“Perry!” His voice sounded strained.
Master Hakon gave me permission to go to him. “But if you tarry returning to camp, your father will dine on my liver.”
We walked our horses behind the cart until Willem reached out to touch my arm. Ignoring Master Hakon’s warning, I reined in my mare and let the cart gain ground ahead of us. “Congratulations!” I couldn’t help adding, “You remembered the power in your back leg, and you kept your shield up.” Admit I helped you.
“I don’t know what I did.”
We entered the copse.
“What?” I shouted. I couldn’t hear him over the wind.
“I don’t know what I did.”
I wanted him to be happier than he sounded. “I wish I could have seen you kill the Kyngoll.”
His horse’s hoof unloosed a stone, which skittered off to the side.
“Ivar will live,” I added.
“I’m glad.” He didn’t sound glad.
“What’s wrong?”
“It was just a lucky thrust that pierced his neck.”
“Whose neck?”
“The soldier I killed. I was furious when Ivar went down. Everybody was shouting. I think I was, too.”
The battle spell.
“I struck, and I’ve never felt so strong.”
Willem turned to me in the saddle. I saw a tightness around his mouth that hadn’t been there before. “There was only a little spot where the soldier had no armor. I got it by accident. He spouted a fountain of blood and I stopped being angry. I said him, but it could have been a woman. Doesn’t matter which it was.”
The apprentice’s torch disappeared in the trees ahead.
“Did you look in the soldier’s eyes?”
“All I saw was blood, and then the line closed in front of me. I didn’t use my spear again. I just moved with the line. I don’t think I even kept my shield up.”
How lucky he hadn’t been gored, too!
I didn’t know what to say. Why was he telling me?
“As soon as I killed him, I seemed to wake up from a dream. I felt like I was the only person in a pack of barking dogs, and a moment before I’d been a dog, too.”
In his place, I’d have stayed a dog. Willem was the true Bamarre and I the true Lakti, no matter who our parents were.
I wanted to comfort him. “Father told me not to look in the eyes of our foes because it takes the joy away and you still have to fight them. Seeing the blood was like looking in—”
“I almost fainted. If I had, I would have been trampled. Then I almost threw up.”
“Vomiting in your helmet would be horrible!”
“I don’t want to fight again. Do you think I’m a coward?”
I didn’t know.
“Am I?”
I searched for words that wouldn’t wound him. “It took courage to tell me.” That was true. “Maybe other people are like you, but they pretend not to be because they’re cowards.” But I thought he might really not be brave, not in battle anyway.
A few more trees ahead and we’d be through the copse.
“What will your father say when I refuse to go back?”
Was this why he told me?
“Will he even let me not fight?”
“I’d go in your place.” I regretted the words instantly. I didn’t mean I was better than he was.
He spurred his horse. In an instant he was out of the trees.
“Willem!” I had to apologize. To explain.
I kicked my mount, too. As she gathered herself to sprint, a rope snare dropped over my head. I fell out of the saddle and landed hard. The mare rode on. Willem must have heard something, or my riderless horse may have passed him. The coward turned his horse to come back to me and was captured, too.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
STUPID! STUPID! STUPID! The Kyngoll must have made some noise that I could have heard, even in the wind if I’d been paying attention. Or I should have smelled them—they wore rose perfume to battle!
Stupid again, I forgot Lady Mother’s pendant until after my hands were bound behind my back. Every bit of me ached from my fall. In the night, our captors were just three shadows. Without gagging us, they slung us across Willem’s steed’s back. If we shouted, we were too far by now from the surgeon’s cart for anyone to hear.
The Lakti regarded captives as deserving their fate. Lady Mother and Father would have to live with the shame of a daughter foolish enough to be caught.
But not with a Bamarre in the family.
Father would be beside himself. The thought of his distress almost made me weep.
And Lady Mother! But the thought of her banished tears. She’d taught me not to cry.
I turned my head and found Willem regarding me.
“I’m sorry for what I said,” I whispered.
“It doesn’t matter.”
Not exactly forgiveness.
“Now you won’t be able to go in my place.”
Not forgiveness at all.
My head kept bumping into the horse’s flank. Our captors were silent. My eyes had adjusted to the dark.
“Perry—”
“Sh!” Who could guess what names they knew?
He nodded. “Your father wasn’t the reason I told you.” He paused. “No. I don’t mean that. He was, but I’d have told you anyway, because you tell the truth.”
“You’re very brave. You came back for me.”
After a moment, he smiled. “Truth.”
But it might have been better if he’d really been a coward and had galloped ahead and raised an alarm.
“I still don’t want to fight again.”
He might never have to admit that to anyone else.
Halina, I thought, what should I do?
Her ringing voice echoed in my mind: Be a Lakti for now. Escape.
Was that her or my imagination? Still, I asked for more aid. Help me escape!
Actual voice or not, her tone was resentful: I just did.
After perhaps a quarter hour of travel at a walk, a Kyngoll slapped our horse’s rear, and he broke into a trot. I thought my bones were going to fly apart. If they planned to cook us, we’d be tender by the time we reached their town.
My voice vibrated as I recited a ditty Mistress Clarra taught us years ago, Lakti poetry.
