First Rider's Call (80 page)

When the laughter subsided, Estora indicated that Karigan should speak first. Karigan nodded toward the Weapon and said, “I was just wondering what he was guarding. I don’t see the king nearby.”

Estora’s buoyancy faltered. “He is not assigned to the king.”

“A tomb guard then? What would he be doing
here?
”

Estora turned in her seat to face Karigan directly. “He is not a tomb guard. He has been assigned to—to watch me.” Her words flowed now in a freshet. “The king has agreed to my father’s contract of marriage. I’m to be King Zachary’s queen.”

Karigan could only stare at her. Her world narrowed to just the two of them and the patch of garden they sat in. Everything else vanished, failed to exist.

Already burdened by other revelations, Karigan had to turn Estora’s words over in her mind until she comprehended their meaning. When she did so, everything she thought she understood about herself in relationship to the king tilted off balance like a foundering ship in a gale, and she had to grab hold of the edge of the bench lest she slide off.

A cargo hold of dreams and possibilities tore loose of their anchorings and rammed into her, and she found herself incredulous—not so much over Estora’s announcement, though it in itself was stunning—but by the dawning realization that her feelings for King Zachary had sometime, somehow, surpassed mere admiration and attraction.

I . . . am I in love with him?
She had hidden it from even herself, made it a secret, a secret she had not wished to admit, for she knew it was an impossible situation to love one like him, one who was a king and so far out of reach for a mere commoner. How could she not have seen it?

And how could she not have seen how it made perfect sense that Estora would become Zachary’s wife? It was like a piece of a puzzle fitting neatly into its space. Lord Coutre wanted to marry off his daughter as advantageously as possible. At the same time, the nobles were exerting pressure on King Zachary to marry and provide the realm with a heir. Politically? It was the perfect situation, the proper fit. Only Karigan’s heart did not work in such political or logical ways.

Somewhere in that secret place in the back of her mind, she had hoped, despite it all, there would be a way that her commoner status could be overlooked, that the breach of rank wouldn’t divide her and King Zachary after all. She almost laughed at herself, a cruel laugh, at how childish it all now seemed. How did she even know the king was interested in her in that way?

“King Zachary is a good man,” Estora said. “He is a good man, but it shall not be a marriage made of love.” She shook her head and looked down, the liquid gold that was her hair flowing down her shoulders. “I’ve loved only F’ryan, and having known love . . . it is hard. This marriage, it is to fulfill a contract only.”

Unreasonably, hope surged anew in Karigan’s breast, that there might still be a chance for her. She fought with it, wrestled it down. Emotions of every kind pummeled her and she felt as if she might drown in stormy seas.

The lilting call of a chickadee, absurdly cheerful under the circumstances, brought Karigan back to herself in time to hear what Estora had to say next.

“I envy you.”

Karigan almost laughed out loud. What was there to envy? Her evil heritage? The battles and deaths of companions? Wounds that scarred her flesh and mind? Who was Estora to speak of envy? She led the life of a lady with servants to see to her every comfort. Her life was genteel, and lacked hard labor and danger, while Karigan’s meant blood, sweat, and calluses.

And Lady Estora was going to marry King Zachary.

“I envy you,” Estora continued, “because you are free—free to choose what you will do with your life; free to marry whom you will. But I must live a narrow life only to further the honor of my clan. I must obey the will of my father. It’s what I was born to do.”

Free?
Karigan wanted to scream at Estora, tell her how she’d been forced into the life of a Green Rider, that because she was bound by magic, she wasn’t free at all.

“How can you . . .” Karigan began, but her throat was so constricted it came out as a croak. “How can you have known F’ryan and say that to a Green Rider?”

But Estora’s sad eyes pleaded for understanding. She had once loved a Green Rider, an affair forbidden because she was a noblewoman and he was a commoner. Had they been discovered, Estora would have been cast out by her clan and forced to fend for herself in the wide world, something her upbringing had not equipped her to do.

