Mist Rising

by Eve Langlais

  “But now?”

  “I hear he possesses a vast library. I want access to it. I and my Soraers.”

  “That’s a large request.”

  “With a valid reason behind it. I need to learn more about our world. Gain an understanding of the mist. The monsters. The Vhampirs. After all, this spilling of the fog over the rim has happened before. Our history holds the answer.”

  “And I told you, the King’s scholars have already looked. There isn’t a book that hasn’t been read multiple times. There is nothing that can be done other than to keep fighting.”

  “Obviously. Giving up isn’t an option. But why are you so sure nothing can be done? Have you ever heard the monster poem?” she ventured, wondering if he’d even heard of it.

  “Are you speaking of the rhyme sung by children? What about it?”

  “What if I told you it’s actually a prophecy.”

  He snorted. “I’d say you’re grasping. It’s a song to play games, nothing more.”

  “Denigrate all you want. I am keeping an open mind because some of us want to do something,” was her pert reply.

  “Glad to hear you think I’m not doing anything important.”

  That was the last thing he said, as Xaav dropped back on the path to join them. They began talking defense for Belle, the last remaining Blessed.

  True to Maric’s word, rather than ride into the night, they stopped at a well-established town and set up a defense perimeter.

  The Town of the Forked Road appeared prosperous and exhibited many large mansions. The grandest, a massive stone affair with fountains of burbling water in just about every room, belonged to the mayor.

  Given the previous incidents, the Soraers decided it best if they all slept in the same room, situated on the third floor with only an attic above. It had only one entry and a window too high to reach. A pair of guards stood on each side of the portal and watched, chewing the lereveilmoss. Another apparently guarded from the roof.

  Agathe took the last turn bathing while the others went to dinner. By the time she made it to the entertaining hall, Belle held court with a troop of young people. Agathe curtailed the fun at a reasonable hour. She wasn’t in the mood to watch them getting drunker and drunker. It would have ended up in her slapping someone’s son or daughter.

  Belle didn’t take kindly to the interruption. “It’s not fair. I was having fun.”

  “It’s late.”

  “Not that late. I want to go for a walk in the garden.”

  “It’s after dark.”

  “The better to see the stars. We never got a chance in the Abbae.” The young woman pouted.

  Agathe wasn’t swayed. “It’s too dangerous.”

  “You can’t tell me what to do.” The chit folded her arms stubbornly.

  “I can. And I will also enforce.”

  “I hate you.” Belle stomped to the corner of the room and proceeded to sulk.

  She wasn’t always such a chore to deal with. Belle’s more recent years proved especially harsh. Surely, Agathe had never been so bad… Then again, she’d tried the patience of those raising her. It pained her to think they might be anything alike.

  “I’m going to see if I can find some food that will last ‘til morning in case the soldiers want to make an early start.” She didn’t mention the fact that her stomach rumbled.

  Arriving in the kitchen, she encountered a servant with a tray, who smiled at her. “I was just bringing some snacks for you and the other Soraers. The chef even included a special pastry for the Blessed one.”

  Only Blessed when she was quiet.

  “I’ll take it up to her. Rest your feet,” she told the woman, who appeared close to the same age with wrinkles webbing the corners of her eyes—in her fourth or fifth decade for sure.

  “That would be most kind. Thank you.”

  Agathe made it only to the hall before she set the tray down for a pause and to eat something. The fruit-and-nut-stuffed pastry provided a sweet and crunchy texture in her mouth, but it also veered on the dry side. She grabbed the jug of juice and poured a mouthful into a cup. She jostled the special cake as she tried to put everything back so it balanced.

  An edge of paper showed under the cake. Odd. She lifted it and saw a note. One word.

  Garden.

  No doubt meant for Belle. Agathe’s mouth rounded. Who’d sent it? She whirled to return to the kitchen to see that the servant who’d handed the tray was gone. Asking the staff left behind, none recognized the description.

