The Fire Mages' Daughter Page 14

  Nothing could be done about the common soldiery, but the nobles at least could be kept from inflaming the fires of hearsay. With Arran in tow, I attended as many social events as I could, staying on various nobles’ country estates or driving to their town houses. Sometimes, my very presence was enough to dampen down the speculation. Other times, I would be taken aside for discreet questioning. I always told them the truth: that there might well be a campaign, but it was to be on our terms, and we were certainly not about to be invaded. I hinted that this was in the strictest confidence, because they were such a well-trusted member of the court. Naturally, each person I confided in would spread the word to everyone in their social circle. It seemed to help, and we staggered through the winter with the nobility, at least, kept calm.

  Winter melted into spring, which blossomed into summer, and still the army sat at home. Preparing, the official word went out. Dithering, was the real reason. The High Commander was new to her role, and more experienced in military theory than real campaigns. Zandara, too, was in an unaccustomed position of leadership. Both had a great deal riding on the outcome of the invasion for their own ambitions, but neither wanted to take that final decisive step.

  Yannassia said firmly that it was up to them, and expressed no impatience. I left them to it, for they never listened to me anyway. Zandara had openly ridiculed my report of the eagle’s harness, so I said no more about it, amusing myself with their indecision, as they invented excuse after excuse for the delay. And so the moons drifted away, and still the Clanlands remained free from invasion.

  Arran was my rock of support during all this. I found it was very pleasant to have him with me on formal occasions, walking one pace behind me, as was proper. Sometimes one of the other guests would look him up and down, and murmur behind their hands, “Very nice, dear! Lucky you!” and I couldn’t help agreeing with them.

  I was proud of him, looking so elegant in his new clothes, running about to fetch refreshments, to find this or that important person I wanted to speak to, and to ensure the carriage was summoned at the right moment. He would hold my hand as we drove home, and whisper nonsense in my ears.

  It was wonderful to retreat to our apartment each night, dismiss the servants and unwind from the stresses of the hours of sun. He would pour us each a glass of wine, and then he would listen attentively as I unburdened myself of all my life’s little irritants. He was a very soothing companion. He never expressed any opinions of his own, but he liked to hear mine.

  He would beam his roguish smile at me. “I am quite sure you are right, my love. It must be so. And how did he reply when you told him this?” And after an hour or so came the best part of every evening, undressing slowly, surreptitiously watching Arran’s manly form emerge from beneath his fashionable attire, and then snuggling up to him in bed. He wasn’t presumptuous, generally leaving it up to me whether we made love or not. Quite often I was happy just to kiss for a while and then fall asleep wrapped in his arms.

  I adored everything about him. I loved having a drusse of my own, someone whose sole function was to make me happy and be my friend and supporter in all things. He was expensive, though. He always wanted more silvers for clothes, or a fancy new sword, or better stabling for his horse, but he was worth it. I didn’t even mind the amount of time he spent training with his guard friends, so long as he was there when I needed him.

  Arran was a wonderful diversion, but he wasn’t enough to distract me from my little problem. My mother had gone, and I no longer needed her the way I had for so many years. That unnatural tie at least had been broken.

  But I still needed something, some ingestion of magic to fill the terrible emptiness inside me. Ly-haam’s power had worked, but he wasn’t available to me. His eagle was, however. She stayed nearby all winter, and I was constantly aware of her. Mostly she perched up in the crags of Candle Mountain, hunting in the fields to the west when she was hungry. But at night, she often came to the Keep, sitting up on the roof as if waiting for me.

  Since I couldn’t detect Ly-haam’s mind connected to hers, I felt safe in sneaking out to see her. And then the temptation to fly was overwhelming. Not just to fly, but to go to the Imperial City and wait for the arrival of the magical bird, that powerful infusion of energy that made me feel so good.

