.”
Her eyes softened, and she absently touched her middle as if Dominic had kicked her. “Merius, it’s only for a little while. I’ll be back long before he comes.”
“This is insane. It’s not safe. You know no one can protect you like I can . . .” I trailed off, swallowing as Father rested his hand on my shoulder.
“Merius, given the circumstances, she'll likely be safer away from Corcin for awhile. I’ll escort her back to Landers Hall,” he said.
“But you’ll have to leave her there when you come back to court . . .”
“Randel can stay there to guard her.” His voice dropped to a whisper so Elsa couldn‘t overhear. “He knows about the assassins, all right? If they try anything else, he’ll be there.”
Safire let go of the trunk handle. “Sir, Elsa, if you could wait in the hall for a moment, I’d like to talk to Merius alone.”
Father nodded. I moved aside as he stepped past me into the hall. My body felt deadened to all sensation, turned to stone. I fumbled behind me for the table edge and leaned against it. Even Safire seemed far away, a distant figure observed through the wrong end of a spyglass as she shut the library door and turned to me. Then she reached out and touched my jaw where she had slapped me earlier. Her fingers felt light as feathers brushing my skin, her gaze intent on mine. The stone me cracked and then crumbled, and I put my hand over my eyes which suddenly stung. A vision crossed my mind, my mother in her casket, her pale hands clasped around my stillborn brother, and I heard a harsh, ragged sound in my ears, the sound of someone crying who was unaccustomed to it. Me--I was the one crying. How could it be me? I hadn’t cried since I was ten and my mother died. Yet I could feel the heat of the tears running down my cheeks, the air catching in my throat as I drew shuddering breaths. I grabbed Safire and buried my face in her hair.
“Shh, shh, it’s all right, dear heart,” she murmured as she ran her hands up and down my back. “It’s only for a little while.”
“But what if something happens, and I’m not there to help you . . .”
“Merius, things will happen how they’re meant to happen. You can’t rescue anyone from her destiny. You couldn’t have stopped what happened to your mother. No one could have--it was simply her time to cross over. You’ll see her again, just like you’ll see me again no matter what happens.”
“But I don’t understand--why do you have to leave?” I choked on the words. “Safire, I swear I didn‘t mean what I said . . . I was just so angry about Peregrine, I wasn‘t thinking.”
“Look at me.” She braced her hands on my chest and stepped back so our eyes could meet. Her velvety aura wrapped around mine, the air tasting of honeyed wine, the taste of her trying to comfort me. “I’ve told you countless times I could never love another man like I love you. Ever. Just
because I need some time to myself has nothing to do with whether I love you or not. And Merius, even if one of us died, we would never leave each other, not really.”
I swallowed. “You know I don’t share your faith in that. I‘ve felt my mother around before, but I think that was just me wishing for her, not her actual presence.”
“If I could give you faith to ease your mind, I would. But you’ll have to find faith on your own, as we all do.” She rumpled my hair. “My dear skeptic.” Then she leaned up and touched her mouth to mine, our tears mingling in a salty kiss. “This will be good for us both, help us remember who we are apart from each other. You need to learn to let go, Merius."
"But," I started, then realized she was right.
"I’ll be back before you know it,” she murmured as she stood on her tiptoes and pressed her lips to my forehead.
Then, her breath coming in hitches, she spun away from me and fled the chamber. I started to follow, then remembered Father was out there. I didn’t want him to see evidence of my tears. Besides, all me following her would do was make it more difficult for both of us. I fisted my hand over my mouth as I listened to the muffled sounds in the hall, the sounds of departure: the patter of rushing footsteps, the tramp of Jared and Father’s boots, the thump of the trunk on the stairs, raised voices as Father called for Jared, Elsa for Birdley, Jared for a coach. Not a word from Safire, though my ears strained for the slightest murmur of her voice. No. What I did hear was one of the canaries chirping, a lonely trill of a tune that faded as someone carried the cage down the stairs. Then silence, unbearable silence.
