Nightborn: Totally addictive fantasy fiction (The Hollow King Book 2)

by Jessica Thorne

  Rynn ended up on a grey mare just as perfectly symbolic as Bastien’s mount, just as complimentary. The pair of them were guaranteed to make an impact wherever they went. Oh, word would spread, all right. That was clearly Lara’s plan. There were many more ways than one to wage a war.

  They’d married in Valenti. Bastien was the Lord of Thorns and Rynn was a royal heir with Larelwynn blood. They were coming home.

  Or at least that was the mummers’ play Lara wanted the world to see.

  Grace’s horse was a bay gelding who resented everyone and everything in the entire universe and showed it at every possible moment. He fought her every stretch of the way for the next few hours. She was exhausted long before Lara called a stop for the night. The next day was even worse. Her body ached in every way possible. As she mounted up again on the miserable beast, she wished that just once in her life she had learned to ride properly. All she could actually do was hold on and hope for the best. At least Daniel was suffering alongside her. Ellyn, though, seemed as at home on a horse as she was everywhere else. It wasn’t fair.

  But when her friend pulled up alongside her, she didn’t look happy – although, after a breakfast of black bread and porridge, Grace didn’t really blame her.

  ‘We’re being followed,’ Ellyn said.

  That dispelled Grace’s bad mood. Or rather transformed it from general misery to darkest suspicion. She glanced over her shoulder but could see nothing but the lonely road through a rocky landscape behind them. Stones broke like old teeth among browning ferns and brambles. The road wound up the hill beyond. That said, she knew to trust Ellyn’s word implicitly. If she said they were being followed, that was that.

  ‘How far back?’

  ‘More than a mile. They’re good. But they’re definitely there.’

  It could just be another traveller, but Grace doubted it. Of course they were being followed. Lara had as good as announced their presence and, although largely lawless, this was still Larelwynn land. Maybe they should have gone through Tlachtlya instead. At least then they would have seen the attacks coming and known to expect them at all times.

  ‘How many?’

  ‘Only one. Tracker probably. Could be more behind, of course. Do you want me to go and get rid of him?’

  Ellyn looked a little too eager. And Grace was sorely tempted to join her.

  ‘You’ll get to punch something soon enough.’ Grace half wondered if she should send Jehane instead. He’d be quicker and quieter. She didn’t doubt his skills. He was still watching her, all the time, her appointed guard. He took the role very seriously.

  ‘Let’s wait and see. We’re ahead of them for now and they seem happy to keep it that way. We’ll reach this inn Lara is taking us to before nightfall. We can sit in the taproom and see who else arrives. Could be interesting.’

  Ellyn nodded but as she lifted her face again, her gaze snagged on Rynn’s. The princess was looking at the pair of them. She turned her face forwards instantly, ignoring them. Ellyn snorted. ‘Can you actually picture her in a taproom?’

  ‘Why don’t you like her? Everyone else likes her.’

  ‘You don’t.’ Grace flinched and Ellyn’s face became instantly apologetic. ‘Sorry, I didn’t… I know why you don’t though. Obviously.’

  Grace sighed. She couldn’t hide anything from her friends. ‘I’m… it’s complicated.’

  ‘That’s a word for it. You have reasons, so do I. Her family had me kidnapped. I’m an experienced Academy officer, Grace. And their mob of uneducated thugs snatched me off the bank of the canal while you were under attack and dragged me off to be nothing more than a bargaining chip.’

  It stung Ellyn more than she liked to show, Grace knew that. All her experience, her knowledge, her fighting abilities, and she’d been taken just like that.

  Grace let her eyes narrow as she thought about it. ‘She’s royalty. She has a way about her.’

  ‘Yeah, she clicks her fingers and people jump to her whim. Even Lara Kellen is doing it.’

  ‘And Bastien,’ Grace murmured, thinking about what he’d said about blood, about his vision, about sacrifice. What was he up to? Time was she thought she could trust him implicitly. Now… now she wasn’t so sure. A whisper in the back of her mind kept reminding her of what had happened in Iliz. Of his hands around her throat.

