by Grace Martin
I wondered if he felt like I did, like the blocks of history were falling into place. He nodded, that charming lock of hair falling forward again, in a way that would fascinate generations in Kiaran. I wondered if Kiaran was his son or his nephew or his brother, but it didn’t matter, really. I had to leave. In twenty years’ time, if I was lucky, I might meet him again, and by then I might be nicer and so might he.
He rose to his feet and drew his sword. His expression was so serious, for a terrible moment I feared that he hadn’t paid attention to a single word I’d said, but then he saluted me with his sword and opened the door. He preceded me into the room and went to stand by the bed, where the King was sleeping.
That was as much trust as I needed from him.
The King’s belt was looped over a chair by the bed, the little key on its chain still attached to the belt. I took the key and went over to the cupboard. I begged Umbra to be quiet and dark ‒ if she woke the King, I would never be able to convince him that I was anything but the Imposter Bach Chwaer and he would never forgive either me or Aine. I lay my hand over the lock before I inserted the key in case there was some kind of alarm. Umbra was so close to me that I felt her warmth through the lock and the power that passed between us melted away the spell that protected her. I put the key in the lock and turned it.
Umbra was there, quiet and dark as I’d requested but almost giddy with joy. I probably surprised Andras with what I did next. I reached up and behind me to take the pins out of my hair and put them in my pocket. I looped my hair into a roll then took Umbra from her stand and stuck her into my hair like the hair pin I’d thought she was when I first saw her.
It was all she could do to keep from winking with delight to be back in her old, familiar place. I felt like I was suddenly balanced, like I hadn’t realised how off-balance I’d felt without her until the moment I had her back again. I gave Andras a radiant smile and he looked a little stunned.
‘Thank you,’ I whispered as farewell, ‘from me, from Umbra, from Elisabeth, and even from Aoife, although she’d sooner die than say it.’
I went to the window I’d flown from earlier in the day, opened it, turned into an owl and flew away.
Although the journey wasn’t as long as an owl as it had been in a lumbering cart accompanied by thirty soldiers, and in the ship, but it was still too far to go in one flight. I stopped and roosted a few times, but I was out under the moonlight and Umbra was with me. I stopped for a proper rest for a few hours when the sun rose, not bothering to change my shape and roosting in a tree, turning my head to rest my feathered cheek against the bark. I only needed a short nap. When I woke up, I changed myself into falcon to take advantage of the day as well as the night and flew further.
I arrived three days later, invigorated by my time under the moonlight, both in the few hours when the moon shone at night before it set, and in the daytime hours when the moon was nearly as high in the sky as the sun. While I wasn’t ready to kill a dragon, I suspected I never would be, and this was probably as good as it was going to get. I’d spent part of my time during the flight calculating how many days it had been since Aine and I had left Rheged. Tomorrow, Darragh would make his demand.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Something made me reconsider changing my shape when I approached Rheged. There’s something morbid, I suppose, that’s in each of us. If we’re really honest, we have to admit that we’d like to know what would be said at our funerals, who would attend, who would be really sad and who would surprise us.
So, I kept my bird shape, just changed to a sparrow and winged my way across the city. Aoife was due to be given to Darragh the next day and the city was in mourning. Everywhere I flew, I saw people with sooty spirals drawn on their cheeks and wearing tattered clothes, every window draped in black. At the palace it was the same. Even the guards, though dressed in immaculate uniforms as always, had painted their faces with grief.
I was a bit surprised. Aoife hadn’t struck me as the kind of person who would inspire this kind of loyalty.
There was some kind of audience in progress when I flew into the throne room. The Empress was on her throne, wearing a black gown and painted face the same as everyone else in the room. Beneath the patterns on her face, she looked pale and the spirals were stained where tears had tracked through them. Beside her, on the throne that Aine had once occupied, was Caradoc. Aoife’s throne, my throne, remained empty.
If the Empress looked haggard, Caradoc looked like the bottom had dropped out of his world. His whole face was discoloured where the soot had been riven by tears and wiped away, over and again. His hair was wild again and he was unshaven.
