The Demon of Darkling Reach (The Black Prince Book 1) (31 page)

“It’s going to look hideous,” she said.
She
looked hideous, with her red-rimmed eyes and dripping nose.

He slid a claw-tipped finger under her chin, and tilted her head up so her eyes met his. His expression was unreadable, but she thought that there might be, if not kindness in those obsidian pools, then at least understanding. “Never be ashamed of a scar,” he told her in that quiet, rasping voice. “It proves that you were stronger than whatever tried to hurt you.”

“Thank you,” she said softly, strangely touched.

She sniffed, and wiped her nose with her hand. It was an unladylike gesture. He handed her a handkerchief. Neither of them spoke. Behind them, the fire crackled. Minutes ago—hours ago, she wasn’t sure—that same sound had been ominous. Now it was merely cheerful. Perversely so. Sniffing again, she dabbed at her eyes and looked at him. Really
looked
at him. Before, when she’d been with him, she’d been afraid of him and her perception of his appearance had been colored through that lens. He’d seemed cold, inhuman, a monolith.

He was still cold, still preternaturally still as he returned her gaze, but it occurred to her that he wasn’t human and never had been. The man whose name he’d taken was dead and had been dead for decades. The being she’d spoken with, proposed marriage to, the one sitting here with her now had no relationship to him other than the coincidental.

And that, for some reason, mattered to her. He wasn’t a different human being, or a bad one. He was something else entirely, a creature whose beliefs and actions couldn’t be measured on the same scale as hers. They were nothing alike…and yet they were. In ways that she couldn’t even begin to define. But what they had in common wasn’t species, or shared goals. It was at once something less meaningful, and much more meaningful.

Tristan, for all that he was so different, understood her. Not empathized, perhaps, and certainly not cared, but understood—which was more than anyone else ever had, even those who loved her the most. Like Hart, and Rowena. And her father, the coward with the feet of clay, whom she didn’t think she’d ever be able to look in the eye again.

“Thank you,” she said again, this time referring to the handkerchief.

In the strong noontime light, Tristan looked far less threatening than he had in the orchard. Or even when he’d faced down Father Justin. His skin was as pale as alabaster, his hair as black as hers. Most men weren’t clean shaven, as it certainly wasn’t the fashion, but Isla decided she liked it. The planes of his face were well defined, but not severe. His eyes were his most arresting feature and, she saw, there was the faintest hint of blue in them. Like in his tunic. She’d seen them flash red, in the firelight, but now they looked almost like anyone else’s eyes. Almost. His lips had a cruel cast that even this faint softening of expression couldn’t entirely erase. Whatever she felt, looking at him, she knew he didn’t. She wondered if he felt anything at all.

“You’re welcome,” he said, his voice quiet against the hissing and crackling of the logs.

The strangely intimate moment stretched between them. A knot popped as the sap inside exploded. Suddenly, and no doubt as a product of her shock, Isla found herself wondering what it would be like to kiss him. She bit her lip in an unconscious expression of anxiety.

He reached up and touched her cheek, his eyes still on hers. “And this?” He was referring to the cut, of course.

“My sister,” she confessed, blushing. She laughed, a small sound but genuine.

The whole thing was so stupid and, realizing that, some of her upset dissipated. She told Tristan about the fight. He smiled slightly, the merest twitch of his lips. He smiled rarely, and then only fleetingly. This was the first time, she thought, that she’d seen the expression reach his eyes. He looked at her with an interest that was hard to interpret. Flustered, she dropped her gaze.

“I came as quickly as I could,” he told her. “I would have been here an hour ago but we were delayed on the road.”

He didn’t specify the nature of that delay, but she could imagine. The roads, particularly the main roads, were thick with thieves and outlaws. A man condemned to the life of an outlaw did, in some ways, suffer a fate worse than death: doomed to live outside the protection of the law, he was forbidden from seeking succor in any village or hamlet where a sheriff’s writ held sway. Whatever poxes, criminals, or other hardships befell him, he was alone. Some left for other parts of the kingdom, or for other kingdoms entire, seeking a fresh start. Others, unwilling to leave their families or other loved ones, stayed behind and made lives for themselves in the forest. With no means of legitimate employment, most turned to crime eventually.

Somewhere outside, a man shouted. Life, amazingly, was going on as usual. “I would have spared you this,” Tristan continued after a moment, “but I gained some very valuable information.”

Isla stiffened. She didn’t care for the implication in his words. Was he telling her that he’d
planned
this nightmare? That the man she’d turned to for safety had, in fact, been the cause of her pain? Seeing the expression on her face, he spoke. And Isla, once again, found it eerie how easily he read her. There was no magic in the ability, just very keen observation.

“You’re alright,” he said firmly, “and will remain so. I wanted to see what the so-called priest would do while I was gone, and I suspected that he might approach you. But I had no suspicion that he’d act so brazenly, and no intention of letting him hurt you. Nor will he,” he added. “I apologize for my…error.”

He’d apologized?
She shook her head slightly, in an attempt to clear it. She was so overwhelmed. “I…no one came,” she whispered, hot needles pricking the backs of her eyeballs as the tears threatened to return. She still couldn’t believe that her father, her entire household had let her down this badly. No one had even
knocked
, in response to her screams.

Tristan stood, pulling her up with him. “You need some fresh air,” he said.

S
he watched him saddle the evil-looking destrier, which glared down at her with a baleful eye.

“His name is Arion,” Tristan said, giving the horse a swift pat and tightening the girth. Arion transferred his glare to Tristan, angered that he’d been fooled.

