Stamped above the maker’s mark was a Hillander terrier.
She found him on the castle roof. The dome of his observatory had been opened like a clam shell, one half of which moved on hinges and ran on some mechanism of tiny wheels and tracks.
King Zachary straightened from the eyepiece of his telescope at her approach, his features registering surprise. Her step faltered upon seeing him.
“Karigan? How did you know where to find me?”
“Fastion.”
“Of course.” He stepped around the telescope toward her, his gaze roving to the coffer tucked beneath her arm, his eyes full of questions.
She wondered if she had made a colossal mistake by coming to confront him in person, for her resolve melted beneath his gaze. She knew that the extraordinary gift he had given her was not a simple one, but an expression of . . . his feelings. To what depth those feelings went, she was unsure. A part of her wanted to know, another part did not.
The gift, in fact, had proved more upsetting than even Estora’s announcement earlier in the day. If this was indeed a true expression of his feelings, what was she supposed to do about it? How was she supposed to respond? Even after a hard ride in the country, she had found no answers, only a swirl of emotions that grew more and more intense till it hardened into anger. How dare he, she had wondered, bestow upon her such an intimate gift even as he planned his betrothal to Lady Estora?
“They’re exquisite, but I cannot accept this gift.”
“I wanted you to have them,” he said, his disappointment obvious.
“They’re too great a gift.”
“I heard your own very special set had been destroyed in the fire.”
Karigan wondered from whom he had heard about it. Several Riders had lost special things, and yet the king singled her out, only reinforcing what she thought the gift meant.
“There is someone else more fitting to receive these.” She held out the coffer, and he gazed at it for some moments before reluctantly reaching for it.
“It’s a queen’s gift,” Karigan said. “Not a gift fit for a common messenger.”
“Karigan G’ladheon, I gave this gift to you.” His voice was firm. “And you are anything but common. You are special to me.”
She trembled.
“Please take it,” he said, offering the coffer back.
She backed away. “What is it you expect of me?”
He stepped closer and took her hand into his.
She wanted to run. She wanted to feel his touch . . . He was so close that the heat of him scorched her. She needed to run. To run was to find safety. She jerked her hand from his, and he drew his eyebrows together, surprised and hurt.
Good, she thought.
He stood there for some moments, the stars glittering in a backdrop of midnight blue behind him and a wisp of moonlight stroking his cheek. Across the roof, guards made their rounds carrying lanterns that glowed like large fireflies, bobbing, hovering, swinging along. While Karigan was aware of them in the background, it was almost as if she and the king were alone in the vast pool of night, if not the whole of the world.
She knew she should run, leave the roof. What she waited for, she did not know.
“Do you remember,” King Zachary began, “a certain game of Intrigue we once played a couple years ago? You played terribly, and after I won, I told you so. I criticized your strategy, and you in turn told me a few things as well. You stood up to me and told me, among other things, that I should leave behind my stone walls and go among those I rule.” A smile ghosted across his lips at the memory. “Excellent advice.”
His words threw Karigan. Why was he bringing this up now? She swayed where she stood, confused.
“I think it was then,” he continued, “that I was irretrievably caught. Caught off guard, caught by you. Here you were, this beautiful, clever, and courageous young woman, who had just ridden across the country through so much danger to deliver a message, and who had the utter temerity to instruct her monarch on how to rule his country.” He laughed softly. “Yes, you, with your passion and fire, took my heart captive then, and I soon realized that I loved you, and have all this time. How could I not?”
Karigan could not breathe. Why? Why hadn’t he ever told her? Why hadn’t he acted on his feelings before? Why had he waited till now? Now when he was going to marry Estora. Now when there was no chance for them . . .
There never was a chance, she bitterly reminded herself. For all the political reasons, and she ticked them off in her mind. His pursuit of a commoner would diminish the esteem and support the mercurial lord-governors extended to him, and threaten his hold on power. The lord-governors might instead lend their favor to some other nobleman more to their liking and pliant to their collective will. Or worse, an ambitious nobleman, sensing the crown’s weakness, might take advantage of the situation and force his ascension to power. Sacoridia could find itself at the mercy of a tyrant the likes of Hedric D’Ivary or Prince Amilton, instead of the benevolent ruler it now enjoyed. In the worst scenario, a struggle for power could embroil the country in all-encompassing strife and civil war, like that of two hundred years ago. None of these scenarios must be allowed to play out. They must not distract from the future threat that Blackveil Forest posed.
So much more was at stake than the hopes and desires of one insignificant Green Rider.
Maybe he decided to tell her of his feelings for her now because he had something else entirely in mind, and the revelation rekindled the anger in the pit of her stomach.
