He drank again, composing his thoughts. “What were you doing up so early?”
“I often rise before dawn. I was reading Taurin law and composing letters to the kirok elders and—”
“Don’t you sleep?”
“I’ve not the same need for sleep as you, majesty.”
He wanted to curse again, but drank instead. “All right. Are you angry because of my orders or because I didn’t tell you?”
“Both. I told you my first night here that it was foolish to risk angering the kirok. When we agreed that you would keep me here as an ambassador, you should have told me everything. If I had known then about your order, I would have insisted you stop it immediately. But I’m also angry because in the three weeks that I’ve been here, you’ve had much time to tell me this and you haven’t. I had to hear it from Logan. I don’t ever want to hear about anything that concerns Taurin relations with Aliom from the mouth of a guard. Do I make myself clear?”
He tipped his head and ran one finger around the edge of the goblet. “I should have you taken to the dungeons for insolence.”
She tossed her head and scoffed. “Best be about it, then. And I’ll be writing my father the moment you do.” She held out her fists as if waiting to be chained. “D’ye have the shackles here, or will ye be calling a guard?”
He stifled a grin. The way this woman talks to me. I should be angry, but gods, I can’t be. He inclined his head. “Put your hands down, my lady. Please forgive me. I was remiss. I should have told you, and I should have rescinded my orders. In all honesty, I simply forgot. I’ve been busy with other things, and it wasn’t important enough to—”
“Wasn’t important enough?”
“Poor choice of words. It was already ordered. I didn’t give it another thought. I ordered it done the first night. By the time you took your position, my thoughts had turned to other things.”
Her voice lowered. “Can I trust you will rescind the orders now?”
He swirled the water in his goblet. “Yes,” he finally said. “This morning. Now can I go back to bed?”
“No. I want full authority to care for the men at our gates and any others who may show up before your messengers reach your men.”
“Full authority? What does that mean?”
“I want to find them a place to stay and be certain they are adequately fed and clothed. And they will not be tortured—do I have your word?”
“Yes. Fine. You have my authority to treat them as you see fit.”
She pointed to his study. “Go write the orders, Braedan. Now.”
He laughed. “You presume to order me, highness? You forget your position.”
“I know my position quite well. I am your ambassador to Aliom, and I will not leave your rooms until the orders are in my hands.”
He finished the water in his goblet and walked out to his study to sit down at his desk. He rubbed his eyes again. “Gods, it’s early.”
She sat across from him. “I’m happy to wait until your majesty has cleared his head of drink enough to form coherent sentences.”
“It’s not drink. It’s just early.” He picked up a quill and parchment and scrawled orders giving her authority to care for the kirons. He then picked up fresh parchment to write new orders for the men he’d dispatched across the island. He gave them both to her to read. “Will these suffice, ambassador?”
She read each one and placed them back on the desk. “They’re adequate.” She stood. “Sign them, and I will see to it that the scribes enter them into record and that messengers are dispatched to the men in the field.”
“You’ll see to it? It is my seneschal’s job.” He signed both papers.
She smiled. “Why bother Cormac with such triflings, Braedan? I can take care of it right now and allow him to sleep.”
Braedan leaned back in his chair. “All right. Go ahead. You’ll see to it that he’s aware of the orders?”
She inclined her head. “Of course.” She picked up the parchment and folded both pieces. “Perhaps this is your first step, majesty.”
“Toward what?”
“That history you’ll want written when you’re old and gray—the one that forgives you for killing your rival.”
He stood and walked around his desk to stand next to her, realizing for the first time that she wore only a light blue, silk dressing gown. Her hair was tied with a loose ribbon and drawn over one shoulder, and he folded his arms to control the temptation to touch it. “You don’t believe I should be king.”
“No, I don’t. You stole this throne—I’ve made no secret of my opinion.”
“And yet you’re helping me.”
“Whether I like it or not, you are the ruling authority in this country. Without some kind of rule, chaos will descend. I have no wish to see Taura fall into ruin. I’m protecting the interests of Eirya as much as I am protecting your interests.”
“I didn’t think you were such a pragmatist.”
“Perhaps I am. Does that bother you?”
“No. But if the saying is true that a man should keep his friends close and his enemies closer, he should perhaps keep the pragmatists in his service closest of all.”
She dropped her eyes in a seductive gaze that had no hint of submission in it. Her cheeks colored, but she shifted her feet toward him. “I look forward to that, majesty.” Before he could respond, she turned and left his chambers.
He let out a long breath when the door closed. This woman can play me. This woman can play anyone. I hope to gods she’s on my side.
***
Igraine walked with a purposeful stride toward the chambers where scribes transferred the king’s orders into record. Logan fell in step next to her. “Did you get what you wanted, your highness?” he asked.
She stopped and turned to him. The brooding features, the dark curls, the haunted eyes—none of them could hide the smile that twitched the corner of his mouth. “Do I amuse you, Commander?”
“No, my lady. The situation amuses me.”
She put her hands on her hips. “You didn’t have to help.”
“That’s true. I didn’t. But I confess—I wanted to see what would happen if you caught him unaware.” He held out his hand. “May I deliver these for you, my lady?”
