Adrian

by Heather Grothaus

  “He knows he was brought here to help locate the Wyldonna treasure,” Maisie supplied. “At the queen’s request.”

  Malcolm’s eyebrows rose and he looked back to the Englishman. “Is that so?”

  “Quite,” Adrian replied. “So if one of you would be ever so kind as to go to the trouble to present me to Queen Maighread, I would be grateful.”

  Maisie’s cheeks heated and her stomach did a neat flip as Malcolm huffed a breath of a laugh. “Nae trouble at all, lad,” he said. He held out one of his wide palms toward Maisie. “You’re in Her Majesty’s verra presence.”

  Maisie dared a look at Adrian, whose face was turned fully toward her now, his slender brows drawn down in their usual frown of concentration, but there was now something more sinister behind those brown eyes.

  “Adrian . . . Hailsworth, is it?” Malcolm continued deferentially. “The Queen of Wyldonna, Maighread Lindsey. Me own dear sister.”

  Maighread Lindsey’s blush was not the delicate wash of pink of a noblewoman; it was raw and red and splotchy, made even more virulent a shade by the proximity of her copper hair. She dropped her face toward the floor for only a moment, and then, as if realizing the meek and guilty pose for what it was, pulled her chin up with a jerk. She squared her shoulders and looked Adrian in the eyes.

  Anger borne of humiliation strained at Adrian’s chest. “You lied to me.”

  “Nay,” she said quickly. “I didna. I lied to your abbot.”

  Adrian ticked through his memories of their conversations since meeting at Melk and granted that, no, perhaps she hadn’t outright lied to him. Everything she’d said referencing the queen of Wyldonna had likely been referencing Maisie herself. But she had withheld information from him all the same.

  “I couldna verra well reveal that the Queen of Wyldonna was about on her own, now could I?” she pressed. “One slip from your priest could have brought an army of my enemies in pursuit.”

  “Enemies?” Adrian repeated. “You mean Glayer Felsteppe?”

  Maighread huffed a laugh. “If it was only him, I wouldna have been so worried.”

  Maisie’s twin brother had apparently composed himself enough to rejoin the conversation. “Have you heard tales of Wyldonna, Hailsworth?”

  “If you mean the myths of its magical populace, yes,” Adrian said.

  “Some of the stories are nae more than myth now, aye,” the bearded man acquiesced. “But long ago, all living creatures were Wyldonians. Each season, some chose nae to remain under our rule or protection, and many of the fools then grew bitter in their life in the Outland. When they were denied return, they convinced themselves it was through fault of the Lindseys that they were hunted and persecuted. They came to believe they were exiled from paradise when it was their choice to leave.”

  Adrian felt his eyebrows raise. From what little he’d seen of this dark, rocky isle, he couldn’t imagine anyone referring to it as a paradise. Madness must obviously be a familial trait. He looked back at Maighread, who was watching her brother with a look of... perhaps sorrow. Adrian couldn’t tell. Nor did he care at the moment.

  “I gave my word that I would aid the queen of Wyldonna in locating the island’s treasure. Obviously, the king no longer needs locating.”

  Maighread’s eyes widened. “You’re nae thinking to try to leave, are you? I already told you—”

  “Enough with the tales,” Adrian said, slashing a palm through the air. “As I told you, my cooperation was based on the completely selfish objective of cornering and apprehending Glayer Felsteppe. He is still coming, is he not?”

  Maighread nodded, her eyes still wide.

  “Then I will stay,” Adrian said, feeling very magnanimous indeed at his generosity of spirit.

  “And you will still search for the treasure,” Maighread added.

  “It will be something to occupy my mind until spring, when Felsteppe returns, even if it is a goose hunt.”

  “Nae so arbitrary a time as spring,” Maighread said with a wince.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “She said nae spring,” Malcolm repeated loudly. “Felsteppe is to return to Wyldonna less than one month from today—at Ostara.”

  Adrian looked to Maighread again.

  “With an army,” Malcolm added.