“Did you know,” she said, her voice laced with that anger, “that my mother’s mirror and brush set were a wedding gift from my father? Not just some pretty baubles he passed along because he fancied her.”
“Karigan, I—”
“It was before he made his fortune. My aunts tell me he worked unbelievably hard at demeaning jobs, like gutting fish down on the wharves, just to afford such a gift. He did this because he adored my mother; loved her absolutely. And they both made sacrifices to be together, forsaking their homes and families.
“And now you want me to accept this gift, you who are to marry Lady Estora? What am I to make of it? Certainly there cannot be the bond my father shared with my mother. What then? To be your—your paramour? To slip into your bedchamber when your wife is away?” A blush raged across her cheeks.
“No! I did not mean for that, though—” and perhaps thinking better of it, he did not complete the sentence. “I meant this gift as an honest expression of how I felt about you. I would never purposely hurt you in any way. This gift . . .” he glanced down at the coffer. “It’s a token of my feelings. Nothing more, no expectations.”
Karigan warred within herself. She wanted to scream, throw herself over the edge of the roof. Why was he doing this to her? No expectations, he had said, but there had been that undercurrent in his words . . . Desire gnawed at her, tempted her, but she smothered it knowing that giving in would only worsen matters and prove more painful in the end. While others might not think twice about it, she respected herself too much to get caught up in such entanglements. No, she would not . . . give in. And while it was within his authority as king to command anything of her, he did not, and he being the sort of man he was, she didn’t think he would. It made the loss of him all the more crushing.
“Do you know,” the king said, staring up toward the endless sky, “there is no better way to gain perspective on one’s life than by gazing upon the heavens. My days are filled with the needs of the country, the petty feuds, the politics. But when I come up here, I ponder great questions about the gods, the world, and the dark side of the moon. And when my eyes return to Earth, my daily problems seem minor in comparison.
“I am the king of Sacoridia, yet so much is beyond my grasp—I’m powerless in so many ways to affect things, just as I cannot touch the workings of the heavens. And yet, I am ever hopeful.”
“What is it,” Karigan said, her voice quavering, “that you hope for?”
>
“I hope there is a place for faith and dreams.” He paused for a moment, gazing intently at her. “And I need you to know how I feel about you, Karigan, no matter what may come. If you will not accept the gift as it is, a queen’s gift given by a king, then I shall respect your wishes. Do know that it will always be here waiting for you.”
She turned and ran, never seeing the sorrow in his eyes.
It was with an odd combination of happiness and grief that on the last evening of the summer, Karigan watched her fellow Riders file into the records room. There was curiosity on their faces, and some were making nervous jokes, but she detected they sensed something larger afoot.
Ben, still preferring his mender’s smock over Rider green, wore a perpetual expression of bewilderment these days. His special ability had manifested almost immediately—it was an ability that augmented the mending skills he already possessed. He could pour his own energies into a patient to help them heal.
The first patient to benefit from his gift was Mara. He had pulled her back from death and given her the strength she needed to fight the festering of her burns and the lung illness. She would forever bear terrible scars, but she would be well.
Ben told Karigan that Mara was already making the captain pay up on some bet they’d made about her and Drent. Karigan planned to get to the bottom of it as soon as she could.
In the meantime, the captain continued to negotiate with Destarion over just how Ben would serve as a Rider, while continuing with his mending duties. The poor fellow, Karigan thought, was going to be busy, but at least it might save him from dealing with horses for a little longer.
Dakrias Brown buzzed around the chamber in excitement. It wasn’t often so many came to his domain. He was a decidedly happy host, greeting each Rider as she or he entered. In the absence of Weldon Spurlock, King Zachary had promoted Dakrias to chief administrator. Surprisingly, he chose to continue working out of the records room. When Karigan had entered, he told her conspiratorially, “They’ve become very friendly.”
“Who?” Karigan asked.
“You know who.”
“I do?”
“Them.” Dakrias gestured vaguely around the room, and lowered his voice to a whisper. “The ghosts, of course.”
“Oh. Of . . . course.”
“They’ve been very helpful with the filing, you know.”
Well, Karigan had to admit, she had known a ghost or two to be rather helpful herself.
Then Dakrias drew closer. “Actually,” he confided, “I think they were trying to be helpful all along.”
Karigan raised an eyebrow, remembering the chaos the ghosts had left the records room in, and poor Dakrias’ frayed nerves. How did he figure they were being helpful?
As if hearing her thought, he continued, “I think they wanted my attention. I think they were trying to tell me something was terribly wrong in these old corridors.”
“Second Empire,” Karigan murmured, remembering how the ghosts had come to her aid when Uxton tried to abduct her.
