The Black Prince: Part I (28 page)

Forced, time and time again, to appear as a woman. To service men he hated, by methods he loathed. A murderer, a bedthing, a broken toy discarded in the corner.

Even now, he felt the old rage begin to awaken.

He stilled himself to calm. Isla had been through so much. And she was…not weak, indeed one of the strongest people he knew. If not the strongest. But she was human, and felt pain. Pain, and more pain, with each new betrayal. He wanted to…spare her. She’d never see Cariad again; what was the harm in allowing her to think of Cariad as just what she’d seemed? A well-meaning hedge witch who’d urged Isla on to her new life?

Let her imagine Cariad puttering about the undergrowth, digging up herbs. And let her imagine Cariad brewing potions, and crafting spells, all for the good of a populace cut off from all forms of legitimate healing by a backward and uncaring church. Let her have that much: one friend who hadn’t abandoned her.

“Osito,” he began musingly, “tell me more about our imminent visitor.” The priest’s consciousness had been transformed into special kind of spirit: a vessel for knowledge. The contents of Tristan’s library were now at its nonexistent fingertips for Tristan to peruse at his will. A luxury he enjoyed greatly, asking the spirit questions even when he already knew the answer. Just to see what it would say.

“Tell me about his family tree.”

I
sla returned from the garderobes to find that her room had been invaded.

She was still in her underthings and she stood there stupidly, wondering what to do. Greta, sitting on the edge of the bed stitching a hem, looked to be avoiding the problem entirely. By pretending it didn’t exist. Which, Isla couldn’t exactly blame her. But she needed to get dressed. Alone.

Mica, her cat, looked to be taking the same approach as her handmaid. Until, sitting upright, she glared directly at Rowena and then began licking her undercarriage. Isla only wished she had the courage for such a comment. “What are you doing?” she asked.

Rowena sat at Isla’s dresser, an array of small pots spread before her on the polished wood.

“Your mirror is better than mine.”

There was nothing wrong with the mirror in Rowena’s room.

Rowena dabbed her finger into a pot, and began applying rouge. This time to her lips. There was already more than enough on her cheeks, which were caked with foundation. She’d all but painted her face white. Fine ground wheat flour, ground lily root, and lead.

“You should understand,” she said, without turning. “
Your
face is as white as as a sheet.” Her laugh was brief and unkind. “Or perhaps that’s simply from being married to your husband.”

“I…don’t get out much.”

“Well you look awful.”

Greta’s head shot up.

Rowena was wearing her favored pink. Where she’d gotten the gown, Isla had no idea. The square neckline was
very
low cut, revealing so much that there was almost nothing left to suggest. The sleeves were loose-fitting, accented with padded rolls at the shoulder and elbow. The bodice was so tight, it appeared to have been painted on.

“Rowena, you need to leave.”

“When I’m done.” The other woman seemed utterly unconcerned.

Capping the rouge pot, she opened another. Dipping her finger into a mustard-colored liquid, she began dabbing it directly on her pupils.

Isla couldn’t help herself: she stared in rapt fascination as her sister poisoned herself. Oh, she wouldn’t die, at least not this night. Although she might eventually go blind. Belladonna was a paralytic and, when applied to the eyes, would keep them from contracting.

“This is the dreamy, flushed look, that’s so sexy to men.”

“And an hallucinogenic,” Greta said darkly, “that witches use to give themselves the feeling of flying.”

Rowena sniffed.

There was nothing sexy about how she looked, at least to Isla. And she couldn’t imagine that the average man, when confronted with the wheat-caked and half blind harridan before them, would swoon overmuch either. Moreover, there was a second and perhaps more pressing point. “Rowena, you’re betrothed.”

Her sister seemed not to hear. “You might have let yourself go, but I have no intention of ever doing so.”

“This isn’t a ball,” Greta interjected. “It’s an adoption.”

“It’s a social occasion.”

