They’d worked out the details. At sixteen, Huwen was finally considered ready to accompany his father on his campaigns and, to his irritation, at fourteen, so was Eamon. Why Eamon, who would not rule and hardly had the temperament or the backbone for a battlefield, was to be trained in war and leadership, was beyond Huwen.
Tomorrow, he and his brother would travel with Father’s magiel, a thousand replacements, and a supply train to Teshe, a country on the edge of the wilds. A contingent of the soldiers would turn off the road after only a week’s travel to deal with a province announcing it had separated from Arcan so it could divorce itself from what it called “the king’s war.”
It was disgusting. Didn’t peasants know kings were God-appointed? How did they expect to govern themselves?
Huwen’s new status came with a loosening of his leash, at least in terms of pleasures of the flesh. Anwen was not accorded the same liberties, but her family, seeing the girl fancied none less than the king-to-be, turned a blind eye. Huwen lay, now, spent and sleepy, in Anwen’s bed in her parents’ grand house in the upper city, playing with a curl of her hair. The day had been cold with the promise of coming winter, but the embers in her fireplace pushed back the chill. “I’ll miss you,” he said, and it was true. He’d miss Anwen very much on the long road, and in the rough tents at the siege of Archwood, beyond Coldridge’s last comforts.
“I’ll miss you.” Her body fit his exactly, made for him. “I hope I get your baby.”
He grinned, though she faced away from him, and he knew she couldn’t see it in the dark. The thought of Anwen having his baby pleased him. But— “It’s best you don’t.”
She turned in his arms. “You don’t want me to bear your child?”
“I didn’t say that.” He thought she knew. “You deserve better. You are the most amazing woman. I want you to be happy, and proud, and have the best of everything.”
“Better than your child? What could be better?”
He hesitated. “I don’t want you to be the mother of bastards.”
She stilled, silent in the dark.
“I can’t marry you.”
Still, she said nothing.
“You knew that.”
A tiny puff of warm breath touched his chest. “Yes.”
He would miss her. Not only this winter, as he accompanied Father on his campaign, but forever, when Father arranged a political marriage for him.
“It seems so unfair.” Her voice was soft in the dark.
He had to agree. “The commonest man can marry for love. Even a second son, on occasion. But a king must make alliances.”
It was a part of his future that had never concerned Huwen until he’d met Anwen. He understood better now, his father’s relationship with his mother. Father and Mother did not argue. Each had his and her own sphere of power, of friendships. But it was an ill-kept secret that Father still visited Uther’s mother in her chambers.
But Huwen loved Anwen. “I want the best for you.”
“I have the best.”
He smiled at the top of her head. “For now, perhaps. But I don’t want you to be the one who walks through a room leaving a wake of whispers behind.” Uther’s mother had her own suite in the great hall. But as a one-time servant girl, she had no status at court, and no friends among her own class. She had a garden and a friend to sit with her.
“I...” Anwen’s words were tentative, a whisper. “I would be your mistress.”
“No, Anwen.“
“I would!”
But how could he deny her plea? How could he deny his heart? “You’d only be unhappy. We should vow, here and now, never to see one another again. You should move to another city, find a wealthy land owner like your father. Build a life.”
She was silent for a long time, and presently he felt her quake with silent sobs. Pain, such as he had never known, shot through his chest then. He hadn’t meant to make her cry. He hadn’t meant to hurt her.
“I only want what’s best for you,” he tried to explain, but his words sounded hollow, even to himself.
“I—know.” Her voice hitched, and the words brought forth a torrent of hiccupping sobs.
“Shh, shh,” he said. “Don’t cry. Please, Anwen, don’t cry. I love you.”
“I—know.” But the sobs would not, could not stop.
He held her, rocking, deep into the night.
The tutor, soon to be reassigned, opened one eye and mumbled something unintelligible as Huwen, dismissing his guard, crept through the man’s room and into his own. Anwen had finally fallen asleep; and well before the winter sun touched the eastern sky, he left her bed. Today, he left his mother, the women and children, and the cloying protection of Uncle Avin, to finally meet with Father and learn what it was to rule. He would ride for Coldridge and then to the siege at Archwood, the last of Shangril’s seven countries to reconcile its differences with Arcan.
