The Traitor's Daughter

by Claire Robyns

  “Until you picked up the flag and continued the family tradition of slaughtering your way to greater power,” I couldn’t help tossing in.

  Nathanial ignored it. “But the deciding factor was likely to balance the limitations of your family’s bloodline.”

  “What limitations?”

  “The High Chancellor can only be succeeded by the firstborn.”

  “And if there’s no firstborn?” This all seemed incredibly ridiculous, a series of rules made by inflated egos. “What happens if I don’t produce an heir and my bloodline dies out?”

  “There’s a contingency plan.”

  “And that would be?”

  “You tell me.” His brow speared with the look he settled on me. “Devon seriously never told you anything of your birth right and legacy?”

  “He taught me everything I need to know to lead our people into the future.”

  “He denied you the ability to form your own opinions and make decisions that might not align with his,” Nathanial said. “Knowledge is power, Rose. Your father took that from you.”

  “Says the man who’s taken everything from me,” I said dryly. My freedom, my loyalty, my family bloodline. I shook my head at him. “This is exactly why we can’t have a civil conversation.”

  “I don’t want to fight.” He unfolded his arms to place a hand on my shoulder. “I tend to speak my mind, but I welcome you to challenge me, too.”

  “I have no desire to criticize your upbringing or rip your father’s virtues from his grave.”

  “You honestly don’t see the problem with missing such an important part of your history?”

  I was beginning to, but that was my frustration to bear. “If it’s so important, then tell me.”

  His hand moved from my shoulder, his fingers trailing a feather-light path up my neck.

  A warm shiver caressed my skin, but we weren’t alone out here and if I pulled away, this would just disintegrate into another lecture about my public duties as his wife. “Why can the High Chancellor only be succeeded by the firstborn? What is the contingency plan and why do we even need one? What is so special about the High Chancellor, Nathanial, that I could take your place, but you cannot take mine?”

  His hand wrapped the base of my skull, locking me in a gentle grip that tipped my face up to him. “I don’t have all your answers.”

  Maybe not, but he did have some. His gaze drifted to my mouth and I knew this conversation was done. He wasn’t telling.

  I pressed a hand to his chest and twisted out from the intimate hold.

  His jaw hardened and I tapped him playfully on the shoulder, leant in to murmur before I walked away. “Don’t forget the eyes on us, Nathanial. Smile, even if it kills you.”

  After supper that night, I did the one thing I’d tried so hard to avoid.

  Never look back. If you keep moving forward, my child, the fingers of regret and loneliness don’t know where to find you.

  My father’s words haunted each narrow step of the service stairway that spiralled up to the east wing. When I turned into the passage on the first landing, I could almost feel the woollen threads of the plush carpet twine around my ankles, slowing my progress. This was another betrayal of my father’s wishes, of his wisdom and his teachings, but the tug of my old home and the memories that dwelled there was too strong to ignore.

  Sorry, Father.

  I passed closed doors, following the curve of the passage to my mother’s bedroom. My hand rested on the brass knob for a heartbeat. Unless something had changed, it wouldn’t be locked. These doors all bolted from the inside, designed to protect us and not to trap. Of course, that sentiment hadn’t done my mother any good. They’d simply hauled her to the tower when they’d needed a reinforced door with a sturdy lock.

  The bitter taste on my tongue forced my hand. The knob turned and I pushed inside with the swing of the door, stopped short as my gaze skimmed the dim room. The curtains had been stripped from the sash windows, the daylight kept out by the wooden shutters. I flipped the wall switch by the door, but the electrics was dead, the bulbs probably removed from the fittings.

  My heart hammered inside my chest as I looked from one corner to the other, searching for the ghost of my mother and the little girl who’d basked in her love and smiles.

  White sheets drowned the poster bed where I’d spent so many mornings snuggling with my mother, draped the vanity where she’d sit to brush her hair and apply a dusting of face powder. A sea of white swept over anything that may have lingered of her presence. The door leading to the master bedroom had always stood wide open in my memories, but now it was as firmly shut as the door between mine and Nathanial’s.