  She couldn’t help throw a glance at Bastien riding ahead with Lara beside him, their heads bent together in conversation. Rynn was right behind him.

  Ellyn pursed her lips. ‘She bothers me. That’s all. She’s always watching us. Every time I look at her, she’s looking back. Her family wiped mine out. The ragged remains of us that made it to Rathlynn never recovered. I’m the last one, all that’s left, and even I… Why is she even here? She agreed to marry him, after all. She can claim that they forced her, but we don’t know that.’

  Grace was starting to see it, her own bleak and miserable future stretching out ahead of her, without him. She didn’t have it in her to be a mistress. She wasn’t the sharing type.

  ‘We don’t know that she’s lying.’ Her throat tightened to a painful knot. She couldn’t say anything more than that. But the marriage was binding. Whether Rynn wanted it or not. Whether Bastien wanted it or not. It was bigger than either of them, and out of their hands.

  ‘She’s hiding something,’ said Ellyn. ‘I’d bet an entire taproom of beer on that.’

  Grace had learned long ago never to bet against Ellyn. In this case that didn’t make her feel any better.

  The sign hanging outside the inn had a crown on it. Grace wasn’t sure if that was a good omen or not.

  Probably not.

  Lara arranged the rooms which meant that Grace, Daniel, Misha and Ellyn were in the guardroom – a barracks-like space – along with Jehane on the ground floor. The three nobles took rooms upstairs. Bastien didn’t argue so Grace thought, fine. It didn’t matter.

  ‘How do we guard them if we’re down here?’ Daniel asked.

  ‘Set up a watch rota, do a sweep hourly, you know the drill.’ Grace didn’t meet his eye as she said the words. ‘Ellyn owes me a beer, so you can go first.’

  This place was a risk. Every step they took was a risk. Bastien was in danger and she didn’t know if she could protect him. Not the way this was turning out. Lara seemed to be going out of her way to separate them. She could be right about appearances protecting them all, about not starting a war with Valenti or turning the population of the kingdom against them. But that didn’t make it any easier.

  Bastien went off to his room without a word, but paused at the top of the stairs, glancing down at her, just for a moment. The look left Grace more confused than she could say. A warning not to follow? Did he think she’d run off after him? No. She wasn’t running after anyone. Ever.

  Let him go off up there with his new wife.

  The empty hole inside her stomach wasn’t just hunger. It was something else, sucking all feeling and energy from her, feeding on anger and sorrow. It twisted away.

  The Deep Dark had done something to her. Every so often she felt it, when misery or pain made her weaken her resolve. Like now. It was that whisper in the back of her mind, telling her that every doubt was true, that she had already lost him.

  That whisper was getting stronger. And so was whatever it had planted in her when it infected the warrant. Whenever she reached for her magic, something else came, too. She ought to tell Bastien, she knew that. But the words wouldn’t form. Why give him another excuse to push her away?

  True, he’d been drugged and his memories wiped. He’d been ordered to murder her and he had almost succeeded. It hadn’t been his fault. But Grace couldn’t seem to forget or put it behind her. He wanted Rynn with him in Thorndale, thanks to whatever vision he thought he’d had. She had royal blood, as did he. Rynn made more sense as a queen or a consort, much more than Grace.

  Maybe she should return the ring. She knew she should. She just… didn’t want to.

  W
hy give herself another excuse to give up and let it consume her?

  ‘Beer,’ Ellyn said, catching a glimpse of the mood inside her. ‘Remember?’

  ‘Yes. Beer. Excellent call.’

  The taproom wasn’t busy. Grace and Ellyn picked a table where they could sit with their backs to the wall, watching the main door, with a good view of the bar and the other ways into the room. The fire was low and lit the room with its flickering light and, as the daylight outside started to fade, the barman lit thick candles on each table and those impaled on spikes set on a heavy iron ring hanging from the ceiling.

  ‘Makes a change from palaces and balls,’ Ellyn said. ‘Almost like home.’

