Traitor's Masque (11 page)

“I would have come back every day, if I could,” was her companion’s simple reply as he leaned back against the wall. “Unfortunately, only a very small piece of my time can be called my own. I’ve managed to keep this morning free each week until now, much as my keepers resist.”

Trystan filed that away as a possible clue to his identity. He spoke so well, she had assumed him educated, but young noblemen rarely thought of their time as belonging to anyone but themselves. Perhaps he was not a man of leisure after all. And perhaps, if he had so little time to be alone, he might prefer her elsewhere.

“I can be getting along,” she offered tentatively, “if you would prefer not to share this, um… hill.” Even as the words came out she felt ridiculous. But even more ridiculous would have been the assumption that he had sought her company.

“If you find my society so distasteful,” he offered with a wry smile, “I will by no means detain you. But I confess I had hoped to speak with you again, if the admission does not terrify you.”

Relieved and absurdly pleased, Trystan smiled back. “I am terrified by very little,” she told him, “except perhaps embroidery.”

Her companion looked abashed. “I fear I must disclose a shocking truth,” he said solemnly. “You see, my only true joy in life lies in embroidery.” When Trystan burst out laughing, he added, “Someday, I even hope to discover whether the art has a purpose beyond drawing blood and driving young women to madness.”

“I believe they tell us it improves our character, though I fear it did the opposite for mine,” she admitted. “I clearly recall burying more than one sampler behind the stable and claiming pixies had taken it.”

“Pixies?” The man seemed impressed. “I wish I’d thought of that when it was time for lessons. Though I fear my tutors would have been less than pleased to discover my history texts at the bottom of a midden.”

He’d had tutors? That, at least, was indisputable proof that he was from at least some degree of wealth. Perhaps his father was a successful businessman.

“I’m afraid it didn’t help much anyway,” Trystan admitted ruefully. “As punishment I was forced to embroider handkerchiefs, which is much worse. My ste-” Trystan broke off swiftly, appalled at her conversational lapse. She’d almost revealed that she had a stepmother. And that her stepmother had been furious when Trystan convinced her father to lighten her punishment. Instead of six sets of handkerchiefs with Anya and Darya’s initials, she’d completed only one, with her father’s initials instead. He’d been quite pleased with them. Kept them for special occasions. Malisse had burned them when he died.

Trystan’s attention was recalled abruptly to the present when Theron walked up and nudged her from behind, clearly displeased with the inactivity. Caught unprepared, Trystan staggered forward and might have fallen had her companion not caught her swiftly by the shoulders and set her gently upright.

It was terribly embarrassing. Caught between worry that she had nearly betrayed herself and humiliation at her near-accident, she realized only as she pulled back, away from her rescuer, that she had no particular objection to being close to him. Which probably indicated she was nearly as lost to propriety as her stepmother thought she was.

Trystan turned around, caught Theron’s reins, and busied herself with pretending to check his bridle.

“Are you all right?” The man’s tentative question did nothing for Trystan’s attempt to recover her self-possession.

“Of course… thank you,” she responded, in a relatively normal voice, turning and giving what she hoped was an encouraging smile.

His answering expression seemed to hold equal amounts of curiosity and worry, but he appeared to quell them both. “So whither are you bound today?” he asked lightly, leaning back against the wall. “The King’s Tree again? Or somewhere more adventurous?”

“Less, I’m afraid,” Trystan sighed, grateful for the change of subject. “This is as far as I go. I must be back before the revelers rise.” She abruptly shut her mouth and pressed her lips together, determined to avoid any further revelatory remarks.

The man either pretended not to notice or decided not to pursue the information she revealed. “In my experience,” he offered in a studiously off-handed manner, “that’s rarely before tea-time. If it makes any difference in your destination.”

Trystan turned to look at him dubiously. “And you offer this information because of your innate benevolence?”

He chuckled. “Decidedly not, as I have none,” he responded promptly. “But there is a place I would like to show you, if time and your conscience permit.”

“My conscience permits a great deal that my circumstances do not,” she returned drily, “a constraint I suspect we share.”

“Your suspicions may have merit,” he admitted, “but today I have decided to prevent either one from interfering with my plans. Will you come?” He watched Trystan hopefully, awaiting her decision.

She knew she should refuse. It was already near mid-day, with tea time only a scant few hours away, near two of them needed for the journey home. And after all, what did she know about the man, except that he had a pleasant laugh and his hair seemed permanently rumpled? It was rather difficult to view him as a threat, but she had to consider the possibility. He had no doubt guessed that she rode in secret. If his intentions proved sinister, who would ever know what had become of her?

“What sort of place?” she asked, trying to sound more flippant than worried. “In stories, isn’t that what the villain says to the heroine before he kidnaps her and drags her off to his lair?”

The man’s eyes widened in evident horror, and, to Trystan’s delight, his face turned rather red. “Ah, no?” He looked anxious, and a trifle apologetic. “That is, I didn’t mean it like that.” Her look of inquiry produced only a sheepish grin. “I suppose I’ve been reading all the wrong sorts of stories. I simply remembered a place in the Kingswood that I often go, and I thought you might like to see it.”

“It does,” Trystan allowed graciously, “sound rather less sinister when you put it like that.” She grinned back at him. “Although,” she added, “I’ve always thought it might make villainy worthwhile if one actually got to have a lair.”

“Possibly,” her companion admitted, “though if I had one, I promise I could think of far better things to fill it with than unwilling maidens. They would probably spend all their time complaining about the dust and the lack of variety at tea time.”

“What would you fill it with?” Trystan could not help asking. “Your lair, I mean.” She wondered briefly if that was too personal a question, but the man didn’t even hesitate.

