Arrows of Promise (Kingmakers Book 2) (32 page)

“You’re such a kingly brother,” she cooed, throwing her arms
around his neck and hugging him.

Edvard indulged her, wrapping an arm around her waist in
return. “Yes, yes, you’re totally spoiled. Go have fun with the girls, now. Oh,
and I include Riana in that.”

Riana was close enough to hear this and protested, “I have
two dresses already!”

Both siblings ignored her. “Of course she’s included,”
Ashlynn agreed. “That was never in question. Don’t you worry, I’ll have
everyone properly outfitted in time for the ceremony. But if we’re talking six
dressed, I’ll need to get the dressmakers started today.”

“Then take a few hours off and attend to that. Broden can
cover for you.”

Broden knew an order when he heard one. “Me pleasure, sire,”
he drawled.

Edvard grinned at him. “See? You’re all set. Go have fun.”

Ashlynn snagged a still protesting Riana and practically
skipped out of the room. Broden watched her go with a sort of paternal
indulgence. Why did the lass enjoy shopping so much? It was beyond him.

“Broden, as it happens, I have a few troublemakers over at
the settlement that I could use an official hand with,” Ash stated. “Care to
row back over with me?”

“Certainly, lad.” Shopping was not his cup of tea at all,
but he’d gladly go and shoot people. Or at least scare them in line. He
followed Ash out of the room without a single pang of envy.

Riana pointed an outraged finger and said firmly, “No.”

Holding up the sparkling blue fabric higher, Ashlynn coaxed
in her sweetest tone, “Now, Riana, this is beautiful fabric—”

“It be itchy and restrictive and no.” Riana had learned from
her last shopping trip that Ashlynn had a taste for the finer things and often
bought things just because they were pretty, never mind if they were practical
or not. So if she didn’t say no, and mean it, the other woman would talk her
into the most ridiculous purchases.

Catriona sidled up next to Ashlynn, looking the fabric over
with a critical eye. “It’s true she would look wonderful in blue. But Ashlynn,
her true color is going to be green, especially with those eyes of hers.”

Ashlynn acted as if she had been struck by a lightning bolt.
“That…oh, that’s a very good point, Cat. Green it is.” Thrusting the blue
material into the arms of a seamstress, she immediately went back to the fabric
bolts, hunting for green.

Casting Riana a wink, Cat mouthed, ‘We need to stick
together.’

Riana felt like hugging her. As long as there wasn’t
anything shiny or stiff in green back in those bolts, she should have just
dodged the problem altogether. At least where fabric was concerned. The same,
alas, could not be said for the dress itself.

Before they had even entered the store, Ashlynn had declared
that no one was to come in armed to the coronation ceremony. There would be no
point, it being held in the temple, and there wasn’t any need to run around
armed in Estole proper anyway unless they were on duty. (Riana privately
disagreed on that last point but Ashlynn was technically armed all of the time
so she probably had a different perspective on matters.) Apparently the ‘appropriate’
style for the women involved stiff sleeves, lots of layers of petticoats, and
even more lace. Riana had taken one look at the design and felt like running
for the mountains.

Gwen, Bria, and Darisa were clearly in their element as they
went through the shop and pointed things out to each other. They already had a
stack waiting on the table of materials they wanted used.

In that moment, it struck Riana what the real difference
between them and her was. She had never known peace. They had grown up in it.
To them, this chaos and upheaval was simply a crisis to get through. Once they
had won the day, they would go back to the peace they had known growing up.
They
trusted
in that in a way that she could not comprehend. Shopping
and putting on pretty things seemed rather pointless to Riana and she couldn’t
invest any of her heart into it. To them, it was as natural as breathing,
indulging in such fancies.

For Ashlynn, going to a ceremony unarmed might be the
natural and correct thing to do. Riana couldn’t imagine going without any
weapons at all, even for the space of a few hours inside of a temple. She might
go through withdrawals if she tried, in fact. Arguing the point with Ashlynn
would get her nowhere so she’d have to be sneaky about this.

With new eyes, Riana looked around the shop. There was a
variety of hairpins stacked along the tables or laid out, depending on if they
were larger and more ornate. Bolts of lace and fabric were all along the back
walls. Examples of shoes lined up along the display case, right behind the
fans. Some of these were flimsy and useless but with the right mindset, a few
could be turned into weapons. If Riana played along with Ashlynn and joined in
on the shopping, the other woman wouldn’t suspect a thing.

