‘We don’t yet have a scribe, that’s not civilized, I know,’ said Lysaer s’Ilessid to the child. ‘But that doesn’t matter. A page should know how to fold and seal a document for the day he grows up to be a lord.’
The boy said something in dulcet, shy tones.
‘The job is only boring before you learn how it’s done.’ A sculptured hand reached up, snagged a ribbon in Tysan’s royal colours from a cache between quills and inkwell, and resumed patient instruction. ‘Here, and here,’ Lysaer said, a smile on his lips to tear the heart. ‘Now the knot. Use two hands this time, and try not to smear the royal star.’
A striker changed hands, then the heavy brass seal with the star and crown sigil of Tysan. Undone by the page’s worshipful concentration as he backed up with his burden to try afresh, Talith held her fingertips pressed to her lips as Lysaer s’Ilessid straightened up.
The light fringed his hair to a leafed blaze of gold. Unsoftened by the coarser glow of candles, his austere face showed an unearthly beauty no memory could preserve with due justice. The impact of cobalt-blue eyes stunned like a physical shock. The frozen moment, while Prince Lysaer sized up her waiting presence, spun the last shred of breath from Talith’s throat.
His Grace of Tysan was not in rough attire, as she had expected, but ablaze with gold studs and a chain worked in pearls and small sapphires. His cuffs and collar were damascened silk, and his tabard, of trimmed velvet, looked cut from the shadow of a snowdrift. Every inch of him lordly, he poised for the space of a heartbeat.
Then a sudden, blinding smile enlivened his face with affection. ‘Lady Talith!’ In one fluid movement he vaulted the table. His rush set the candle flames streaming. Sooner than she wished, he reached out and touched, and enveloped her in welcoming arms.
The firm, muscled strength underneath his soft clothes lifted her, spun her, set her down. Talith was consumed, then ignited by his flame of vital heat. She sensed the sped pace of his heart as his knuckles sank in her damp ermine, and his lips seared a kiss on her forehead. ‘You are just the person I wished to see, beloved. My writ was to reach you in the hands of the next messenger. Yesterday, our wedding date was set.’
Her anger in trembling ruins, Talith recovered her breath with a gasp. ‘What?’
‘We shall marry when the orchards are in blossom.’ Lysaer consumed her with his gaze, then took swift advantage of her open-mouthed, speechless surprise.
‘Leave him if you can,’ her brother had mocked.
Wrapped in the prince’s embrace, sealed to his lips in a branding flush of passion, that challenge rang sadly diminished. As though drugged, or enspelled, Talith felt her resolve sublimate like wax set in flame.
The kiss ended and left her bereft.
‘By Ath, you crossed the passes. No wonder you’re peaked. The journey had to be terrible.’ Still talking, Lysaer set her down on one of the cushioned benches. With the same seamless charm, his page was dispatched to fetch mulled wine and scones from the bakehouse. Then, while she was still heady with his presence, Lysaer, Prince of Tysan, raised both her hands and savoured them, captive in his grip.
Only now did she notice the calluses inscribed by sword and lance and bridle rein, the telltale smudges of fatigue in the hollows of his face. The stamp of cold purpose lay on his good looks like the blued gleam of steel from the forge.
And like the first ice to trammel clear waters, reason caught up and flawed his joy. ‘My dear, you are magnificent. No doubt my best officers are all stumbling into walls at the sight of you, but what possessed you to leave Erdane at this season?’
Talith had no more will to frame answer; then, as Pesquil’s nasal tones intruded from the outside corridor, she lost all need to use words. Lysaer stepped away. His jewels spat indigo sparks in the gloom, and candles winnowed by spurts of disturbed air threw wavering, ominous shadows. His pleasure erased before a turbulent frown, the prince flung wide the door to his private study.
Left, but not forgotten on her bench, decimated beyond reprieve by Lysaer’s magnetic charm, Lady Talith sat in dumb misery while her brother and the Captain Mayor of Etarra’s league of headhunters made free and entered, and dispatched the news that the Master of Shadow had sown havoc through two cities in the east.
Throughout, Lysaer listened, not rigid with outrage, but distilled instead to a leashed back, frightening fury. The glow from the casement etched his rapt profile and splintered through the gold ribbon on his sleeves.
