2
We buried Hugh the next day.
In keeping with their silence in the face of loss, the people of Avonlidgh hold neither wakes nor elaborate services for the dead. How brilliant Hugh, so full of life and laughter, had come from these grave people, I didn’t know. He had been the sunlight streaming through a break in the storm clouds. Now there was only gray.
The rock carvers had been working since we’d heard the news, and they had Hugh’s final resting place ready. He would be entombed with the rest of his line, the royal stone sarcophagi each in their niches, then sealed in. Though Erich’s seat was at Castle Avonlidgh, a much more central location, on the Danu River, Windroven was the ancestral home of their family. This rocky, desolate shore was where they were born, if it could be arranged, and where their bodies were laid to rest, Glorianna willing.
Ursula and Old Erich flanked me, slightly behind, as if I might turn and run, a child bolting from punishment. I fixed my eyes on Kir, High Priest of Glorianna, who’d traveled from Ordnung when the news spread, for the express purpose of laying the hope of Avonlidgh to eternal darkness. The only one not in gray, he wore Glorianna’s vivid pink, a color undimmed by grief or death.
I found myself clutching my golden pendant, Glorianna’s rose, for . . . something. I couldn’t call it comfort, for there was none to be had.
All too soon, Kir finished with his benedictions and they covered Hugh’s body in the open sarcophagus with a blanket of pink roses woven by the chapel priests from their carefully tended hothouse. Glorianna is eternal, thus Her roses bloom year-round. It’s Her gift to us, that nothing truly dies, but lives on.
The pendant bit into my palm as I prayed fiercely for it to be true. But Glorianna did not answer.
“Princess Amelia?”
Oh. They all waited on me. I took a step and faltered. Ursula put a hand under my elbow, but I yanked it away. I didn’t need her support. I needed only one person and he was forever torn from me. Feeling the cold damp of the caves in my bones, I moved like a corpse myself, to gaze down on Hugh’s waxy, bloodless face.
Though his skin was dull, devoid of life, his golden hair flopped over his brow, as it always had, gold spun into silk. Someone had washed it. But they hadn’t fixed it right. Of its own accord, my hand reached out to tidy it, the way I’d done so many times. Always he would turn his head and kiss the palm of my hand and say, You might as well not bother. My wife is the most beautiful woman in the Twelve Kingdoms. No one will notice how I look ever again.
Part of me waited for it, for him to complete our little ritual.
But he was gone.
Someone muffled a cough—one of those winter lung diseases, wracking and wet—though the rest of the assembly held their silence. With a sigh, I reached up and unclasped the necklace my father had given me for my fifteenth birthday, Glorianna’s rose worked in precious gold dangling from the chain with sparkling light, even in the gloom. I tucked it in Hugh’s clasped hands. His fingers felt like stone already.
“Glorianna’s love go with you, as mine always will,” I whispered.
High Priest Kir led me out of the niche, patting my hand on his arm. The assistant priest, in mourning gray over a white monk’s robe, a deep cowl covering his head, closed the sarcophagus and returned to his master’s side. His eyes flashed from the shadows of his hood and I got the searing impression of their unnatural green color, like apples in the early spring. Scar tissue distorted the shape of his face and I understood why he wore the cowl.
My fingers spasmed, crumpling the fine velvet of Kir’s sleeve. He didn’t protest, but he smoothed my hand, then whispered that we need not watch the stonemasons close the tomb.
I shook my head, pressing my lips together. I would stay. Stay until they had sealed Hugh forever away from the light.
High Priest Kir and his assistant withdrew with deep bows and murmured prayers, drawing Glorianna’s eternal circles in the air. Behind me, people left as quietly as they could, the whispers of their clothing marking their passage. There was some bit of fuss in helping Old Erich into the chair they’d carried him in. His aged joints couldn’t navigate the narrow and uneven cliffside path.
Silence settled, broken only by the splat and scrape of the stonemasons building their wall. Someone still breathed behind me and I looked to see Ursula, standing military straight and somber, at my right hand.
“You can go,” I told her.
“I’m staying with you.” She said it in that tone, the one that meant I’d never argue her out of it.
