Princess at Sea

  We had both loved the wrong person. Duncan had betrayed me, his soul lost to the greed of wealth. Contessa had fallen prey to a noble man who had seen her through hell and possible death. I wouldn’t judge her. I couldn’t. The thought that Thadd’s love for Contessa wasn’t any less because Contessa loved another lifted through me. Was my own love for Duncan, then, true and unsullied though he never loved me at all?

  I didn’t know.

  I lost sight of Thadd when we went round the bend. The wind rose, filling my head with uncertainty. It laughed and snickered, and I pulled my hand up to hold down my hair though the pennants draped from the windows in celebration hung silent and still.

  Twenty-seven

  After weeks at sea, just the stillness of the air made it seem warm despite the dampness. I sat on the stone bench in the garden, hunched and miserable beside my parents’ graves. Banner, my dog, abided patiently at my feet, his head on my lap as I fingered the wispy, curly hair atop his head. The large wolfhound had joined me shortly after I found refuge upon the hard stone, skulking up behind me slowly with a drooping tail until he was sure his presence was welcome.

  The heavy fog hiding the moon was chill, and the light from the candle I had brought with me glowed upon the flat expanse of the two slabs of polished stone embedded in the earth. It wasn’t that I had anything to say to them, but this was the sole place I could get away from everyone where, if they saw me, they wouldn’t dare approach.

  And I was desperately seeking solitude.

  I slumped, pulling myself straight when I reminded myself I was still a princess, even if I wasn’t a particularly good one. Banner lifted his eyes to mine, never moving his head. When I remained still, he returned his gaze to nothing, content to offer what silent solace he could. The fingers of my right hand slowed their motion, and I rested my hand atop his head. The punta bite ached all the way down to my palm.

  The damp wind lifted through the moonflower vine twining over the trellis arching over me. It stirred the slumberous zephyr in my head back to wakefulness, and I groaned. Is this going to happen every time the wind blows? Eyes shut, I willed the zephyr to go back to sleep. But it shook itself, whispering that Duncan never loved me. He used me. That I trusted him, and he never loved me at all, and wasn’t I the glorious fool?

  Teeth gritted, I forced my hands in Banner’s fur to stay loose as I fiercely wrapped my will about the wind and forced it to be still. It laughed and pretended submissiveness, planning in a soft, audible whisper to drive me insane. The breeze in the vines died, and the candle flame grew steady in the damp night.

  Relieved, I let my shoulders slump and looked across the expanse of damp garden and up the tower walls to the hazy square of light showing from Kavenlow’s room. I could see the occasional shift of light from bright to dull. Kavenlow was there. With Jeck. Speaking of me, no doubt.

  I’m sure their private conversation had begun with me helping Contessa and Alex to board the pirates’ ship, making the natural progression to me having been bitten by a punta and surviving thanks to Jeck’s healing powers. From there the talk would likely drift to the venom being trapped within my tissues, spilling out to make my magic violent and unpredictable when I grew angry. Jeck would tell Kavenlow that I had tried to call the wind and fallen prey to it, and I knew the rival player would make Kavenlow understand when he wouldn’t believe me that my residual levels of toxin would never fall, making it impossible for me to take over Kavenlow’s game when he was ready to retire.

  My eyes closed against the new lump in my throat. And it was because I let Duncan use us. I made it possible because they trusted my judgment, and my judgment was measured against the stick that I thought he cared about me.

  Kavenlow would never keep me as an apprentice. Not now. I was twice disgraced. And Jeck? Jeck thought I was a silly, foolish woman.

  I caught my breath before I started crying, holding it. My head started to throb, and Banner whined. I pulled my gaze up and over the palace’s wall, the fog glowing pink from the celebration fires lit in the streets. My fingers racked through Banner’s fur to reassure him. “It’s all right, boy,” I whispered, thinking lies were easy when no one but you could understand them. “It’s going to be all right.”

  His eyes went soulfully to mine, then shifted away. His tail began to thump. It took on an urgent intensity, and I sent my gaze to follow his, seeing a white shadow flit across the tall black of the hedges and back behind the shrubbery. It moved with an awkward swiftness, and it was only Banner’s calm anticipation that kept my hands from rising to remind me my dart tube and darts were missing from my topknot.