I can’t tell you what that meant to me. I just can’t. Sparrows can’t cry.
I waited until the audience was over and followed Caradoc back to his room. I nipped inside, just as he closed the door behind him, and changed back to my own shape. I didn’t want to have this moment in the throne room. I wanted this moment to be private, because it felt so special I thought I might burst.
‘Caradoc?’ I said, to draw his attention.
He turned, but he didn’t whip around. He turned politely, slowly and I felt off balance for a moment, because I thought I’d be in his arms the moment he saw me.
‘Emer?’ he asked. His lower lip quivered and tears sprang to his eyes. He closed them to keep the tears in. ‘Emer, I miss you so much,’ he whispered.
‘Then why are you still over there?!’ I demanded.
His eyes snapped open. He looked confused. ‘You aren’t a dream?’ he asked.
‘Would a dream be this bad tempered?’
‘Oh, God, Emer!’ he cried and then I was in his arms.
He clutched me to him, sobbed into my shoulder, my hair, ran his hands over me and clutched me again. He wept, he cried my name, he even shook me.
‘Where the hell have you been? I thought you were dead! The Empress thought you were dead! The whole country is in mourning for you! How could you do this to us?’
‘Obviously, I’m not dead,’ I snapped. ‘And I’d hope that I’ve been honest enough with you that you know I wouldn’t have done anything like that of my own accord. I was taken away from you, I would never have willingly-’
All of a sudden, memories of that night the scouts captured us, the suffocating feeling of being pushed into the earth, rose up to swamp me and I struggled out of his arms. He came towards me again and I backed away until I hit the wall. I cried out involuntarily.
That stopped him, brought him up short. ‘Emer, I’m not hunting you,’ he snapped. ‘I was glad to see you, for God’s sake!’
‘So much for all your fine words,’ I snapped back. ‘You said if loving me meant that you couldn’t ever touch me, you could accept that. I might have known a sentiment like that wouldn’t last any longer than it took to get your hands on me!’
‘What?’ He turned away from me and ran his hands through his hair, messing it up even more. He sat on the edge of the bed and stared at me for the longest time. A dozen emotions chased their way across his face, a dozen times he opened his mouth to speak and silenced himself. I was ready for angry words, but he surprised me, then. He bent his head into his hands and started to cry.
‘Caradoc,’ I cried softly, ‘oh, please, don’t!’
But it seemed like once he’d opened the floodgates, there was no damming the flood again. I knelt before him, all my fears forgotten in the horror of seeing him cry. I put my hand tentatively on his knee for a moment then drew my hand away. ‘Caradoc, please.’ I thought I’d cry too.
‘I thought you were dead,’ he told me, looking down into my face. ‘I thought ‒ I couldn’t bear it. I wasn’t alive without you. It was like the sun had gone out.’ He wiped away his tears. ‘I’d die for you, Emer, I wouldn’t even hesitate. You’re everything to me. I never meant to frighten you. If anyone ever hurt you again, I’d kill them, I swear to God I would.’
I drew back suddenly, once again back in that awful
night and it was even blacker because I couldn’t tell him now, could I? But he saw the movement.
‘What?’ he asked. ‘What made you respond so sharply to that?’ If anything, his face went paler. ‘Oh, God, Emer, what happened to you?’
I looked away. ‘We were captured,’ I said. That part would come to light sooner or later. People would notice that Princess Aine had gone over to the other side, if not now, then certainly when she was crowned the Dark Queen. ‘I escaped.’
Caradoc stared at me, like he was trying to read my mind. ‘And what happened, Emer?’ he asked, his eyes full of tears and pity.
I hated the pity. I didn’t want his pity. I stood up and went over to the window. I didn’t want to be kneeling at his feet, certainly when I said the ugly things I was going to have to say. I’d hoped that I wouldn’t have to tell him, but how could I avoid it?