And though I thought I hadn’t needed her, a rush of gratitude filled me to have her there as witness. Then, one day, if I needed to ask her if we’d really buried him, she could tell me and I’d be able to tell what was true.
I tried not to think about how Andi should be there, on my other side. Never did I imagine we three wouldn’t always be together.
Much less that Andi would murder my one true love.
I worried at that, a tongue returning again and again to a sore tooth, unable to help myself, despite the sick, spiking pain each time I touched it. I pictured her face, those stormy eyes burning out of the wild mess of her rusty black hair. In my mind, she plunged her dagger into Hugh’s breast. There, the pain. I played the scene again, Andi’s sweetly mysterious smile twisting into an evil grimace of delight. Oh, the pain. I clung to it, reveling in it, needing it.
The stonemasons had finished. They gathered up their tools and bowed their way out, leaving us alone in the tomb, with only the gusting wind whistling through the alcoves, worming its way through the cracks.
Ursula never stirred. If I stayed here all night, she would stay with me. With her fit warrior’s body, she would long outlast me.
With a last prayer, I made myself move. Ursula followed me, giving me space and the courtesy of her quiet, something I’d never before appreciated. The wind hit me like a closed fist when I stepped out of the tombs, taking me by surprise, and my gray-kid-slippered foot slid on the ice that formed on the rocks. My stomach flew and the precipice loomed beneath me, white, foaming waves churning below.
Ursula, fast as a striking snake, grabbed me and steadied me. “Watch that step, Ami.”
I stared down at the waves. “You should have let me go. It would be fitting.”
She pushed me against the rock wall, the stones biting into my back, and gripped my shoulders, steely eyes sharp as a blade. “Never. I will never let you go. Neither will Andi.”
Andi’s face, gleaming with unholy joy as she plunged in the knife.
“Andi wouldn’t care.”
“She does.” Ursula’s fingers dug into my shoulders like talons. “I don’t care if you believe it or not. But she made me promise to see that you survive this blow. If not for us, if not for yourself, then live for the child you carry.”
“I’m still not sure that—”
“I don’t care if you’re convinced. I am certain enough for both of us. Now, can I trust you to walk up this Danu-cursed trail on your own, or do I have to truss and carry you?”
“You shouldn’t swear by Danu.”
“You’re not in a position to be giving me advice. Choose.”
I sagged, deeply chilled and ever so tired. Only her strength held me up. “I’ll go. Suicide is against Glorianna’s plan.”
“At least we have that.” Ursula’s tone held a hint of her usual dry wit, but she sounded tired, too. I hadn’t asked her how the last months had been for her, chasing Rayfe’s demonic armies through the Twelve Kingdoms, taking our father’s and Avonlidgh’s troops after the Tala, only to fail in the end.
Drained, feeling as empty as Hugh’s corpse, I still didn’t ask.
That night I lay alone in our huge bed, the fire casting lurid shadows against the looping lace above me. It seemed the satin rosettes, cunningly formed to echo Glorianna’s roses, mocked me with their loveliness. Outside the wind howled in the turrets. A full gale had hit just after Hugh’s burial, sealing us inside Windroven as surely as the castle’s dead were entombed below.
I curled on my side under the extra blankets my ladies had piled on. Surely I’d never be warm again. They’d covered the glazed windows with tapestries to keep out the chill, but the wind is clever. It snuck through, as it had snaked through the tombs. It seized me that Hugh would be cold down there, all alone.
Here I lay in our bed, while he had only the freezing comfort of stone and rotting roses. It gnawed at me. My fingers curled with the gut-wrenching need to tear the stones apart, to unbury him from the crushing weight of the tomb. He should be here with me, cuddling against my back.
The tapestry rippled, the wind clawing at it.
In a flurry, I hurtled out of the covers, pulling on my heavy velvet robe. It wasn’t mourning gray, but Hugh wouldn’t care. I burst into the anteroom, looking about for my boots. Ursula sat in a chair by the fire, a wine goblet dangling from her hand. She’d been staring at the flames, deep in some memory, but her keen gaze found me.
“Where are you going, Ami?” She spoke gently, as she had when Andi had been so afraid, when the Tala first found her.