“To you, maybe.”

Greta was right. It was an adoption, and an adoption that had nothing whatsoever to do with Rowena. A solemn and religious occasion was not the time to flaunt her charms. What man, or group of men, was she hoping to seduce? Had her months in the village made her completely forget about Rudolph? Had she realized, at last, that there might be richer and more important pickings?

Rowena turned. Her eyes, in a bizarre mockery of Tristan’s, were two black pits. “You have to help me find my slippers,” she said, “because now I can’t see.”

“Oh, Rowena, get out.”

A few minutes later, astonishingly, she did.

Isla was left alone with Greta. Greta, the tremendous amount of sewing that she seemed to have taken on, and Mica the cat.

“I want to wear the gray wool, I think.” A dark gray the color of charcoal, which had been picked out in black. Tristan would be wearing his house colors, as would Asher. Isla didn’t want to compete. Although she would play a minor part in the ceremony, as she was becoming Asher’s legal mother, this was about the bond between father and son.

“You should at least wear something green. In your hair, maybe.”

“The small circlet, then.” A single row of perfectly matched emeralds, each the size of her smallest fingernail. It had been in Tristan’s family for generations. His mother had worn it. And it had been his gift to her, during that first snowstorm. The one that seemed to still be blowing outside the windows, rattling the glass in its panes, all this time later.

“Spring comes soon, doesn’t it?” She stared out the window into the whiteness.

“Spring is upon us in the South.” Greta came up behind her. She, too, stared out the window. “Spring comes quickly in the North. Just wait. One morning, you’ll wake up and all the snow will be gone. The hills will be covered in tassel flowers and snowdrops. Tassel flowers are red. And orange, and pink. Daisies, too, in all colors.” Greta grimaced. “The South just has mud.”

“And bearberry,” Isla corrected absently.

“What’s that?”

“A rather ugly shrub.” She didn’t turn. “Its berries are used as an antiseptic.”

“The seasons change quickly here.” Greta paused. “Everything does.”

“Has Hart returned home?”

“Yes.” Greta went about fetching the requested dress, and the circlet. Let her pick out Isla’s other jewels, and her slippers. Isla didn’t care. There was nothing in her wardrobe that she loathed, and nothing that would fail in the intended objective of covering her nudity.

“This morning.” She turned, one hand on the door to the wardrobe and the gray wool in the other. “Your brother….” She trailed off.

“Yes?”

“He’s handsome. And frightening.”

He’d more than earned his title, the Viper. Isla’s brother was a torturer and a murderer who drank the blood of his enemies. But in this, he was no different than her own husband. “He’s a good man,” she said. “He is…perhaps misunderstood. I don’t know. But what I do know is that he cares well for those who’ve earned a place in his life.”

Greta smiled. “He seems to love you very much.”

“He does. We’re…he’s my only family. We’re each other’s only family.”

But she hadn’t seen much of him lately. He’d been…mysterious. Then again, she had to reconcile herself to the fact that while she’d changed so had he. There had always been a part of his life that was closed to her: the part with women, and bandits in the woods. She didn’t imagine that all this time he’d been serving them biscuits and ale but she hadn’t asked, either. Still, that she hadn’t known about Apple…hurt.

The truth about Apple.

The truth about her father.

“Family, you know, is who you choose.” Greta seemed to be reading her mind. Then she continued, and Isla understood. “My mother died giving birth to me. I don’t remember her, although I’m grateful to her. The woman who raised me was, is, my father’s second wife. They married about a year after my mother died.

“She came to our home, to care for me. She and my father fell in love and are in love still. I call her mother.”

“Your parents…are still in love?”

Greta’s half smile was almost sheepish. “Some marriages last. Can you picture falling out of love with Tristan?”

“No, of course not. But….” But her parents hadn’t, either. Had they?