Smiling to herself, she went to the hairpins first and
looked them over. Most were made of metal, some carved of wood, and were long
sticks with something pretty and delicate on the end of them. Ashlynn was
looking for something green, so she needed to pick up something that would
either match or coordinate well. A slender pair of matching hair sticks caught
her eye. They had weaving vines of bronze and green glass leaves weaving around
the end of the sticks. Pretty enough for a ceremony, certainly, and sharp
enough to be considered weapons if Riana needed them to be. She picked those up
and headed for Ashlynn. “I like these,” she said to the woman before popping up
next to her, holding them out. “Something to match this.”

“That’s the spirit,” Ashlynn crowed, bouncing on her toes.
“Alright, give me one, and you go find a fan and shoes to match.”

Taking one hair stick with her, she went off as directed.
The fans were mostly slender wood, nothing that could be used effectively in a
fight, but there was one that had a metal base with fabric over the top. The
metal was what caught her attention because folded up, it would be strong
enough to ward off a blow or strike a man in a tender spot. The design wasn’t
the best, but she took it anyway and asked the seamstress hovering nearby, “Be
it possible to change the design on this?”

The seamstress, a matron that had been in business in Estole
for at least two decades, took only a glance at the fan in her hands before
assuring her, “Certainly, Miss Riana. What would you like to have?”

“Something that would match this,” she explained, holding
out the hair stick.

“Ah, something green? That’s certainly possible. We have two
weeks until the king’s coronation, which should be plenty of time. Miss
Ashlynn, did you find anything that would match?”

“Three, but one of them isn’t suitable material. Riana, this
one,” Ashlynn held up a velvety looking material that had a subtle shimmer to
it when it moved, “or this one?” The other looked more like suede and was a
deep hue of green.

“Not the velvet,” the seamstress disagreed, moving forward
and taking it out of Ashlynn’s hands. “Not the right shade for her coloring.
But that suede is very nice and would look striking with her height.”

Riana was inclined to like it just because it wasn’t bright
and shimmery. “I like that one?” she ventured hopefully.

“This one it is.” Ashlynn looked relieved that she was able
to find something they both could agree to. “Now, as for the design…”

Knowing that she wouldn’t be able to influence them much,
Riana still tagged along toward the drawing table and watched as the women went
back and forth about the design of the bodice, sleeves, skirt, pieces she
didn’t recognize the terms of. She did manage to get them to incorporate
pockets on both sides of the skirt, and to shorten the sleeves enough so that
they wouldn’t be restrictive around the shoulders or elbows. But that was as
much leeway as they would give her.

It was enough. She grinned as she retreated and let the
other girls move forward and design their dresses. When she got the dress,
she’d put a slit in both pockets—that way she could strap daggers to her
thighs. No one would be able to tell with that many layers on. Between the
daggers, hairpins, and fan, she should be armed enough to handle danger if it did
pop up.

Hopefully it didn’t, though. Riana wished that more
fervently than anyone else, that there would not be trouble on that day. Edvard
and his family deserved to have
one
nice thing pan out smoothly for
them.

“If Edvard’s plans work out, do you think we’ll have nice
young barons and earls coming to visit?” Catriona asked wistfully. “There’s no
one to flirt with here.”

Darisa looked a little panicked at this topic, and cast a
desperate look at Bria, who smoothly responded, “Even if there were, I’m not
sure how much attention you could get from them. Between Ash, Tierone, Edvard,
and Broden, it’s a miracle if men approach us to ask for the time.”

Riana blinked. “Me da too?”

“He’s just as protective of us,” Bria explained in a tone of
complaint, although she smiled as she said that, which meant she actually liked
it.

Cat held up a piece of antique lace even as she continued to
Riana, “The whole city is scared of him, so he’s got it down to this
look
that says ‘Go away while your bones aren’t broken.’ It would be funny if it
weren’t so maddening. This lace for the sleeves?”

“Too white for that deep wine color. Try something cream
instead,” Ashlynn suggested. “Girls, are you really telling me that you didn’t
have any beaus from home? I know that Bria was a little separated from society
but the rest of you weren’t.”