  Agathe eyed a window overlooking the courtyard. The garden was in the center of the keep. Surely, no threat could penetrate that deep.

  No choice but to find out. However, even she realized she shouldn’t without letting someone know first.

  The surprise was the fact that she knocked on the door that a servant told her had been given to Maric.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  The door swung open on the first rap of her closed fist. Agathe blinked at the sight of Maric’s bare chest. She couldn’t exactly avoid its width. It had no hair, which meant his scars stood out against his skin. The ridges of healed wounds crisscrossed his torso. One sat very close to his heart. A miracle he’d survived. She almost lifted her fingertips to touch.

  “What’s wrong?” A gruff query.

  Wrong? Other than the fact that she wanted to put her hands on his flesh?

  Agathe thrust out the note. “I found this tucked under a cake meant for Belle. I can’t find the woman who gave me the tray. And no one in the kitchen could recall seeing her.”

  It took him but a moment to read. He whirled and stalked for a chair where some clothes were draped. “Did you ask Belle about it?”

  “No.”

  “Why not? She might know who sent it.” He slewed a gaze in her direction as he tugged on his shirt, covering his body.

  Good, maybe she’d be less distracted. She glanced away from him as he tugged on his sheath as well, buckling it around his hips.

  “Who would be sending her a note? She’s been living in the Abbae most of her life,” Agathe exclaimed.

  “Exactly. She’s a nubile young lady currently surrounded by people—men, women, whatever she prefers—flattering her. Giving her a taste of life without the cloister of your Goddess’s rules.”

  “You think she’d meet with a stranger, given what happened to the others? She’s not that stupid.” Then again…

  “Would you like to wager on it?”

  No, because Maric might be right. She remembered how hard Belle argued about wanting to go for a walk in the garden. How had it never occurred the note might be for a tryst? “Maybe I should ask her.”

  “Don’t bother. She’ll lie and start her caterwauling again. That girl needs a muzzle.”

  She chomped her lip lest she laugh at his woebegone expression. To think she’d almost been jealous of the polite attention he paid Belle.

  “I’m sorry I bothered you.”

  “I’m not. Your trust is appreciated. Now, shall we?”

  “Shall we what?” she asked, noticing he’d not only put on a shirt and sword belt while they spoke but also his boots.

  “Find out who’s trying to meet the girl in the garden.”

  She might have argued she didn’t need his help to spy, but he had said “we.” Plus, she did trust him if they happened to run into trouble.

  “It’s probably just a rendezvous with a boy.” The more Agathe thought of it, the more it made sense. Still, she didn’t argue as she kept pace with the general.

  He wound through the keep as if he knew every hallway and room. Eventually, they ended up in a sitting room one floor above ground, chosen, she soon realized, not for the rickety table and chairs and the fragile knickknacks on every surface but the balcony overlooking the garden in the courtyard.

  They lay flat on the floor, half in the room, upper torsos outside and peering through the metal-hammered vine railing. The need for silence wasn’t pressing yet, as the garden
still showed much movement from a couple sitting on a bench shyly holding hands to a more intimate pair doing things under a tree that warmed her cheeks. She turned to look away and caught Maric eyeing her.

  She thought he might speak, but instead, he looked away.

  And so, they waited in silence as the garden quieted and the lights in the windows overlooking went out until only the glow of solarus orbs lining the paths illuminated the area.

  Only as the third moon rose did they see the shadowy figure that emerged into the garden, wearing dark clothes, sliding through the shadows.

  “There’s our culprit,” Maric whispered before rising silently. In a single smooth motion, he vaulted over the railing and landed with barely a thud.

  Whereas Agathe eyed the drop with an inwardly held sigh. Her body wouldn’t thank her for it. She should have asked him about his plan before.

  It took her a little longer to climb over the railing, and she wasted time lowering herself so that by the time she let go the fall was only a few feet. Her knees took the impact, jarringly so. Once she stopped wobbling, she sprinted, aiming for the sudden fracas.