  Banner’s tail thumps grew louder, his head unmoving atop my lap. With a clatter of hard soles on slate, Contessa lurched from the fog and bushes behind me. She drew to a sudden, unexpected halt when she caught sight of me. “Oh, I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I didn’t know you were here.”

  The pitch of her voice and her utter lack of a noble accent told me she had been crying. We had all apparently been having a stellar evening. I silently slid down the damp bench to make room for her. Banner stood, waiting to see if I was going to leave.

  “You want to be alone,” she said, looking like a ghost as she stared at the long seat.

  I glanced at our parents’ graves. “I’m not alone. Sit. Unless you want me to go?”

  “No.” It was a quick-worded admission that brought a sliver of ease to me. At least Contessa thought no less of me. Somehow that made me feel worse.

  She hesitated as if gathering her courage, then, after a nervous look at me, curtsied low and humbly to our parents. Silk rustled, and the faint scent of lavender and rock dust floated between us as she sat. Straight and stiff, she stared into nothing, her hands clenched in her lap as if she would fall apart if she dared loosen them. Banner sighed with a soft huff of air, lying on our feet so he could touch us both.

  She took a shaky breath, and I readied myself for whatever Alex had done to her now.

  “He’s gone!” she blurted, her upright stance collapsing.

  My mouth dropped open. “Gone!”

  “Thadd,” she blubbered, hiding her face in a hankie that had been crushed unseen between her fingers until now. “He’s gone!”

  “Oh.” My pulse slowed in understanding. The memory of his face when we had reentered the city passed before my mind’s eye. Contessa shook with half-heard sobs, and I put a sisterly arm about her shoulders. Banner got to his feet, and the huge dog slunk to the shadows with his tail tucked, thinking this was his fault somehow. “Contessa, I’m sorry,” I said, feeling her hurt though it had likely been my words to him that set his thoughts to leaving.

  Shaking, she caught her breath, and my arm dropped from around her. “He took his nasty old horse,” she said, the foggy candlelight showing a sheen on her face where her tears reflected it. “And his wagon, and all his tools. All he left me was this letter. See?” Making a small sound of dismay, she looked at herself as she searched for it. “Oh, here,” she said, finding it tucked into her waistband and extending it. “He must have had someone pen it for him,” she babbled, as I uncrinkled the crushed parchment. “I know he can’t write.”

  Leaning closer to my candle, I held it so the light fell upon the unfamiliar handwriting. My first sense of relief that it wasn’t Kavenlow’s turned to worry as I wondered if it might be Jeck’s. Lips pressed, I read, I LOVE YOU, AND I WILL NOT STAY HERE. A chill ran through me as I recalled it was the same thing he had said when he was going to force me to take him with me when I carried the ransom out.

  “He didn’t even say good-bye,” she blubbered, and I looked up from the letter to the surrounding dark gardens, hoping no one could hear her. Yes, everyone knew they were lovers, but as long as there was no proof . . .

  “I found it propped up on the statue,” she continued. “The one he was making of my hands.”

  I stifled a cringe. It was supposed to have been a statue of her and Alex’s hands intertwined. I was sur
prised he hadn’t taken his hammer to it and broken it to dust.

  “You don’t think someone made him leave, do you?” she asked, her sudden thought allowing her to find a measure of control.

  “No,” I whispered, guilt thick in me. Forced, no. Convinced, yes. “You can tell by his words it was his own decision.”

  I probably should have said it another way, as Contessa renewed her tears, her last hope that he might return to her, broken. “He just left,” she cried, sniffing and snorting like a jilted barmaid. Looking at her now, you couldn’t tell that a kingdom almost fell because of her absence. “I thought he loved me,” she wailed.

  It was so close to my own raw feelings that I hunched in pain. “He does love you, Contessa,” I managed, glad the moon was hidden behind the fog. I knocked over the candle before she could see my face, and it went out to leave the sharp scent of burned wick. “He saw that you were starting to care for Alex, and he left to protect himself.”

