Elise, kneeling beside the last of the wounded to come out of surgery, making him comfortable until he could be moved into the lighthouse, looked up at Doc. He was very worn, his face pale even in the lamplight.
"He'll make it," she told him.
"I know," came the reply, "though I wasn't sure for a while and we'll need to mind infection."
The man—one of Elise's father's archers who had been hit by some of the return fire from the third floor of the lighthouse—grinned weakly and held out a hand.
"Thanks, Doc."
Sir Jared took the offered hand and pressed it.
"My pleasure, I assure you."
A deep voice spoke from the shadows.
"I'll take over now," Baron Archer said. "Prince Shad sent me over with a team to shift the patients into the lighthouse. You two need to get some rest. I understand that neither of you have been assigned a watch tonight."
The baron grinned, his expression only faintly visible in the poor light.
"The senior medical officer seemed to think you have both done enough—especially for volunteers."
Doc and Elise accepted their dismissal and began to walk toward the lighthouse. Now that the fighting had ended, spare lanterns had been set to light the path. It made for an odd effect, Elise thought idly. Feet were lit nearly as brightly as daylight, but anything above waist level was cast into comparative shadow.
Ahead, Smuggler's Light was a swarm of activity. Still charged with the excitement of the night battle, many of the troops were celebrating with some of the ale that had been found in the storeroom.
"I can't handle that noise yet," Doc said with a weary sigh. "Go on ahead, Elise. I'll find myself a rock somewhere and sit until I can bear it."
Elise took his arm, tingling at her own boldness. Earlier that evening, as they had worked side by side preparing for the coming assault, she had finally caught hold of the thought that had teased her earlier.
"Let me walk with you," she said, and he didn't refuse.
Now, Elise realized, might be the only time she had to speak with Doc privately. Come morning, they would move back into the larger camp. Their own private mission completed—though she realized that the matter of the artifacts had yet to be completely settled—Elise suspected that her father would insist on her coming with him first to Eagle's Nest, then home to the family estates.
That his desire would be based in a wish to brag about her and her exploits to Lady Aurella—and to anyone else who came within hearing—might make Baron Archer's insistence tolerable, but it did mean that Elise's brief freedom was ended.
Protected by the darkness, she allowed herself something of a wry smile. Freedom. In some ways she was as trapped as those pirates who were now being held in one of the rooms of their own former fortress, and like them, the walls that held her in were those of her own home.
She could feel Doc's exhaustion in the bone-deep trembling that gently shook the arm she held. He was so tired. Perhaps it was unfair to speak with him now, but it might be more unfair not to do so while they had the chance.
By stumbling against it, they found a rock large enough to hold them both, too large, in fact, for the smugglers to have hauled it away when they were clearing the ground around the lighthouse. It was low to the ground, however, barely higher than a footstool. Given Smuggler's Light's elevation, it would have offered little cover, if any.
"I think," Doc said after a time, "that I remember this rock. It was near where Princess Lovella fell. It must be the same. There weren't many upon the island."
After a long pause he said:
"It is much more pleasant being here with you than it was with the princess."
He couldn't even muster the energy to laugh at his own feeble wit. The effort came out like a dry cough.
Belatedly, Elise remembered the brandy flask stuffed into one of the pockets of the apron she wore over her dress.
"Brandy?" she asked, drawing it out. "I also have cold tea. It is heavily dosed with honey and in my opinion tastes foul."
"Brandy," Doc replied, accepting the flask and knocking back a fair swallow. "I'd rather sleep tonight."
The night air was crisp, the skies clear and bright.
A few weeks ago, Elise thought, I would have found this cold. Now, after the Sword of Kelvin Mountains, it seems comfortable.
Doc seemed to divine the course of her thoughts, for he asked:
"Are you cold?"
"No," she laughed. "I was just thinking how pleasant this is after our trip through the mountains. There's no wind, no sleet, no ice, and no one chasing us. I think I've learned something about comfort."
Doc chuckled. "I suspect it's a lesson like that more than anything else that makes Firekeeper so tolerant of bad weather. She's had to put up with worse conditions and has learned from them."
"I've learned another lesson, too," Elise said, sensing that this was the opening she must take if she was not to lose her courage.
"Oh?"
"I've realized that someday I'll be Baroness Archer," she said. "I knew in my mind all along that was what I was to be, but I don't think I ever knew what it meant. I learned this trip that it's not just a title—it's a responsibility. My father has been trying to show me that for years, but it never sunk in before."
"What changed you?"
"No one thing," Elise said. "Part was watching other people be responsible. Without Derian taking responsibility for all the small details together we would have failed. There were other things: watching you with your patients, Firekeeper with her single-minded sense of purpose. I couldn't help but contrast that to Edlin, who was along for a lark—for an adventure. I realized that for all my words, I was more like him than I wanted to admit."
She sighed and forged on.
"I saw Grateful Peace give up his place in the Dragon Speaker's court for what he thought was right. That made a tremendous impression. So did realizing that Lady Melina had abandoned her responsibilities—as a mother, as a head of house—for her own desires."
