Firebrand

  “You are only making it harder on yourself,” she said.

  “Perhaps. But please do not lecture me, Laren. I have a wife who is carrying our children. I know my duty.”

  “Does it have to be just duty?” Laren asked.

  He grew quiet, his expression softening. “Estora is a remarkable woman. I am very fortunate. It is not just duty.” Then his gaze sharpened. “But do not deny me the pleasure of bestowing a gift on one whom . . .” He faltered as if searching for the right words. Then, “It is a gift she can use to preserve her life, and I am glad to give it.”

  “I won’t lecture you for all that you called me the elder sister you never had. It gladdens me that you see Estora as more than duty. I care deeply about you and have ever desired your happiness.”

  “I know.”

  “So,” she said, “when do the Eletians want to send their guide north?” The sooner Karigan was sent away, she thought, the better for Zachary. And Estora.

  “I have not said I’ve agreed to this mission,” he replied, “though it seems a likely course. As soon as they sense winter breaking is all they told me.”

  Not exactly definitive, Laren thought, but there were ways to keep Karigan busy and out of Zachary’s sight in the meantime.

  THE FIRE WITHIN

  Zachary Davriel Hillander, king of Sacoridia, swordmaster, husband to the lady of Coutre, and soon-to-be father, watched as his old friend walked away to retire for the night. He saw how stiffly she moved, and was aware, though she would never tell him herself, how the use of her ability in his service, combined with years of injuries and knocks and tumbles in the course of her work, caused her recurrent pain. He wondered if it would always be so, that those closest to him should suffer. According to the counselors he’d inherited from his father when he first assumed the throne, he was not, as king, supposed to concern himself with such matters. His only concern was supposed to be that those who served him did so well. They were his tools, he was told. When they wore out, they should be discarded and replaced.

  He discarded those counselors instead, and replaced them with advisors of his own choosing. Laren, who had practically overseen the raising of him, was one such. She’d made captain on her own merit, but he ensured she stood by his side as one of his most important advisors. Not every king or queen before him had thought so much of their Green Rider captains to have done so, but he knew well they were more than just simple messengers.

  He left the gallery behind and started down the corridor that led to the royal apartments. Finder the Second and Jasper trotted at his heels. Normally the dogs spent the night in the kennels, but ever since the aureas slee’s attack, he’d kept them with him in the queen’s apartments. They were good watchdogs and, if he or Estora were threatened, vicious defenders, despite their small size. His Weapons were excellent, and he knew the queen’s apartments were now warded against further magical intrusions, but he was determined to protect his unborn children and their mother in every capacity possible.

  When he reached the door to his own rooms, Ellen asked, “Will you be guarding the queen again tonight?”

  He paused. “Do you object?”

  “No, Your Majesty. We are pleased you’ve taken an active role in her safety.”

  He tried to fathom if there was more behind her words, but like all Weapons, she was well-trained in keeping a neutral expression. Sometimes he wished he could be a Weapon himself, for their duties were clear, black and white, and devoid of entanglements of the heart. It must be simpler, but was it really? For all their stoicism, their stony facades, they were still flesh and blood and surely not immune to human emotion. No, theirs was discipline, a mastery over their passions and desires, and in this he wished he could emulate them.

  “I am just going to retrieve my sword,” he said, “then will spend the duration in the queen’s sitting room.”

  “Very good, sire. We will be outside if you require us.”

  We indicated Ellen and Willis immediately outside his and Estora’s rooms, and whoever relieved them at third watch.

  Inside, Jasper sniffed the edge of a bookcase and sneezed. Finder yawned, waiting to see what interesting thing was going to happen next. Zachary removed his longcoat and tossed it over his chair. He could hear his valet snoring in the parlor—he’d probably tried to wait up for his master, but failed. Zachary did not awaken him, but as he had since the attack of the aureas slee, he retrieved his sword from its display. On impulse, he also grabbed a plain, wooden chest that rested on a shelf. With these items in hand, he and his terriers crossed through the passage that led to the queen’s sitting room.

  Embers glowed in the fireplace, and a lamp dimly glowed on the table before the sofa, but Estora was nowhere to be seen. He glanced into her bed chamber and made out her sleeping form beneath her blankets, her steady breathing. He returned to the sitting room and set aside the game chest and sword to throw a fresh log on the fire and stir the embers. Shortly, flames greedily attacked the log. Pleased, he sat on the sofa and drew the blanket over his lap that Estora had been using during the day to keep warm. It smelled lightly of lavender, of her. He kept the sword bared at his side, and snapped his fingers at the dogs to lie down by the fire. It did not take much to convince them.

  He thought to pick up Estora’s book of sonnets to read, but love poems did not appeal to him. They were overwrought with sentiments that were . . . that were unobtainable. Instead, he stared into the fire. Ordinarily, if he was awake in the night, it was because he was working late in his study, going over petitions and correspondence, and more recently, examining maps of the north marking the known movements of Second Empire. He was always busy, always with some problem for him to solve. These nights he kept vigil in Estora’s sitting room, however, were silent.