She looked down at the parchment. “They just need to be transcribed into record and then I need a copy taken to Cormac. I had thought to wait and deliver them to Cormac myself.”
Logan took one step closer to her. “Let me, highness. You can gloat to Cormac when all the kirons are safely ensconced and fed.”
Her eyes jerked up to his. “You were listening!”
He laughed. “It’s my job to listen. And if I may be bold, highness, it wasn’t hard to hear you. Some of the servants are even now being treated for bleeding ears.”
She opened her mouth to retort and then thought better and closed it. She gave him the parchment. “If I ask later and discover these weren’t delivered—”
“You won’t.”
She nodded. “Very well. Then I’ll go see to the kirons.”
Logan bowed. “Good day, your highness.” He strode down the stone corridor.
Igraine frowned. Logan confused her. He seemed to want to be her ally, but when she had flirted with him, she had been met with everything from lack of interest to outright derision. Yet he’d also shown her kindnesses that she never expected from one of Braedan’s loyal men, and he had let her into the king’s chambers when doing so could have meant punishment. He risked his own safety for me.
She started in the direction of the castle gates and then stopped. She turned toward the sound of Logan’s footsteps. “Commander.”
He stopped. “Yes?”
She caught up with him and folded her arms. “What are you about, lad?”
“Highness?”
“You left a skin of Eiryan oiska on my desk this morning.” He started to speak, but she held up a hand. “Don’t be denying it was you. I asked my guards. They told me y
ou’d been in my study.”
He shifted his feet and cleared his throat. “I thought you might like a taste of home, highness. Nothing more.”
“Hmm.” She bit her lip. “I’ll not be carousing with men beneath my station, lad.”
“Of course not, highness.”
“And yet this isn’t the first kindness you’ve done.”
“Highness?”
She stepped closer. “Eiryan lace? Threads in my father’s colors? Even lamb chops for my supper one night? I know you’re after bringing these little bits of home to me.”
He frowned. “No, your highness. I only sent the oiska.”
“Then where did the other things come from?”
He shrugged. “I can investigate if you’d like.”
Braedan. Does he think he’ll be seducing me with gifts? “No, thank you. I think I know where they came from.” She paused. “I do thank you for the oiska.”
“I meant nothing improper by it, my lady. I just thought you might miss the Citadel.”
Her irritation faded. “I do miss it, aye? Sometimes. The oiska will remind me of nights around my family’s table.”
He inclined his head. “Is that all, highness? I have duties.”
She gestured in the direction of the scribe chambers. “May I walk with you?”
“What about the kirons?”
“The servants will care for them. They can wait.”
He hesitated. “I’m going to visit the sayas. I may be a while.”
“So early?”
He took a long breath. “I don’t want the king to know that I visit them.”
She blinked. “Are they well? What are you—”
“They’re well,” he interrupted, holding up a hand. “But you can’t say anything to the king about what you see. Do I have your word?”
She hesitated for a long moment. This is a good man. This man is better than the king he serves. She finally nodded. “Very well. You have my word.”
Chapter Thirteen
With justice, mercy.
With death, life.
With the raven, the dove.
Balance arrives in the place with no law.
— Songs of King Aiden, Book 15, Verse 3
The great expanse of the Wilds stretched before Connor and Mairead as they rode at a steady pace past small homesteads and through deep forest. Rain muddied the road with a nearly continuous downpour for two weeks after they left Keely’s village in the night. The rough weather made travel difficult and cold, but it kept thieves and brigands away. “It’s a two-edged sword,” Connor told Mairead. “Thieves are lazy, so they stay out of the rain. We’re miserable and they’re warm, but at least we don’t have to fight them.”
To her credit, Mairead didn’t complain. “I think I like the rain,” she announced one night as it hammered the small lean-to he’d fashioned to keep them dry.
“Liar.”
She laughed. “If I keep saying it, I might start to believe it.”
“Are you warm enough?”
“I’m all right.”
“On the other side of the Wilds there’s a fair-sized city called Leiden. A lot of merchants and traders and freelances stop there. It’s the only real city between the Wilds and slaving territory. We can stop there, find an inn, and warm up.”
“Is there nothing between here and Leiden?”
“Not much.”
She was quiet for a moment. “How did he know we would go there?”
“Who?”
“The one who’s tracking us. How did he know we’d go to that tavern in that village?”
He turned his head toward her. “I wondered that, too.”
“Perhaps it doesn’t matter where we stop—perhaps he knows where we are right now. He knew where we were after Aileen and Donal’s house, and he knew where to send the Taurins.” She turned to him. “How do we fight that?”
Her eyes really are pretty. He rolled away. “Get some sleep.”
They slept close to each other that night, wrapped in separate blankets, their small fire smoking and sputtering nearby. When Connor woke in the morning, his arm was draped over Mairead’s waist, and she was curled up close to his chest. She smells like fresh rain. I just smell like wet horse. “Mairead.”
“Hmm?”
“Time to ride.”