She sighed and toyed with the hem of her apron. Beside her, Doc sat listening, so carefully attentive that she could hear his measured breathing. After a moment she went on:
"My father has been trying to show me how much depends on me being a responsible baroness. Until this trip, I never realized what that would mean. There are people out there whose future and whose family's futures will be affected by what I do, by the choices I make. That's terrifying. The only thing that must be more terrifying is being one of those people and wondering if some silly chit of a girl is going to grow up or if she's going to ruin your lives out of nothing more malicious than thoughtlessness."
Jared laughed softly.
"You're awfully hard on yourself, Elise."
She shook her head, though he couldn't see the motion.
"Not at all, Jared. I might have ruined them. Think what would have happened to them if I'd married Jet! Do you think he'll be a good caretaker?"
She answered herself.
"Not unless he learns to think for himself and about what his actions mean for others. Maybe he will now that Lady Melina's gone, but when I was swooning after him I wasn't seeing a person, I was seeing an image with a handsome face—a conquest—the young man all the other girls wanted.
"I," she ended with heat, "was an idiot."
"You," Jared retorted, "were a girl not yet to her majority, under considerable pressure to think herself grown, and… well, maybe a bit of an idiot."
They both laughed, then Elise drew in a deep breath.
"I may be out of line, Doc, but I've been under the impression that you're… fond of me."
"More than fond," he said, perhaps too drained to maintain polite deception. "I love you."
"I appreciate the compliment," she said, "I really do, more than I can say. I like you. I respect you. I might even love you. That's Elise speaking. The future Baroness Archer—she's someone I hardly know yet. I need to know her better before I let
myself make any commitments for the future."
Elise realized that tears were running down her cheeks and sniffed them back, angry with herself.
"I'm not doing this very well," she said. "I… What I'm saying is that I can't make any choices, any decisions, not for a long time. Eventually, I need to marry, to marry while I'm young enough to produce healthy children. Given that my mother seems to have the Wellward weakness in that area, I probably should marry before I'm twenty-five, just in case I'm infertile, too."
Sir Jared patted her hand.
"Easy, now. I'm not asking you anything. I never would."
Elise sniffed, then laughed, the tendency to tears backing away.
"That's what Mother said. She said if any asking was done I'd need to do it because you were too much the gentleman."
Jared chuckled. "Wise woman. I appreciate the compliment, though I might have called myself an insecure coward, not a gentleman."
"You're a gentleman," Elise said. "And what I'm trying to say is that if I was just Elise, I'd probably do something impulsive and romantic and propose to you right now and argue out the consequences with my parents later. Since I'm finally facing up to who and what I really am—though I hope the ancestors let me keep my father for a long time yet—I'm not going to do any such thing. I'm not even going to promise. I might marry Edlin. I might marry some fat merchant thirty years older than me with no social connections but lots of money."
"Not that!" her listener said in mock horror.
"All right, not that, but you understand what I mean."
"Yes. You're telling me that I may smile to know that I have my dearest one's affection, and may hope for no more."
He squeezed her hand, then let go.
"That's quite a lot, actually."
Putting a hand on the rock, he pushed himself to his feet.
"Come along, Lady Archer, before the gossips think I have indeed had more."
Elise rose.
"You are a gentleman."
"Not at all. I suspect your reputation will be protected in any case by my pallor. I could barely raise myself to my feet, much less…"
He trailed off. Elise could almost see his blush.
As it turned out, their reputation was protected by more than Jared's exhaustion. When they were nearing the tower, Wendee Jay stepped to intercept them.
"Baron Archer," she said, "suggested that I have been with you all the time."
"Kind of him," Sir Jared said gravely. "And of you. My thanks."
Elise shook her head in amazement.
"Yes. Thank you."
As a trio, then, they entered the lighthouse and into the glow of the general celebration.
Chapter XL
Aboard Waveslicer the next morning, King Allister of the Pledge learned of the victory at Smuggler's Light. The news was flashed out at dawn by heliograph from the top of the lighthouse. In addition to announcing the victory, it thanked his vessels most warmly for their part in holding the coast secure.
Although the message seemed perfectly in order, the pirates were more than clever enough to try such a feint, so King Allister ordered his ships to hold their stations. He himself insisted on leading a shore party. His guard protested, but Allister waved the protests away.
"No, Perce. I'm going and not by a later boat. We have their message, and from everything we can see by long-glass, the lighthouse is the smugglers' no longer."
Besides, he thought, this is Shad's first major victory and I'll throw this damn crown in the bay if being king means that I must stop being a proud father.
As the landing craft was rowed up the smugglers' sea channel, Allister had ample opportunity to study its design. He thought he detected several concealed boathouses along its length and made note to pass this information on to Shad and Sapphire.
Despite his bodyguard's evident apprehensions, they made the lighthouse without being attacked—though Allister thought that their approach was noticed. This was confirmed when, on arriving at the island that held the lighthouse, they were met by a delegation that contained both crown prince and crown princess.
Shad and Sapphire embraced him warmly.