He’d notice, sooner or later, that I was even more skittish than ever. He’d notice that I couldn’t accept the kind of intimacies I’d been able to accept that night on the roof, and he’d wonder why I couldn’t let him anywhere near me anymore. He might not realise why. He might think I didn’t love him. He might think I’d fallen in love with someone else. He might think I’d accepted his kisses and caresses that night on the roof out of a sense of obligation and painful generosity, and it would sour one of his most beautiful memories. In the end we’d fall apart. I wasn’t going to let six soldiers I’d never see again in my life ruin my future with Caradoc.
When I spoke, it was matter of fact. ‘There were soldiers,’ I said. ‘They came upon us on the road at night. They assaulted us and they took us to Camaria.’
Caradoc stared, then shook his head like it was unthinkable ‒ well, it was. He drew in a shuddering breath and pressed his hand over his mouth like he was going to throw up. From behind his hand, I heard him moan, ‘No, Emer!’
He flung himself off the bed and pounded his fist into the door with all his might. Every muscle strained with anger and despair. I threw myself between him and the door, so he didn’t hurt himself anymore. Already his knuckles were bleeding and disfigured. I didn’t have much healing magic, but I had enough for this. I mended the bones and tissues, holding his hand gently while he shook with the effort of controlling himself.
‘Emer, it’s not right, it’s not fair, after everything you’ve been through-’ his voice tore away and his chest heaved as he drew in a painful breath.
‘As you kept telling me, we’re at war. This kind of thing happens in war.’
‘Tell me where they are. Tell me who they are and I’ll kill them for you.’
I shook my head. ‘I need you here.’
‘Tell me where and who they are!’ he shouted suddenly, making me jump. ‘I’ll kill them for me. My Emer ‒ Emer…’ He tilted his head back like he wanted to scream at the sky.
I closed both my hands around his fist. ‘I’m here, isn’t that what matters? That I survived and came home to you?’
‘Of course that matters.’ He looked down at me again, examining my every feature. While they’d hurt me badly, I’d hardly had a bruise to show for it after Andras healed me. I’d always thought, if it ever happened again, I’d scream, that I’d kill the man who dared to touch me without my consent, but from the moment they touched me, I went silent, and it was like I was thirteen again with no way out. I’d let it all happen, and that was one thing I could never tell Caradoc, because the only person who could ever understand that was Elisabeth, and maybe, now, Aine. It was like I let myself die for those hours, until it was over and life could resume and dead girls don’t scream.
‘Then kiss me, Caradoc.’ He looked at me like I was mad and maybe I was, because I wasn’t even sure if I could tolerate any kind of touching from anyone. I tried to explain myself. ‘I want to feel something beautiful.’
He didn’t wrap his arms tight around me or crush me. I was standing between him and the door and he turned so that his back was to the door and I could flee if I wanted. I put my hands on his chest ‒ maybe a kiss right now was the right thing, because it felt completely right to touch him like this. He put his hands over mine where they rested against his chest, so gently I could barely feel the touch, and lowered his head.
He was so gentle, even his lips trembling as they caressed mine. I could taste his tears. It was long moments before I realised I was tasting my own tears too. He brushed his lips over my cheeks, over my eyes and I felt the odd texture of the soot on his face as his lips caressed me.
And I wasn’t afraid. Not for one moment, because this was Caradoc and no man who could hurt me could kiss me like that.
He whispered soft words to me: that he loved me; that I was everything to him; that he would do anything, anything, anything for me, I only had to say the word. I slid my hands around the back of his neck and stepped sideways, drawing him with me. His hands caressed my arms with barely-there touches. The back of my legs bumped into the bed. I drew away from him further and lay down on the bed.
‘Show me love, Caradoc,’ I whispered.
He couldn’t resist that and followed me onto the bed.
I thought, this might work, this might really work. I felt like I was flying. Caradoc was gentle beyond words, but passion was taking hold of him, and every bold, foolhardy caress I gave and received was one step closer to a reality I wasn’t ready for. When he moved over me, careful to keep his weight on his arms and slid his thigh slowly between mine, I realised that I was fooling myself.