“Books,” he replied promptly. “And horses. And perhaps a friend or two, though I suppose the idea of a ‘lair’ doesn’t seem well suited to convivial gatherings.”

Trystan chuckled. It did sound rather more like a home than a lair. What that might say about his real home was a question for later consideration.

“And you?” he prompted curiously. “What sort of place would you retreat to when the pressures of villainy grew too great?”

Caught off-guard by the question, Trystan floundered for an answer. “Ah, I… well, I don’t know.” What would she wish for? All she really dreamed of these days was
not
being with her family. She had never stepped beyond that dream to imagine what she might choose to do with her life.

“Just as well,” the man said, saving her from having to invent an answer. “I can’t imagine you would make a very convincing villain.”

Trystan tried to look hurt, and failed. She couldn’t imagine anyone taking her seriously either.

“So will you come?” He reminded her of his earlier invitation. “I promise there will be no embroidery, no kidnapping, and only slightly dull conversation.”

She hesitated. Perhaps it would be wiser to say no. She should return home, to the company of Millson and an afternoon in the garden. But just then, she did not particularly want to be wise. She wanted a friend. The garden, while peaceful, was no substitute for human contact. There was but one condition. “If our path lies west or north, then I agree,” she answered finally. “I cannot help but reveal that much, as I truly dare not be late.”

She met the gray eyes next to her as she spoke. It struck her then as odd, how easily she could read what she saw there. Curiosity, of course. And a great deal of concern.

“I must ask…” he began, then stopped, and folded his arms a bit fiercely. “Do you need… Is there anything…?” He could not seem to get the words out.

Trystan was at once humiliated and warmed by his consideration. But it was not enough. She could tell him nothing that would either inform or console him. “I fear I am no more at liberty than you to divulge my secrets,” she answered his unspoken question with quiet sympathy. “Our burdens, I fear, are not the sort that grow lighter with sharing.”

“My obligations are not the sort that could be shared, even if I wished to,” he admitted, “but how could you have guessed such a thing?”

“You’ve made no secret of your desire to be other than what you are,” she reminded him. “And yet you return to it anyway. Your idea of rebellion is simply to be alone.” She shrugged, not sure how to explain what seemed obvious to her. “It was not difficult to surmise that you shoulder your burdens because you must. Or perhaps simply because you cannot imagine forcing them on someone else.”

He shook his head at her wonderingly. “Even those close to me…” he told her, “the people who know me best, seem to find my choices incomprehensible.” There was pain in the admission. “But you”—he took a step forward, closing the gap between them—“I’ve told you so little, yet you seem to understand so much.” He took another step. Trystan held her ground, heart pounding at his nearness. “How can that be?” He sounded so perplexed that Trystan looked up, into his eyes. They were fastened on hers, with an intensity that held her breathless. “Why do I feel like I know you?”

The same question Trystan had asked herself. A question she had been unable to answer, through several sleepless nights. “I feel much the same,” she answered him softly, dropping her gaze, “but I suspect it is an illusion. We simply recognize ourselves when we look at one another. But we know next to nothing.”

It struck her, then, the depth of her ignorance about even the people she knew best. What, after all, had she even known about her father? That he was kind? That he was handsome? That he loved her? Had she even truly known that? What would she ask him, now, if she had the chance?

She looked up again, into the man’s gray eyes, and wondered. “I do not know what you love or what you fear,” she told him simply. “What moves you to hatred or to envy… I might guess at what would make you laugh, but not what might make you cry. What you live for, even what you would choose to die for…” She shook her head, trying to convey something she had not really understood before that moment.

“I could not begin to imagine what things make you get up in the morning with hope instead of despair,” she went on. “While it pains me that I cannot know your name, in truth, that is the least of what we hide.” She had not intended to say so much, but with his eyes on hers it had not seemed possible to stop.

“And yet,” he responded with growing intensity, “you see me anyway. No young woman has ever spoken to me as you do. All the polite conversation in the world cannot convey what you seem to understand without being told.”

“I fear I am only beginning to see beyond myself,” Trystan admitted, with a strong sense of shame. “And my life offers few opportunities to speak plainly, or at all, really. I fear you are bearing the weight of far too many words unsaid. If I have distressed you, I apologize.”

Without warning he caught her hand and pressed it. “No,” he said swiftly and firmly. “Not distressed. I am dismayed by your insights, but relieved, I think, by your candor. I might prefer anonymity, but to be unknown… that is not always a relief.”

As he had done before, he so nearly echoed her own thoughts that Trystan was surprised to find she had not spoken them. “But neither is it always a comfort to be known,” she added thoughtfully. “Knowing can so quickly turn to hurting that it is little wonder how deeply we hide.”

“I would not hurt you,” the man said quietly. “Though I know you have little reason to believe it.”

“I believe you would not hurt me on purpose,” she answered honestly. “But I also believe we do not always get to choose who is hurt and who is not.”

He looked sad and dropped her hand. “No,” he said, turning away. “We do not.” Catching his horse’s trailing reins, he mounted and turned toward the forest. “Ride with me?” he asked. “North and west. Without burden or expectation. Just a chance to talk, of whatever would not cause you pain.”

Trystan nodded, her relief and joy mingling with an equal sense of apprehension. Even more than she feared being late, she now feared how strongly she wanted to tell him everything.

They rode slowly back into the Kingswood, and at Ramsey’s prompting the girl managed to tell him a little of her apparently tempestuous childhood. She carefully confined her stories to her younger years, when her experiences would have been less specific, but she could not hide everything. Though she was careful not to give names, her artless telling revealed much about her origins.