He hadn’t offered to saddle Piper or suggested that she do so and so, still stunned from the morning’s events, she waited. The stable was cool and dark, smelling of manure and hay. Enzie Moor’s stables weren’t as clean as they should be; her father lacked the skill to either choose a suitable overseer or supervise the matter himself. And so, as in most laxly run establishments, the employees lazed about all day and did little more than the bare minimum. Which was virtually nothing. The horses ate, and didn’t wallow in their own filth; but that was because the stable hands, good lads all if lazy, liked horses. They had no wish to see an animal suffer. They also didn’t want to miss time away from the dicing ring.

Arion snickered. Isla always offered Piper treats. She didn’t think Arion was the kind of horse who got—or wanted—treats. As if to confirm this suspicion, Arion glared at her again.

“How tall is he?” she asked, for wont of a better question. When she’d first laid eyes on the massive stallion, she’d guessed him to be at least eighteen hands. Isla was tall for a woman, at least by Western standards, but Arion towered over her.

“Twenty-four hands,” the duke said, leading Arion through the stable and out into the sunlight.

Seeing them standing side by side, Isla realized that Arion was in fact taller than the duke. Arion, like every true war horse, had a dense, rounded body with a broad back. He had strong loins, powerful hindquarters, and long legs. Destriers were bred for these qualities, along with very dense bones. Arion had a silky black coat. His eyes, like the duke’s own, glowed with suppressed fire.

Of all war horses, as a breed, the destrier was finest. They were trained from birth to fight in battle, possessing the strength and stamina to carry a heavily armored man for long periods of time and, in addition, to inflict grievous injury on the enemy. A destrier was, in fact, another soldier—something Isla had learned from Hart, who’d always wanted one.

Specifically, a destrier was trained to take commands from knee pressure rather than reins, freeing his rider to hold both sword and shield. He was trained to trample his enemies, as well as brutalize them with his massive hooves. He both bit and kicked on command. Very few destriers, once they’d reached adulthood, allowed themselves to be ridden by more than one man. It wasn’t uncommon, on the battlefield, for a horse to go berserk once his rider had fallen: charging into enemy lines or, depending on where they were, charging headlong off a cliff or into a ravine. Looking at man and beast together now, Isla thought she saw something of the strange bond of loyalty of which the bards so loved to sing.

Tristan was matter of fact with Arion, not coddling him in the slightest, but the connection was there. Tristan patted him briefly, scratching behind his pointed ears, and Arion whickered. He seemed to enjoy the attention, in spite of himself.

Tristan turned. “Shall we?”

Isla stood, transfixed with trepidation and unsure of what to do. He wanted her to, what, exactly? She’d heard horror stories of men being horribly maimed after having the foolhardiness to approach a strange war horse. Tristan’s own groom attended the beast; none of the manor’s hands would touch it for fear of what might happen to them.

“Come. There’s no cause to be upset.”

His tone conveyed a great deal about his thoughts on the matter: that she was a woman, and therefore a certain frailty was to be expected, but that his patience on the subject was wearing thin. And it was this lack of empathy, oddly enough, that did her the most good. Determined to prove him wrong, and to challenge him, she strode confidently up to the horse. She was hardly dressed to ride and even standing
beside
Arion made her quake with fear but she’d be damned if she let him see that.

In one swift movement he placed his hands on either side of her slender waist and lifted her into the saddle. She sat side-saddle, blinking in surprise as she looked down at him. She’d found herself atop Arion before she’d even had a chance to realize that she was moving. Placing his hands palm-down on the smooth, worn seat of the saddle, he vaulted up behind her. She turned and, for a split second, saw Rowena standing at the gate. Her sister’s expression was unreadable. She looked like she was about to call out, tell Isla something, but then Tristan kneed the powerful horse in the ribs and they were gone.

He raced down the straight road and Isla laughed, the wind blowing in her hair. As trite as the sentiment sounded in her own ears, she’d never felt so free. She couldn’t help but laugh.

She tucked an errant lock of hair behind her ear as she took in the world around her. They were moving so fast, doing so was barely possible. Tristan, seated firmly in the saddle behind her, kept one hand on the reins and one on her waist. Here together, like this, she could almost believe that he was a normal man—and she a normal woman, two lovers out on an adventure. She felt comfortable in the saddle with him, although she wouldn’t have thought she would have. He was a masterful rider, and his confidence was infecting.

Passing the far gate, he slowed first to a canter and then to a trot. Finally catching her breath, Isla was able to study her surroundings for the first time. They were in the forest, now; old growth trees reared up around them, their bark covered in green-gray lichen. Fall was truly upon them now, having wormed its insidious fingers into a summer that should have lasted another month at least. The leaves were a riot of color, gold and orange and bright, flaming red. Birds called out to one another as squirrels hunted desperately for the last few acorns. Every year they buried trove after trove, and every year their little rodent minds proved unequal to the task of remembering where. Which meant that every year, green shoots pierced the newly thawed earth as more oak trees were born.

The forest had a still, silent air, the battered road stretching ahead of them into the gloom. Even a bright, sunlit morning such as this couldn’t fully pierce the dense canopy of leaves overhead. She felt like they were riding through a tunnel, and one that stretched into infinity.

As uneasy as the thought made her, Isla lost the last vestiges of the horror that had gripped her heart in the beauty surrounding them. Father Justin, his threats, all of it faded away into nothing. The
forest
was real; life was real. The other began to recede.

Almost without conscious thought, she breathed a sigh of relief.

Arion clattered over a small but wide bridge, a brook rushing beneath them. The brook was low in fall, but still full; in spring, as the snow thawed in the mountains, it would be a rushing torrent that flooded everything in its path. More than once, this very same bridge had been washed out and travelers forced to ford the brook at their peril.

“It’s lovely here,” Isla said. She’d miss the Highlands; she doubted that the North could be so beautiful.