Froi of the Exiles (59 page)

When she arrived back at the cottage it was still empty. The fire had died down and the room was cold. Try as she might, Phaedra couldn’t start it up again and she felt as useless as when she lived here as his wife. Lucian arrived soon after, grunting with displeasure at how cold the room was.

‘You couldn’t have made some porridge, I suppose?’ he snapped.

She watched him grab a bowl of cold stew she had left from the night before.

‘Your
shalamar
sent it over yesterday,’ she said, not having anything else to say.

‘
Yata
,’ he corrected, wolfing down his food. She noticed that when he was tired and cold and hungry he had the worst temper.

‘We say
shalamar
,’ she said.

‘Well, that’s a ridiculous word, and we say
yata
,’ he said firmly, the discussion finished as far as he was concerned.

‘And the word for
shalamon?
’ she persisted.

He refused to respond.

‘That’s our word for grandfather,’ she said.

‘
Pardu
,’ he muttered. ‘Are you happy now?’

‘A strange word.’

‘Not so strange at all,’ he said.

‘And you know better, do you?’ she asked, feeling her temper rise despite the fact that Phaedra had never been known as one with a temper.

‘Well, I’m not the one unable to say simple words,’ he said.

‘Well, actually, you are,’ she said, sitting opposite him.

‘Me?’ he asked, putting down his spoon and finally giving her his attention.

‘You say “Phedra” and my name is Phaedra.’

‘I do not. I say Phaedra,’ he insisted.

‘To your ears it sounds like Phaedra; to a Charynite it sounds like Phedra.’

‘I’ll call you whatever I like,’ he muttered.

‘Of course you will. You’re the King of the mountain. Why wouldn’t you do as you please?’

She stood up and searched for her shawl, preferring to be anywhere else.

‘King of the mountain?’ he shouted. ‘I’ve just spent a night birthing a foal. I’m frozen to the bone, my food is cold and it seems as if my wife has been bitten by a viper.’

‘I’m not your wife,’ she cried. ‘I’m just a fool Charynite girl you sent back, ridiculed by your people with not so much as a thank you for traipsing half the morning looking for that wretched bull.’

Lucian sighed. ‘Orly was here? You should have sent him away.’

‘Yes, that would have made me more well-liked than I already am.’

He looked at her hands clutching her shawl and then he sighed again, stood up and left the cottage. A little while later he returned with four small logs.

‘Come here,’ he said gruffly, and he showed her how to build a fire and light it. ‘This cold will only get worse and you can’t go around freezing half to death.’

That day in the valley she felt Rafuel’s eyes on her, whispering to Donashe and pointing her way. Later, when she was at the stream with some of the other camp dwellers, Rafuel approached.

‘You,’ he snapped, pointing to Phaedra. ’I want a word. There’s a set of rules you need to follow.’

Kasabian and Harker stood and Phaedra saw them turn to Jory.

‘Don’t let her out of your sight,’ Harker snapped. Both men were less than forgiving of Jory and his Mont cousins’ nightly excursions into their camp weeks ago. Jory had responded in turn by choosing to charm the Charynite women. ‘They don’t even know how to fight,’ he muttered once to Phaedra about the men. ‘So who am I to care what they think of me?’ But deep down she could tell the lad was desperate for their approval.

Phaedra waved their concerns away and followed Rafuel along the stream, with Jory trailing behind.

‘They are aligned to no one,’ Rafuel said quietly. ‘They’re scum who are travelling through the provinces searching for lastborn women after Quintana of Charyn’s failure at the coming of her age. On the road between the Citavita and Sebastabol these men were stopped by the King’s riders, or I should say, Bestiano of Nebia’s men. They were told that in the valley at the foot of the Lumateran mountains, a group of landless Charynites were camped and that amongst them were seven rebels led by Rafuel of Sebastabol. They knew this information because Bestiano’s men had apprehended a spy who I believe was Zabat.

‘Never,’ Rafuel said, grabbing Jory by the ear to bring him closer and to give the impression that he was reprimanding the Mont, ‘trust a whinger from Nebia.’

‘Matteo!’ Donashe called out. Rafuel and Phaedra turned and the man shook his head. ‘Don’t touch the Mont. We can’t have trouble.’

Jory pushed him away, but hid a smile all the same. ‘Yes, don’t touch the Mont, Matteo,’ he mocked.

‘Do you think they’re spying on Lumatere?’ Phaedra asked. ‘Or are they truly after you?’