  I tried, truly I did, to resist it, but my willpower was weak. I would sneak out at night wearing my warmest winter riding clothes, and up we would go, gliding over the Keep, over the rooftops of the town, over the Shining Wall and into the main street of the Imperial City. I would get my fill of magic, and the eagle would carry me home again. It was foolish, and dangerous, yet even as I understood that, I was helpless to defy my own need.

  But one sun I accidentally found another way. I was in a meeting with Yannassia and her senior advisers, a very dull meeting, so my mind was wandering. I was restless, needing another dose of magic and wondering whether I would be able to slip away that night. There were four mages present, and their vessels distracted me. Ever since I’d first been to the Imperial City and been filled with magic, I’d been very aware of the sources of magic that all mages carried. Two of the four had the old-fashioned type of vessel, a carved piece of wood or stone or mineral which could be filled with magic during their secret renewal ceremony. These vessels carried only modest amounts of magic.

  But the other two wore the new form of vessel, a series of jade stones set into a belt worn next to the skin. Having several vessels multiplied the amount of magical power the mage could summon, and the jade stones were full of magic. I could count the number of stones each of them used, and I knew from the almost luminous strength of some of them that they’d recently been refilled.

  It almost drove me mad. There it was, exactly what I craved, calling to me seductively. I wanted those stones so badly, I almost felt it as a physical pain. The thought of it filled my mind, blotting out every other consideration. I had to sit on my hands to stop myself from reaching towards them.

  But if I could control my hands, just about, I couldn’t control my mind. Somehow, I reached out mentally for the magic in the stones. With a perceptible pop inside me, a little burst of magic shifted into me.

  I gasped, then immediately changed it to a cough, as Yannassia turned to stare at me.

  “Are you all right, Drina?” she asked, concern in her voice. “Take some wine. That will help.”

  A servant rushed forward with a glass and decanter, and poured for me. With the fuss over the wine, I managed to regain my composure without attracting too much attention.

  The best of it was, the jade stone which had released its magic to me was very little affected. Once the meeting resumed, and the elderly law scribe with the droning voice continued his report, I tried again and took a little magic from a different stone. Then another. And another.

  My energy levels were rising, and I stopped myself before I took enough to be noticed. There must have been a smile of triumph on my face, though, for Yannassia looked at me in bewilderment.

  “Drina, you are in a strange mood. Do you feel quite well?”

  “Perhaps she is pregnant,” Zandara said, turning her pale eyes on me.

  “She is certainly not pregnant,” Vhar-zhin said, with more force than the situation warranted, it seemed to me. “She would have told us.”

  “Of course I’m not,” I said. “And I am quite well, thank you.”