Chapter Eleven--Eden
Corcin, Eastern Cormalen
July, 3 years ago
Safire had visited me at court almost daily for the past several months, sometimes to attend a palace function but more often just to drink tea and gossip in my chambers. In contrast, I had only been to her and Merius's rented house a handful of times, generally in the afternoons when Mordric and Merius were at council. Even though Merius wasn't there when I visited, the evidence of his presence was inescapable: tottering stacks of books, mostly "borrowed" from the Landers library, tattered maps and dusty parchments that gave me sneezing fits when I glanced at them, odd instruments such as globes marked with the stars and constellations rather than the lands and seas, and several kites in various stages of construction that made Safire sigh when she saw them. She never said anything directly to me, but she didn't have to--her sigh said it all. It was the sigh of a woman wavering between pride and terror and trying to hold her tongue at all costs. I was sure Merius had no idea how much he worried her with his schemes. In his mind, she belonged to him, not he to her. She was his to protect, cherish, and smother, but God forbid she do the same to him. No wonder she'd left for a while. I just wished she hadn't taken Mordric and Randel with her.
I sighed myself at the thought of my absent Sir. He should have been back two days ago, damn him. As I knocked on Merius and Safire's door, I noticed a burly man in a dark shirt and pants lounging against the wall of the house. One of the assassins. They really were the most boring looking men I'd ever seen--one would think assassins would be exciting and mysterious, their faces perhaps concealed by masks. Instead, we had these nondescript dullards.
"My lady?" Bridget stood beside me. Attuned to my least expression of dissatisfaction, she looked alarmed.
"It's nothing," I said. "Just a little tired." I straightened, preparing to confront Merius. He hadn't attended council in three days--he should be grateful that I hadn't written to Mordric.
The cook-cum-housekeeper-cum-maid opened the door after my second knock. She was generally a neat creature, so it surprised me to see the untidy haystack of her hair, the grease stain down the front of her bodice, the smudge of ash on her cheek. She looked like she hadn't slept well in several days. I couldn't remember her name, but Bridget saved me.
"Good afternoon, Birdley," she said.
"Afternoon, miss, my lady." Birdley nodded in my direction, her eyeleted cap almost sliding off her head before she clapped her hand over it. A loud thump echoed down the stairs behind her, followed by muffled raucous laughter that sounded like it came from Merius's makeshift library. Birdley's eyes narrowed, her lips pinched.
"I take it Sir Merius has other guests? Perhaps we should return later . . ." I started.
"No, my lady, please come in." Birdley practically towed us into the front hall. "Sir Merius is upstairs," she whispered. "Elsa said this would happen--I should have heeded her and gone with her and Lady Safire, but I couldn't abandon Sir Merius. That Jared, he's been no help whatsoever. He's encouraged it, the blackguard . . ." she sputtered.
"Encouraged what?"
As if in answer, a hideous brass urn banged down the steps. Birdley, Bridget, and I ducked as it bounced against the wainscoting and landed on the floorboards, spinning madly.
"Oh no, they've put a dent in it," Birdley moaned. "That was a wedding gift from Lady Talia. Whatever will she say?" She started toward the urn, but I grabbed her arm, restraining her before some other flying piece of bric-a-brac could take her out.
"If it's any consolation, I'm sure Lady Talia will never visit here," I said. "Birdley, why don't you and Bridget go back to the kitchen and make some tea? Maybe you can help her tidy up," I hissed to Bridget, who nodded mutely.
"My lady, be careful," Birdley said as she and Bridget started toward the back of the house. "Sir Merius is not himself, and this is no fit place for a lady. That Jared, I could just wring his neck . . ." Her litany faded.
I started up the stairs, ready to duck as I heard more laughter. The library door was slightly ajar, a whiff of pipe smoke and the sour smell of warm ale wafting in the air.