  I blinked back hot, angry tears.

  What had I expected?

  It was as my father always said, this was just a room of stone and brick and glass and wood. The flesh and bone and love and laughter were rotting in the grave with my mother.

  - 14 -

  The following days rolled one into the other.

  I rose with the sun each morning and went down for breakfast in the summer parlour. Usually I arrived just as Nathanial was finishing and we shared our coffee over banal chatter. Nathanial sipped and, to his constant amusement, I cradled the mug close to my lips and savoured the darkly intense aroma without tasting. I supposed I could have arrived ten minutes later and skipped this ritual, but I figured if I gave a little, he wouldn’t take a lot. So far, it worked. He left me to my day and I didn’t have to see him until supper and that was buffered with James and Amelia and often a few others.

  After breakfast, I’d make my way to the grounds behind the barracks to train with Markus and David. Liam was on his feet, but under strict instructions to take it easy. Doctor Lossing warned if he tore the internal stitches, his guts would spill out.

  Then I’d take full advantage of the indoor plumbing in my bedroom to wash away the sweat before tackling Jeremy and his social calendar.

  Today was no different and neither was my answer when Jeremy mentioned the Mayor’s monthly tea.

  “I’m afraid you’ll have to decline,” I said as I swept around him to take a seat behind my desk. “I’m busy.”

  “I haven’t given you the date yet.”

  I met his furrowed stare. This job was eroding his bright-eyed shine bit by bit. “When is it?”

  “Wednesday next.” He scratched at the collar of his shirt. “Four in the afternoon.”

  I felt sorry for him, I really did. But I hadn’t been raised a lady of leisure and I had no desire to be turned into one. My social engagements usually involved some form of weapon, not dainty China.

  I would eventually have to conform, lead from the tea parlour instead of on a battlefield, I knew that.

  But not today.

  And not tomorrow.

  Not next week or the next.

  I offered him a smile. “I’m definitely busy Wednesday next at four.”

  He flipped the pages of his notebook. “I don’t see anything pencilled in.” He looked at me with that perpetual frown. “How am I to manage your affairs if you don’t keep me informed of your engagements?”

  I’d encouraged this informality, insisted he speak his mind, demanded he call me Rose instead of the infernal your grace. And this is what I got for it. A secretary who spoke his mind and made his disgruntlement known.

  “Give me that.” I held out my hand for his notebook and lead pencil.

  He handed over his precious ‘bible’ and tipped forward to see what I’d do with it.

  The notebook was already opened to a page with 22 June, Thursday, 152 NC scrawled in the top right-hand corner: 152 years into the New Calendar.

  The end of our world hadn’t been the first event to reset the years of our calendar. There’d been the birth of Jesus Christ, dividing our timeline into BC and AD.

  Now we had NC, and storytellers still spoke about the AD world. Metal birds that carried passengers across oceans in their bellies. Pictures that moved
and spoke on paper thin malleable glass. Messages sent from one continent to the next in the time it took to write.

  And the weapons.

  Fire-spitting sticks cast in iron that went by many names: guns, rifles, firearms. Bullets as tiny as baby acorns that could shred your body from the inside out. And the missiles, of course, that had blasted across the skies like flights of arrows from the gods, burning the planet for weeks and when there was nothing left to burn, churning poison into the soil, the water, into the wind.

  I didn’t know much about the old world and I didn’t know how true those stories were, but I did know this. There was nothing left of it.

  I placed the notebook on the table and scrawled the word “TRAINING” across the page, slashed double lines above and below for emphasis.

  “My goodness, don’t you two look serious,” Amelia exclaimed, striding in without so much as a knock or a good morning. One of the many things I liked about her. We were fast becoming friends. “What are you planning? A soiree or a coup?”

  I laughed. “Jeremy and I are synchronizing our diaries, so he can better manage me.”