“Not all matches are love matches, even from the beginning. Sometimes people think they’re in love, because they want the same things out of life or have really great sex. Or because they like the image that a possible union presents in their minds: of nice things and other things that don’t matter. You know?” She held out Isla’s dress, for her to step into.

“This is why, on the balance, I think arranged marriages tend to fare better. More is involved in the selection than foolish notions about romance.”

She began to lace up Isla’s kirtle. Isla sucked in her stomach to aid the procedure. Although most of her garments had already been taken in, including this. Never plump to begin with, she was now thin to the point of emaciation. At least, she reflected with some satisfaction, she’d kept something of her curves. Curves which were modestly hidden beneath the broad, square neckline of her dress.

“You need to eat something.”

“I did! This morning.”

“All you ate was an egg.”

“An egg is a nutritious breakfast!”

Greta gave the weighted laces a final tug. “Every time I do that, I’m afraid I’ll snap you. Not like lacing up my sisters, they’re all built like she-boars and proud of it. Don’t think that enjoying your food makes you unattractive to men, either. Lorna and Agnete have ten children between them and it isn’t because their husbands sleep in separate bedrooms.”

Isla laughed.

“My cousin, Gitte, is twice as fat as both of them and can hardly move for all the suitors swarming around her father’s home.” Greta considered her own words. “Perhaps
I
need to gain weight, then I can find a husband.” She considered her work, appraising Isla as she would the aforementioned she-boar, were it up for sale at auction. “Men don’t seem to like me.”

“Only because you haven’t met the right one.”

“What made Tristan the right one?”

“What?”

“Oh, don’t be coy. Everyone knows that it was a love match.”

Isla colored.

Greta’s expression grew concerned. “What?”

Her eyes searched Isla’s. Isla shrugged half-heartedly. How could she explain?

“Isla,” Greta said seriously, “that’s a good thing.”

“It wasn’t to Rose, who pretended she was my friend until I brought her here. Or to my own sister.”

“Which is ridiculous.” Greta’s tone was firm. “Love is the subject of half the sagas, the reason the Gods do everything they do. Or almost. That,” she added, smiling, “or a well endowed mortal man.” She produced Isla’s slippers. “What self-respecting woman
wouldn’t
bed a man before she married him? One has to take the horse on a test ride, as it were.”

She gave Isla her arm, to steady her, as Isla wedged first one foot and then another into the small, square-toed confections. “I personally would hate to find out that I’d agreed to spend the rest of my time on this earth with a man hung like a jackrabbit, or who had no interest in a woman’s pleasure. Who mistook me for the anvil and he the hammer, to borrow my sister’s phrase.”

“In the South….” In the South it had been enough pretext for Father Justin to maim her and and her father to agree.

“But we’re not in the South. Thank the Gods.”

Greta produced the circlet. Isla sat down on the couch near the fire so Greta could fit it in her hair. “I’m worried about Rowena.”

“That one can care for herself.” Greta’s tone was firm.

Isla sighed.

Greta stepped back, admiring her handiwork. After which Isla decided that she, too, should have a look at herself. Standing, she walked over to the mirror where Rowena had been preening earlier. And stared. She was a vision in gray, somber and subdued. She looked exactly like what she was: the partner to the most powerful peer in the realm. She’d…aged somehow. Except
aged
wasn’t really the right word; she hadn’t aged a day. If anything, looked somehow younger. And yet also…more settled. Stronger. She had, she had to admit even to herself, acquired something of what the bards called
gravitas
.

“You look dignified.”

“Thank you.”

“Now please drink this ale.” Greta handed her a cup. “Or you’ll keel over halfway through the service.”

Feeling resigned, Isla accepted.

“Isla,” Greta said, “you can’t keep holding the door open for half the world and then beating yourself up when no one walks through. And that includes your sister, and your father. They have free will, just like you; you aren’t responsible for their choices, any more than you are for theirs.” She paused. “You aren’t responsible, either, for the fact that their choices are wrong.”