“Marlady,” she said, bowing with all the flourish of a good-looking young lord. “I see you are not dancing.”
The vassals’ wives and daughters turned away, sighing with envy. The young Danalustrous lordling was very handsome indeed.
“No, I—but I would be happy to take a turn with you,” Sabina said rather breathlessly.
Kirra took the marlady’s hand and led her into a sedate quadrille. She would have to concentrate; it was easy to forget she was dancing the man’s part. Sabina showed no inclination to make conversation, so Kirra asked, “Have you been enjoying yourself?”
“Oh—yes—it’s been—yes, I have,” Sabina replied. At this rate, Kirra couldn’t imagine her conversation with Senneth was going to turn up any interesting news at all. “And you?”
Kirra could not help a wicked smile. “Very much so.”
“Are you from Danalustrous?” Sabina gathered her courage to ask.
Kirra nodded. “Serra Casserah told me I should come ask you to be my partner.”
Sabina grew calmer at that. So she had not been sure this young man was the promised courtier. “I have not noticed you before,” she remarked. “Have you been here this whole time?”
Impossible not to laugh when asked such questions! “Indeed, I have. But I have not mingled much till tonight.”
“Will you be going on to Rappengrass?” Sabina asked somewhat wistfully. “My husband and I will be returning home.”
“The serramarra is going on to Rappengrass, I suppose, and she will not travel without me,” Kirra said. “So, yes, I will be heading there next.”
They made similar halting conversation for the duration of the dance—and it seemed very long—while Kirra slowly edged them closer to the necessary doorway. She turned them so Sabina’s back was to the dance floor while Kirra could scan the room. Halchon was still engrossed in his conversation and no one else appeared to be paying them much attention. Kirra tightened her grip on Sabina’s hand and pulled her from the room.
Into the hallway, a few steps down, three knocks on the closed door. Senneth opened it instantly, gave Kirra one quick look of amusement, and nodded gravely to Sabina.
“My lady,” Senneth said. “I am eager to hear what you have to say. We must talk quickly, though, for I don’t know who might come to use this room.”
“I’ll guard the door and turn away curious servants,” Kirra said.
Sabina looked doubtful. Senneth said, “He can look quite ferocious. Come inside.”
The door closed between them, but this was one conversation Kirra was determined to overhear. Keeping a watchful gaze on the hallway, she pressed her ear to the wood and listened.
Sabina didn’t waste any time. “You know my husband is planning a war,” she said, sounding as if it was taking all her resolve to keep her voice from quavering.
“We all have had some suspicions of that,” Senneth replied. “Do you have proof?”
“I have names of lords who have agreed to band together with him in an uprising. And how much they have agreed to commit to the cause.”
Senneth sounded surprised. “Written down?”
“No. I have played hostess to a succession of visitors for the past year and a half. When I could, I listened to conversations. Now and then, my husband has let some information slip. And his mood was always easy to read. When someone agreed to join with him, he was remarkably pleasant. When they did not—” A small silence. “I am fairly certain of the list.”
“Can you tell me?”
“Rayson Fortunalt and Gregory Tilton. Rafe Storian is toying with the idea, but he has not yet committed.”
“What about Nocklyn? Siding with your husband, I am guessing.”
“No—that is, I am not certain. I think Lowell is afraid to do anything too drastic while Els is still alive. At any rate, I know Halchon is not sure of Nocklyn.”
“That’s interesting,” Senneth commented. “I would have put Nocklyn down as a traitor even before Rayson Fortunalt. Who else?”
“Heffel Coravann turned him down, but several of his vassals came by stealth to make deals of their own. The same is true of Eloise Kianlever and her lords—she said no, but some of her vassals said yes. There could be bloody uprisings within the Houses that would instantly alter where the king might look for allies. Baryn will not be able to quell those mutinies because he will be faced with an assault on his own territory.”
“Do you know when this is slated to occur?”
“No. I believe Rayson and some of the others are raising funds and do not want to move until they have enough money to pay troops. Rayson at least is engaged in some shipping venture and he absolutely refuses to join any rebellion until his cargo is safely home.”
“So we have some time. Weeks, maybe. Months?”
“Months, I would say. Not much longer.”
“Where do they plan to attack first?”
“I’m not sure. But my husband keeps talking about the day he is installed in Ghosenhall. He might envision one great battle in the royal city, with all the other Houses tamely throwing down their arms once he is on the throne.”
“I cannot see Merrenstow or Brassenthwaite reacting so mildly.”
“You must warn the king,” Sabina said.
“I will. He is aware that—but we have not had such specific information before. It is terrible news you bear, my lady, but I am glad you have brought it to me.”
“I’m so afraid,” Sabina whispered.