As he eased the bolt into its place behind him, a gray shape shifted on his bed.
“It’s me,” the shape said before Huwen could reach for his knife or call out.
He peered between the open bed curtains. Eamon. Fully dressed. Waiting.
“What are you doing here?” Huwen breathed.
Eamon sat up and leaned back against the headboard. “Nothing.”
A lie, obviously, but one Huwen knew he would not expose by arguing. He was too exhausted, too drained by excitement and heartbreak. He slipped out of his breeches, stockings, and jerkin, and, nudging his brother aside, slipped under his sheets in his shirt and small clothes.
“Were you with Anwen?” Eamon’s words came from the darkness.
“Yes.”
“A farewell,” he murmured, quietly, almost to himself. “Until you return.”
The romance of his younger brother’s words rankled. “Not ‘until I return,’” Huwen snapped. “Forever. She’s only an estate holder’s daughter.”
“And you hold that against her?”
“No!” Huwen took a calming breath. “I won’t be allowed to choose my bride. Be happy if you’re able to choose yours.”
There was a long silence, and Huwen began to grow sleepy. Just a few candlemarks, and he and Eamon would be called to ready themselves to ride.
“I won’t be able to choose my bride,” Eamon said softly.
“No?” Huwen left his eyes closed. Eamon was too young to know his heart. “Why not?”
“The one I’ve chosen won’t have me.”
This made Huwen open his eyes. “Who?”
Again, there was a long silence, and Huwen began to doubt that Eamon would answer.
Then his brother’s voice drifted out of the lessening dark. “She’s beautiful. Royal. Of an age. Virtuous.”
“Sounds like I should marry her,” Huwen mumbled, sleep tripping his words.
Again, no reply.
“I was joking,” Huwen said. “You know I love Anwen. How do you know this girl won’t have you? Have you asked Uncle Avin to speak to her father?”
“No.”
“Then how do you know? What has she said?”
“Nothing.”
Huwen was getting tired of the riddles. He was about to send his brother back to his room, when he spoke again.
“I’ve kept my promise to you, Huwen. I don’t cut myself anymore. The thought of her keeps me alive.”
Huwen was wide awake, now. “How do you keep such an—intense—love secret?”
This time the silence was filled with waiting. “She doesn’t know I’ve been thinking of her.”
“Never—” This was bizarre. Huwen had to clarify. “You mean you love a girl you’ve never been with? Not even to talk to?”
Eamon’s weight lifted from the bed and in the soft light Huwen could make out his shape approach their connecting door. “You’re not the only one leaving his love behind.”
On the far side of a wide, swift river, Carn Coldridge was visible for some distance, perched on the edge of a sweeping upland. As Sulwyn’s pony picked its way down from the ridge on a winding road, Rennika and her sisters crowded forward in the cart for their first glimpse of the city. They were in Teshe now, not Orumon, but Rennika was not sure when they had crossed into the new country.
The city, if she could call it that, was on top of a small, flat hill, its edges disappearing into farmland, so different from Archwood’s high walls among the peaks. Squashed mountains fell away north of the carn, disappearing into a band of flat snow clouds. To the east lay an endless land of forests and hills under a morning sky so huge it seemed to Rennika to press down on her like a giant hand. Like Archwood, swathes of trees near the town had been cleared for farmland, and the fields were hidden now under a blanket of white. Huddled against the wind outside a crumbling city wall, a pleasingly careless array of shops and houses stood along crooked streets. On a high point within the city, a second, higher wall surrounded a castle, but the castle seemed plain and stark.
Meg and Janat pulled their hoods over their faces as Sieur Cordal—Sulwyn—guided his pony over the icy wooden bridge, across the fields, and up the hill. Soldiers in King Artem’s colors stood at the city gate.
Apprehension crept into Rennika’s stomach. Why weren’t King Larin’s guards here? These men watched carefully as the carts and farmers passed under the gate’s open arch but didn’t stop them or question them.
They halted on a side street next to a wide square with a boisterous market and Rennika craned to take in everything at once. She was glad she didn’t have to cover her face: there was so much to see, and everything was noisy and colorful and fascinating.
