by A. M. Manay
Jonn dragged him away from his vigil and sat him down, setting a plate in front of him. “Eat,” the healer ordered. “You need your strength.”
Silas nodded and mechanically obeyed, not tasting a morsel of his meal. “I spent half the day using that exact curse on the Becketts,” he confessed bleakly. “And I felt nothing.”
“Tell it to a priest. I don’t want to know any more about it,” Jonn replied, reaching for a flagon of water.
“And now,” Silas continued as though his friend had never interrupted, “it’s killing me to watch her suffer even a fraction of what they endured.”
“It’s not a little bit reassuring, to know you still have a soul after a day like that?” Jonn asked as he tore apart a loaf of bread.
“Do I? His grace is making me arrest their wives,” Silas sighed. “I’ll try to spare their lives, if he lets me. The loss of his son has made him vengeful.”
“I imagine so,” Jonn responded.
A knock sounded at the door to Jonn’s office. “Come in,” the healing master called.
Daved entered, looking worried. Jonn and Silas stood to greet him.
“I didn’t see Shiloh at supper. Is she well?” Daved asked.
“She will be. She’s having one of her attacks. Master Markas and I, and Northgate, here, are taking turns with the countercurse. We’ve got things under control, my lord, not to worry.”
Daved looked somewhat mollified, but his eyebrows were still drawn.
“Can I see her?” he asked.
Jonn and Silas exchanged looks. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, my lord,” Jonn replied. “She doesn’t much like being seen in such a state.”
Daved opened his mouth to argue, but then restrained himself. “Well . . . can you at least tell her I came by to check on her?”
“Of course, my lord,” Jonn assured him. “Come mid-morning tomorrow, if you like. She’ll most likely be ready for company by then.”
Daved nodded, gave Silas an indecipherable look, and departed.
“Somebody has a crush on Shiloh,” Jonn observed as he sat back down to resume his meal.
Silas worried at his lip.
“What? Concerned that you might have some competition for her favor?” Jonn teased.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Silas retorted. “When he’s grown a few more years, if his feelings persist, they can have a torrid affair before he gets married, and they would have my blessing,” he lied. “They won’t even have to worry about her getting pregnant.”
“What if he wants to marry her?” Jonn asked.
“It would be out of the question,” Silas stated flatly.
“Does Redwood understand that?” Jonn asked.
“Of course he does. He’s not an idiot. He knows he will have to make a political marriage,” Silas countered. He couldn’t share the other reason: that a secret princess of the blood could never be permitted to marry a lord of the realm.
“But the child spent his whole life as the disposable fourth son. Back then, he probably could have married anyone he wanted and been left in peace. Besides, when you were thirteen, were you a paragon of rational behavior?” Jonn asked.
Silas thought of the night he’d run off with Edmun to fight for Alissa, with only the clothes on his back and the wand in his pocket.
“No. No, I suppose not.”
***
“They’re sparing all the women of the court from the obligation of attending the execution,” Daved told Shiloh.
They sat next to each other in the garden, watching the other courtiers play tennis. Shiloh was still exhausted from her battle with Soor’s Curse the week before, and was thus sitting out. Daved had, of course, volunteered to keep her company.
“That’s a relief,” she admitted. “Why?”
“Because it’s going to be so gruesome,” Daved explained. “There’s no one to buy them any mercy, you see. Not like my brothers. So instead of getting their heads lopped off or necks snapped in a quick fall, they’re to be castrated, disemboweled, and torn apart by horses. Then burned, maybe? I might be forgetting something.”
“Gods above,” Shiloh gasped. “I did not need to picture that.”
“Sorry,” Daved apologized with a wince.
“Not to worry, my lord. I’d have heard about it somewhere,” Shiloh absolved him.
“What about all their wives? Have you heard anything? I saw them being taken to the High Tower last week,” Daved replied.
“They’re sending Hana home to her parents for awhile. She’d only been married to Jasin a month, and the queen managed to convince the king that Hana was a victim rather than a conspirator,” Shiloh shared. “Hatch—I mean Lord Northgate—doesn’t think she knew anything.”