  At first he’d brought his own books to read to keep his restless mind satisfied, but tonight he stared into the dance of flames too tired for much else. He’d resisted the silence because it permitted unpleasant memories to surface, memories of betrayal and violation, and tonight was no different.

  Betrayal had become too familiar an unwanted companion since his ascension to the throne. There’d been his brother, of course, but there’d been little love between the two of them to begin with. No, Amilton’s betrayal had not been the knife twisted in his back that had been the betrayal of advisors he had chosen and trusted.

  He reached across the table and opened the wooden chest he’d brought, which contained his game of Intrigue. He laid out the board and started setting up the markers, which were crudely carved wooden figures in red and blue, the paint worn and chipped from use. He held the green in reserve. The set had belonged to his great grandfather and was passed down to him.

  As he considered the markers in their starting positions on the board, he acknowledged that time eased the pain, that the betrayal was not nearly as visceral as when it had happened, but he remained angry, angry that he lost three experienced, hardworking men because they had simply not trusted him the way he had trusted them. When his survival was in question after the assassin’s arrow, they took matters into their own hands and violated royal law by forcing his marriage to Estora while he lay fevered and insensible.

  He punished them for their transgressions. Master Mender Destarion had been reassigned to an outpost in the northern wilds where he must suffer hardship and privation. General Harborough had been stripped of his rank and sent to stand before a military tribunal, but unable to endure the dishonor, he ended his life prior to sentencing by hanging himself in his cell. Colin Dovekey had been sent to Breaker Island, home of the Black Shields and the academy, and was summarily executed for treason.

  Three men who had simply wanted what was best for their country, a continuity of leadership, gone because they had not trusted that he would provide for succession in the event of his own premature death.

  He raised his hand, trembling with supp
ressed fury, to slam the game pieces off the board, but he drew back, reined in his anger, reined it in as he always must. The fire sizzled and flared as though a manifestation of how he felt inside. As king, he could not afford the luxury of venting his fury. He must always show himself to be in control. It was almost laughable for his outward calm was a sham. Inside, he burned as hot as the fire, and there was little release.

  Thank the gods, he thought, that he still had Laren, the one person who had stood by him and opposed the schemers. If she had been complicit in the conspiracy, he didn’t know what he would have done. If only he could tell her all that raged in him, but admitting such vulnerability, he feared, would lessen his standing in even her estimation.

  As for his wife, she was the last one he would tell, for she’d been a player in the entire debacle. There was only one person who he thought would hear him out without judgment, but she was beyond his reach. She was not his that he could tell her his innermost thoughts and feelings.

  He closed his eyes, willing himself to calm the anger, and soon relaxed, breathing deeply.

  • • •

  The pop of the fire startled him, and he realized he’d drifted off. He’d been dreaming, something about rushing through the woods and pursuing someone or . . . something. A deer, he thought. An image came back to him of a doe bounding through the woods, her tail flagged in alert. Graceful, wild and free, she was, and he could not catch up. He—

  “Zachary?” asked a quiet voice.

  He started again, silently cursing himself for failing so spectacularly at guard duty.

  Estora came round the sofa and looked down at him. She was dressed in only her sleeping gown, its drape accenting the roundness of her belly.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  “Enjoying the fire,” he said.

  “Is that all?” She gazed at his sword. “No, I see that it is not. You are keeping watch. Have you been doing this since . . . ?”

  “Yes.” He glanced at the terriers who snoozed soundly by the fire. They hadn’t alerted him to Estora’s presence, but by now they knew she was not a threat, but one of their own. “You should be in bed resting.”

  “If you must know, I am weary of rest.”

  “Vanlynn says—”

  “I am most tired of hearing what Vanlynn says.”

  She was so emphatic he almost smiled, but he knew better than to do so.

  “Perhaps,” she said more evenly, “you should come to my bed and keep me company.”

  “It would be difficult to keep watch if I am . . . keeping you company.”

  “That is actually what I am counting on. Oh, Zachary, I am pregnant, not sick or dying. I simply wish . . . I wish to be with my husband.” Then she gazed thoughtfully into the fire. “And I have been having the strangest craving for fermented cabbage and maple cream. Together.”

  He cocked an eyebrow. “Shall I send for some?”

  She shook her head, her long, loosely braided gold hair shimmering. “No, my love. I would prefer you, with me.” She extended her hand to him.

  He hesitated.

  Through no fault of her own, Estora was a constant reminder to him of the betrayal he’d suffered, of how he’d been used. Of how they’d both been used, by those who should have known better. The conspirators had led her to believe that a deathbed wedding was the only way to preserve the realm, should he die from his wound.

  As if the wedding had not been enough, one of the conspirators, Estora’s cousin, had insisted the rite of consummation, an ancient tradition that sealed the contract of marriage, be performed and witnessed. It usually took place on the wedding night, but Zachary had been near death and unable to take part, so the push for it to happen came later.

  Estora had protested he was still in no condition to participate, but her cousin overruled her with threats to ruin her and her family. She could not refuse. Zachary, fevered and bereft of his senses, and unaware of the machinations going on around him, was dosed with an aphrodisiac to enhance his responsiveness. Apparently he’d been strong enough to successfully complete the rite, but he remembered little of it, just the shadow of a dream.