‘I have no verified facts from either government,’ Pesquil hastened to add. ‘But the rumours are spread through more than one source. Jaelot and Alestron are unlikely places for spurious tales of fancy to arise.’
A glint of sharp distress charged the depths of Lysaer’s eyes as he reeled off a string of fast conclusions. ‘They are port towns. It is s’Ffalenn design, and wantonly inflicted on innocents.’ Passion frayed through as he added, ‘The instant the weather lets the trade galleys sail, we’ll send for documented evidence. At last I’ll gain the leverage I need to turn Tysan’s guildsmen. The threat this man presents is dire, but until now, only cities in Rathain saw the proof.’
Pesquil tapped the worn steel in his scabbard, his sidelong glance whittled shrewd. ‘Erdane’s offered you three hundred reserves already, upon presentation of hard evidence.’
Lysaer dealt the headhunter captain a spirited slap on the shoulder. ‘Well done!’ He surged behind his desk, seized pen and paper, and scribbled a rushed line of notes. ‘We have much to accomplish in a matter of days. As you must be aware, you’ve earned a reward. I had a thousand royals posted for the man who brought the first word of the Shadow Master.’
‘Use the gold to pay soldiers,’ Pesquil said in a sudden red flush of embarrassment. ‘Your army, they’re prepared?’
Lord Commander Diegan broke in, ‘The men are more than ready. On command, they would march against Dharkaron himself.’
‘Weather won’t delay us overlong,’ Lysaer added. ‘A third of our forces already lie south in Caithwood, on hired campaign against barbarians. Word can be sped by fast courier. Those divisions can be marched east directly.’ Rapidly, he outlined his intent to gather Avenor’s high officials and every ranking officer from the barracks. Then he spun and met the irate glare of Talith, who believed herself set aside and forgotten.
You may wish the chance to freshen up from your journey,’ the prince suggested.
Entrapped like a netted songbird, swept over by the eerie, concentrated focus still engaged by the impact of Pesquil’s news, Talith endured as Lysaer’s regard encompassed her closed features and after, every soiled nuance of her dress. He grasped her loose hands, found them cold, and his urgency gentled to concern. ‘You’ll want a lady’s maid, of course. Wait in the anteroom. My page will deliver you refreshment there and my equerry will build up the fire. At least you’ll be warm until I can arrange for a suitable attendant.’
Talith snapped back from his touch in offended fury. ‘No thank you, my Lord Prince. If you’re going to draw up plans to slay your nemesis, I shall stay exactly where I am.’
‘But of course.’ Lysaer stroked a fallen curl from her cheekbone, his tenderness too sincere to be patronizing. ‘I expect you back once you’ve changed. This is no mayor’s realm, to keep women at home uninformed.’ He smiled, sternly royal, and admonished, ‘You shall be Avenor’s princess on the equinox feast. Could you doubt for a minute? The responsibility to defend Athera’s cities must be shared. Your place through this war council is nowhere if not by my side.’
Outflanked and speechless, Talith inclined her head. She gathered mud-splashed skirts and swept headlong from the study.
Just past the door, she lost composure. Weakened and shaking, she braced against the saw-cut boards of the corridor while Pesquil’s rapid consonants rang through the panel at her back. ‘Provisioning’s your worst obstacle. How many veterans can you send at first thaw to earn their passage as caravan guards?’
The Captain Mayor’s
point was too obvious: if Lysaer chose Etarra as the site to muster troops, the long march must be sustained across Tysan, through cities not yet won to his cause. To support an armed force across the continent before the harvest would require extensive planning and diplomacy. Any shortfalls created by logistics and supply must not disrupt the chance for alliance in the future.
‘Much care is needed,’ Lysaer agreed. ‘At least until we reach Rathain.’
Most of the army had no choice but to hold back until the grass greened enough to graze for fodder. The roads would have dried, and ox carts would not mire in mud left softened by the thaws.
‘Diegan claims your men are ready,’ Pesquil interjected. ‘I would ask, are they good?’
Lysaer answered in guarded excitement. ‘We have four thousand, enlisted. An hour remains before sundown. Let us go and observe them, and see if their achievements can impress you.’