I wrapped my arms around myself. “Where are my ladies?”
“Asleep. As you should be.”
“Why aren’t you?”
She grimaced. “Can’t. So I volunteered to sit with you.” “I’m not a baby who needs to be sat with.”
“You’re grieving, Amelia. People go out of their heads with it. There’s no shame in needing people around you.”
“What do you understand about it?” As if summoned by her words, the grief rose and caught me around the throat, choking my voice away.
“Enough that I’m not letting you go anywhere near those cliffs.”
“That’s not where I was going . . .”
She only gazed at me, eyes dark with sympathy, the salt scent of it soft on the air. I couldn’t say that I meant only to visit him, to keep him company. The wind howled, mocking me.
“I’m going back to bed.”
“Or you can sit with me by the fire. Have some wine and talk.”
She and Andi used to do that—sit up late after feasts and have long, wide-ranging conversations. First I was too young to stay up with them; then . . . Then what? I’d had better things to do, I’d thought. I starred in my own sonnet by the time I was twelve. After that it seemed there had always been some entertainment, some far more exciting thing to do. The court social life at Ordnung had circled around me and I’d loved it. So odd that I was the one left out now.
What would we talk about? I nearly asked her.
Instead I mutely shook my head and returned to my cold bed.
The sick hit me before I fully awoke. I managed to roll to my side, to at least spew on the floor, but only dry heaves racked me. When had I last eaten? I wasn’t even sure if it had been last night that I’d talked to Ursula by the fire. It might have been a dream.
Hearing me, my ladies rushed in, all dressed for the day, flowers looking toward spring. No extended mourning. The people of Avonlidgh give death its nod and move on. There’s always more work to be done.
Lady Dulcinor clucked in sympathy, tucking the pillows behind me and setting an empty washbasin on my lap. “Oh, Princess! So terrible how wan you are. It’s a tragedy for you to be widowed so very young. And poor Hugh! Cut down in his prime. They’re already writing the songs, I hear, of your tragic, young love.”
She babbled on. I nearly hurled the washbasin at her. Would have, but the surging queasiness hinted I might need it yet. Suddenly I understood why Andi had called her empty-headed.
One of the other ladies set coddled eggs, pickled fish, and some of my favorite jasmine tea on a lap tray. The scent curled into my gut, wrenching it in its sickly-sweet fragrance, and I gagged into the basin, coughing up bitter bile.
“Take that away,” Ursula ordered from the doorway. “Isn’t there a midwife around here?”
They gaped at her. No flower, she. Instead she wore her fighting leathers, a tall and lean woman, a hawk among doves. She looked haggard and I wondered if she’d slept at all.
“But Princess Amelia isn’t—” one of the younger ladies ventured.
“This is nonsense,” she snapped at them, making scooting motions with her hands. “The lot of you are useless. Go find a midwife or at least a castle woman who’s had the morning sicks. Someone who knows how to deal with this. Surely someone knows. Danu knows I don’t.”
“Get Dafne—the librarian.” I rolled my head on the pillow, damp with cold sweat.
Ursula raised an eyebrow. “You think she’ll know?”
“Really, Princess Ursula,” Dulcinor fluttered at her, “Lady Mailloux has no real royal status. She’s not fit for Princess Amelia’s—”
“Go get her.” Ursula jerked her head at the doorway. “And take that stinky tea with you.”
They darted out, songbirds scattering before the talons could strike them also. Ursula went to the water pitcher and poured some into a goblet, handed it to me, and took the basin away. She rinsed it out into the chamber pot and set it on my lap again.
“Drink the water,” she ordered.
“I’ll just puke it up.”
She shrugged. “Gives your stomach something to do. And some of it might soak in. Drink it—you look like hell.”
I nearly choked on the water. “I don’t think anybody has said that to me in my entire life.”
She grinned, tucking her thumbs in the waistband of her leather pants. “That’s what older sisters are for.”
Sipping the flat, metallic-tasting stuff, I stared into the dull gleam of the washbasin. It helped not to have the smell. Surprising that Ursula would know that.
“You don’t have to take care of me. If you hadn’t run my ladies out, they’d be doing this.”
