The High King's Tomb by Kristen Britain
“I don’t see why Zachary has decided to entertain these crude beasts,” Richmont murmured. “Instead of negotiating trade with them, he should just send some soldiers over and claim whatever it is he wants from them.”
Estora sighed. Conquest was Richmont’s answer to everything. “The ways of the Huradeshian people are not our own.”
“That’s because ours is a cultured, moral society.”
“Our differences do not necessarily mean we are better than they, nor that we should start a war with them.”
“War? Who said anything about war? We could just take what we need.”
Estora shook her head. Her cousin would never see things in any other light, so there was no use in arguing with him.
During the reception that followed, servants wove among the guests offering food and wine. As usual, Estora was hemmed in by clinging ladies asking questions about wedding plans that she had grown heartily weary of answering. She did not feel like responding at all, but her mother had trained her well, and she maintained a smile—though it did not reach her heart—and responded to the questions with courtesy.
“What color will the gown be, my dear?” old Lady Creen asked.
“Cobalt, for the clan,” Estora said.
“A harsh color for a bride.” Several ladies nodded in agreement with Lady Creen.
“It is tradition in Coutre Province,” Estora said. From the corner of her eye, she saw Zachary near the throne, his attention dominated by Yusha Lewend and a group of gentlemen. They were all staring at the ceiling. It was an almost comical sight until she realized he must be explaining the significance of the portraits of his predecessors painted there. Soon she too would sit there, beside Zachary on a queen’s throne, with the rulers of the past peering down on her as if in judgment. Would she meet their approval? She shuddered.
Actually, she was more worried about what Zachary would think on their wedding night when he realized she wasn’t—
“—picked a day yet?” Lady Creen inquired.
Estora brought her attention back to those who encircled her. “No, though the moon priests are leaning toward the summer solstice, Day of Aeryon.”
There was much murmuring and nods of approval among the ladies. Again from the corner of her eye, she glimpsed the man Richmont had named Amberhill roving among loose groupings of people, a goblet in his hand, and a charming smile on his face as he greeted those he knew.
The ladies were discussing the advantages and disadvantages of a solstice wedding when Estora politely extricated herself and edged through the crowded throne room in a path she hoped would lead to Amberhill. Courtesy required her to pause and exchange greetings with those who wished to speak to her, but with a deftness acquired over a lifetime of banquets and receptions in her father’s manor house, she was able to keep moving while appearing to be attentive to all she encountered. As she went, she overheard snippets of conversation.
“The price of silk has—”
“—heard that the council in D’Ivary has already chosen a successor—”
“I want to leave now.”
“Rumor has it that the Raven Mask has returned to burgle—”
“—filthy barbarians coming half naked before decent folk.”
Estora forged on, keeping her eye on Amberhill, but somehow he always managed to slip farther away. Then she came to a clearing near the fringes of the crowd, and she hurried, without seeming to, to approach him. He was currently engaged in conversation with two elderly ladies who were giggling and fanning themselves like schoolgirls. He had a devilish glint in his eyes as he regaled them with some tale.
Estora paused to consider why she was pursuing him like this. She supposed it was to thank him for his kindness that morning when Karigan upset her so. But inside, she knew it was more, that she was drawn by the mystery of who he was. His kindness and handkerchief would be an excuse to speak with him and learn more.
She lifted her skirts to approach him when someone touched her arm. “My lady?”
Estora turned to find Zachary beside her, accompanied by Yusha Lewend, his interpreter, and the most wrinkled crone she had ever seen. The crone gazed at her with one sharp green eye. The other was opaque with blindness. She clung to Yusha Lewend’s arm, and was dressed in a more subdued fashion than the other Huradeshians, in somber grays. A round emerald stone tied around her neck with a leather thong was the only adornment she wore. The emerald matched her eye. Was this Yusha Lewend’s mother? Estora curtsied.
“Yusha Lewend wishes to meet you,” Zachary said, “and the lady is Meer Tahlid, a wisewoman of the tribe.”
Estora nodded respectfully, which made the wisewoman smile broadly. Gold teeth glinted in the late afternoon sunshine that streamed through the tall windows. Yusha Lewend started rattling off something in his own tongue, and Estora glimpsed Amberhill on his way out of the throne room. Somehow aware of her gaze on him, he smiled at her before passing through the entrance.
“Yusha Lewend expresses that such beauty is rare and he is honored to be in its presence. A gift of your sun goddess, no doubt.”
Estora jerked her attention back to those who stood before her. Astonishingly, Meer Tahlid started weaving back and forth, muttering, a hand held to her forehead and the other grasping her emerald. Both Zachary and Estora looked at her in alarm, but Yusha Lewend appeared unconcerned.
“The wisewoman can see many things ordinary souls cannot,” the interpreter explained. “These seeings sometimes come on her suddenly.”
Then, in a high-pitched voice, Meer Tahlid spoke in a rush. Both Yusha Lewend and the interpreter glanced at Estora. When the woman stopped weaving and speaking, she smiled again like a benevolent grandmother who had no idea of what just transpired.