She’d been to the market in Archwood only twice in her life, and this market was different—filled with music and smells and noise. On a corner, a pair of wrestlers grappled one another as a frantic crowd waved purses in the air. Further down, a long area had been fenced off for archery competitions. Everywhere, shoppers and dawdlers wound past one another in the crush as traders called out their wares, and an inordinate number of Arcan soldiers kept watch.
Janat huddled, if possible, even more deeply into her corner of the cart, her eyes never leaving Sulwyn, but Meg peered out from under her hood with interest. Even Sulwyn tried to look everywhere, mouth gaping at the strangeness of it. Rennika wondered if even he had never seen a town like this before.
Sulwyn nodded down the main avenue to the town square and castle gate where the soldiers in green and gold patrolled. He ran his hands over his pony’s back and legs. “Stay here. I’ll ask about King Larin and his magiel.” He loosened the pony’s harness.
Meg looked curiously into the market. “It’s cold enough. I could keep my hood up. I could go with you.”
“We should stay here,” Janat said.
Sulwyn agreed. “I’ll be back soon.”
Rennika peered around the back of the cart as Meg slid to the ground. The scent of roasting mutton drifted on the breeze. Janat sidled into a niche between two buildings where she could watch the alley from beneath her hood without being seen.
Rennika took in what she could of the market from the alley. It was confusing and exciting all at once. Farmers with carts of strange vegetables and carrots and sacks of unmilled grain beckoned to passersby. Shop doors stood open, and some vendors even displayed their wares on tables or on blankets over the ice and mud. In the midst of the endless flow of people, groups huddled about braziers, and the smell of soup and spice mingled with scented candles and incense, and the stink of offal and unwashed bodies. Hawkers shouted over the squabbles of hagglers.
Sulwyn was true to his word, returning only a short time later, bearing a loaf of flat bread and a block of cheese, his water skin filled with ale. He broke off chunks of bread for each of them. “Teshe capitulated even before King Artem marched on Orumon.” He seemed to be speaking to Meg, but he kept looking at Janat. “King Larin keeps his throne, but the men in King Artem’s colors are everywhere, not just about the castle.”
Janat’s fingers reached for the death token collar at her neck. “King Larin would give us to Artem?”
“Seems likely.” Sulwyn shrugged. “Maybe your magiel uncle could still help you.”
Rennika stuffed bread and cheese into her mouth, her eye on the crust that Janat didn’t seem to want.
Meg slumped against the wall of the building. “We could try another city. Maybe the king of Gramarye will take us in.”
King Gramaret. Rennika remembered him from their trip with Mama last summer.
Meg gave Sulwyn a tentative look. “Gramarye—is it—is it far? Or Midell?”
“I don’t know.” Sulwyn wiped his hands on his pants and passed around the water skin, and then produced blankets and a water jar from his cart. He gave the blankets to Janat.
Janat took the gifts with an air of surprise.
“Well.” Sulwyn stood awkwardly in the street holding the jar. “Keep well,” he said finally.
“Are you going?” Janat shuffled a little, looking sick with apprehension.
“I have my work.” He spoke as though he apologized to Janat. “I have the name of a man to contact.”
“Thank you,” Meg said. “For all your help.”
Janat bit her lip. “I...You’ve been very—good. To all of us. I appreciate it.” She lowered her eyes. “We all appreciate it.”
Sulwyn bobbed his head, his eyes never leaving Janat’s face. “I’ve seen people here who hail from other cities. Some are hazy-skinned. They could be magiels or at least mixed. With so many displaced, you should be able to find crowds to blend into.” He let out a puff of breath and looked around, as though he didn’t want to leave. “Well. I better go now.”
Janat attempted a smile of thanks. “It’s...” Janat licked her lips. “It’s good work that you do.”
Meg shot her a look of surprise.
Sulwyn puffed out another breath of air and glanced at the market. “Yes. Well. Goodbye.”
“Goodbye,” Janat said.
He hesitated for a moment, then placed the water jar in Meg’s hands and climbed into the cart. Taking the reins, he prodded the pony into the street.
Rennika shook her head. That was strange.