‘These men are cutthroat opportunists. They have purpose. They think, much like Matteo of Jidia, that if they do the right thing they will be rewarded in the new Charyn. Perhaps be appointed palace riders. Here in the valley is the closest they can come to proving themselves. This land we stand on may be Lumatere’s, but they see the people as theirs to do with as they will. It’s all about power, Phaedra. Always about power and who grabs it first.’

‘Then tell your people to leave,’ Jory said. ‘They’d be idiots to stay. No one’s keeping them imprisoned.’

Rafuel stared at Jory as if he could not believe what he was hearing. ‘Do you not understand, Mont? These people have nowhere else to go. They will endure anything for the slightest chance that your queen will let them into Lumatere.’

Most nights, the Monts came to Lucian with all sorts of favours and complaints. As Phaedra fell asleep that night, she heard the slur of tiredness in Lucian’s voice and knew that if she was his proper wife, she’d order them all home. The next morning she heard Orly call out for his bull again and this time she hurried to the door before the man came knocking.

'He’s sleeping,’ she said firmly.

Orly tried to look over her shoulder.

‘Then wake him up.’

‘Why, when I was able to help yesterday?’ she said briskly, grabbing her shawl. ‘Let’s go. We’re wasting time.’

This time Orly’s wife Lotte was with them. Her cow had managed to escape as well.

‘I hope wherever they are, they’re together,’ Lotte said.

‘Who?’ Phaedra asked.

‘Why, Bert and Gert. Who do you think, idiot girl?’

Later, when they found the bull and cow in two separate fields, Phaedra saw Orly’s relief and Lotte’s sadness.

‘It’s your people,’ Orly snapped at Phaedra as he placed a plank across the stable door. ‘Coming up this mountain and making mischief.’

Phaedra walked away, but made it as far as the stone hedge of their land before returning, walking straight into their cottage where husband and wife were warming their hands over the fire.

‘Firstly, I’m not an idiot girl,’ she said firmly, ‘so don’t call me one again, and secondly, my people don’t have the strength for mischief. The only thing they have the strength for is breathing. And another thing. If a bull went missing every morning amongst the people of my province, neighbours would help each other. Where are your people now, Orly of the Monts? What kind of place is this if the only help you can find is from an idiot girl who belongs to your enemy?’

Phaedra turned and walked straight into Lucian who stood at the entrance of Orly’s cottage, staring at the three of them, a bear of a man in his coat of fleece and his fierce dark eyes. No one spoke and he stepped aside. Phaedra bristled at the silent order. Her Mont husband wanted her out of his sight.

When she reached the stone hedge for the second time that morning, Lucian was there beside her. ‘Now let me do the counting,’ he said and suddenly she felt the weight of his fleece on her shoulders and a comfort beyond imagining because it was his gruff voice that warmed her as much as his coat. ‘Firstly, these are the mountains, Phaedra. People freeze in winter up here, so you don’t leave the cottage in all hours of the morning wearing a shawl to protect you from the cold. Understood?’

She could smell the bread wafting out from the baker’s cottage. The Monts were finally beginning to awaken, the start of another miserable day for Phaedra.

‘Secondly, Orly’s bull is my problem, not yours. Understood?’

Phaedra didn’t respond.

‘And thirdly, you’ll have to forgive my people. They are still grieving their leader.’

She stopped and looked up at him. ‘Their leader is living,’ she said firmly. ‘He’s standing in front of me and the only person in this mountain who is not acknowledging him these days is the leader himself.’

Phaedra saw Lucian’s fury first and then she saw his eyes water. Was it from the cold bite of the morning air or something else?

‘I’ll never be as good as him,’ he said. ‘They know that. We all know that.’

She shook her head. ‘Speak the truth, Lucian.’

‘What truth?’ he asked angrily.

‘You don’t want him here because of the mistakes you think you’re making. You want him here because you loved him and he’s gone and you can’t say those words out loud.’

He stared down at her, but Phaedra refused to look away. And then he moved closer, his lips close to her ears as though he was afraid the mountain itself would hear his words.

‘Sometimes … I miss him so much I can barely breathe.’

He joined them in the valley later that day and Phaedra took him for a tour of the caves. He was polite and attentive to all he met, including Kasabian and Harker who she felt Lucian was trying hard to impress after Jory’s reports about how cold and unforgiving the men of the valley were to Mont lads. Phaedra could tell her Mont husband liked Kasabian best. Kasabian reminded Phaedra of her own father and he was gentle in a way that his sister Cora wasn’t. But Cora was trustworthy and worked hard. Both were good people who Phaedra believed had much to offer Lumatere if they were ever allowed to enter.