The interpreter and Yusha Lewend conferred for a moment before the interpreter finally said to Zachary, “Meer Tahlid has had a seeing, Your Highness. She said you must guard your treasure well, for men are greedy and will want what does not belong to them.”
“My…treasure?”
The interpreter gazed significantly at Estora. “Meer Tahlid saw that one would try to steal your lady from you.”
Zachary gazed at Estora as if seeing her for the first time. “I will not permit that to happen.”
Long after most of the castle’s human inhabitants settled into their beds for a night of rest and dreaming, and most lamps along the corridors were extinguished or turned down to a low ambient glow, a white cat emerged from the dusty, unused corridor that joined the section being reinhabited by Green Riders.
At first all the activity had frightened the cat, who had watched from the shadows, around doorways, and from behind suits of armor, but being a cat, his fear soon was overcome by curiosity and so he investigated, over the course of weeks, this intriguing new world created by the Riders. Not only was it a feast to his senses of smell and hearing, but it was warm. If there were embers still burning in the common room’s hearth and no Riders in sight, he’d settle down before it on the hearth rug, stretched out to his full length.
Tonight, however, there was another sort of warmth he sought.
When he arrived at the door, he found it slightly ajar. He butted it open with his head and slipped inside, pausing, his tail in a low sweep from side to side as he looked around. A candle next to the bed was close to sputtering out, and the human was sprawled under a blanket breathing deeply, an open ledger and some papers scattered atop her chest.
The cat rubbed his full body length against the corner post of the bedframe, then lightly jumped up, walking so carefully, as only cats can, that he did not rumple the papers or inadvertently awaken the human. He curled up on the human’s long brown hair, which was splayed across the pillow. His brethren might catch more vermin down below and have full bellies by morning, but he preferred sleeping with the warm living humans rather than the cold husks of the dead.
The cat’s eyes were beginning to close when suddenly he felt a tingling along his whiskers and down
Sometimes the cat saw the spirits as solid entities, and sometimes only as mere points of light. This one materialized as a smoky figure that wavered in spectral air currents. A gold brooch gleamed on his chest and he carried a bow in his hands. There was some armor and other weapons, and a horn slung at his hip. He had the look of a Green Rider, but the cat really didn’t care about any of that. To him, it was just another spirit among the many that inhabited the castle.
The spirit drifted in the air for a time, gazing down at the human in her bed, who snored away as obliviously as any of her kind in the presence of a ghost. What this one’s purpose was, the cat could not divine. What prompted any spirit to haunt the living world when they could be resting peacefully instead? It was a mystery, but not one the cat wasted time puzzling over. To his mind, it was more imperative to find his next meal and decide where to take his afternoon nap.
But then the Green Rider ghost did something unusual, something none of the other spirits had ever done: he spoke to the cat. I think, he said, you know what she is.
The cat’s eyes widened in surprise, but as the words faded, so did the spirit, its smoky form seeping away until the cat’s whiskers no longer tingled.
The cat, of course, could not speak the human tongue, nor did he understand most of it, so the words of the spirit came to him as gibberish. That a spirit addressed him? Now that was curious, but not likely to change his life overmuch.
He yawned and stretched, more interested in sleep than the inscrutable ways of humans or their ghostly counterparts. All he knew was that he chose to sleep with this particular human because, though she was alive, there was something about her that was not so far removed from the dead, which made him feel right at home.
DEPARTURE
Karigan’s breath fogged upon the crisp autumn air as she strode across the castle grounds toward the Rider stables with her saddlebags thrown over her shoulder and a bedroll and greatcoat tucked under her arm. Frosted grass crunched underfoot. The frost would melt off quickly as the morning sun rose above the castle walls.
She couldn’t wait to ride, to escape the castle grounds, to move toward a goal and leave behind all the talk of wedding preparations. Distance would make everything easier. Distance would remove her from King Zachary and all the feelings he made roil within her. She would go away, and by the time she returned, she would be over him.
And maybe, just maybe, Alton would have come to his senses by then.
Now she wouldn’t have to concern herself about either man. She had a journey ahead and tasks laid out before her. Each task would carry her farther away, and the day-to-day needs of her journey would occupy her thoughts. She never knew what a relief a message errand could be.
She rolled her shoulders to loosen the tension in them, her stride never slackening till she reached the Rider stables. Outside she found Connly helping Fergal Duff strap his saddlebags to the saddle on an older gray mare retired from the light cavalry, who stood dozing with eyes closed and nose sinking toward the ground.
“Morning, Karigan!” Fergal cried.
Though it wasn’t terrifically early in the morning, his enthusiasm grated on her. “Morning,” she replied, more subdued.
Connly straightened and slapped the mare on her neck. “Sunny’s all ready, Fergal. Good luck on your first errand.”
“Thank you, sir!”
“What brings you out this morning?” Karigan asked Connly.
He shrugged. “Just thought I’d help see you off. Since you’ve been filling in for Mara, someone has to fill in for you.”