Dakrias nodded vigorously. “Spurlock and his cronies met in the old section. Good thing our ghosts are anti-empire.”
Truly, Karigan thought, bemused.
Dakrias left her to greet other Riders trickling into the chamber. There was almost a full complement of Riders in attendance, which wasn’t saying much considering their diminished numbers. Dale was still recovering from her wounds in Woodhaven, and Alton had so far chosen not to return. Destarion would not permit Mara to leave her chamber. And there were others who should have been standing among them this night, but they were forever gone.
“Let us make a circle,” the captain said.
The idea might have been Karigan’s, but it was the captain’s place to carry it out. The Riders needed to look to their captain for solace and guidance, purpose and courage.
Karigan had enlisted aid from her friends among the Weapons. They carried in the chest of Rider artifacts with due respect. Item by item, the captain revealed pieces of Rider history.
Meanwhile, the Weapon Donal lit a lamp in a darkened space that illuminated the silky banner of the Green Riders. There was a collective intake of breath as the Riders took in its beauty and the shining gold winged horse moving as with life.
When the cross sash of Lil Ambrioth was revealed, the Weapon Allis passed out bits of plaid much like the original to each of the Riders. Karigan’s father had hurriedly acquired the cloth and shipped it to her. How he managed such a feat in so short a time, she had yet to find out.
“In memory of the First Rider,” the captain said, “you may pin these beneath your brooches so they make a fitting backdrop. From now on Lil Ambrioth’s plaid will be incorporated into your uniforms.”
That part was a surprise to even Karigan. She did suspect there had been some correspondence going on between the captain and her father, and this is what it must have been about.
By the time the captain revealed Lil’s horn again, there were few dry eyes in the records room.
“There is much that has been forgotten over the years by and about Green Riders,” the captain explained. “It is time to remember. Time to remember our history and the heroic acts of the past. Time to remember our fallen. Would everyone please hold hands?”
The Riders did so, some looking at one another with questions in their eyes. Yates stood on Karigan’s right, and Tegan stood on her left.
“Karigan learned of an old tradition practiced by Lil Ambrioth and her Riders,” the captain said. “A way to remember lost comrades.” She then explained what to do. “And so I shall begin by remembering Ereal M’Far thon, Rider-lieutenant.”
“Ereal,” the group chorused.
Constance was next. “I remember Tierney Caldwell.”
“Tierney.”
“I also remember Ereal M’Farthon,” said Ty, with head bowed.
“Ereal.”
He must, Karigan thought, remember her every time he mounted Crane.
“Joy Overway,” Connly said. “I remember Joy.”
“Joy.”
As the Riders named the fallen, Karigan kept an eye toward the ceiling. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the Weapons dimmed the lamps in the records room. They were perfect for this duty, for they could be like shadows that vanished into the background.
Beyond the halo of dimming light, Karigan also perceived the others, the ghosts, watching and listening. She wondered if there were a few Rider ghosts among them looking upon the scene with pride.
Yates sniffled beside her. “Justin.” It was all he could choke out.
“Justin.”
“I remember Bard Martin,” Karigan said.
“Bard.”
The Riders continued with more names—Ephram, F’ryan, and even Lil.
A light blinked to life above the ceiling, and another, and another. As Weapons worked in the chamber above to light lamps, images captured in glass emerged in a riot of color, unblemished, unfaded, and unfractured by time.
It took a few moments for the Riders to even notice, but when they did, they craned their necks and whispered in wonderment as the tableau unfolded, revealing their long darkened heritage.
Lil Ambrioth, her horn at her hip, stood tall in the stirrups of her fiery steed, her arm outstretched behind her toward Riders who rode prancing and rearing horses. One Rider unfurled the standard of the winged horse, and another the black and silver of Sacoridia. Many of the Riders flourished weapons in the face of a cowering foe.
The enemy retreated, threw itself down before Lil for mercy, or lay dead on the field of battle. They were rendered in black, gray, and crimson.
The backdrop was the deep evergreen forest representing burgeoning life, and blue-purple mountains, a symbol of strength. A storm receded over the mountains representing the retreat of the enemy and war.
The lamps revealed another scene worked into the domed glass, that of Lil draped in a cloak of green and kneeling before a moon priest. He held his hands up in benediction,
while King Jonaeus looked on, his crown a bright glowing gold.
In yet another scene, the Eletian king, Santanara, handed Lil the winged horse banner, while both Riders and Eletians stood in attendance.
In the center of the dome, in a sky of midnight blue and silvery constellations, the god Aeryc, with crescent moon balanced on his palm, looked upon the Riders with beneficence and approval.
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