Kirra rode alongside Romar and had a grand time of it. They had been successful in their mission; they were out of danger; and she was the lone woman in a crew of men, the most handsome of the four riding at her side. She could not help but enjoy herself hugely.
“So, you promised to tell me the tale of your adventures,” Romar said shortly after they set out. “The story of what turned the silly and superficial serramarra into a cold killer in service to the king.”
“I don’t think the transformation was quite that dramatic,” she said with a laugh. “But it certainly was an adventure.”
She spent the next hour or so giving him the colorful details of her trek across Gillengaria last winter with Cammon, Justin, Donnal, Tayse, and Senneth. He was familiar with the general outline, of course, because the king had shared the story with him. He knew that Halchon Gisseltess had told Senneth to her face that he wanted to be named heir to the throne. He knew that Halchon’s sister, Coralinda, had styled herself the head of a devout order known as Daughters of the Pale Mother, and that she was sending her novices out to proselytize for that revived religion. He knew that mystics had been prosecuted and murdered throughout lands held by many of the southern Houses. But he hadn’t heard the tales of their exploits in Dormas, Neft, and Lochau—or the story of Tayse’s capture and rescue from the Lumanen Convent—or confirmation of the rumor that Halchon Gisseltess wanted to wed Senneth Brassenthwaite before he took over the throne of Gillengaria.
“But he’s married,” Romar exclaimed.
“He seems to not consider that an obstacle,” Kirra said.
“It would be a good match. For him, I mean—for a man bent on taking over the throne. Brassenthwaite and Gisseltess—at least six of the other Houses would follow their combined lead. I applaud him for his strategy even as I hate him for his treason.”
“No need to worry,” Kirra said. “Senneth will never marry him.”
“Her brother Kiernan had better be looking for another match for her,” Romar said. They had effortlessly slipped into one of the favorite pastimes of the aristocracy: plotting bloodlines and alliances. “What about Rappengrass? Ariane seems most loyal to the king. That strengthens the crown in the southern region and gives Rayson Fortunalt a reason to think twice before joining a rebellion.”
“I think only one of Ariane’s sons is unmarried, and he’s almost ten years younger than Senneth.”
Romar made a dismissive sound. “What does that matter when there’s a kingdom to secure? But if not Rappengrass, then Nocklyn, perhaps. I know that Els has only got the one child, a girl, but I think his brother was widowed a year or so ago. Senneth could marry there.”
Kirra laughed. “Actually, I fear there is little chance Senneth will marry to oblige her king,” she said. “Regrettable but true. She’s found love in a less—conventional—place, and I doubt either Kiernan or Baryn will persuade her to give it up.”
Romar looked instantly intrigued. “Really? A mésalliance? With whom? Kiernan must be beside himself.”
“Kiernan lost all hope of influencing Senneth when he allowed their father to turn her out the door when she was seventeen,” Kirra said. “He’s lucky she’s willing to attempt reconciliation now.”
“Yes, no doubt,” Romar said. “Who’s she lost her heart to?”
Kirra bubbled with laughter. “A King’s Rider. Tayse. He rode with her to Brassenthwaite a couple of months ago and I’m dying to hear how the journey went.”
Romar appeared to be completely dumbfounded. “Senneth Brassenthwaite in love with a King’s Rider? Surely not. Never. I won’t believe it. There’s—there are standards to uphold, even among the most wayward of the serramarra. She can’t be considering marrying him, can she?”
Kirra pulled her horse to a halt, and Romar, after continuing on for a few paces, reined back around to face her. She was suffused with fury. “You know, I hate the smug, suspicious, stupid aristocrats who believe an accident of birth makes them better than all of the ordinary people in the realm. I hate that sense of privilege and entitlement and outright arrogance that makes people like you believe someone else isn’t as good as you are, not fit to touch your hand, or—Bright Lady forbid it!—the hand of your wife or daughter or sister—”
Romar, incredibly, was laughing. He flung up a hand to stem her tirade. “I was only joking,” he said. “I think it’s marvelous.”
She was so angry that it took a moment for his words to register. “You’re so—What did you say? And it’s not funny. I don’t know why you’re laughing—”
Ahead of her, she could see Justin had turned around to see what the holdup was, while Cammon was no doubt just a few yards behind and greatly entertained by what he could pick up of the argument. Kirra kneed her horse forward and battled back her rage.
“I was joking,” Romar repeated. “I don’t feel that way at all. Frankly, I think the bloodlines could stand a little mixing up. Though, it’s true, it’s rare that a serramarra would mate with a soldier, even a high-ranking one, or someone else of a lower class—say, a household servant. In fact, the only instance I can recall is when Kallie Fortunalt ran off with her husband’s steward, and you know that affair didn’t end up so well.”
Kirra took a couple of deep breaths to dispel the lingering effects of anger. In the calmest voice she could muster, she asked, “What happened to them? I was only seventeen when the story came down, and my stepmother wouldn’t tell us the details. And my father never bothered with gossip of that sort.”