There was the sound of rustling cloth; Kirra imagined Senneth had put her arm around a weeping marlady. “If your husband suspects you have told me these things, I fear you will be in very grave danger,” Senneth said.
“I am in danger already. My husband wants me dead.”
That was true, and Kirra and Senneth both knew it, but it was even more shocking to realize that Sabina knew it as well. “Then leave him,” Senneth said.
“How can I? No matter where I might go, he would track me down. If I tried to leave him, he would kill me for certain.”
Kirra could only imagine the expression on Senneth’s face, the expression she wore whenever something helpless fell under her protection. “Come with me. My friends and I will keep you safe.”
That elicited a small, hopeless laugh from Sabina. “Oh, I don’t think even you would be able to protect me, serra. He is impervious to your fire, is he not? And he would be happy for an excuse to hurt you. I do not want to provide that excuse.”
“Then go somewhere else. To Rappengrass. Ride out with Darryn in the morning.”
“And bring my husband’s wrath to Ariane? I could not. I could not bring such destruction to the House of a friend.”
“I hate to think of you going back with him, frightened and wholly alone.”
“You have just described the entire sixteen years of my married existence.”
“Are you worried about your sons? I will undertake to bring them to safety as well.”
“My sons! Oh, they adore their father. They have had no interest in me since they were old enough to hold a toy sword. I wish I could tell you that I stayed on their account, but—no. It is fear that holds me in Gisseltess. No one there loves me enough to make me want to stay.”
There was another short silence and then Senneth said abruptly, “Take off your pendant.”
“What? My pendant? Why?”
“Give it to me.”
More rustling and the sound of Sabina’s bemused voice. “All right, but—I don’t know what you could—here.”
Kirra had to think to remember what sort of jewel the women of Gisseltess usually wore to cover their housemarks. The emblem of Gisseltess, of course, was a black hawk holding a small red flower. Kirra believed that the traditional stone was onyx, often set with a small garnet. Though Sabina could have been wearing something more colorful, just for the sake of fashion.
“What are you doing?” Sabina asked fearfully.
“I am—you know I have some mystical
ability,” Senneth replied. “Sometimes I can bestow some of that power onto an inanimate object—store it there, so to speak. I am putting some of my magic into your pendant. When you need strength, when you need courage, take hold of this stone. You will feel some of my power seep into you. It will help you through.”
This was the second time Kirra had witnessed Senneth taking a common object and infusing it with magic—or pretending to. She had never tried such a thing herself, and she found it hard to believe it actually worked. Then again, this was Senneth, and she had abilities no other mystic had ever displayed. And even if she did nothing but create a faint fiery glow around her chosen object and solemnly promise the owner that it was now imbued with magical power, and the owner believed her and thus was heartened—well, where was the harm in that?
But Kirra rather thought there was a transfer of magic.
“I must go back to the ballroom now,” Sabina said nervously. Her voice was a little muffled, as if she had tilted her head down to refasten her pendant. “If my husband has missed me—”
“He will see you returning to the dance floor on the arm of a handsome Danalustrous man,” Senneth replied. “Will that be so bad?”
A despairing laugh from Sabina. “Almost as bad as the truth!”
“Then go now. And think about leaving Gisseltess. I believe I could find you sanctuary somewhere.”
“You are very kind,” Sabina whispered. “I knew you must be, for my husband to hate you so much.”
Senneth laughed. Kirra heard her footsteps cross the small space and hurriedly straightened up. The door opened and Senneth peered out. She gave Kirra one brief, expressive look and then glanced up and down the hall. “Any visitors?”
“Not even a servant has crept by.”
“Good.” She motioned Sabina out, and Kirra took the marlady’s arm. “You two go back to the ballroom. I will go out through the dining room and circle around to another entrance.”
“If Halchon has noticed that we were both gone—” Sabina began. The hand she had laid on Kirra’s arm was trembling.
Kirra had to fight to keep from dissolving into laughter. “I know,” she said to Senneth. “Come in by the main entrance. Make sure someone glimpses you in a passionate embrace with Tayse. Not even Halchon will suspect that you were off hearing confidences from his wife if you’re seen pursuing illicit romance instead.”
Senneth frowned at her. “I cannot think why serra Casserah wanted to bring you in her train,” she said. “You have a debauched mind.”
“Serra Casserah would make the same suggestion if she was standing here,” Kirra replied. “It is a good one and you know it.”
Sabina—who clearly should have more pressing matters on her mind—looked shocked. “Serra Senneth! No! Not even for my sake should you consider consorting with someone unsuitable!”
Kirra laughed. “The very thing you should not have said if you didn’t want her to do it.”
Senneth gave her another repressive look. “You two go back to the ballroom. I’ll give some thought to what I should do next.”
Sabina gripped the mystic’s hand. “Thank you.”
Senneth smiled. “You’re the one who risked herself to bring me news. Why are you thanking me?”