“That’s good. I mean, she’s awfully snobbish, but she doesn’t deserve to die or get locked up forever,” Daved replied. “What about Blufeld’s wife, and his daughters-in-law?”
“They are to be hanged,” Shiloh informed him. “The small children are being fostered out to people the king trusts, people who will treat them kindly. The queen seemed determined to make sure the children don’t suffer for their parents’ sins. They’re lucky Zina’s not still queen.” She shook her head.
Daved whistled. “Mother and Maiden. To have to live your whole life married to a Beckett, and then get hanged for your trouble. That’s the saddest thing I’ve heard all day.”
“I wonder if Lord Northgate hurt them to get their confessions,” Shiloh said softly. “Gods, I hope not.” She wasn’t quite sure if she hoped it for his sake or for theirs. Probably both.
“I doubt it,” Daved assured her. “He never even drew a wand on me when I was locked up. If he doesn’t like torturing children, my guess is he avoids it with women, too. I bet he got enough out of the men to convict them all.”
Shiloh nodded. Even that troubled her. “You’ll have to attend the executions, my lord?”
“Of course,” Daved replied. “I must show my loyalty, after all. I’ll make sure to go on an empty stomach. Speaking of loyalty, did you hear his grace is giving us all medals?”
“Yes, the queen told me,” Shiloh replied with a smile. “She’s designing them, apparently. She asked me if I wanted earrings instead.”
“What did you say?” Daved asked, grinning.
“I told her I’d rather have gold-toed riding boots,” Shiloh laughed.
“By the way, they found Blufeld’s nephew in Vreeland, I heard,” Daved continued. “He barely speaks Brynish, knows absolutely nothing about grapes. He’s going to have an interesting time of it.”
“What about the Fist? Who inherits the title of Duke of Kepler?” Shiloh asked.
“His uncle, Moroh Grey. That’s who was running things for Jasin before he got married. I guess the king is satisfied that he had nothing to do with the plot. He’s a pretty decent man. Capable. Never heard anything bad about him,” Daved replied. “Actually, he’s my uncle, too. My mum was his sister.”
“These bloodlines are confusing,” Shiloh complained.
“Tell me about it!” Daved laughed.
“How are things in the Wood?” she then asked. At the tender age of thirteen, Daved was responsible for governing his holdings, under the supervision of Lord Mosspeak, as Daved had no remaining male relatives to help him.
“Good. My father had this terrific steward named Paloh. He was excellent at handling both people and money. Knows the forest like the back of his hands. He quit when my father started up his rebellion. Like I said, smart guy. Anyway, I tracked him down and gave him his job back, so all is going smoothly,” Daved replied happily.
“Splendid,” Shiloh replied. “Are you looking forward to school starting back up in a few weeks?”
“Yes!” he declared emphatically. “I just want a few months of nothing dramatic or dangerous happening. I want the only thing to worry about to be getting my homework done.”
“Agreed,”
Shiloh sighed. “Agreed.”
***
“Lord Northgate wanted to see me?” Shiloh asked Perce, who was in the midst of shuffling papers, all in a dither. He barely looked up at her.
“He just ran out to talk the king down from something or another. Oh, just go on in and wait,” he told her. “Now where the hell did I put that scroll? Uncle is going to kill me.”
Shiloh, shaking her head at his frantic search, did as Perce had advised and entered Hatch’s sanctum. His desk was not less full than his nephew’s, though much better organized. In the center sat some kind of notebook handsomely bound in green leather. It sat open. Shiloh thought nothing of it until a drawing on the open page caught her eye.
Is that a hexmark? she asked herself.
She knew she oughtn't to pry, but before she could make herself turn away, she realized what she was seeing. The bottom dropped out of her stomach, and angry tears appeared in her eyes.