As Talith overheard, her bitterness deepened, that once again her love must make way before the great quest to stalk down the Shadow Master. Her autonomy could not be sustained against Lysaer, and her anger fell powerless before yearning. She moved off, beaten humble by misery, to seek refuge in the quiet of the anteroom.
Pesquil’s last question pursued her. ‘You can move armies from here to Sithaer and back, Prince. There’s little to stop you. Except how will you know, once your muster is accomplished, where to corner the Master of Shadow?’
‘Trust my foresight,’ Lysaer replied in iron-clad surety. ‘When the time comes to march, I possess a sure means to find out.’
Rendezvous
Like a vulture cramped in a roost sized for finches, the brig Black Drake dominated the tiny, cove harbour of Merior. Crowded by the swing of her cable, the moored dories of each absent fishing lugger wallowed in her hulking shadow. Jieret Red-beard lounged at her rail, peeling across his hawk nose from the burn of the strong southland sun, the quilloned knife just used to pare his nails still unsheathed in his hand. Relaxed though he seemed, the sailhands who had shared winter passage from the Gulf of Stormwell maintained their distance. The lad had cold eyes and no patience for the fool who dared cross him while he simmered with impatience.
A raucous flock of gulls arrowed up, disturbed by the sight Jieret waited for: rapacious under timed oarsmen, Drake’s tender sheared through a wind-caught slash of spray to pull under the brig’s leeward side.
The only black head on board was Captain Dhirken’s.
‘He isn’t here,’ Jieret said, nettled. The thunk as his weapon struck upright in the rail rang across a closing gap of water.
‘Not,’ Dhirken cracked, her jet braid dangled down her back as she aimed a poisonous glower upward. ‘And damn you for scarring my brightwork in pique for your prince’s bad promise. There’s ale enough in my hold to nurse yer male temper till ye’re witless, flat out, or paralysed.’ Poised in the bow to snatch the line tossed down by a deckhand, she made the boat fast to a cleat. To the jinking swing of her cutlass, she scaled the side battens in scorching irritation.
Regaled in a man’s velvet knee breeches, red shirt, and a flamboyant vest with pearl buttons, the event of her presence had raised a storm of wild gossip in the sleepy fishers’ village where Arithon s’Ffalenn had signally failed to keep his rendezvous.
The settlement was pitilessly remote, its quiet less idyllic than a calm that threatened stagnation, with its rows of shuttered cottages and a near-deserted market stacked with fish barrels, rancid and reeking in the turgid noon heat. Impatient with the soporific rustle of palm fronds, and the chink of clay charms to keep iyats from unravelling tired fish nets, Jieret wondered why his liege had chosen the site in the first place.
The longboat rocked as the rowers shipped oars. Arrived at the rail, their captain talked still with inspired venom. ‘May the whore’s pox plague your vaunted prince. If he’s light with his word as all that, I’m sore tempted to act in kind. Myself and my mates, we could live like fat mayors on his contraband.’
Jieret freed his blade and stepped back as Dhirken vaulted aboard. ‘You know where to look for Prince Arithon?’
Dhirken’s lips split into a nasty grin. ‘Aye. He’s at Innish. So said a wee, pale snip of a woman. It’s to do with a promise he chose to honour.’
‘You’ll sail there?’ Jieret pressed.
Poised on braced legs, her back stiff as nail stock, Dhirken shrugged. ‘If I don’t, you’ll walk, is that so? With all his blighted treasure on your back? You’ve got lint between your ears to think he’s worth it.’
A pause ensued, while the busy wind flicked through the laces on Jieret’s jerkin and ruffled his raw-spun copper beard. The tropical sky scored glints in hazel eyes that seemed to view a sight very different.
When Dhirken snapped her rings against her cutlass hilt to recoup his attention, the Earl of the North stated baldly, ‘If not for my liege, I wouldn’t stand here alive.’
‘Well at least sheath that dirk before you stick somewhat else with it.’ Brazen in distaste for loyal sentiment, Dhirken spun away to chastise the longboat’s oarsmen, now crowding the rail at her shoulder. ‘Do I pay you my silver to gawk? Smarten up and haul in that tender!’