‘No!’ I cried and jerked myself up the bed. I drew my legs up to my body and covered my face with my hands ‒ I might as well because I wasn’t actually seeing anything in that room. I was seeing a road by moonlight and shadow; I was seeing a little girls’ bedroom in Cairnagorn. I couldn’t let him touch me there and for a moment I hated him, because why would he want to touch me when it would only hurt me?
Caradoc rolled off me so quickly I had to recognise that he’d been waiting for this. ‘It’s all right,’ he whispered. ‘I promise it’s all right, Emer, nothing needs to happen.’ He took hold of one of my hands and kissed every finger. ‘I’m not going to hurt you, Emer. I promise.’ He reached up to stroke my wild hair away from my face. ‘You wanted love ‒ this is love, Emer. This is love where we can be together and listen to each other, talk to each other. This is love that is willing to wait until it will be beautiful for both of us.’
I stared at him. I was still frightened. My heart was still pounding, but I trusted him and I loved him so much. I threw myself towards him and he held me in a gentle embrace that demanded nothing and gave everything, until I fell asleep.
I cried out in horror when I awoke in the night and realised I wasn’t alone. Caradoc was startled awake, but he rallied valiantly with soothing words that brought me back to the present. Once I was calm, he swung his legs over the side of the bed and started pulling on his boots.
‘What are you doing?’ I asked.
He looked over his shoulder at me. ‘I’ve got to get to work,’ he said and in the moonlight I saw the flash of a reckless smile.
‘Work?’
‘Work, my own darling one. And you, too.’
I tried to think what he meant. I had a dragon to face today, but there was nothing I could do ahead of time except get a good night’s sleep. I tried to point this out, even waving a finger under his nose.
He caught my finger and kissed it. ‘I’m sorry, my darling Emer, but you’re wrong. I’ve just had a fantastic idea how you can prepare for today.’
‘There isn’t much that sounds better than a good night’s sleep,’ I griped, but I got up none the less. ‘I thought you were asleep.’
‘I was asleep, but if you think you’re not as much in my mind when I’m asleep as when I’m awake then you and I have a lot to talk about.’
I kissed his cheek for that. He went very still, like he was storing up the moment to remember it. When I drew back, he put up his hand to cover his cheek as if to hold the kiss there. Then
he grinned. ‘I’ll have to shave,’ he murmured. ‘Don’t want to give you whisker burn, do we?’
And I was glad it was dark, because I blushed like Aine would have. I got dressed again and wound my hair into a knot, securing it with what Caradoc didn’t know was Umbra. When I was ready, Caradoc grabbed my hand and pulled me through the castle at a lope.
‘Where are we going?’ I asked in a whisper.
‘You’re going to get some support,’ he said. He cast me that reckless grin again and I had a sense of what he must have been like fighting in the rebellion against the Empress. ‘I know some people.’
He took me through dark passages I hadn’t even seen when I was a featherskin. They grew smaller and more tortuous and I started to wonder if even the Empress was aware of half these passages. When he opened a door that led to the street outside the palace, I was pretty sure that the Empress didn’t have any idea that Caradoc had an alternate way into the palace.
We didn’t slow down until we had been going through the city for a good twenty minutes. We’d passed through the rich plazas and wide streets around the palace. Now we were in the poorer areas, where the public squares were used for commerce, collecting water and the politics of living, instead of simply a place to see and be seen. At this hour it was deserted, but Caradoc didn’t hesitate.
He ran up the steps to the well in the centre of the square and rang a bell that sliced through the night air. He gestured for me to join him at the top of the stairs. ‘Put on a show with me, darlin’ and you’ll have every Camiri in Rheged behind you tomorrow.’
I stared at him, remembering the star of power the young magi had used in the Halls of the Young. It had never occurred to me that I could use the power of the Camiri in the city.
They came quickly, running into the square with torches and candles to light their way, many of them armed with swords and just as many armed with wands. They all seemed to recognise Caradoc and greeted him with a cheer.
‘Brothers and sisters!’ Caradoc shouted when they quieted down. ‘Today I bring you hope like we have never known before!’