  Jeremy coughed. “Her grace has—”

  “Her grace?” Amelia rolled her eyes at him. “Don’t put on airs on my account.”

  Jeremy pretended he had no idea what she was talking about. “Her grace has seized my diary.”

  While they discussed my lack of cooperation, I slashed out a few more pages with “STATE AFFAIRS.”

  Amelia saw and drawled, “You could at least add some imagination and detail to your excuses.”

  “This…” I stabbed the pencil on the page. “This is not an excuse. I intend to make a round of visits to check how my people are settling in.”

  “I planned to personally oversee such visits in about three months,” she said. “Actually, do you mind if I join you? Then I could mark their progress from now to then.”

  I swallowed the automatic refusal. These were my people, my family, my duty. But I had to start letting go and release them into the general public. That is how I came down from the mountain. That is how we all came down from the mountain.

  “It will take a week of days if I’m to be thorough,” I told Amelia. “Do you have the time?”

  “I’ll make it,” she said decisively.

  “Then you are welcome to join me.” I flipped the page and saw Jeremy’s neat entry jotted down in hard ink. “The Hunt Ball?”

  I’d forgotten about ‘the season’, a string of balls hosted by each of the baron families. I groaned inwardly, tried to keep my expression neutral but apparently failed miserable.

  Amelia calmly asked Jeremy to excuse us. Once the door closed behind him, she turned on me with an animated, “Don’t even think about! Nathanial cannot attend without you. The Hunt Ball is the first of the season and I’d be mortified if the royal couple shunned me.”

  “We never would,” I sighed, well aware ‘the season’ couldn’t be dismissed as easily as the Mayor’s tea party or the annual Ladies Picnic by the lake.

  “I know it’s short notice, but I’ll help you with your dress.” Amelia perched on the edge of my desk and smiled at me. “You needn’t worry about a thing.”

  It wasn’t the dress that worried me. I had the King’s store and Janine Marshland at my disposal.

  I grimaced at Amelia. “Would I absolutely have to dance?”

  “It would look rather odd if you didn’t.” It took another moment for her to catch on. “Oh, you don’t dance.”

  “I grew up in a cave,” I reminded her. My first ball would have been Nathanial’s sixteenth birthday and even then my attendance at such a young age was a concession to our friendship.

  “Well, you have just over a week to learn the basics,” Amelia exclaimed. “That’s doable.”

  “Are you offering to teach me?”

  “That would be too confusing,” she said. “You need a man.”

  “I already have one and it’s one too many,” I muttered.

  Her interest perked. “Trouble in paradise?”

  I pursed my lips on the clumsy mistake. Amelia had been my friend for a few short days. She’d been a rabid royalist all her life. Besides, grumbling about my marriage was unworthy and a useless suck of energy…although the temptation was nearly irresistible. If Amelia pushed, I might crumble.

  “I’ll make you a deal,” I said. “You don’t ask questions about my marriage and I won’t ask about you and Markus.”

  She blinked innocently. “Markus?”

  “I know you were engaged to him.”

  “Is that what Markus told you?”

  Her tone took me slightly aback. “It’s not true?”

  “I’m just surprised he remembers.” She shrugged. “It was ten years ago and we were engaged for all of five minutes before he abandoned me.”

  My brow hitched. “Five minutes?”

  “Not literally.” Amelia laughed dryly. “It was more like a month, but my point remains. Markus chose his High Chancellor over me.”

  And you chose your King over him. I didn’t fling the accusation, though. Amelia was married to James and Markus insisted there was no problem. That was a pot best left unstirred.

  “Speaking of Markus, you could always ask him to teach you,” Amelia said. “He’s a superb dancer.” She stabbed a finger at me. “Do not tell him I said that. Or you could get Mr Johansson to give you private instruction, although…” Her mouth shrugged. “He is old and rather rigid. Markus would be a lot more fun.” She stabbed at me again, this time with a pointed look. “Do not tell him I said that.”