“We Lakti don’t mind pain.
Torture is in vain.
My body obeys my brain.”
Willem joined in, and we continued for the rest of the miserable journey, even as we entered the Kyngoll town and clattered down a cobblestone street.
A moment after our steed stopped, I was lifted off. My heart hammered. I shook my shoulders so that my cloak covered the magic pendant.
Our captors were three women, one tall, one short, one in the middle, who held a torch. The short woman had the horses’ reins. The tall one drew my hood away from my face, although my hair—whatever length it had grown to—was still concealed by my cap.
“They’re children!” Her accent softened the ch to sh. “Are they sending shildren into battle?”
The short one said, “The girl is younger than my Marla. Don’t be afraid, shild.”
“Probably not afraid,” the tall one said. “They beat fear out of them.”
I’d never been beaten! And I doubted Willem had been, either.
The tall one grabbed my arm, and the medium-sized one took Willem’s.
On one side of the street rose a large stone edifice, the baker’s guildhall, judging by the iron rolling pin nailed to the wooden door. On the other side were prosperous half-timbered houses, seemingly untouched by war. A few hurrying figures rushed by, leaning into the wind. Voices raised in song emanated from a tavern, the Quilted Pig.
We were marched down three houses to a door guarded by two Kyngoll men. Our captors pushed us inside and prodded us up a narrow flight of stairs.
Another guard let us through a low door into a solar—the great hall of a house—with an arched ceiling. A fire blaz
ed in the fireplace, and no fewer than five coal braziers smoked the air. My eyes smarted. I smelled sage in the rushes that covered the floor tiles. All un-Lakti-like luxuries.
A clean-shaven man watched us from a bench placed to the side of the fire. He wasn’t as lean as Father or truly fat, but I thought he liked his meals.
Embroidered linen panels hung on every wall, each depicting a garden. Between two large glazed windows, an open cupboard displayed stacks of bowls, platters, and table linens. On the wall across from the fireplace stood a buffet. Pride of place in the middle of the buffet was taken by an oaken carving of a cat, perhaps a foot tall, sitting on its haunches.
Cushions were scattered across the floor and spread along the bench where the plump man sat. “Come in.” His voice was full and deep. “Sit.”
I was pushed down and sank into a floor cushion. Comfortable.
Soft.
The women removed their cloaks. They were well fed, too.
“I am Sir Lerrin. How old are you, lad?”
Willem hesitated. “Seventeen.”
No harm in telling. Our youth was obvious.
“Fascinating. I expect you’re both hungry, though I suppose you’ll deny it.” He grinned. “Are you hungry?”
We each shook our heads.
“Well, I’m hungry.”
The short woman said, “You always are.”
I was surprised she’d speak that way to her superior.
“Yes, Zasha, I am.”
The women smiled.
Sir Lerrin continued. “Then we should eat.”
Did the Kyngoll poison their captives? Would they unbind our hands so we could eat? Or would they feed us?
The women assembled a table from the board and trestles that leaned against the wall next to the buffet. Sir Lerrin stood with the litheness of a cat and was revealed to be no taller than Willem. He padded to the cupboard and lifted an embroidered tablecloth from the top of the pile of linens. Holding it, folded, over the table, he announced, “Good tablecloth, please set thyself.”
When he let go, the tablecloth hung in the air and unfolded itself. It settled crisply over the tabletop. And then—
I yelped. Food, on fine platters and in tureens and bowls, popped out of nothing above the table and descended gently, in more variety than I’d ever seen at a castle feast: quail, honey-glazed by the skin’s glisten; sliced roast boar; a whole golden carp; leek-in-cream soup; pickled onions; boiled beets; rolls studded with raisins; almond-milk frumenty; and a wheel of soft cheese.
My open mouth watered, and my stomach rumbled, perhaps loud enough for everyone to hear. “Is it fairy-made?”
No one answered.
The shower of food ended, but six silver spoons and six empty bowls in a stack arrived, the top bowl almost falling and then righting itself. The tablecloth expected Willem and me to eat.
The Kyngoll filled their bowls to brimming. I marked what they served themselves. If our hands were untied and we agreed that we should eat, I’d take only what they had.
No. I wouldn’t eat at all. I’d use the pendant and draw my thrusting dagger, and Willem would draw his. With the pendant, we had a chance of defeating them all.
But Willem didn’t want to fight again. I didn’t know if he’d make an exception to escape.
Sir Lerrin himself freed us, after removing the daggers from our waists. He went to the door and handed them to the guard.
We each still had a little knife in our purses, but they were for eating with—capable of killing nothing bigger than a mouse. I flexed my wrists.
Willem took his cloak off, but I kept mine on to hide the pendant.
The tall soldier said, “Wouldn’t you like to take your cloak off, young mistress?”
“I was chilled today, and I can’t seem to get warm.”
“Strange chill,” Sir Lerrin said, “with beads of sweat collecting on your forehead.”
Hastily I wiped the wet away.
Zasha chuckled. “When my Marla keeps her cloak on, it’s because her kirtle somehow doesn’t please her.”
Let them think me as vain as a Kyngoll.