  With another surge of anger, he thought of how they’d both been violated that night.

  “Zachary?” Estora said. “Is something wrong?”

  She was blameless, and she was his wife, no matter how it had all come to pass.

  “No,” he said, “nothing is wrong.” He took her hand and kissed it. He could not let her see his anger. He would save it for the battlefield. He would show her only the kindness, the tenderness, she deserved.

  He stood, pushing the blanket aside, and collected his sword to take with him.

  “I hope that is not the only sword you are bringing with you,” she said, and she squeezed his hand.

  “I would not be concerned on that account.” When Finder and Jasper stood to follow, he ordered them to stay.

  Estora led him steadily through the dark and into her bed chamber.

  GHOSTS

  The spirits came as they always did, even when she was too sound asleep to sense them. They crowded around her bed, their whispery babble like the rustling of curtains in air currents. The tomb cat glared at them from the foot of the bed, his ears flat and whiskers erect.

  Their stories made her restless this night, and she rolled over many times, burying her head in her pillow. The spirits became agitated when she would not listen, became more aggressive, prodding her through her blankets, and moaning. One used all its energy to move a book one inch on her desk before dissipating in a twist of smoke. The tomb cat growled.

  Suddenly she sat up. “Leave me,” she commanded in a voice that was perhaps not entirely her own. The spirits obeyed and vanished, and the cat leaped away in fright. She sat dazed and puzzled for a moment before flopping back into her pillow with a sigh, and quickly fell into undisturbed sleep.

  Though all the others fled, one ghost remained behind, but he did not tell Karigan G’ladheon stories. He did not prod her. They had met before, she and he, though the death god would have obscured her memory of it. He’d been her counterpart in a long ago time, a Green Rider. He had worn the brooch she now wore. As he had once been, she was an avatar of Westrion.

  She had commanded the ghosts, and they obeyed.

  The tomb cat came out of hiding from beneath the bed and sat on his haunches, watching the spirit with the particular disdain only cats could muster. The ghost of Siris Kiltyre laughed before he turned and vanished.

  A SWORDMASTER TRAINS

  The next morning, Karigan woke up stiff and sore from her exertions during the “test” the previous night, and strangely satisfied. Yes, she’d made it to swordmaster at last, but her sense of satisfaction was something more. Perhaps it was just that she had slept so well.

  Before she attended to anything else, she swung her legs off the bed and reached for her new sword where it leaned against the wall next to her bonewood staff. She drew it out of its scabbard, and it gleamed coldly in the dull morning light that filtered in through her arrow slit windows. The silk band knotted beneath the guard seemed to bisect the blade from the wire-wrapped hilt. Fastion had explained that the silk absorbed the blood of enemies, that to have it stain the silk was an honor and imbued the blade with the enemy’s strength. It enlivened the blade’s thirst for blood.

  While she was not particularly stirred by Fastion’s words, she was by the quality of the sword. She admired its precise, deadly form, the sharp double edges. It was unadorned but for a plain wheel pommel that balanced it so well, and the etching of the black shield on the blade. She swallowed hard and glanced at her bandaged wrist. They had fought with true edged blades last night, not just wooden practice swords. It was a tribute to a swordmaster’s skill and control that it was so.

  On the side opposite the black shield etching was the maker’s mark, a
nd she recognized it as that of one of the royal smiths, one of the finest. The kingdom, she thought, did well by its swordmasters. Or, at least, those affiliated with the Weapons, even if only honorarily.

  It was not the bejeweled, ornamented sword some would want, and she preferred it that way. She admired its austerity. There was beauty in its bare form, and no mistaking the purpose for which it had been forged.

  She swept it through the air until Ghost Kitty batted her elbow. She smiled and petted the cat, then sheathed the sword, pleased the scabbard was just as plain. Then her smile faltered. She wished she could tell Cade. She thought he’d be proud of her. He’d wanted to be a Weapon. Ghost Kitty rubbed against her arm, and for a time she simply stroked him and hugged him. Then, with a rattling breath, she began preparing for the day.

  At breakfast, she joined Mara in the dining hall, choosing tea this time instead of kauv, and ham and eggs. She was starving.

  “Oh, good,” Mara said when Karigan sat down. “You can tell me all about making swordmaster last night.”

  “You know?”

  “Oh, yes. The captain is fuming that no one warned her it was going to happen, and I think Drent is in for it. Congratulations, by the way.”

  “Thank you.” Karigan sawed into her ham steak.

  “Now tell me everything.”

  “Sorry, but I’m not allowed to say anything specific about the, er, test.”

  “Typical,” Mara muttered.

  “Typical?”

  “Typical you, typical Weapon secrecy.”

  “If I could, I’d tell you the whole thing.” In fact, Karigan was dying to do just that, but she’d been strongly admonished, on her honor, not to speak of the test, or even of where it took place, to avoid ruining the element of surprise for future swordmasters. She had been assured that if she continued to climb the levels, however, that those tests would not be surprises, but “interesting” in their own way.