Yet in the end, there had been a far greater sacrifice, the death of F’ryan Coblebay, her one great love taken from her by two black arrows in his back. Because of Karigan’s connection to F’ryan it seemed Estora tried to reach him through her, seeking comfort, and maybe forgiveness.

Estora gazed off into the distance, a tear in the corner of her eye. “He was more free of spirit than anyone I knew. He embraced the bonds placed on him, then broke them.”

Karigan did not hear this last, because she was struck all at once at how eerily opposite, yet alike, their situations were. Estora was constrained by her status as a noble, destined—in servitude to her clan and country—to a noble marriage she did not desire. Karigan served her clan and country as well, but was bound to do so as a messenger, and a commoner.

Estora’s love of F’ryan, a commoner, was forbidden, and any aspirations Karigan might hold for one who was of the lineage of the high kings of Sacoridia, was likewise forbidden.

They were both trapped, neither free.

Karigan could not scream at Estora, nor could she find words of comfort. She stammered an excuse and hurried away, the gardens blurring in her vision. None of it mattered. She had known all along King Zachary could not be for the likes of her.

And in her disappointment, more disappointment than she could have ever imagined, she grew angry and turned it inside.

 

Emotions stormed within her as she strode down castle corridors, but she allowed none to surface. Lil Ambrioth had shared her love with King Jonaeus, but he had not been royalty when he started out in life, just a brave clansman whose decisions in war earned him the trust of people, enough so that they made him their first high king and united behind his banner. And had Lil truly shared a life as his partner, or did she die prematurely?

Karigan let go a rattling sigh as she turned a corner toward the Rider wing. This was all for the best, wasn’t it? Not just the political reasons, but for Karigan herself. It cut short any girlish notions she might entertain. This was the real world, and now she’d just have to throw herself into her work and drive King Zachary out of her mind.

Only, it wasn’t going to be that easy.

She threw open the door to her chamber, halting just inside. She stood there, unsure of what to do. She wanted to be alone, to work this all out in private, but she’d go mad in the tiny room. She needed to
do
something, to work it out actively.

“Riding,” she said. She’d go riding into the countryside where she could be both alone, and be doing something physical. It would make Condor happy, too.

“At least
someone
should be happy,” she murmured.

She was about to leave when she spotted something different in her room, the sun slanting through the narrow window and shining on objects on her washstand. Cradled in an open coffer in deep, luxurious purple velvet, lay a silver comb, brush, and mirror.

She crossed the room and carefully took the mirror into her hands. Reflected light glared into her eyes until she tilted it away from the sunshine. It was a dainty thing, light to hold. A hummingbird poised at a flower ornamented the mirror’s back, and so did her initials, just as her mother’s mirror had been engraved.

She traced the hummingbird with trembling fingers, feeling as she had not in a very long time, like a young woman who had no need of swords or uniforms, or any special duty. Just free to be herself, to be as she should have been, without worldly cares. And she felt . . . she felt feminine. How long had it been since she had worn a dress, or even jewelry?

She couldn’t take her eyes off the mirror and its fine workmanship, wondering where it had come from, and who would have known of the loss of her mother’s mirror. She searched for the maker’s mark and found it easily enough. Her cheeks flamed. The mirror nearly slipped from her fingers.

Stamped above the maker’s mark was a Hillander terrier.

 

She found him on the castle roof. The dome of his observatory had been opened like a clam shell, one half of which moved on hinges and ran on some mechanism of tiny wheels and tracks.

King Zachary straightened from the eyepiece of his telescope at her approach, his features registering surprise. Her step faltered upon seeing him.

“Karigan? How did you know where to find me?”

“Fastion.”

“Of course.” He stepped around the telescope toward her, his gaze roving to the coffer tucked beneath her arm, his eyes full of questions.