  Adrian nodded his acknowledgment, but his eyes were still on the redhead. She stared back at him without flinching. Unapologetic. Bold.

  Malcolm sighed. “Which means I must return to my plans.” He turned toward his sister, who pulled her gaze away from Adrian’s.

  “Can you nae wait, Malcolm? Perhaps he can find—”

  “I will defend Wyldonna to my last breath,” Malcolm told her with a glare. “For the good of all living things, both in spirit and in flesh. You’ve all but sealed your fate, you ken?” He glanced at Adrian. “I do hope he finds the gold. ’Twould pain my heart for all eternity should . . .” The bearded man broke off and then abruptly quit the room, pulling the door behind him in a slam that caused Maisie to flinch.

  Adrian crossed his arms over his chest. “What else haven’t you told me?”

  Maisie only looked at him for a moment and then sighed, shaking her head. She swerved around him toward the bed, where she pulled the strap of her satchel over her head and swung it onto the coverlet.

  “Nae now, Adrian,” she said, and he could hear the fatigue in her voice. “Let us both retire for the evening. It’s been a long and perilous journey.”

  “It’s only been three days,” Adrian pointed out. “I’m quite fine. Rather feeling like conversation.”

  “It’s been a bit longer than three days for me,” she snipped. “And longer still than the mere distance I’ve come with you. Your insatiable thirst for knowledge will have to wait.”

  “You owe me an explanation,” he demanded.

  Maighread whipped around on him. “I doona owe you anything,” she growled, and there was no trace of the Maisie Lindsey Adrian had thought he was becoming accustomed to on the crawler ship. “You agreed to come through your own free will when twice given the opportunity to decline. I will share the details of my dilemma after I have rested and have my wits about me once more. Regardless of the scorn you hold for the fantasy you believe Wyldonna to be, I am queen here, and at least in my own chamber, my wishes are to be obeyed. I am tired. I am going to bed. And so are you.”

  She walked to the hearth and crouched down before the flames, hugging her knees, the fight gone out of her quickly. The dull gray stone that comprised the hearth on the floor before the fire was carved into the shape of a fantastically long lizard, its back sporting a row of perfectly aligned and proportioned spikes amidst a field of flawless, monochromatic scales. Adrian thought perhaps the spikes were utilized to prop an iron or stake upon, and the body of the lizard ensured that no stray embers or logs would roll onto the wooden floor. Quite a decorative and fanciful fitting for such an otherwise foreboding chamber.

  She turned her head to look at him, and her eyes reflected the dancing firelight. She didn’t look like a queen to him then, more like a frightened young woman who was dreadfully burdened and alone. Adrian’s hunger to know nearly threatened to consume him, and he briefly entertained the idea of going to her there on the hearth, pressing her until she yielded to him the explanations he sought. If he touched her as she’d touched him on the crawler . . .

  “Go!” she demanded.

  “Go where?” he said in vexation, his fantasy dissolving with her brusque command. “Am I to sleep on the floor at your feet?”

  “Go with Reid,” she said as she turned back to the fire.

  “Go with Reid? Is that some strange Wyldonian equivalent to ‘Go with God’?” Adrian held his palms out from his sides, waiting for a response, but none came.

  A muffled pounding fairly shook the wooden door of the chamber then, as if someone was attempting to gain entrance to the queen’s residence with a quilted battering ram. Assuming the visitor could only be for him—which m
ade him feel a bit better about being forced to answer the door as if he were a servant—Adrian dropped his hands and turned on his heel to cross the floor. He pulled the door open and found himself staring into his own dull reflection in a huge brass buckle.

  Adrian’s eyes traveled up, up, up a wide expanse of rough brown cloth until he was forced to tilt his head back. And still he had to lean into the corridor to look past the lintel of the door frame.

  A sallow-skinned face, as large as a bushel basket, with thick, glossy black hair looked down at him.

  “Good evening, Man,” the thing said in an accent that was distinctly Rhine. “I’m Reid.”