“True.” The job of helping Riders off on message errands belonged to the Chief Rider, but since Mara was confined to the mending wing, the task had fallen to Karigan.
“Condor’s all tacked up inside,” Connly said, jabbing his thumb over his shoulder toward the entrance to stables.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me,” he said with an enigmatic smile. “I’m not the only one who came out this morning.”
Curious, Karigan headed into the stable. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the gloom, but when they did, she found Condor hooked up to cross-ties in the center aisle, all groomed and tacked. Captain Mapstone cradled one of his hooves in her hands, inspecting it. Condor gave Karigan a perky whinny of greeting, and the captain released his hoof and straightened.
“Hello,” Karigan said in surprise. It was unusual for the captain to see off any of her Riders. Usually she was too busy attending the king or sitting in on meetings.
The captain dusted her hands off on her trousers. “Good morning!”
“His hooves all right?” Karigan stroked the big chestnut’s nose and he bobbed his head.
“Perfect. He’s in fine fettle, and seems anxious for his journey to begin. Speaking of which…” And the captain smiled. “You wouldn’t happen to have some space to spare in one of your saddlebags, would you?”
Karigan did not, for she had packed extra layers of clothes to contend with the colder weather, but she’d make room, for she could guess why the captain asked.
“Certainly,” she said.
The captain’s smile brightened. “Wonderful.” She walked over to a bale of hay sitting against the wall and picked up a package bound in paper and string, as well as a message satchel. “Just a few things for Melry. Er, don’t get it too near a campfire—there’s some chocolate in it from Master Gruntler’s.”
Karigan chuckled. Melry, or Mel as the captain’s adopted daughter preferred to be called, would be thrilled. Master Gruntler was the premier confectioner in Sacor City, and Mel often spent any currency she earned in his shop. Currently, Mel was attending Selium, and Karigan would be sure to visit with her there. She took the package from the captain and rummaged through one of her saddlebags to make room. She then hitched the bulging pouches to Condor’s saddle and lashed on her bedroll.
The captain handed her the message satchel. The leather was well scarred and worn, but the emblem of the winged horse punched into its flap remained unmarred. Karigan crossed the strap over her shoulder so that the pouch fell comfortably against her right hip, opposite her saber.
“There’s a letter for Melry in the satchel,” the captain told her, “as well as the messages for lords Fiori and Mirwell, and the certificate of purchase for horses, which you will present to Damian Frost. Along your journey, Arms Master Gresia has asked that you run through some sword exercises with Fergal.”
Karigan nodded.
“He’s also written and mathematical exercises to keep him occupied during the evenings. Ty says he’s coming along fine, but he should keep practicing. He’d like you to assist as you can.”
Karigan resisted the impulse to sigh. While she knew this would be a training journey for Fergal, she hadn’t expected to play the role of instructor. She reminded herself that most Riders, unlike herself, came to the messenger service without an education of any kind. If they were to bear the king’s messages, they needed to learn courtly etiquette; to read, write, and figure; and to ride and fight. It was a lot to learn all at once, and Karigan had been fortunate to have good schooling behind her when she had finally answered the call. As she thought about it, it occurred to her that she knew nothing of Fergal’s background, not even where he was from. She supposed she now had time to find out.
“Any questions?” the captain asked.
Karigan mulled it over for a moment. “I don’t think so, but…”
“But?”
“If something should happen, if Mornhavon should return and magic were to become unreliable again…” The thoughts ran continuously in the back of her mind. When would he return? What would they do?
“The king
Karigan nodded, pleased by the implicit trust in her words. She unhitched Condor from the cross-ties and started to lead him out when the captain stopped her with a hand on her arm.
“One more thing. I realize you’ve been involved closely with all that has happened with the wall and Blackveil, but I don’t want you to think of it as your personal responsibility. You’ve done this kingdom an astonishing service by securing us the time to prepare for Mornhavon’s return. Free your heart of the weight of such concerns. If Mornhavon returns, he returns, and we will cope with it best as we can. In the meantime, you are a Green Rider with tasks set before her. Think only of those tasks, for others are shouldering the responsibility of coping with the threat Mornhavon poses.”
It was an unusual speech from the captain, and only after hearing it did Karigan realize how much of the problem of Mornhavon and ending the threat he represented she had taken upon herself. The captain’s words reassured her she wasn’t alone, easing the burden. She could be an ordinary Green Rider for once with delivering messages as her sole duty. And looking after Fergal, of course.
“Thank you,” she said.
“It was never really yours to worry about in the first place—it’s the responsibility of your king and his advisors. Trust me, one day when you’re an officer, you’ll have more than enough to worry about.”
Karigan couldn’t tell from the captain’s expression whether or not she was joking. It had never even occurred to her to contemplate becoming an officer…
“You’d better get going,” the captain said, gazing through the stable doors. “Fergal is mounted and looks ready to ride off without you.”
Karigan led Condor outside where, indeed, Fergal sat astride Sunny, and in his eagerness, was trotting her around in circles.