Moving with a slowness that betrayed the great effort with which she controlled her rage, she moved to Hatch’s side of the desk and sat in his chair. She looked down with hot eyes and examined Hatch’s sketches of the scars she took such pains never to see. Hatch’s neat, efficient script listed the names of the associated curses, noted their effects, and posed queries about whether or not certain others had ever appeared.
She heard the door begin to open. She did not leap to her feet and run to the other side of the desk to conceal her snooping, as might be her normal reaction. She made no frantic apologies. She simply looked up at Silas Hatch from his own chair, eyes aflame and face cold as ice.
The questioning, slightly irritated expression on his face gave way almost immediately to a pleading and guilty countenance.
“When did you do this?” Shiloh asked, her voice little more than a whisper.
“It was before I asked for permission and you told me not to,” he admitted. “The first time you got sick here, and you were unconscious. I never looked again after you forbade it.” He watched her carefully, as though she might be rabid.
“Why?” she demanded, a little louder this time. She impatiently flicked a tear from her face. It landed on the page with a little splash.
“I have an academic interest in—”
“Don't lie,” she spat, “my lord.”
“So that I could figure out if there were any fatal curses she'd never used when she was carrying you. So that if you turned on us, if I ever had to kill you in a duel . . .” he confessed, brow drawn in distress.
She nodded, then picked up one of his pens. In the lovely, flowing hand that Edmun had practically beaten into her, she jotted a short list.
“Sawcro’s Hex. Nevsi’s Bane. Kenn’s Hex,” she said softly. “Those are the fatal hexes whose marks have never appeared on me, at least not so far. You see, Master Hatch, I tried to figure out the same thing. Just in case I ever had to put myself out of my own misery and was too much a coward to use a knife. When I got sick after Edmun died and there was no one to help me, the thought did cross my mind.”
She bit at her words as though they were hangnails. Tears by now streamed down her face, which only made her angrier.
“Why I ever thought we were friends is beyond my comprehension. Edmun warned me to be careful of you. He did. He told me what you can do, seeing inside people’s heads when they’re suffering. I knew better, and yet I still began to trust you,” Shiloh scolded herself.
She stood and marched toward the door. Hatch tried to take her arm, but she shook his hand off.
“Shiloh, I'm sorry,” he began, but she shook her head.
“No, you aren't. You'd do it again tomorrow,” she replied.
“Only for the good of the kingdom,” he protested.
“Well, then, maybe for the good of the kingdom, I will find a way to forgive you,” she replied, her hand clenched tightly. “Until I manage it, leave me well alone, will you? And if you do decide to do me in, good luck getting one of those through my wards,” she told him, then turned her back to him. “You’d need it.”
“I was going to burn it,” he called out to her, eyes begging. “That's why I had it open.”
She turned around, her eyes searching his face, looking for a lie in it, but finding none. With thin lips, she asked, “Why did you even want to see me?”
Hatch laughed bitterly. “I think we should wait for a moment when you despise me a little bit less,” he suggested.
Shiloh took a deep breath and blew it out through pursed lips. She shook out her skirts and perched on her customary chair on the proper side of his desk.
“I don’t despise you,” she asserted icily. “I’m simply angry and mortified. What did you want?”
He took his own deep breath and walked around his desk. Before sitting, he tore his two pages of notes and sketches out of the book, folded them up, strode to the hearth, and threw them into the fire. He then straightened his coat and took his seat. Before beginning to speak, he poured them both a generous serving of whiskey.
“The king wishes for you to take a husband,” Silas began.
Shiloh shot back to her feet, taking a step back as though he’d drawn a weapon. “I beg your pardon?”
“The king wishes for you to marry,” he repeated.
“Why?” she cried, seized with panic. She’d thought the one good thing about being hexborn was that she’d never be married off against her will to someone who would treat her badly. “Did I do something wrong?”
“Please, sit, Shiloh. It . . . it isn’t as bad as all that,” Hatch said placatingly. “Take a breath,” he pleaded.
She reluctantly resumed her seat, feet twitching in her red silk shoes. Silas downed his drink before continuing.