  Adrian tried to swallow, but the awkward angle of his head forced him to tilt his chin down first in order to accomplish that necessary task. He reluctantly looked back up and was dismayed to see little dots dancing in his vision. He threw a hand up to brace himself on the door frame. Then Adrian suddenly shut the door.

  He leaned his forehead against the frame for a moment, his hand still on the latch, his eyes closed.

  In, one, two; out, three, four.

  He opened the door again, and once more the brass buckle reflected his slack face. Adrian looked up again.

  “Man?” the giant inquired.

  Adrian attempted to respond, but nothing came out except a wheeze. This . . . creature would make Roman Berg seem a child. Adrian cleared his throat. “Yes?” His voice was still little more than a squeak.

  “This way, if you please.” He turned to Adrian’s right and began walking slowly down the corridor. The wooden boards of the passage bowed like unfastened planks under the giant’s feet.

  Adrian looked back over his shoulder at Maighread, still crouched by the fire. She had laid a hand on the carved hearth stone, and her chin was tucked down against her forearm. She seemed to be whispering something into the flames as her fingers danced along the spikes. She paid him no heed, and although Adrian suddenly preferred to stay here in the chamber with her—sleeping on the floor if need be—rather than follow the colossal Reid through the dim corridor, he told himself that he was being ridiculous.

  The man was obviously a biological anomaly. Adrian scolded himself; he should feel pity for the poor creature, relegated by his misfortune to serving in the dark corridors of the castle so as not to frighten the rest of the populace.

  Adrian reached for the door handle and pulled it after him, but in the instant before the wood met the jamb, his mind played a further mean trick on him, making it seem as though the carved gray eyelids of the hearth stone opened and looked directly at him with glittering gold irises.

  Chapter 9

  Adrian followed the freakishly large Reid down the corridor, keeping his gaze on the floorboards, partly to avoid tripping on the upturned ends the giant created with each step, but mostly to avoid staring at the poor man. The scholarly part of Adrian wanted to observe the way the man moved, the mechanics of his limbs in correlation to his extreme height. But he was certain that Reid received enough ogling in his everyday life and so Adrian nobly withheld his curiosity.

  They passed a dark doorway on the opposite side of the corridor from Maighread Lindsey’s chamber, and Adrian did glance up then to peer inside. The door was open, but no fire glowed inside the chamber, and he wondered what the room was until he recalled the specifics of this part of the castle from the drawings he’d studied. It had to be Malcolm’s chamber, although it was obvious the king was no longer keeping residence within the royal wing.

  Adrian never broke stride as he dug into his satchel and withdrew the rolled-up sheets of parchment. Glancing up only occasionally—secure enough in the massive presence ahead of him to alert him to a turn or a stop—he impatiently riffled through the curled corners until he had located the sheet that detailed this floor. Adrian turned the map to orient it in the direction in which he was headed.

  Yes, that had been Malcolm Lindsey’s chamber. They’d just made a left-hand turn, and so—yes, here they were. Reid had come to a stop to one side of another open doorway and now gestured graciously for Adrian to enter.

  What a dear being, Adrian thought. He gave the man a nod as he passed into the room, well lit with a blazing fire in the hearth and a brace of candles on a table where a covered platter and pitcher and cup awaited him. Despite his general skepticism, Adrian was grateful for the luxuries and the swift consideration shown him by Wyldonna’s servants. He turned, expecting Reid to enter behind him, a word of thanks at the ready.

  But the giant remained in the corridor, facing the opening now and so tall that Adrian could not see his face. He stepped back to the doorway and leaned out to look up at Reid.

  “My thanks. Very kind of you.”

  The giant stared down at Adrian, as if examining him. He said nothing, but Adrian sensed an air of forced reserve. His sallow skin was like the peel of an overripe pear, hairless and smooth, but flecked with nearly imperceptible brown dots. His eyebrows were thick and black and glossy, like his hair, his fleshy lips like strips of cooked liver.

  A thoroughly unattractive individual.

  “Well, then,” Adrian said, discomfort creeping up his spine. Perhaps the man was mentally damaged as well, although his welcome moments ago had seemed quite lucid. “Good night.” Adrian waited a breath longer, and when it seemed apparent that the man was unwilling or unable to respond, he felt behind him for the door handle.