"Cedric, did you just piss off the balcony?" Merius demanded.
"I swear, I just went out for some air."
Someone roared a laugh. "What did you expect him to do, after you threw away the urn?"
"Damn it, I told all of you, use the privy chamber. I don't want you pissing in urns, and I don't want you pissing off the balcony."
"Why not, old lady? You did earlier."
"I most certainly did not."
"You're too drunk to remember what you did." A nasty series of thumps and swear words followed, ending with a loud ripping of cloth.
"Stop it, you two. Let's finish the game, all right?" Cedric said.
At that moment, I pushed open the door. The big table, along with most of the other furniture, had been moved to make room for several long wooden poles and a narrow piece of sail canvas that ran almost the whole length of the chamber. Jared knelt on the floor, a ball of twine in one hand as he tied one of the poles to a smaller length of wood, forming a cross. His hands clutched around the stave and twine with the careful deliberation of a man who had drunk far more than he was accustomed to, his shoulders swaying slightly. Gerard (I should have recognized his booming laugh), Cedric, and Merius sat around a small table in the corner of the chamber, playing cards. Merius had one of the window drapes wrapped around his shoulders like a cape. They all looked up when I shut the door, the golden afternoon sunlight glowing against their stubble and making them appear momentarily godlike in a way only healthy, boisterous young men could look.
"Eden, my lovely, come over here," Gerard yelled, the god image shattered.
"She's my kinswoman, for God's sake, not a tavern wench," Merius shouted.
"Both of you, please," Cedric said as he threw down his cards and grabbed his temples. "You're giving me a headache."
I sauntered toward the table, doing my best to step daintily over the staves. I slid on to Gerard's lap, took a sip from the ale glass he silently offered me, and glanced at his cards before I raised my eyes to meet Merius's bleary gaze.
"I suggest you fold, cousin," I said.
"Here's the rules, poppet." Gerard rested his hand on my knee. "Don't you dare give him any more hints. He's the enemy as long as you're on this side of the table."
I smiled
and spared him a sideways glance--I always had been fond of his cheerful bluster. "It's a round table, love--there are no sides. And what if I break the rules? What are you going to do then?" I purred.
Gerard offered a foolish grin. "I've been waiting for you my whole life. Will you marry me?"
"Father sent you," Merius said tonelessly, tossing down two of his cards.
"Not exactly." I dealt him two to replace the ones he threw aside.
"Here now--you can't do that, round table or not. He has to raise first." Gerard swatted my hand away from the deck.
"Is there something wrong? He should be back by now--it's been two weeks." Merius's words might be slurred but his eyes had lost their bleariness and brightened to an alert curiosity.
"Only a week actually, not two. It seems the liquor bottle has elongated your sense of time."
"I say, she uses big words for a tavern wench." Gerard slapped the side of my rump. "What did you say, long gates? What does that mean?"
I arched my brows. "It's a state men like you aspire to but rarely achieve."
Merius snorted. His cards fluttered to the floor as he put his head down on the table and howled with laughter.
"Saucy wench. Landers, where are your goddamned cards?" Gerard demanded.
"I don’t know. They vanished." Merius stood then and stumbled over to where Jared still labored with tying the staves to the crosspiece. "How goes it?" he asked. "Here, let me tie the last one."
Jared waved his hand. "Sir, I've got it. You just wait--I'll have this in the air in no time."
"You're not really going to fly that thing, are you?" Cedric asked. He frowned at his empty ale glass.
"Of course we're going to fly it!" Merius exclaimed, rocking on his heels. "You think we hauled a bunch of sail canvas and wood from the shipyard yesterday for a lark? I've been planning this for years."
"Can't we just go to a tavern and dive into a vat of ale instead? I'd rather be a fish than a bird, Landers." Gerard drained his glass. "And just where are you going to launch that thing?"
Phoenix Ashes (The Landers Saga Book 3) Page 24