After a brief, terse conversation with Donashe and his camp leaders, Phaedra took Lucian to Cora’s cave. There was always tension in that dwelling because Cora disliked Florenza and Jorja. She believed they had airs and graces despite their journey and referred to them as the Ladies of the Sewer. There was a lazy girl named Ginny, who Cora called Lady Lazy Muck. Cora had a name for everyone.

‘I want to be placed with my brother,’ she snapped.

‘You know they’ll never allow that, Cora,’ Phaedra said patiently.

There was a new woman in the cave. An older woman who came from the north and never stopped speaking. Yet no one understood a word she spoke.

‘Dialect,’ Phaedra explained to Lucian.

‘Her mouth never stops,’ Cora muttered.

The woman from the north spoke to Lucian, and Phaedra wanted to giggle, watching him nod seriously. ‘Hmm, yes,’ he would say every once in a while.

Outside he stared at Phaedra, slightly stunned.

‘If you ever take me into that cave again, I’ll lock you up with my great-aunts,
Yata’s
sisters!’

‘You would not enjoy that, Phaedra,’ Jory piped up, as they walked back to the Lumateran side of the stream.

‘Rafuel said the same about that cave,’ Phaedra laughed. ‘He calls it the cave of she-devils. The women hate him most of all.’

‘They don’t hate me,’ Jory boasted. ‘I can charm Angry Cora. She says she hates idiots and everyone she meets is an idiot.’

When they reached the stream, Lucian grabbed Phaedra around the waist, lifting her over the water so her feet wouldn’t get wet. She had seen him do the same thing with his Mont cousins and Tesadora. Phaedra’s face flamed when he did it for her, so absently.

‘You’re a good spy too,’ Lucian said to her. ‘Except spies usually have more important subjects than women named Lady Lazy Muck and Angry Cora and the Ladies of the Sewer.’

She found herself laughing again and he looked at her strangely.

‘You don’t do that enough,’ he said quietly.

It was strange what Phaedra became used to living amongst the Monts. She liked their directness and lack of pretence. She liked the way they worshipped in the open at shrines that could be planted at the side of the road wherever someone pleased, rather than godshouses that were built thousands upon thousands of years ago. She liked having her hair braided by
Yata
, who once took Phaedra’s face in her hand.

‘I had granddaughters with eyes as pretty as yours once,’ the old woman said sadly, and Phaedra knew she was speaking of the Queen’s sisters who were slain in the palace all those years ago.

What Phaedra didn’t like was their food. It was very plain and it lacked taste.

Finnikin of Lumatere, his father and Perri the Savage were visiting one night with Tesadora, and the Consort noticed Phaedra’s lack of appetite.

‘Best food I ever had was in Yutlind,’ he said.

‘The best food in the land is in Paladozza,’ Phaedra insisted.

‘You’ve been there?’ he asked with excitement.

She nodded. ‘The Provincaro invited my father during one of Charyn’s very brief moments of peace between the Provincari. He is very handsome, De Lancey of Paladozza is.’

‘Then why didn’t your father marry you to him?’ Lucian asked, sharply.

‘Because he’s old. Nearing at least forty-five years.’

The Captain and Perri looked up, mid-mouthful, and exchanged looks. Tesadora laughed at their reaction.

‘Regardless, the Provincaro De Lancey loves the company of women, but not in his bed,’ Phaedra said.

‘Ahhh,’ they all said, intrigued.

It was late in the night when everyone left. The Consort and the Captain were staying in
Yata’s
home with Perri and Tesadora.

‘They asked quite some questions tonight,’ Lucian said from his bed. ‘I never know what they’re up to.’

‘Should the valley dwellers be worried?’ she asked.

‘No, but I get a sense that my cousin Isaboe wants to travel down the mountain again, so perhaps Trevanion and Perri are ensuring it is safe for her.’

‘If they won’t allow Tesadora amongst Donashe and his men, I can’t imagine them permitting the Queen.’

Lucian gave a short laugh. ‘The Queen doesn’t wait for permission.’

Phaedra thought about it. ‘It would mean so much to the valley dwellers if she visited, especially with the child. That precious girl would lift their spirits for days and days.’