She wondered if she had made a colossal mistake by coming to confront him in person, for her resolve melted beneath his gaze. She knew that the extraordinary gift he had given her was not a simple one, but an expression of . . . his feelings. To what depth those feelings went, she was unsure. A part of her wanted to know, another part did not.

The gift, in fact, had proved more upsetting than even Estora’s announcement earlier in the day. If this was indeed a true expression of his feelings, what was she supposed to do about it? How was she supposed to respond? Even after a hard ride in the country, she had found no answers, only a swirl of emotions that grew more and more intense till it hardened into anger. How dare he, she had wondered, bestow upon her such an intimate gift even as he planned his betrothal to Lady Estora?

“They’re exquisite, but I cannot accept this gift.”

“I wanted you to have them,” he said, his disappointment obvious.

“They’re too great a gift.”

“I heard your own very special set had been destroyed in the fire.”

Karigan wondered from whom he had heard about it. Several Riders had lost special things, and yet the king singled her out, only reinforcing what she thought the gift meant.

“There is someone else more fitting to receive these.” She held out the coffer, and he gazed at it for some moments before reluctantly reaching for it.

“It’s a queen’s gift,” Karigan said. “Not a gift fit for a common messenger.”

“Karigan G’ladheon, I gave this gift to
you.
” His voice was firm. “And you are anything but common. You are special to me.”

She trembled.

“Please take it,” he said, offering the coffer back.

She backed away. “What is it you expect of me?”

He stepped closer and took her hand into his.

She wanted to run. She wanted to feel his touch . . . He was so close that the heat of him scorched her. She
needed
to run. To run was to find safety. She jerked her hand from his, and he drew his eyebrows together, surprised and hurt.

Good,
she thought.

He stood there for some moments, the stars glittering in a backdrop of midnight blue behind him and a wisp of moonlight stroking his cheek. Across the roof, guards made their rounds carrying lanterns that glowed like large fireflies, bobbing, hovering, swinging along. While Karigan was aware of them in the background, it was almost as if she and the king were alone in the vast pool of night, if not the whole of the world.

She knew she should run, leave the roof. What she waited for, she did not know.

“Do you remember,” King Zachary began, “a certain game of Intrigue we once played a couple years ago? You played terribly, and after I won, I told you so. I criticized your strategy, and you in turn told me a few things as well. You stood up to me and told me, among other things, that I should leave behind my stone walls and go among those I rule.” A smile ghosted across his lips at the memory. “Excellent advice.”

His words threw Karigan. Why was he bringing this up now? She swayed where she stood, confused.

“I think it was then,” he continued, “that I was irretrievably caught. Caught off guard, caught by you. Here you were, this beautiful, clever, and courageous young woman, who had just ridden across the country through so much danger to deliver a message, and who had the utter temerity to instruct her monarch on how to rule his country.” He laughed softly. “Yes, you, with your passion and fire, took my heart captive then, and I soon realized that I loved you, and have all this time. How could I not?”

Karigan could not breathe. Why? Why hadn’t he ever told her? Why hadn’t he acted on his feelings before? Why had he waited till
now?
Now when he was going to marry Estora. Now when there was no chance for them . . .

There never was a chance,
she bitterly reminded herself. For all the political reasons, and she ticked them off in her mind. His pursuit of a commoner would diminish the esteem and support the mercurial lord-governors extended to him, and threaten his hold on power. The lord-governors might instead lend their favor to some other nobleman more to their liking and pliant to their collective will. Or worse, an ambitious nobleman, sensing the crown’s weakness, might take advantage of the situation and force his ascension to power. Sacoridia could find itself at the mercy of a tyrant the likes of Hedric D’Ivary or Prince Amilton, instead of the benevolent ruler it now enjoyed. In the worst scenario, a struggle for power could embroil the country in all-encompassing strife and civil war, like that of two hundred years ago. None of these scenarios must be allowed to play out. They must not distract from the future threat that Blackveil Forest posed.