“Rayson won’t talk about it—she was his mother, you know. The story at the time was that Reynold hunted them down and had them killed. For the dishonor to the name. But I’ve always wondered about that. It’s just the story Reynold would have put out, even if he’d never been able to track them down. I like to think they escaped on one of the small ships you can always find in Forten City and took off for foreign lands, where they built themselves a small house and settled down to live happily for the rest of their lives. Certainly anyone who’d been married to Reynold Fortunalt deserved such an ending.”
That made Kirra laugh, and her good humor was almost completely restored. “Right about now you’re thinking I need to apologize for my outburst,” she said.
“No. Now I’m thinking I should apologize for seeming to be the kind of person you despise.”
He said it so seriously that she was caught completely off guard. “I despise the type,” she said. “I don’t know you well enough to know exactly where you don’t fit the mold. From the outside,” she added with a small laugh, “you seem to embody it.”
“What, privileged, pompous, and stupid?” he said, grinning. “Thanks for the compliment.”
“Privileged, intelligent, pure-blood, related to the royal house, blessed with royal favor, most likely to benefit greatly from maintenance of all current conditions.”
He gave her a quick sideways look from those deep brown eyes. “And in what way does this description not also fit you?”
“Oh, no, I’m a complete mongrel. Not only was my mother Thirteenth House, but she—or someone in her family—was a mystic. I can play serramarra well enough, but I’m only in the higher echelons on sufferance. If my father ever lost his standing among the marlords—or ever lost his patience with me—I’d be ostracized so quickly it would be hard for you to remember my face.”
Another sideways glance, this one accompanied by a quick little bow, neatly accomplished even from the saddle. “Serra Kirra, I do not believe I will ever forget your face.”
A giggle for that. “Well, no, you’re bound to remember me since I saved your life,” she said. “And now you’re bound to answer my questions, too, since you owe me for the favor! What makes you so different from the marlords and their kin? How have you rebelled against the strictures of the Twelve Houses?”
He gazed before him, his face meditative. “I don’t know that the rebellion has been by action so much as by attitude. The man I trust most in the world is the
captain of my guard—a man not much different from a King’s Rider, in fact, all duty and honor and loyalty. He has run of my house and can interrupt me at any point, night or day. I dine with him and several of his officers at least once a week.” He shrugged. “But many an aristocrat will tell you he values his servants and his soldiers. I try to see every man as my equal—perhaps not in intelligence, perhaps not in wealth, but having some knowledge or some skill that I do not possess, as well as the intrinsic appreciable qualities that make him a good soul. I look everyone in the eye. I deal honestly with any man or woman. I admit, I haven’t looked ahead to marrying my children off to farmers’ daughters and merchants’ sons, but I wouldn’t disinherit them if that’s what they wanted to do.” He laughed a little. “Or so I say now, before I have a precious daughter who wants to go off to be the blacksmith’s bride. I may find myself a whole pile of class arrogance then.”
“I hope not,” Kirra said, speaking with assumed lightness. She had been stirred more than she liked to admit by his thoughtful avowal. Her father was something of an egalitarian, too, though she’d never heard him put the philosophy into words; merely, Malcolm considered any man good enough to use, and then reward, for service to Danalustrous. “I would like to see a blacksmith’s son running estates in Merrenstow someday!”
“Well, once I have a daughter and she grows up to fall in love with a smithy,” Romar replied, “I shall most certainly invite you to the wedding.”
“I shall most certainly come.”
Their conversation continued much this way for the next couple of hours, interrupted only by their infrequent stops for food or privacy. True to his self-description, Romar always spoke directly and with unforced respect to the other men of the party, asking them if they’d noted anything of interest on the road or how long they thought they might be riding this day. Justin seemed to take his fellowship as a necessary consequence of their proximity, a camaraderie that would last only for the journey, but he also seemed to find that completely understandable. Cammon, of course, blithely accepted Romar as a kindred spirit, a delightful new friend, and over lunch pelted him with questions about his capture and his escape.
“Did you kill any of the men who tried to abduct you? Did you know where they were taking you? Were you afraid? What did you think when Kirra appeared at your cell door?”
Romar answered everything patiently or playfully, laughing at the final question. “I thought, ‘They must have drugged my food. I’m having hallucinations. I better not eat tomorrow’s breakfast.’ ”
“Did you see her changing shapes, then?” Cammon said. “Everyone says it’s very unnerving, but I can’t follow it myself when Kirra and Donnal shift. They always just look like themselves to me. I mean, I know Donnal’s a wolf. I can see the wolf shape, but he still looks like Donnal. It’s hard to explain. But everyone else says it can be a little eerie to watch a transformation.”
Romar glanced at Kirra. “No, she didn’t wake me till she was standing before me in human shape. They say that sometimes a goddess will come visit you the night before you die. I didn’t want to die, but she looked like a goddess to me. That’s why I was hoping for hallucinations instead.”
After the quick meal, Romar volunteered to help Cammon refill the water containers in a sinkhole Donnal had found. Justin and Kirra worked in silence to erase evidence of their passage. But after a moment the Rider looked over at her with something of a smirk.