“I had plenty of men chasing but none of them caught my
attention.” Darisa shrugged in resignation. “Mostly toadies that thought even
an illegitimate daughter of a duke was a step up.”

Riana silently applauded this answer as it neatly avoided
who she was courting
now.

“Same,” Cat admitted although she looked more aggravated
than resigned. “Actually, it’s Bria that had the best luck out of us.”

Bria blushed and focused very, very hard on the two fans in
her hands. “This one or this one?”

“Neither,” Ashlynn responded, sidling up and putting an arm
around her shoulders. “Bria, dearest sister, are you holding out on us?”

Bria got this trapped look on her face, an expression that a
rabbit would have while surrounded by hungry wolves. Swallowing nervously, she
offered, “He’s the third son of an official, sort of, and I met him while he
was running an errand for his father?”

“Wonderful information, do continue,” Ashlynn encouraged,
completely riveted.

Throwing her hands up in the air, Bria countered, “Does it
matter right now? I disappeared from home completely because of Zelman and now
he doesn’t have the faintest idea of where I am. I can’t even write to let him
know because trade has been halted.”

“She does have a point,” Riana observed. Partially in pity
for the girl, partially because she wanted this conversation to stop before
they asked her about her own relationship with Ash, Riana got hold of Bria’s elbow
and drew her out. “I agree with Ashlynn, the fan does no’ suit what ye picked
out. Mayhap something with more blue in it?”

“More blue? Really? But it’s mostly a cream white and gold
dress. Then again, the blue would be a nice contrast…” Bria seemed grateful for
the change in topic and willingly went along with Riana’s lead, talking far
more than she normally did to keep the others from prying any further.

Riana wished her luck on that as it would only be temporary.
Tonight, when everyone started to retire, her sisters would likely corner her
again.

The next two weeks seemed to crawl by and yet at the same
time, Riana felt that if she blinked, half the day would pass. They didn’t do
anything extraordinary, simply worked on the same tasks day in and day out,
trying to get things finished before they lost the nice fall weather and the first
snow hit.

Really, the only thing remarkable was that a young baron and
baroness, Skadi and Ingrid Covington, heeded Edvard’s invitation and came to
talk. Edvard and Tierone spent many hours closeted with them talking, and even
Argent was invited to sit in several times. Ashlynn kept them abreast of the
progress the group made and it sounded promising. Both siblings had agreed to
stay the full two weeks to see Edvard’s coronation ceremony before leaving.

Aside from that, Riana did bring it up to Edvard that they
really had to come up with a name for their new settlement. Saying ‘the
settlement, the settlement’ all of the time was getting old and it was no
longer accurate. The place had grown to the size of a respectable town by now
and there were more people moving in every day. After all, if they stayed in
Estole, they were still on a very long waiting list to get a house. If they
moved to the settlement, it was a shorter list and they could help with their own
hands to further the matter along.

Edvard heard her out and agreed, “You’re right, we need to.
Over dinner, we’ll come up with a name for it, and when the coronation ceremony
is completed I’ll announce it officially.”

Pleased, she’d agreed, and privately started cataloguing a
list of names she thought would be a good fit.

It didn’t take one night’s discussion around dinner, but a
full week of them before they all agreed on a name: Ganforth. Edvard, being a
man that liked surprises, swore them all to secrecy. Which meant, of course,
that half the city knew by the next morning and were already using the name. As
long as Edvard didn’t learn about this, that was fine, and Riana wasn’t about
to be the one to tell him.

Tierone called them the night before the coronation to say
that he wouldn’t be able to make the ceremony after all. Most of his people
were down with some sort of nasty cold, and, while not deadly, it did seem to
lay everyone out for a good two weeks before they started to recover. He
himself wasn’t sick but most of his staff were, and rather than risk carrying
the disease over into Estole, he chose to close down the borders until it
passed.

Everyone was disappointed, of course, because this was meant
to be a dual ceremony with both Tierone and Edvard. But Tierone observed that
they could always do another one later, one for just him, and that way
celebrate twice. It appeased the youngest member of the family (Gwen was always
up for more parties) and so they made tentative plans for that.