“For—just for existing, I think,” Sabina said. “For being someone I feel I can trust.”
Senneth nodded. “And you can. Always. Now go.”
Still Sabina hesitated. “Tell your brother—your brothers—that I asked about them. And tell them I am well.”
“I will certainly do that,” Senneth said gently. She would not look at Kirra. “Now you must return.”
Kirra stepped down the hallway and Sabina perforce followed, her hand still upon the young man’s arm. In a few moments, they were through the doorway, through the crowd clustered along the walls, and back on the dance floor. Kirra didn’t think they’d been gone more than fifteen minutes. No one seemed to have missed them. Romar was standing on the perimeter of the dance floor, smiling down at his niece and wholly ignoring the hovering Valri. Halchon was still engaged in what now appeared to be an argument with a group that had swelled by three men. Opinions seemed to be passionate, but no one appeared to be angry. If he had been looking for his wife, he gave no sign.
“I believe you are safely through this exercise, my lady,” Kirra said, smiling down at Sabina’s small, worried face. “Would you like a glass of wine? Shall I find you another partner? Or would you like to sit awhile and recover from your adventures?”
Sabina managed a shaky laugh. “I think I would like to sit quietly by myself,” she said. “With a glass of wine.”
Kirra guided her to an arrangement of stiff-backed chairs striped in the Nocklyn colors. “I’ll be back in a moment,” she promised.
In a few minutes, she had secured a drink for Sabina, bowed one last time, and crossed the dance floor with the aimless circumlocution of a man who wasn’t quite sure what to do with himself next. She finally made it to the servants’ hallway, but had to pass a few moments pretending there was a problem with her shoe as a small parade of footmen traipsed between the kitchen and the dance floor. Finally—a period of solitude—and she changed herself back to Casserah by increments. If anyone had noticed her disappearance down this hallway half an hour ago, and now saw her reemerging, they would think she had been stealing sweets from the cooks or creeping out to the gardens by the kitchen door. She reentered the ballroom, smiled at a young lord, and dipped back onto the dance floor as if nothing had transpired at all.
CHAPTER 30
IT hardly seemed fair to expect the evening to hold any more drama. The clock had just struck two, and a few guests had already begun to trickle out, when a crash at the main entrance caught everyone’s attention. Kirra whirled around to first look for Senneth, and found her across the wide room with a hand on Amalie’s shoulder. Next she tried to determine the source of the commotion. She expected to see Tayse and Justin engaged in some kind of confrontation at the main entrance, but it wasn’t Riders who poured into the ballroom in a dark phalanx. It was a regiment of royal soldiers in black and gold, at least fifty of them, all sober, heavily armed, and primed to fight. At the head of the troop was Romar Brendyn.
He strode heedlessly through the couples on the dance floor, who cried out and tumbled back from him, and a wedge of soldiers followed. More soldiers streamed in and split to either side of the doorway till there was a line of them completely enclosing the room. They made a heavy dark circle of containment around the gaudy colors of ball dresses and fashionable waistcoats.
Romar came to a halt in front of Halchon and Sabina Gisseltess. “Marlord,” Romar said in a ringing voice. “Your escort has arrived to take you back to Gissel Plain.”
Kirra put a hand to her mouth to push back her delighted laugh. Across the room, she saw Senneth manage to maintain her stony expression, but Valri looked maliciously pleased. Halchon’s body clenched in fury, but he kept his face smooth and his voice relaxed.
“I am not yet ready to return to my home.”
“Servants are even now packing your bags. Your carriage is at the door. I cannot imagine what holds you here.”
“I come and go as I please,” Halchon snarled, losing some of his restraint. “If you think your impudence has carried the day—”
“I think a hundred of the king’s men carry the day,” Romar replied, his voice contemptuous. “You are in violation of his majesty’s direct orders to confine yourself to your property. You will be returned to that property. Now. You will not set foot off of your own land again until the king has lifted his interdiction.”
“I. Am. Not. Ready. To leave,” Halchon spat out. He lifted a hand as if to signal men of his own. Romar caught him around the wrist and twisted his arm sharply.
“Do you really want bloodshed? Now? Tonight? Do you really have the manpower on hand to win a skirmish like this?” Romar demanded, scorn still dripping from his voice. He flung Halchon’s hand away. “
Do you want to see swords rip through ballgowns? Do you want to humiliate your Nocklyn friends? Then call for your men. But most of them are already under guard and could not respond to you if they would. You are well and truly taken, marlord. Accept it with grace or accept it with violence. But you are going back to Gisseltess.”
A smoldering moment while the two men stared each other down, then Halchon jerked himself to one side. “Sabina,” he said to his wife in a tightly controlled voice, “you might want to fetch a cloak. We’re returning home tonight.”