“At least,” said the tall soldier, “take off your hood.”
I pulled the hood back, lifted off my cap, and then tugged off the hood of mail. My hair tumbled out. The locks that didn’t pool in my hood descended to my shoulder blades.
“Marla will be green with envy.”
I was expected to meet Zasha’s daughter?
Willem’s eyes met mine. “Should we eat?” we asked each other at the same time.
“You should,” the short woman—Zasha—and Sir Lerrin said in unison, too.
Willem and I probably shared a thought, too. If they killed us here, we’d die after a full meal.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“THE TABLECLOTH ISN’T fairy-made,” Sir Lerrin said.
We filled our bowls, both of us choosing only dishes that the others were eating. I wished someone had taken the cheese puffs, a treat I’d tasted just once and relished.
Could I overturn the groaning board and create chaos that would let us escape?
They’d catch us, or the guards would.
“You Lakti!” Sir Lerrin helped himself to several cheese puffs.
I took a few, too. What did he mean?
He explained without being asked. “Cautious. Self-denying.”
Self-denying, yes, but not at this moment. I pointed at the cheese puffs with my spoon. “They’re delicious, Wi—” I stopped myself before his name came out and changed the Wi to why. “Why don’t you try them?” Everything was delectable, the flavors purer than anything I’d ever tasted.
Willem helped himself to cheese puffs. “How are we cautious, Sir Lerrin, when we’re renowned for courage?”
I wondered if he was thinking of his doubts about his own bravery.
The tall woman said, “Neither of you is eating anything we didn’t taste first.”
Sir Lerrin sat and leaned back against his ridiculous cushions. “Little mistress, you eyed those cheese puffs as if they were family you hadn’t seen in years.”
I blushed. “You said the tablecloth wasn’t fairy-made, but you didn’t say who did make it.”
“We purchased it before the war. The Lakti merchant said it was a sorcerer’s creation from Old Lakti.”
Like my pendant!
The tablecloth had come from a pile of linens. I gestured at it. “Are they all magical?”
He shook his head. “None are, but we were told that others like ours exist.”
Were there were other magic pendants, too? Might Sir Lerrin or any of the others be concealing one right now?
“What other differences are there between the Lakti and the Kyngoll?” Willem scooped up a dollop of frumenty.
A perfect question. We might get information Father could use—if we escaped.
“That’s easy,” Sir Lerrin said. “We’re deep thinkers.”
Meaning the Lakti weren’t.
The others chimed in.
“The Lakti are cruel.”
“Relentless.”
A good quality in war.
“You worship war.”
“For the peace that will follow,” Willem said. “And we don’t worship it.”
Yet Father had confessed that he’d find endless peace dull.
“Lacking sympathy.”
Sir Lerrin stroked his chin. “The Lakti live in cities that the Bamarre built. What have you added to culture? To cookery?”
Zasha added, “You have no poetry.”
I burst out, “I love poetry!”
Willem stared at me.
I pulled back my shoulders to recite a poem that Lilli wrote near the end of her life:
“Heavy with hope denied,
Leaden with the lid
Slammed on tomorrow . . .”
I gulped.
“What eases my heart?
A scent of sea, music,
A speckled stone,
&n
bsp; Parchment under my pen.
Writing my horizons away.”
Outside, a bell rang the hour. Eight o’clock. Father would be frantic.
Sir Lerrin coughed. “Fascinating. A poem by a Lakti master, young mistress?”
I admitted that the poet had been a Bamarre.
The mood shifted back to scorn. I wondered what Kyngoll poetry was like.
“A difference you’ll both care about,” said Sir Lerrin, “is that we Kyngoll don’t kill our prisoners.”
Would we be imprisoned forever?
Zasha said vehemently, “We’d never kill a child. Never!”
Sir Lerrin served himself a big wedge of cheese. “Tonight, we’ll hold you. Zasha, take the boy to the guildhall. I want to talk to the girl alone.”
Don’t separate us!
The tall soldier said, “She’s just a youngster. She’s probably tired.”
Sounding annoyed, Sir Lerrin said, “I know. Go!”
Willem’s hands were bound again. They left. Three fewer people to stop me if I used the pendant. Then I’d go for Willem.
“What do they call you, young mistress?”
He might know Father had a daughter named Peregrine—Perry.
Sir Lerrin cocked his head. “You think I might recognize your name.”
“We’re told to give no information if we’re captured.”
“Might you be Lady Peregrine, Lord Tove’s daughter?”
I succeeded in not changing my face and giving the truth away.
“An unusual name. Is there a tale behind it?”
I didn’t answer.
He continued. “Another quality that we Kyngoll have and you Lakti don’t is intuition. Lady Peregrine, there is around you an air of destiny. I believe you’ll be a queen. Of New Lakti or perhaps of Kyngoll.”
I laughed. A Bamarre queen of New Lakti! I could hardly catch my breath. I prayed my wild laughter wouldn’t dissolve into tears.
Sir Lerrin stared.
My laughter finally died. “I hope your last prisoner didn’t give secrets away when you told her about her future crown.”
What were the women saying to Willem?
I trusted him! He wouldn’t be deceived, either.