"I'm pleased to see you both looking so well," Allister said as they walked up the slope toward the lighthouse. "Last time I saw you, you both still looked a bit peaked. Obviously marriage agrees with you."
"Or winter campaigning," Sapphire said, but her bluff words didn't quite cover her blush or the smile she gave Shad, "and what a campaign it has been!"
"How is your sister?"
Sapphire looked less happy.
"Alive, but whole neither in mind nor body. The bastard…"
She bit back the words with visible effort.
"It's a long tale and not all my own. We're moving our wounded and our prisoners out of the lighthouse and to drier land. We plan to move to less open quarters in Port Haven today. Our first task this morning was to signal your vessels and send a rider to King Tedric. He'll need to know of our success and we want his advice as to what to do with the prisoners."
"Sapphire," Shad said, "has no stomach for executions—nor, I must admit, do I."
"Good," Allister replied. "Anyone who does would make a poor ruler. Unhappily, sometimes a ruler must make that decision."
They discussed the situation of the pirates and smugglers as they crossed to the Smuggler's Light. Some were truly hard cases, others were simply sailors gone bad. A few were slaves escaped from Waterland who had bought their freedom from being resold by the pirates by joining in their ventures.
Only when they had reached one of the long, rectangular rooms that radiated off the base of the tower did Sapphire and Shad begin the long history that had led them to this point. The room had been chosen for its relative warmth—it backed onto the kitchens, which had been turned into infirmaries—and for its promise of privacy. For that reason, Shad and Sapphire held nothing back.
Queen Valora's treachery was reported, and the truth of that report confirmed by a broken man with a bandaged hand who Sapphire introduced with spitting scorn as Baron Waln Endbrook, ambassador from the Isles to the courts of New Kelvin. Allister could hardly believe that this was the same man he vaguely recalled being introduced to at the Hawk Haven wedding.
"I hate him," Sapphire said as he was led away. "He mutilated Citrine's hand—cut off two fingers. He left her here in the keeping of smugglers and pirates, knowing she would be sold into slavery if he didn't return."
"That's one execution," Shad added, "neither of us would have trouble ordering. Unfortunately, he has the means to buy his life."
They told him then of Lady Melina's part in the plot, of the securities she had given so that Baron Endbrook—on behalf of Queen Valora—had been willing to trust her. They brought in Derian Carter to tell the part he and his companions had played, and though the young man was a long time over the telling, King Allister had a feeling that something was being left out.
He didn't interrupt, however, for Shad and Sapphire had shifted to the part of the story that involved them most closely. They told how Sir Jared's message had confirmed their own worries, how they had charged forth to the rescue, how the rescue had been effected.
During this part of the tale, they ceased being self-conscious and became what they were—two young people, barely into their third decade, who had risked much and succeeded where all others had failed. Allister liked them for their enthusiasm and even for their bragging. They hadn't held themselves in the reserve, nor taken undue risks, but had chosen parts where they were needed.
I think, despite all the ways we could have gone wrong, he thought, that Uncle Tedric and I may have chosen wisely. Ancestors guide them when we are no longer here to do so!
By the time the long telling had ended, all but the soldiers being left to hold the lighthouse against the pirates' possible return had departed the swamp. Word was sent that the slower contingent carrying the wounded was already under way to Port Haven.
"We can fo
llow more swiftly," Shad said. "Anything more you want to know, Father?"
"One thing," King Allister replied. "Where are those damned artifacts?"
There was an uncomfortable pause; then Derian Carter spoke up.
"Firekeeper asked me to tell you—all three of you," he fumbled as if uncertain of what titles to use.
"Go on, son," Allister said, "no need to stand on formality here in private."
"She said to tell you that she'd like an audience with you, not here, out in a bit of swamp. It's about the artifacts. She has them, you see."
Derian knew he was flushing as he delivered his peculiar message, but he couldn't help it. Maybe Firekeeper thought nothing of ordering kings and royal heirs apparent hither and yon—especially out into swamps at the dead of winter—but he did!
He could tell that King Allister's bodyguard, standing to that point impassive against the wall near the door, thought something of it too, and it wasn't a kind thought. Visions of recent assassination attempts danced in his eyes and he frowned.
"Really, King Allister," the guard said, stepping forward, "I must protest. Sir Whyte Steel would never permit such a thing and I cannot either."
"Enough, Perce!" King Allister snapped with what Derian thought was truly the royal note to his voice. "I register your protest. However, the lady in question is very odd and very honest. If she wants us in the swamp for whatever reason, I, for one, am going."
Derian was relieved to see that Shad and Sapphire were of one mind with King Allister.
"Firekeeper is odd," Sapphire said to the guard, "but as you may recall from our wedding, she is also firmly on the side of our safety."
Perce had to be content with this, but Derian could see that he felt the responsibility strongly.
"I'm coming with you," he said in a tone that brooked no disagreement.
Derian shrugged. "I don't see how Firekeeper could mind one more. We're quite the little party."
In addition to the three rulers, Firekeeper had requested that all the members of the group that had gone into New Kelvin come as well. This had caused some argument, for Elise and Doc felt that their place was with the wounded. The military surgeons, however, gave them leave.
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