  I was very well indeed, if they had but known, positively overflowing with health. But I could no more explain to them than I could swim to the moon.

  ~~~~~

  I’d seen very little of Vhar-zhin since Arran had come back into my life. She’d been strange with me over the business with Lathran, almost hostile, but now it was as if she was avoiding me. When we met at Yannassia’s planning meetings, she said little and scuttled away quickly afterwards. At one time, she would always wait for me and we would have left together, arm in arm. Now, if I lingered to discuss fine points of strategy with Yannassia and Zandara,
when I emerged it was only Arran’s smiles which greeted me.

  Vhar-zhin and I attended many of the same social functions, but she was surrounded by a gaggle of waiting women, nobles who were haughtier than the Drashona herself, and looked down on me, the drusse-born daughter of a village rat. And I had Arran’s arm to hold on to, and no desire to let go of it. So we encountered each other often, but said little. I was sad about it, for we’d been close for a long time, but we had to grow up and move on. One sun, Vhar-zhin too would have a man to love.

  But then came the moonrose festival. One of the great noble houses had a moonrose garden, and held a party every year on the sixth brightmoon, when there was usually a good flowering. Guests wandered amongst the great stems, enjoying the unusually strong perfume, while eating, drinking and gossiping in vast amounts. Beneath the frivolity, the usual business of the nobility could be conducted – arranging alliances between the houses, or making business deals, or political manoeuvring, or simply the discreet exchange of information. The constant, but subtle, vying for position amongst the ruling factions. I could read it like a book.

  I had found myself a good station in the shade of a small pavilion, where I could observe the interactions without drawing attention to myself. And of course it gave me an excuse to stand quietly with Arran, whose arm had somehow found its way around my waist.

  Vhar-zhin, as well-trained as I by Yannassia, should have realised what I was doing and left me to it, or played rider for me – noticing when my observations were disrupted by other guests, and riding in to sweep them away. Instead, she disrupted me herself.

  “Drina! Such an age since we have talked. How are you? Is Arran taking good care of you?” She tittered a little, and her waiting women raised their fans to hide their smiles. In anyone else, I would have been suspicious about such behaviour, but this was Vhar-zhin, and I saw nothing.

  “And Arran! How are you?”

  He bowed politely to her, although not quite as respectfully as he might have done. His face was wary. I don’t think Vhar-zhin had ever addressed him directly before. I felt the first stirrings of alarm.

  He said nothing, and she went on in a rush. “And how is the baby?”

  “Baby?” I said, bewildered. “What are you talking about, Vhar?”

  Her hands flew to her mouth. “Oh, gods! You did not know! Oh, Drina, I am so sorry, so sorry!” And she turned and fled, her waiting women fluttering in a whisper of silk in her wake.

  “Baby?” I said coldly to Arran.

  He flushed, shuffling his feet. “It is… a long story.”

  “I have all evening. Let us find a quiet spot, and you can enlighten me.”

  He trailed miserably behind me. We found a quiet arbour, a secluded spot where in other circumstances I might have hoped for a few kisses, and some tender words. No chance of that now.

  “Now then,” I said, sitting, and smoothing out the long coat of my azai. “Tell me of this baby. You have a lover somewhere?”

  He licked his lips. “A wife.”

  “A wife! You are married?” Years of training couldn’t keep the shock from my face.

  He nodded.

  “How long? When?”

  Another pause. “Look, Drina… I…” He reached for my hand, but I moved it out of his reach.

  “Just tell me the tale, Arran.”

  A stronger nod. “It happened after… after I kissed you. Do you remember? I lost everything, Drina. I was dismissed from the Elite, I had no future, no work…”

  “You could have come to me. I would have arranged something.”

  “I did not like to beg. I went home for a while, to… to think about things. I was very bitter, though, and… I behaved foolishly. There was a woman I have known for years, a friend. She… comforted me and I got her pregnant. It was stupid, I realise that, but I was not thinking straight. I married her so that she would have the protection of my family. For the child. She should not suffer for my weakness.”

  I said nothing to that, but it had always seemed to me that an unexpected pregnancy involved a certain amount of weakness on both sides, not to mention carelessness over taking the herbs to prevent such things.

  “I came back here to try to resume my career,” he went on. “And I had the great good fortune to become your drusse, and, Drina, it is the best thing that has ever happened to me, you must believe that. I love every moment of our life together.”

  There was no doubting his sincerity. He reached for my hand again, and this time I allowed him to grasp it. A casual affair. An accident. Nothing more serious than that. Perhaps the woman had even trapped him into marriage by deliberately becoming pregnant. It was not as if the herbs were hard to come by. Yes, that must be it. Nothing to justify the lurching of my stomach, the tightness around my heart. No need for jealousy, it was me he loved, surely?

  A small, cold voice inside me pointed out that he’d never said so. He’d called me ‘his love’ and ‘his little flower’ and much other nonsense, and he’d certainly acted as if he loved me. Sometimes when I’d pressed him, he’d even said the words, sliding uneasily past them. “Of course I love you, my sweet one.” Not a wholehearted declaration.

  “Drina, there is no reason not to go on as we are, is there? You would never have married me anyway, so there is no reason why I should not have a wife.”

  “But you didn’t tell me. Why ever not?”

  “I was afraid to. In case it spoiled everything. It was all so… so perfect.”

  More than anything in the world, my heart wanted to believe him. Yet the courtier in me wasn’t convinced. An honest man would have told me everything, I knew that. He’d told me nothing, he’d hidden the truth and allowed me to go on thinking I was the only woman in his life. And once I saw that truth, naturally I wondered what else he wasn’t telling me.

  I’d never suspected – his behaviour had never given me cause for alarm – but Vhar-zhin had known. And how could she? A wife tucked away in some provincial town far from Kingswell? Had she gone looking for trouble on my behalf? Or—

  “She is with your family at Hexmore, your wife?”

  And there at last in his eyes was guilt. “No.” His voice was barely above a whisper. “It seemed best for her to be here. For the sake of the child.”

  “I want to meet her.”

  “Drina, no!”

  “You can stay with her tonight, I’m sure she will be pleased to have your company. Tomorrow, after the noon board, you can take me to meet her.”

  He blanched, but he could hardly refuse.