  “Protect himself,” she scoffed, turning her tears into an unjustifiable anger as I knew she might. “Against what?”

  “His pride,” I said, then felt my face lose its expression. Maybe . . . maybe some of my shame for Duncan using me could be blamed upon my pride. I had been trained to be a player, to use my wits to manipulate people. Duncan had bested me using methods I had deemed too low to use. How much? I wondered. How much of my pain was due to that, and how much was from my wounded heart? I sat straighter when I realized I didn’t know.

  Contessa saw my new stance and eyed me in question. “How can you say he left because of pride?” she questioned carefully, wiping her nose on her sleeve.

  I stifled a twinge of annoyance, knowing this wasn’t the time to correct the backwoods manners that came out when she was stressed. “Contessa,” I said softly, not wanting to hurt her but thinking she deserved the truth. “He saw Alex kiss you when you came over the city’s threshold.”

  Her face went long, and her narrow chin trembled as it all fell into place. “He saw?” she warbled.

  “It was a very sincere kiss,” I added gently. “And you gave him one back.”

  “It was just a kiss!” she said belligerently, her emotions flying from one extreme to the other. Then she slumped, a faint gray shadow on the bench beside me. “And I meant it,” she sighed. “Oh, chu pits, Tess. No wonder he left. How can it be wrong to love someone? I didn’t want to care for Alex. I would have been happy living a lie if it didn’t hurt anyone, but now, anything I do will hurt one of them. Why did Alex have to be so understanding, so nice? If he had been mean and ugly, this never would have happened.” Her hands twisted in her lap as she wound the hankie tighter and tighter. “It’s not my fault!”

  “Contessa . . .” I cajoled softly. “He couldn’t stay, knowing you might love Alex, even if that day hadn’t yet happened. Could you ask him to remain where he would have to watch the love between you and Alex grow, always standing in the shadows, knowing he could never be with you openly? It would prey upon him. The life you had planned together would gather dust and take on the hue of childish dreams when held up to the life you and Alex would be sharing.”

  She sniffed, saying nothing, the haze of the newly risen full moon glowing dully behind her shoulder. Not wanting to be cruel but having to finish, I set my sun-browned hand atop hers. “Contessa, Thadd gave you a gift by leaving. Just as Alex did when he left his Rosie.”

  “Oh, don’t,” she said, catching her breath with a hiccup. “It was horrible. He thought I was her. He loves her so much. Didn’t you hear it in his voice? How could he just leave her like that? He didn’t even know me . . . then.”

  I glanced at the square of light coming from Kavenlow’s room, thinking that even now I was playing the game, even now when it was lost to me. If I could convince Contessa that loving Alex wasn’t wrong, then the kingdom would be strong enough to bear a hundred wars.

  “Alex knew there might be a chance you might love him, and he, you,” I said, telling myself that this was as much for Contessa’s happiness as it was for Kavenlow’s damned game. “And Alex would rather see his life with Rosie in the shadows shattered than see the chance you and he might find love destroyed because of a jealous woman. There’s no right or wrong to it,” I coaxed. “I can’t give you an answer. Alex left her because he had to.” Contessa sniffed, sounding ugly, and I added, “Just as Thadd left you. He knew you would never ask him to and that you would one day hate him for making you endure it. This way, the love you had for each other will never tarnish.”

  She was silent, emotionally spent. “I wish I could talk to him,” she whispered forlornly. “Just one last time. I would ask him . . . I’d ask him . . .” She stopped, her eyes closing. The faint light from the tower glinted upon a new tear that slipped past her shut lids. “I don’t know what I’d ask him,” she finally said. “Maybe all I’d say was I was sorry, and that I love him and I always will.”

  “He knows that already,” I whispered, thinking of Duncan. Had it all been a game to him or had he loved me . . . just a little less than he loved his money? The wind rose, rattling the leaves. I shivered, listening to it mock me. “Contessa,” I asked hesitantly. “Could you tell . . . when you kissed Alex today . . . could you tell that he loved you? Like he loved Rosie?”