“I don’t mind. I take care of myself most of the time. It’s not as if I can take handmaids to battle with me.”
I’d never thought about that. Ursula had always been . . . Ursula.
“I want you to come to Ordnung with me.” She tried to make it sound casual, but the steel in her gaze told me this wasn’t a suggestion.
“Why? Because you’re afraid I’ll do myself harm if you’re not here to watch me?”
“There are other reasons, but in a word, yes.”
At least she was honest.
“Is it me you’re worried about or this babe I’m carrying?”
“Right now you’re a package deal,” she returned evenly, not responding to the petulance I heard in my own voice. “At least you’re acknowledging that you’re with child.”
“I’m not, necessarily.” There. Stubborn felt better.
“How long since you’ve had your monthlies?”
“You know I’ve never been regular. I can’t ever keep track.” But a while, I thought. Months maybe? I’d been so afraid for Andi; then there was the kidnapping and Hugh leaving. Then the news. I’d hardly been thinking about my monthlies.
“Knock-knock?” Dafne stood in the doorway, burdened with a tray. “Am I interrupting?”
“No.” Ursula eyed her. “What did you bring?”
Dafne set the tray down and busied herself with a teapot. “I’ve sent for the village midwife. In the meantime, quick research says this gingerroot eases the morning sicks. I’ve also got some dry toast for you to nibble, Princess. Small bites, until your stomach settles.”
Dubious, I tried a bite. It was bland, but at least my gut didn’t rebel. The tea smelled a bit of the spiced cakes we always ate during Moranu’s Feast at midwinter, a thought that made me cringe, but the cramping sick didn’t rise to it. Feeling braver, I drank some, sighing as the comforting warmth relaxed my belly.
“Well done, librarian,” Ursula said. “She actually looks as if she might live.”
“I told you. Dafne knows everything.”
“No wonder Andi likes you.” Ursula gave her an approving nod.
“Because Andi never studied a day in her life? Yes.” I smiled, remembering, and Ursula grinned at me. Then I realized I’d forgotten, for a moment, to hate Andi. We all should hate her. “Thank you, Dafne. That will be all.”
Dafne curtsied and backed out with perfect manners, but she didn’t look properly humble. Just for show, then.
“There was no call to order her out like that.” Ursula folded her arms and frowned at me.
“She’s little better than a servant. You ordered my ladies out with less kindness.”
“They deserved it. Dafne helped you when she didn’t have to. And she is decidedly not a servant.”
“She’s probably Andi’s spy,” I grumbled, knowing I was being unreasonable but unable to help myself. I felt sick and miserable and alone. If Hugh were here, he’d gather me into his lap and hold me, stroking my hair and telling me over and over how much he loved me. Now nobody loved me. The knowledge knotted low in my throat, where all those unshed tears had lodged.
Ursula sighed, clearly out of patience. “I’ll send your ladies in to tend you. If the midwife says you can travel, I want to leave tomorrow. Day after, at the latest.”
She turned to go and I wanted to call her back. To apologize, of all things. But what for? She said she wanted to help me in my grief, but all she did was kick at me. Same as always.
“I’m not going!” I yelled that at her back instead.
“Yes, you are. As I outrank you, I’m commanding it.”
“That’s not fair. This is my castle!”
She ran a hand through her uneven auburn shag. “Danu—you sound like you’re five, not eighteen.”
I gasped, outrage filling me, and threw the teacup at her head with an incoherent scream. She plucked it neatly out of the air and I found myself gaping at her. She’d always been fast, but I hadn’t seen her hand move. Giving me that look, she poured more tea into the cup and set it on my tray.
“This is the second time I’m cutting you slack, Ami. This is a horrible thing for you to go through, and I know it’s our fault for always spoiling and petting you. Still, you’re going to have to find it in yourself to come through this. I can only do so much.”
She turned and closed the door behind her with a soft and significant click.
Furious, I hurled the teacup at the door, enjoying the satisfying smash of the delicate ceramic. For good measure I followed it with the plate of stupid toast. Then I flung myself on my pillows, willing myself to cry.
But the tears refused me.
I was as dry as stone.