“There’s a lord who’s found something he likes,” he said. “You might tell your father you can find a husband on your own.”
Kirra felt a little chill pass over her. If Justin, the least sensitive of the lot, could see the little coil of attraction that was tightening around her and Romar, how terribly obvious must it be? “He’s just flirting, the way all nobles do,” she said in a neutral tone. “He’s married.”
Justin dropped a tin plate, his hand no doubt made nerveless by surprise. Not until he had picked it up and dusted it off against his trousers did he speak again. “He certainly doesn’t act like he’s married. And you don’t act like he is, either.”
She gave him a frosty look, wishing she had Senneth’s power but in reverse, so her glare could chill him into a statue of ice. “Since when did my behavior become a concern of yours?”
He shrugged. “Well, you’re always telling me when I do something you don’t like.”
“Again—”
“He seems like a decent fellow, though,” the Rider went on. “I can see why the king picked him for regent.” He shoved the plate and a few sundry items into his saddlebag and worked the buckle closed. “If he lives long enough to do the part.”
She tried to let go of her irritation and her little nugget of fear and turn her mind to other worries. “You think those men will come after him, then?”
Justin patted his horse on its nose and let the animal lip at his face for a moment. “If not them, others. He’s a target. He’s going to have to get himself an awfully good personal guard.”
“He says he has one back on his estates.”
“Well, then, let’s get him there as quick as we can.”
Hearing voices behind her, Kirra turned to see Cammon and Romar approaching, the younger man laughing at something the older one had said. She also saw Donnal sitting a couple of yards away, having arrived silently at some point during her conversation with Justin. His amber wolf’s eyes were fixed on her face; his own face, shuttered at the best of times, was absolutely unreadable now. She had no idea how long he had been there, what he had heard, what he had gleaned from his own observations.
“Any trouble on the road ahead?” she asked him. She always talked to him, no matter what form he was in, because she knew he understood her. He would understand her even if she spoke some language he’d never heard before, some tongue she had fabricated on the spot. The connection between them had always gone that deep.
He didn’t answer, of course, just came fluidly to his feet and padded over. She put her hand down and he nuzzled at her fingers, then sent his tongue in one quick, sticky lick across her palm. That made her laugh, and she bent down to ruffle both his ears, putting her nose against his cold black one, daring him to lick her chin, her mouth. But he didn’t. He waited for her to release him, then turned his head away to give an appraising glance to the two men who had just arrived. Cammon had instantly gone to Justin’s side and was telling him some story in a lively voice, but Romar was standing on the edge of the camp, watching her. Watching Donnal. Kirra knew he must be wondering just why she had been so eager to champion the friendships between serfs and serramarra and just what her relationship was to the shiftling at her feet.
IT was nearly sunset when the attack came. They were riding through a little gully, and Justin had just said, “This would be a nice place for an ambush,” when Cammon cried out a sharp warning. They had bunched together against the oncoming dark, so Cammon and Donnal were both with the main party, and Donnal immediately loosed a low growl of menace.
Instantly, the men raised their swords and formed a neat circle with Kirra in the middle. Cammon quietly called out numbers and details. “Two over the hill, both on foot. Two before us and one behind, mounted. Another one some distance ahead—I guess in case one of us tries to run.”
“Fair odds,” Romar said, not sounding at all discomposed. Kirra could not help but notice that he seemed perfectly at ease with Justin’s borrowed blade in his hand. “Do you think they’ve come across us by chance, or that they’ve been hunting for me?”
“This place, probably bandits,” Justin said, his gaze fixed on the top of the hill where Cammon had indicated two of the attackers lay. “We’re in open territory between Tilt and Merrenstow—not that well patrolled. And the force isn’t big enough to have been sent after you specifically.”
“The ones ahead of us are coming closer,” Cammon reported.
Justin glanced down at Donnal, who was standing stiff-legged and snarling a little ahead of Cammon??
?s horse. “Guessing this lot will be more impressed by a man with a sword than a wolf at our feet,” the Rider said, his voice carefully holding no hint of command. “Extra blade on Cammon’s saddle if you want to fight that way.”
Kirra’s attention was caught by Cammon’s yell and the sound of pounding hoofbeats, so she missed the moment when Donnal transformed. Suddenly, she was in a thicket of upraised swords and descending arms and struggling bodies. Donnal was at a disadvantage on foot. “Donnal!” she cried, kicking her feet from the stirrups and scrambling up so she was almost standing in the saddle. “Take my horse!”
She sensed Romar turn wildly her way, a bloodied blade in his hand, but she was already changing shapes. “Kirra!” he cried. She thought he grabbed for her, but the world was first hazy, and then very, very clear. She flung herself from the horse’s back just as Donnal leapt up to take her place. She shot herself in a straight line for the top of the gully, the ambush site where one man still waited. She was not high enough, she did not have the altitude for a truly dizzying, spectacular plunge, but she could frighten him well enough. She was a spring hawk, small and light-bodied but bred for hunting. She aimed herself directly at the man who was just now cresting the hill and starting to clamber down.