Bonds of Vengeance (6 page)

“I see.”

She swiped at a strand of hair falling into her eyes. “Look, I’m still tired and sore from last night. Can we talk about this another time?”

Grinsa regarded her for a moment before giving a small nod and standing. “Of course. Do you need anything? Can I bring you some food, perhaps?”

“No, thank you.”

He turned from the bed and started toward the door.

“Do you want to hold her?” she called after him.

He stopped, facing her again. “What?”

“Do you want to hold her? She’s your daughter, too, and you haven’t held her yet. I thought maybe you’d like to.”

He stood motionless, as if held by some unseen hand.

Cresenne laughed aloud. Strange how this powerful man, who spoke of defeating the conspiracy and protecting her from the Weaver, could suddenly look so frightened at the notion of holding his own child.

“She’s not going to hurt you. You’re the Weaver, not she.”

“I—I don’t know how.”

“To hold a baby?”

He approached the bed, his steps uncertain. “I’ve never held one before.”

She lifted Bryntelle, holding her out to him. “Just be certain to support her head. Her neck isn’t strong enough yet.”

Grinsa swallowed, nodded. Taking her in his slender hands, he cradled her awkwardly against his chest. Immediately, Bryntelle began to cry.

“See?” he said, trying to give her back to Cresenne. “I told you I didn’t know how.”

“You’re holding her like she’s a crate of pipeweed. Have you ever held an animal in your arms?”

“Well, yes. A cat.”

“Good. Hold her as you would a cat.”

“By the scruff of her neck?”

Cresenne arched an eyebrow.

“Please take her,” he said. “I’ll try again another time. I think she senses that you and I are at odds right now.”

She shrugged, taking Bryntelle to her breast again. The baby fretted a moment longer, then began to nurse again.

“Do you think there’ll ever be a time when we’re not at odds?” Cresenne asked, her eyes fixed on the baby.

“I hope so, for Bryntelle’s sake.”

“So do I.” She looked up, meeting his gaze. “Truly I do.”

“I’ll check on the two of you later.” He crossed to the door. “Consider what I’ve told you, Cresenne,” he said, pausing with his hand on the door handle. “Whatever affections I still harbor for you, whatever I may feel for our child, I won’t let sentiment be my guide in this. I can’t. Too many people are depending on me.”

She eyed him for a moment, then nodded, though she kept her silence. At least until he was gone.

“Don’t worry,” she whispered to the baby, once the door had closed. “He won’t really take you away from me. He can’t. We’re all he has in the world, unless he actually thinks of that Curgh boy as family.”

Brave words. But her hands still trembled as they had when he first threatened to take Bryntelle. A voice in her head screamed for her to take the baby and flee, but her body wasn’t ready for a walk through the corridors, much less flight through the highlands. Which actually worked to her advantage. It would be several days before the herbmaster would let her leave for the City of Kings, and the journey would have to be a slow one. That gave her time.

Grinsa might have been allied with the Eandi now, but he was a Weaver. And who had more to gain from the Qirsi movement than a Weaver?

A Weaver with a child.

Chapter
Three

Curlinte, Sanbira

Diani rode swiftly along the edge of the headlands, her mount’s hooves so close to the precipice that when she looked down past the horse’s left flank, all she saw was the drop to the cliffs below, and the Sea of Stars frothing and pounding at the dark stone. Her black hair trailed loose behind her and she closed her eyes, trusting Rish to step true.

There was still snow in the northern highlands and even atop the highest ridges of the Sanbiri Hills a mere two days’ ride to the south and west. But here in Curlinte, where the wind blew warm off the sea and the sun shone upon the headland moors, it seemed that the planting had come early. She wore a cloak yet, and a heavy blouse below that. Nonetheless, there could be no mistaking the sweet hint of the coming thaw carried by the mild breeze, or the exuberant singing of the sealarks that darted overhead and alighted to sun themselves on the boulders strewn across the grasslands.

Her father had not approved of her decision to ride today. Her mother had been dead but a turn and a day, and though the castle banners flew high again, and those living in the duchy were permitted once more to open the shutters on their windows, it was, he told her, still too soon for Curlinte’s new duchess to be taking frivolous rides across the headlands.

“The people will look to you now,” he had said, appearing weary and old, as if grieving for his wife had cost him years. “You lead them. You must help them through this time of loss.”

“I understand,” she answered, knowing that he would think her childish and irresponsible. “And this is the way I see through. Mother was ill for more than a year. Curlinte has had her shutters closed for
too long. I ride to end the mourning.” She stepped forward then and kissed his cheek. “It’s what Mother would have done.”

His eyes blazed, and she thought for just an instant that he would berate her. Instead, he turned away. She could see from his expression that he recognized the truth of what she had said. He would be angry with her for a time, but he would forgive her.

Her father had been right about one thing. The people of the duchy needed her now. Diani was two years past her Fating, old enough to assume command of the castle and Curlinte’s army. But she had yet to prove herself. Her grandmother had lived to be nearly eighty, so that when her mother became duchess, much of the duchy already knew her. Dalvia had been mediating disputes and joining the planting and harvesting celebrations for many years. Diani had started to do the same when her mother became ill, but there hadn’t been time to visit all the baronies, not with the more mundane tasks of accounting the tribute and paying tithe to the queen intruding as well.

Normally her father would have helped her, but as duke, it was his duty to train the soldiers, and as husband, his place was by Dalvia’s bed, watching as she wasted away.

If this weather held, Diani decided, she would spend the early turns of the planting visiting all the baronies to oversee the sowing of crops. It was important that she be seen, particularly now, and not just in the courts but in the villages and farming communities of the Curlinte countryside as well. Even her father could not find fault with such a plan.