  ~~~~~

  His wife was a pretty little thing, pale and plump, and several years older than me. Arran had provided her with a few rooms above a carpenter’s workshop, and a couple of servants. In a way, it was a relief to know that the extra silver I’d given him had been spent this way, instead of on frivolities.

  She wore her best clothes to meet me, and she smirked insolently, which infuriated me. Her bow was not at all as respectful as it should have been.

  Then she lifted the baby from his cot to show me, grinning the whole time. Such a tiny baby. No more than a couple of ten-suns old, and clearly no accident from early last year.

  The secrecy I could, perhaps, have overlooked. The lies I could not.

  Arran understood all too well. He said nothing, but the regret was unmistakable in his face.

  “So,” I said, leaving the word to hang there like a sword.

  He lowered his head, cornered. Even then, seeing the misery oozing from him, I wanted to kiss it all away, to take him home with me again and pretend none of this had happened. But it was impossible. I was the Drashona’s daughter and I could not trust him.

  “I am legally obliged to provide for you until the end of our contract,” I told him. “I do not want you in the Keep, but I will pay the costs of your establishment here. I will have your things boxed up and sent to you.”

  “I am so sorry,” he whispered.

  Undoubtedly he was. And so was
I.

  ~~~~~

  Two suns later, the army marched north at last, and Kingswell fell into a frenzy of patriotism as news filtered back of the success of the expedition. Everyone was swept into triumphant celebration.

  Everyone except me. I crawled through the long hours of military reports and huge feasts, longing only for the night to come so that I could wrap myself in my grief and cry myself to sleep. The big bed seemed so empty without Arran’s long limbs and easy affection. False affection, I knew that now.

  How could I have been so stupid? The nobility was littered with the broken hearts of those who thought a drusse or spouse or lover was theirs, only to discover the painful truth later. Those in positions of power were targets for ambitious men and women, undoubtedly. Why had I thought I was an exception to that? I prided myself on my judgement, yet I’d fallen for such a common trick. No doubt he’d intended something of the sort right from the start, when he’d first kissed me. No bodyguard should be so presumptuous. I should have seen that.

  So stupid.

  Only one matter was urgent enough to intrude on my misery. I began to need an infusion of magic. Some of the mages had noticed that their supply was lower than expected, and that had caused a stir. So I turned back to my earlier source. My eagle still sat atop the Keep each night, but she carefully came only when it was full dark, more difficult in these shorter nights of high summer. I would have to time my expedition carefully to be back before the first hint of dawn. I didn’t want any awkward questions asked about giant birds seen above the Keep.

  The thought of so much magic inside me was exciting. It was the first time since Arran had left that I’d looked forward to anything. Even so, I was cautious. It was three nights before I was satisfied that the guards on duty were sufficiently lax to allow me to get out and back in the time available. Then I donned my riding gear, and slipped out to the roof.