  Before I could get a word in, the door opened and the man himself strode him.

  “And there’s my cue to leave,” Amelia said under her breath and slid from her perch on the desk. “Markus,” she greeted as she swept past him.

  “Amelia.” His gaze tracked her out the door and lingered.

  I had to clear my throat to get his attention, which was probably not a good sign. Then again, what man’s head wouldn’t be turned by Amelia? Maybe it was nothing personal.

  Markus gathered himself, scrubbing a hand over his jaw as he came closer. “I overheard some of the soldiers in the barracks discussing a raid on the caves. They ride this afternoon.”

  “The caves?” My spine snapped straight. “Nathanial never mentioned anything.”

  “And that surprises you?”

  I honestly wasn’t sure. I’d assumed we’d moved beyond strategic outmanoeuvring, but this was Nathanial and Lord knew I always seemed to be two steps behind him. “What are they hoping to find?”

  Markus gave a slow shake of his head. “But we were all given a chance to collect our personal belongings before we surrendered,” he said. “You haven’t been back, though. If there’s anything you want to fetch before they get their hands on it, I suggest we go now.”

  Like everyone else who’d lived on the mountain, I could fit my personal belongings into a cloth bundle. The only item dear to me was my father’s signet ring, kept in the small wooden box beneath my bed. But that was securely stashed, hidden in a crevice slashed into the stone, and I liked knowing it was there with the ghost of his presence. Bringing any piece of him here to the castle felt like a sacrilegious offense.

  “I don’t,” I said to Markus. “But we’re going anyway. I want to be there when they come snooping.”

  - 15 -

  The dam wall had been pulled down and once again the river churned its turbulent fury against the east ridge before rushing between the craggy headlands. The sight and sounds of the watery inferno filled me with longing for the way things were.

  I was no martyr and I enjoyed the comforts of town living. Lavish dishes prepared by the castle chef. Steamy showers at the twist of a knob. Sleeping on a down feather mattress. Waking with the sunlight on my face.

  But this mountain still felt like home.

  After dismounting, I removed Arandite’s saddle so she could graze freely by the grassy bank. She wouldn’t
run and if something caused her to bolt, she’d find her way back. This was her home, too.

  Markus had ridden a stallion from the King’s stable and he looped the reins over a low-slung branch. We then walked up the rocky slope in silence, brooding on our thoughts and past.

  Life here had been rough, stark, edged with danger.

  Life here had been honest.

  We did what had to be done to survive and we never lost sight of our honour.

  Lately, I felt like I was scraping the bottom of an empty barrel for whatever scraps of honour I could find. I’d surrendered my people to the enemy. I’d delivered Jarvis and Lennard to their executioner. I’d married my father’s murderer.

  The goats and chickens had been taken away, but inside, the main cave preserved that fatal night of the Battle for River Grodden. The stalagmites rose from the ground, the stalactites speared from the roof. Some of the wooden crates we used as furniture were kicked over. A basket of rotting apples gave off an overly sweet scent. A discarded blanket lay near my feet where I stood, paused on the threshold. The daylight stalked our backs, fading into the shadows and then into the inky blackness of the farther recesses.

  “If you could turn back the clock,” Markus said, “would you?”

  “How far?” I murmured. “To the night when I surrendered our mountain? To that morning when my father and I set off to hunt?”

  To that day when I should have sliced Nathanial’s fingers and watch him plunge from the cliff to his death?

  Or further still, to the last time I saw my mother, not knowing it would be the last?

  I felt Markus’ eyes on me and turned my head up to him. “Is this to be the measure of my life, how far I must rewind before I reach the point of no regret?”

  “I’m not judging you, Rose.”

  He could, though. He could judge me, speak his mind, do and say anything because our loyalty and friendship to each other was absolute.

  “But you are asking if maybe I’m content with the status quo,” I said to him. “I am Queen, after all. My position as High Chancellor has been restored to its full might and glory.”