‘We’re sailing for Innish.’ Jieret grinned unrepentant over his knife blade. ‘And don’t say for the sake of sparing my dastardly back.’
‘The whore’s pox on you, also!’ Dhirken’s sidelong glance in malice scored somewhere in the middle of the earl’s chest. ‘Your royal friend left no charts for the southcoast. If you don’t want to dance on the equinox as shreds for some crab on a reef, you’d better pray there’s a merchant’s galley laid in at Shaddorn willing to sell her spare rutter.’
Baleful enough to scald air, the lady captain turned her raunchy invective to send her hands flying to make sail.
Burdened under full canvas, Black Drake ran hull-down, driven by the hard, pranking winds that partnered the shift in the season. The coast slipped past, green and gilt, the land breeze a pomade of citrus blossom spiked through with the resin of slash pine.
At Shaddorn, a fickle squall and a running, high swell had the traders’ galleys battened down in sheltered waters like boiled crabs salted in a barrel.
‘Damned merchant captains!’ Incensed and soaked from a rain shower, Dhirken peeled off her oilskins in the musty gloom below decks. ‘Stupid down to their toenails. My Drake tries on an honest charter forbye, and look at them! All huddled together like sheep gone spooked by a wyvern.’
She stalled her tirade long enough to accept a mug of soup from the cook. ‘No charts for sale, they say.’ Broth sloshed the rim as she gestured in sulky frustration. ‘It’s all spite. Just because I tail-whipped their tubs in the Eltair ports and undercut their prices, they’ll nurse useless grudges and obstruct us every way they can.’
Days were lost as sails were reefed to slow their passage. Drake nosed her way forward, a leadsman in her chains to call the mark, and a lookout posted aloft to spy out reefs lest shoaling waters set her aground. Forced to find anchorage each night by dark, Dhirken stalked her brig’s quarterdeck like a panther, while Jieret cursed the tropical airs that mouldered his leathers and patched rust on his daggers and sword. He refused to think of his clansmen. By now, the news out of Jaelot had reached Etarra; in the lapsed months since he left to track Arithon, a storm of war would be brewing.
Weather at least showed him favour. The winds stayed fair through the Drake’s coast-hopping run down to Southshire. Tucked between the hill country and the oak hammocks of Selkwood, the seaport’s shingled roofs pricked taut angles through the smoke from the rendering of resins and turpentine. A coin tossed to a lighterman across shining water bought Dhirken her assurance: the maze of the Harbour Street markets included a chart-maker’s stall. Packing’ a minor arsenal of knives along with her favoured cutlass, Drake’s captain rowed herself ashore. While her crewmen grumbled on shipboard mending sail, she quartered the city on foot.
The thoroughfare was packed. Gourd sellers
burdened under poles and baskets plodded between rumbling drays from the stone quarries at Elssine, behind mules panniered in silk bales from Atchaz, and abalone shell from Telzen, bound for the furniture makers. Chipped wood littered the gutters by the shipyards, with the half-shaped hulls of galleys rowed like picked bones on their ways. Under wind-flapped awnings, Dhirken prowled the shaded alleys of the shoreside market, with its glass blowers and snake venom sellers, its fragrant crates of citrus and its stalls that reeked of strong cheese, where robed bands of Sanpashir nomads drove nimble goats.
Dhirken elbowed through a begging squad of urchins to reach the chartmaker’s shop, slammed inside, and confronted a gnome-like old man enthroned amid pens and coloured inks.
His moist eyes regarded her in scholarly curiosity. Then a cheery smile stirred his drooping moustache. ‘I expect you’re after maps for the coastline to Innish?’
At the captain’s stiff glare, he waggled a moth-eaten goose quill. ‘Ach, there’d scarcely be two of you, yes? The young master sent word in a letter last month, along with pay to see your needs met.’ The cartographer bobbed beneath his counter, rattled aside rulers, tufts of string and worn nibs, and popped erect with a ribboned roll of parchment. ‘Your chart, lady captain, with yon mannerly gentleman’s compliments.’
‘Dharkaron’s hairy bollocks!’ Dhirken advanced a nettled step. ‘I’m nobody’s bound lackey! It’s naught but a stray slip of fortune that I bothered to visit here at all!’