  Her eyes dropped as she realized I had seen what she had done while playing Rosie under the deck of the pirates’ ship. Shame showed in her slight motion. “Yes,” she whispered. “It was the same. He loves me.”

  Contessa’s eyes were wet as she turned to me. “I-I came to talk to them,” she said, her gaze flicking to the flat gravestones atop the manicured ground.

  “Do you want me to leave?”

  She shook her head solemnly, and I settled back. I watched, somewhat uncomfortable as she rose, and with the grace of a saint, knelt before the slabs of stone to look like one of Thadd’s heartfelt statues among the hazy ribbons of fog.

  How could it be wrong to love someone? echoed her confused question in my thoughts. How could it be wrong? I turned my eyes from the sight of her lips moving in silent prayer. How indeed? But it certainly hadn’t been right for me to have loved Duncan.

  Had I loved him? resounded in me, and while my heart ached in yes, I found a new anger accompanied it, anger that he had used me for gain, anger that I had blinded myself to him using a weapon to manipulate me that I was not prepared to use. The anger felt better than the hurt, and I fastened on it, watching the petals of the moonflowers tremble in a soft breeze. From my deeper thoughts, the wind laughed, urging me on. If it could make me angry enough, it knew I would lose control and it would have its freedom. It would have had it this afternoon if Jeck hadn’t brought me back again. Its wheedling, conspiring prattle checked my anger, but I still felt my pulse quicken and my muscles tense.

  No one had found Duncan. The searching sentries had located his empty rowboat only a short distance from the shack, and a potent rush shook my fingers when I realized he had probably heard me call for him and never returned. There had been an obvious track of heavily sunken footprints where he’d staggered, carrying the heavy satchels to two horses.

  The horses’ deep prints had led back into the water, where the outgoing tide had washed away every trace of them. I imagined one of the horses had probably been Tuck, Duncan’s gelding. It would account for the animal’s absence in the stables. Duncan had undoubtedly taken the second horse from the stables as well, stealing it when he had come to give us Rylan’s demands, walking past the palace gates and sentries with them unquestioned, secure in that they trusted he wouldn’t have two horses unless someone in the palace knew about it.

  My teeth gritted, and I held my breath. Duncan had twisted my emotions so easily that night, playing upon my feelings, letting me believe that his life was in danger, that he was making a noble sacrifice. And because of that, I had deceived Kavenlow, making sure the ransom that Kavenlow wasn’t going to give made it into Duncan’s thieving hands. And he had done it all so easil
y.

  Stupid, stupid, I berated myself, but my heartache seemed to lessen as I accepted my failing for what it had been; I had been manipulated by someone using emotions I had thought were too sacred to sully with schemes. Never again. Not that it mattered.

  The misty breeze lifted my singed hair, and I pulled my angry gaze away from the stark line the palace walls made against the sky. They were suddenly like the walls of delusion I had placed about myself to stay blind in my search for a happiness that I could never have. A wash of claustrophobia cascaded over me. I stood, heart pounding. From the shadows came Banner, pacing to me in a slow lope as he saw my need to move. I had to get out, get past the walls.

  As I stared at the stone imprisoning me with an almost hungry fervor, I realized what Kavenlow had meant when he said I could make no lasting attachments. I had thought he meant that to do so would make me vulnerable as whomever I loved could be used against me. That the ones I loved would be in danger if a rival player knew they meant something to me and I would sacrifice my game to save them. But what it could also mean was that anyone I loved could use my emotions for his own gain. Just as Duncan had. “Bloody chu pits,” I whispered, feeling my breath shake as I exhaled. I finally understood. But it was understanding come too late.

  Contessa’s bowed head rose at my mild curse. “Tess?”

  I took three quick steps to her, feeling unreal. She looked at me strangely when I bent to take her hands and pull her to her feet. “I have to go out for a bit,” I said, feeling the cold dampness of her fingers from the dew-wet grass.

  Her eyes widened, almost unseen in the dark. “You’re leaving the grounds?”

  I nodded, giving her hands a little squeeze. “I can get past the gates all right, but I need you to tell Kavenlow or anyone who asks that I’m sulking somewhere and don’t want to be disturbed.”