Diani reined Rish to a halt at the promontory, swinging herself off the beast so that she might walk out to the edge. There she sat on the stone and closed her eyes once more, feeling the sun on her face. There would be less time for these rides in the turns to come—the demands of the duchy would tether her to the castle, or force her to ride away from the sea. Either way, these rides to the headlands were about to become a rare luxury. She knew it was foolish, but she begrudged the loss.

It was here that she and her father had scattered her mother’s ashes just a turn before. Dalvia had loved this spot as much as Diani did. Often, before her mother grew ill, the two of them, mother and daughter, duchess and lady, had ridden out together to discuss matters of state, or just to escape the burdens of the castle.

Their last ride together had come on a cold, clear day near the end of Kebb’s turn more than a year before. Her mother had been more talkative than usual that day, perhaps sensing that her health was beginning to fail, and she had offered a good deal of counsel.

“A duchess must marry well,” she had said. “Your father will want you to marry for an alliance—one of the brothers Trescarri I would imagine, or perhaps Lord Prentarlo.”

“I prefer one of the twins to Prentarlo,” Diani said, smiling.

Her mother had glanced at her, a smile tugging at her lips and her dark eyes dancing. “As would I. But my point is this. A marriage based on military might is as fraught with peril as one based solely on your mate’s good looks or skill with a blade. With luck you’ll lead Curlinte long after his hair thins and his muscles begin to fail him.” She stared out at the sea, brilliant blue that day, like a gem. “Marry a man you trust, a man with whom you can share your fears and doubts as well as your triumphs. Your father is still a fine swordsman.” The smile returned briefly. “And I still think him handsome. But I value his friendship above all else. You would do well to marry as fine a man.”

Diani glanced sidelong at her mother. “Choosing a husband seems more complicated than I realized,” she said lightly. “Perhaps I’d be wise to claim both the Trescarris as my own.”

Her mother laughed long and hard. At times it seemed to Diani that this was the last she had ever heard of her mother’s strong, deep laughter. She knew it wasn’t in the turns that followed they managed to share small precious moments that shone like gold and then vanished, as if illusions conjured by festival Qirsi. But it might as well have been the last. Grief had consumed Castle Curlinte ever since. And as much as she wanted to order an end to their sorrow, to banish her mother’s ghost with some sweeping ducal decree, she knew that her father clung to the pain, as if he thought it better to mourn than to live without his love.

She would ride to the baronies to reassure her people. But she couldn’t deny that she rode also to seek refuge from Sertio’s despair.

She heard a falcon cry out, and opening her eyes, saw a saker soar past her, following the contour of the cliff. It was the color of rust, of the rich soil in the hills. Its wings remained utterly still, its tail twisting to direct its flight. The Curlinte crest bore an image of a saker—seeing one, it was said among her people, was a portent of good tidings. Diani
watched the bird as it glided up the coast, until she lost sight of it among the angles of the rock face.

From behind her, Rish snorted and stomped.

“I know,” she said, climbing to her feet. “Father will be expecting us.” She stepped to her mount and tightened his saddle before starting to swing herself onto his back.

The first arrow embedded itself just above her breast on the left side, knocking her to the ground. No warning, no sense of where the archer had concealed himself, though she guessed that he must be in the jumble of hulking grey stones just off the promontory.

A second arrow skipped harmlessly off the stone and past her head before diving into the sea below. A third struck her thigh, making her cry out.

She grabbed at the shaft of the arrow in her chest to pull it out, then thought better of it, remembering instructions her father had given her many years before.

“You’ll do more damage pulling the thing out than it did going in,” he had told her. “If you have to break off the shaft, do. But don’t remove it. You’ll bleed to death.”

Right.

“Down, Rish!” she said through clenched teeth, as another arrow struck the stone and clattered over the edge.

She crawled back a bit toward the cliff, flattening herself against the stone, her chest and thigh screaming. The pain wasn’t spreading, though—no poison on the points.

Rish lowered himself to the ground. Diani scrambled over to him, took hold of his mane and the pommel of his saddle, and kicked at his flanks with her good leg.

“Ride, Rish! Now!”

A third dart buried itself in the back of her shoulder and yet another whistled past her ear. But by now she was speeding away from the promontory, clinging desperately to Rish’s neck and steering him from side to side to present a more difficult target. She wasn’t certain she could hold on if she was struck again; if Rish was hit her life would be forfeit. Even as she rode, though, she glanced over her bloodied shoulder toward the stones. She saw her attackers immediately. They weren’t bothering to conceal themselves anymore.

Two men, both with heads shaved, both tall and wearing dun cloaks.
They loosed their bows again in unison, but the arrows fell short. She was too far.

Diani shifted her gaze to the shaft jutting from her chest. There were two rings just below the fletching—yellow and blue, the colors of Brugaosa. Of course. The Brugaosans had long been Curlinte’s sworn enemies. They were a patriarchal dukedom within the Sanbiri matriarchy, and had long chafed at the Yserne Supremacy. Unwilling to oppose the Crown openly, however, they had instead sought to undermine Yserne’s strongest allies: Curlinte, Prentarlo, and Listaal. The Brugaosans often boasted that theirs was the finest ducal army in the realm, second in skill and strength only to the queen’s own. Their archers were renowned throughout all the southern Forelands.

Except that even through the pain, even dazed and weak, Diani knew that the Brugaosans wouldn’t make an attempt on her life. Yes, Brugaosa and Curlinte were rivals. There had even been a time within the last hundred years when the two houses had spoken brazenly of going to war. Many, including her father, still blamed Brugaosa for the murder, a bit more than three years ago, of Cyro, Diani’s brother. But Diani saw a darker, more sinister purpose behind Cyro’s assassination, and she felt certain that the same shadowy hand had given gold to the archers whose arrows had pierced her flesh.