  But the crisp edges of the man’s accent sliced through the air before Adrian could close the door.

  “If I was permitted to speak to you, I would return your courtesy by wishing you a most pleasant evening as well,” Reid rushed.

  Adrian paused and looked around the lintel again at the man, who now appeared a bit more relaxed. Reid clasped his hands in front of his enormous buckle and stared at the stones of the wall above Adrian’s door as he gave a quiet but impressive sigh.

  “I see,” Adrian said, although he did not. “I assure you that your acknowledgment would have been deeply appreciated. Were you permitted to speak to me, of course.”

  Reid nodded, a faint quirk to his mouth.

  Adrian opened his mouth but then thought better of it and instead pulled himself back inside the room and slowly closed the door on the giant, who made no move to depart. He waited a moment, his hand on the latch, before easing the door open a crack. The doorway was still blocked by the man’s girth, although he now faced away from the door, and Adrian’s view was comprised entirely of the man’s considerable backside.

  He closed the door again and turned to lean back against it. Adrian shook his head firmly and blew out a strong breath before pulling himself aright. He took off his satchel as he crossed the floor toward the table, where he laid the plans of Wyldonna Castle near the platter. He looped his strap over the back of the chair with one hand while he tilted up the domed cover on the platter with his other. The smell of cooked fish wafted up in a cloud of steam and Adrian sniffed appreciatively before replacing the cover and removing his cloak, eager to be done with his ablutions and attend his meal.

  There was a small stand with a washing bowl and linens against the longest, empty wall, and it was while he splashed his face with water that he realized the chamber contained no windows. According to the drawings, its location along the corridor should have placed the chamber on an outside wall, unless there was another small chamber or walkway behind it that Adrian had missed.

  By the time he had made use of the chamber pot and crossed back to the table, the domed platter had been forgotten save for the moment it took for him to push it aside so that Adrian could once more unfurl Wyldonna’s plans. He used the pewter chalice and the rounded eating knife to hold the curling pages flat while he poured himself a full cup of wine from the carafe that he’d only just discovered tucked behind the water pitcher. Then he traded the chalice for the carafe on the parchment edge and drank deeply, studying the lines and scribbles from the corner of one eye.

  He sighed with relief at the refreshing life the
sweet wine brought him and set the chalice away, bracing his hands on the tabletop and leaning closer to the parchment. His face tilted this way and that, confirming his location before he placed one finger atop the rectangle that signified his chamber and then drew the pointer finger of his other hand down the long line of the exterior wall. He looked up and ahead: hearth. He looked over his shoulder: solid stone. To his left: doorway. To his right where he’d washed up: solid stone.

  Adrian picked up his chalice and walked to the wall that should separate him from the grounds—and a direct view of the sea. He took a long drink and looked up at the stones, his eyes searching for any anomaly. But the wall was perfect. No window.

  Which meant no escape, save that of the door.

  Adrian’s heart began to pound, but he walked in a deliberately calm manner to the door again and pulled at the latch. It opened freely, and Reid’s wide presence still filled the opening. The giant turned to look down past his shoulder at Adrian, his brows like horses’ tails raised in question.

  Adrian raised the cup. “The wine is delicious. My compliments,” he said, and then shut the door, his heartbeat slowing to normal once more.

  He wasn’t trapped in the room, then. Just being guarded. He walked back toward the table, draining his cup on the way.

  Guarded from escaping, or guarded from harm?

  Why must it be either? I came here of my own free will, and because my presence is at the queen’s request to help the very people who live here be freed from Glayer Felsteppe’s threats, who would wish to harm me?

  He filled the cup again and lifted it halfway to his mouth.

  What about the creatures in the wood?

  What creatures? I saw nothing at all either on the trail or in the wood that would lead me to believe there was anything more threatening than rats populating the forest.

  He drank the wine, noting again the interesting salty-sweet flavor, like berries wet with the sea. In a moment, the cup was again empty. He refilled it.