She opened her eyes, saw where she lay, and scrambled to sitting. “I’m sorry—I don’t know what—” Her face turned crimson. “You must think I’m no better than—” She bit off the words.
“I thought you were cold, that’s all. It was an arm, Mairead. Nothing more. Your honor is still intact.”
She crawled out of the lean-to. “I’ll be ready to go in a minute. I need to say prayers.”
He wondered how much supplication it would take until her god forgave her for being cold enough to curl up next to him.
Three nights later, they sat huddled separately in a small grove. The trees sheltered them from the worst of the rain, but their wool cloaks were soaked, and they struggled to keep the fire burning all night. Mairead sat with her knees to her chin against a tree trunk, shivering and sniffling, a steaming cup of tea in her hands.
Connor inched closer to her. “Tea not helping?”
“Not much.”
“Let me put an arm around you.”
“No, I’m all right.”
“You’re not all right. You’re teeth are chattering, and you’re nearly in tears.”
She wiped her nose on her cloak. “If I weren’t so wet, I could tolerate the temperature. I just feel like I’ll never be warm again.”
He wrapped his cloak around her and pulled the blankets over both of them. She tensed at first, but as he rubbed warmth into her back and arms, she started to relax. She sighed against his chest. “I shouldn’t do this. It’s not proper,” she said.
“Would you rather catch a chill and end up waylaid for the winter?” He put his other arm around her. Her shivering slowed. “I’ve seen men die from consuming coughs and fevers, and I don’t want history to remember me as the man who let the Taurin heir die.”
Mairead laughed. “Then I suppose I will suffer your arm around me.”
He grinned. “And I suppose I’ll suffer a pretty girl next to me. The sacrifices I make for my job.”
She laughed again.
The next day, the rain started to ebb and the temperature rose a bit. When Connor smelled a distant cook fire, he directed Mairead off the road. They followed a narrow, barely visible path through thick brush to a grove deep in the trees. A few goats bleated in surprise, and a man emerged from the house with a bow drawn and aimed at Connor. Connor held up his hands and offered to pay for a warm meal and a dry bed, and the man lowered his bow and gestured them to a shabby outbuilding with only three sides. “At least it’s dry,” Mairead said.
They tied the horses to one end of the shed and went to the woodsman’s house. He was a gruff man in middle years with little to call his own, but he’d cooked a thick stew for his supper, and he was willing to share for the coins Connor dropped on his table. When Connor brought out his skin of oiska, the man gave them a brown-toothed grin and suddenly offered Mairead a shabby fur. She tried to refuse, but Connor gave the man another coin and poured oiska into a worn clay cup, and the man draped the old pelt over Mairead’s shoulder.
When she settled onto her straw bed later, Connor spread the pelt over her. “It’s not what the noble ladies in Torlach are wearing, and it stinks like dead mice, but at least it will keep you warm,” Connor said. He moved away to sleep at the other side of the pile of straw. When he rolled away from her, he could still feel her eyes on his back.
The rain held off for the next several days, despite the overcast skies. They finally crested a hill and broke through the line of trees that marked the northern edge of the Wilds. Connor pointed to the labyrinthine sprawl below. “That’s Leiden. They say it’s the oldest city in Culidar. I’ve heard there’s a well in the center of the city that dates bac
k to when the Western Lands were united.”
“How many times have you been here?”
“Dozens, years ago. I used to pick up work here. I ran a lot of these northern routes back and forth until I started getting more work in the south.” He dismounted. “We can’t make it to the gates before they close at sunset. We’ll have to wait until morning.”
They built a fire and ate, and she retreated to say her evening prayers. He stirred the fire with idle distraction as she returned to sit across from him. “Your face is always peaceful when you finish praying,” he said.
“I know it’s a nuisance to you, but it centers me on what’s important. It helps me remember to be thankful.”
“Some would say you have few reasons to be thankful right now.”
She blinked, surprised. “How? I have my life, for one thing. Some of the sayas cannot say the same. I’m healthy and safe.” She gestured at the sky. “It’s finally dry and not too cold. We had apples and salted meat for supper, and you made that delicious flatbread. Don’t you have any faith in anything?”
“I have faith in myself. When I rely on myself, everything is perfect.”
She said nothing.
The silence pressed on him like a pebble in his boot. “I used to pray, but I don’t see the point,” he finally said. “The gods, the earth, Alshada—they do what they want and I do what I want. My prayers can’t change anything.”
She worked her hair free of its braid. “What about the ravenmark?”
“What about it?”
“Don’t you think it came from Alshada? Don’t you think there’s a purpose for it?”
“I don’t know.” He thought. “I’ve seen the earth magic. I know it’s real. There’s more to it than just the Morrag. The tribes say that when the chaos grows strong enough on Taura, the Forbidden will return to power and the earth magic will rise to seek vengeance.”
“Do you believe that?”
“I don’t know. I’ve tasted the earth magic when I’ve hunted with the tribes. And after what we’ve already heard and seen on this journey, I believe more and more that the Forbidden are coming out of hiding. But still, it seems like a leap of faith, and I’m not very good at those kinds of jumps.”
Ravenmarked (The Taurin Chronicles) Page 17