  “Unhand me!” The shriek was familiar.

  “I should go.” A more tremulous voice.

  Agathe came onto the scene of a young man, hands held high, eyes wide, and a very irate Belle, who railed, “Let me go! How dare you lay hands on me. Wait until I tell the King.”

  “Tell him what? That you were having an illicit rendezvous?” Maric drawled.

  “Jealous?” Belle tossed her head, convinced of her superiority.

  Maric’s lip curled. “I prefer women to children.”

  The insult brought a mean squint to Belle’s eyes. “You’ll regret being rude to me.”

  “I highly doubt that. Back to your room.”

  “You—”

  Agathe had heard enough. The ear she grabbed had the chit screaming, “Ouch. You cow. Unhand me!”

  “You heard the general knight. Enough.”

  “You can’t—ah!”

  Pulling Belle by the ear, Agathe ignored the screeching as she marched her back to the room. She met Hiix as she dragged the yodeling girl up the stairs.

  “There you are! We thought you’d been kidnapped.” Hiix looked disheveled, her lips swollen. Baer glowered more fiercely than usual.

  “She was off making questionable choices,” Agathe said.

  “I only wanted to have some fun.” Belle sulked.

  “Two of your Soraers are missing. Now is not the time for levity.”

  “Don’t do this. Don’t do that. Is it any wonder they wanted to escape?” The young woman mulishly stuck out her lower lip.

  “And you think the Citadel will somehow be better?”

  “What makes you think it won’t?”

  Given all that happened, Belle might have a point. What if she was safer behind those walls as a prisoner of the King? At least then she’d be doing something positive for the people.

  Agathe wearied of it all. Her shoulders slumped. “You’ll be there soon enough. Go to bed, and don’t you dare leave it. If I catch you outside this room—” She wagged a finger.

  “You’ll what?” taunted Belle.

  For some reason, an old expression came to mind. Spare the hand, spoil the child. “Test me and find out.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  The argument with Belle made Agathe’s blood boil. She couldn’t stay around the girl and not shake her for being so dense. She stalked off and, with nowhere else to go, ended up in the garden, quiet now that everyone had gone to bed.

  The air held the fragrance of green, growing things, and the stars really were pretty. A winding path drew her to a private bower with a stone bench. She sat on it and waited.

  She didn’t react at all when someone joined her with a creak of leather. No need to look. For some reason, she was attuned to Maric. She didn’t understand it. She’d never before met a man who made her so aware of herself as a woman.

  Agathe said nothing. He’d obviously sought her out for a reason.

  It emerged on a low growl. “Baer’s been told the next time he neglects his duties, I’ll geld him.”

  An abrupt start to the conversation. “It’s not entirely his fault. The Maeder should have known better than to leave Belle alone.” Left unsaid was that none of them understood what Hiix saw in the big barbarian.

  “They’re allowing themselves to be distracted. Now is not the time.”

  “No, it’s not.” In Hiix’s defense, she wasn’t the only one having an issue staying focused. Agathe glanced at her hands clasped in her lap. “After tomorrow, I guess we’ll be going our separate ways.”

  “Maybe.”

  Her heart stilled, and she slewed a glance at him. “Meaning what?”

  He leaned back, legs stretched, arms across the back of the bench. “Didn’t you ask to meet the King?”

  “Technically, I only want access to his library.”

  “Even if it was granted, it would under strict guard.”

  She deliberately misunderstood him and asked in false innocence, “Isn’t the Citadel safe?”

  “Don’t pretend to be dense. The guard wouldn’t be to protect you.”

  “As if I’d ever damage history.”

  “And what if the past is so shocking you’d rather bury it? Deny it ever happened?”

  “Destroying our history instead of studying it only ensures we repeat it.”

  “Some think the past influences the future.”