“It has come to his grace’s attention that Daved, Duke of Redwood, wishes to marry you when he comes of age.” Shiloh’s mouth fell open. “Surely, you’ve noticed that he is sweet on you, Shiloh. Do you love him in return?”
“We’re just friends,” Shiloh protested. “Besides, I can’t marry him even if the king would grant a dispensation to allow it. I can’t give him children. I’m sure I could love him, if I allowed myself, when he got a little older . . . but I am not in the habit of permitting myself to yearn for that which I cannot have.”
She narrowed her eyes, then asked, “Just how did this come to the king’s attention, exactly? Because this seems much more like something that you would notice rather than something the king would.”
Hatch cleared his throat guiltily. “I may have mentioned something. After I told him, the king asked Daved, who confessed his feelings. At any rate, I’m relieved you don’t have your heart set on him,” Hatch admitted, “because the king can never allow it.”
“Because I’m a bastard?” she asked, straightening her back.
Hatch shook his head. “Because you’re not,” he explained, eyebrows drawn. “Everyone considers you one, and that would be enough of an impediment if it were true. But you know, and I know, and the king knows, that you are, in fact, not dead Blackmine’s bastard but a princess of the blood. Which is an even bigger problem. If you were to marry a proper, pure-blooded lord of the realm, a man of noble birth, that would strengthen any possible future claim you might make to the throne.”
“I have no intention of ever making such a claim,” she protested.
“I know. So does the king. That’s why you’re still alive. But someone could use you against your will. Imagine if Redwood had forced you to marry his son, for example. Besides, intentions change,” Hatch pointed out.
“Well, then, his grace should broker a marriage for Daved. Get him a long betrothal with someone suitable. Someone nice,” Shiloh argued. “Give him a few years to grow up and get used to the idea before they consummate the union.”
“Even if he does, which I agree he should, Daved won’t be the last of your suitors. Word of your abilities is spreading, even abroad. The king wants to marry you off before any other bluebloods
get the idea that you might make a good wife, barren or no. Plenty of noblemen are widowers with heirs aplenty already, and thus your barrenness poses no disadvantage. The king wants to marry you low enough to outweigh your parentage should it ever become known.”
“Then whom does he want me to marry?” Shiloh demanded, heart pounding and anxiety twisting her eyebrows. Her mind reeled, pulling up the faces of all the boys in her combat training, obsessed with dueling and drinking and tavern girls. Nausea set in and her words flew out in a rush of fear.
“Some stranger? Someone’s bastard? Is he sending me abroad? I don’t want to go into exile. One of those idiot boys I beat in duels every week? They hate me for always winning. Any of them would treat me terribly. I won’t do it. I won’t share a bed with—Mother of heaven, help me—” She could barely breathe.
“Please, Shiloh, for the Gods’ sakes, calm down! It’s me,” Silas cried out. He took a deep breath. “He wants you to marry me. I’m lowborn enough; my mother was a laundress, for the Youth’s sake. And he trusts me to keep you from making trouble for him even if you were so inclined, which I know you aren’t. The other options simply weren’t acceptable—”
An hysterical peal of laughter escaped Shiloh’s mouth, and Hatch’s face turned to stone before Shiloh exclaimed, “Oh, thank the Gods! I was terrified it was going to be someone bad enough to make me want to jump off the roof.”
“I’m gratified that the prospect of being my wife doesn’t, thus far, drive you to consider suicide,” Hatch replied, exhaling. “I would understand if you were averse to the match. I’m twice your age, and I’m a terrible person, and I can’t expect you to love me, not to mention—”
“No, I’m not . . . as opposed as I would have imagined,” she said slowly, cutting off his self-condemnation. “The idea will take some getting used to. I cannot deny that. But we do . . . work well together. And I don’t have to fear your beating me for spite or something like some of these . . . The age thing is a bit . . . concerning. Though most of my neighbor girls back home were married by my age, some to men as old as their fathers. And I suppose it could be worse. Heavens, the king is over fifty, and Queen Penn is eighteen.” She took a large, fortifying sip of whiskey.