  “Of course, it does. What has happened to us before shapes how we act in the present.”

  “At the same time, getting caught up in things that can’t be changed can become a vicious self-fulfilling circle.”

  “Haven’t you done things you wish you could change?”

  “No. I stand behind all my decisions but one.”

  What would an arrogant man like Maric ever regret? “That bad?”

  “The worst thing I ever did.” Their gazes met, and she was struck by his blue gaze. So different from everyone else with their brown eyes.

  “Funny how one thing, one stupid, stupid decision can change the course of your life,” she muttered, thinking of her own regrets.

  “Does it have to define the future?”

  She didn’t want to talk about the things that led to the betrayal. The blood. So much of it.

  “Forget past and future. There is only now.” A chance to make new bad decisions.

  Before she could change her mind, she leaned over and kissed him.

  He froze.

  She remained close, her gaze locked on his.

  Nothing was said, and yet his mouth suddenly clung to hers, their lips meeting in a clash of hot breath and sudden fierce passion. He dragged her onto his lap, and she was more than willing, turning so she straddled him, gripping his cheeks, plundering his mouth as surely as he explored hers.

  When the groping and panting on the bench led to extreme need and frustration, she found herself carried to a mossy patch where he threw down his shirt first before laying her back on it. Under the boughs of a tree that filtered the starlight, Maric took her. His thrusts made her hum and rock in time to him. Her gasps and his groans were the only sounds other than the sighing of wind through the leaves.

  When her climax hit, it proved strong enough that she went rigid. Her nails dug into his flesh, surely drawing blood.

  As if either of them cared. A sated lassitude took her. She didn’t protest when he gathered her in his arms and took her to his room, where he took his time bringing her to the brink again—a slow, pleasurable ride.

  It had been so long since she’d allowed herself to be with anyone she didn’t remember it.

  The guilt didn’t set in until she woke curled against Maric. There was a certain perverse satisfaction in what had happened between them. She, an older woman, had been properly bedded by the general, who was definitely all man.

  For one night, they’d been perfect together. However, sh
e was enough of a realist to know that it wouldn’t last. A Soraer of the Shield had a duty to her Goddess, not to mention a responsibility that began with a purple-eyed orphan girl. A different man might have helped her on her quest. Maric…he belonged to the King.

  She rose with the dawn, her movements drawing a drowsy sound from him.

  “You’re leaving?”

  She glanced back at him, the shadows already receding, meaning she could see him clearly. “We should be discreet.” She grabbed her clothing, only to hear him suck in a breath.

  “You have a lot of scars.”

  “Not just on my skin,” she muttered. “I have to go.” She fled without a kiss or a goodbye. Fled before she could change her mind about finding a way to be with him.

  It would never work.

  This early in the day, the bathing facilities for the women were almost empty. The other Soraers rose when Agathe entered, uttering a bright and cheerful, “Morning. How was your night?”

  “Not as good as yours, apparently.” A dry reply, but no rebuke even as it was deserved.

  She and Maric had both been beyond distracted. All. Night. Long. It left her with certain expectations.

  She didn’t see him at the rushed breakfast, only Xaav, who appeared to be waiting for the Soraers, given he kept saying, “Hurry. The general knight wants an early start.”

  Could it be Maric was as eager to see her as she was him? She’d left without them discussing what would occur next. Was it a one-time thing? Would he want to see her again? Did she want to see him?

  By the time they emerged from the house, most of the Brigade was mounted. Maric already sat upon his steed, and without asking, he snapped his fingers at Belle. “You ride with me today.”

  Agathe didn’t quite manage to hold in her shock and had to quickly force herself to snap her jaw shut.

  “Me?” Belle exclaimed. Then simpered. “Of course, General Knight.” She held out her arms to be lifted.

  Useless chit.

  And yet, she got to sit in the saddle in front of the general, who didn’t once glance at Agathe. Acted as if she didn’t exist. As if last night had never happened.