  ‘Almost like the Larks’ Rest, you mean.’ Kurt Parry’s tavern was the nearest either of them had to a home apart from the Academy. Misha set up by the fire, tuning his harp. Never one to miss the opportunity to play to a willing audience, that one. Grace wondered if he should after the incident on the ship but Bastien had assured them that his magic was back in balance and Misha himself had promised that he would just play, not use his magic at all. Lyrics probably didn’t come through this way too often and it wouldn’t do to draw attention. The border was dangerous.

  The door opened and closed behind three men. Grace gave them a covert once-over. Locals by the look of them, no sign of travel, and they knew the place well. Two took seats while the third called out a greeting to the barman and headed up to order.

  The night dragged on. Jehane joined them and finally Daniel did too as Grace got up to take her turn checking the perimeter. Admittedly that involved little more than walking around the exterior of the inn, via the yard at the back. She wandered through the stables, where the horses whickered and shifted in the straw-filled stalls. It was quiet here. The sort of place where nothing happened. People came and went, but this town – not even a town really, a crossroads with an inn and some houses – this town was just passed by. It was almost tragic. Nothing seemed permanent except the walls of the inn. But the people, the horses, the carts and the cargoes, everything travelled on.

  But the night air was soothing, calming. There was some kind of scent from the flowering bushes along the road that was strangely familiar. She pulled one of the small white flowers off and lifted it to her nose.

  It felt like inhaling memories, sweet and bitter all at once.

  It grew in the garden, at the rear of the forge. Her mother loved it and refused to cut it back as much as she should. And the evenings were full of it as the flowers clustered around the open window of her little room.

  Grace dropped the flower and took a rapid couple of steps back. She stared at it accusingly as it lay in the mud of the road. What was that? A memory?

  ‘Captain Marchant?’ Jehane appeared in the inn’s doorway. ‘Did you want dinner? Bastien and Rynn are having a meal sent up, and Lady Kellan said to order what we wanted in the taproom.’

  Bastien and Rynn. The ring felt heavy on her finger, his ring. She twisted it around and around as if it was a magic charm, as if it could take the pain away.

  Grace waved Jehane off. ‘I’m fine. I’m not hungry.’

  She was better off out here, in the dark, in the peace and quiet. The lights of the inn were warm and inviting, but the one in the upstairs window just reminded her of what she was about to lose. What she had to let go.

  The darkness inside her spread a little more, devouring that pain, thriving on it. She swallowed hard on the lump in her throat.

  ‘We can talk, if you want,’ Jehane said, coming closer.

  She didn’t need his sympathy. Or his pity. ‘Talk about what?’

  ‘Whatever you want. Him? Your… your relationship?’

  ‘No thank you.’ The thought of spilling her intimate fears out to Jehane made her suddenly uncomfortable. It was too much, too familiar. And she wasn’t sure what she would say anyway. Not now.

  ‘I… I don’t mean to intrude. I… just… you’re hurting. It isn’t fair.’

  ‘Life isn’t fair, Jehane. It tends to make that pretty clear very quickly. Better get used to it, and fast.’

  He sat down on the low wall, his long legs dangling, his arms stretched out on either side. ‘I know that as well as anyone, my lady.’

  She frowned. ‘Don’t “my lady” me. I’m not a lady.’

  He smiled, an easy, gentle smile. ‘But you are. You hold the warrant. The king gave it to you, so that Bastien would be safe. And it protects you. It’s unique, the one thing that can command his power, command him. You know, some people would say that warrant should make you the queen.’

  That caught her wandering thoughts. She snapped up to attention, staring at him in horror. ‘What? No.’

  But Jehane shrugged as if it was the simplest thing in the world. ‘The monarch holds the warrant,’ was all he said.

  ‘That wasn’t what Marius intended. He was trying to protect Bastien. I was the only person there who could do it.’ But that wasn’t true either. Grace knew that. There were all kinds of people who could have done it. There were any number of Royal Guards. But Marius hadn’t been sure who to trust, who had what agenda, and how many Aurelie had gathered to her cause. So he had chosen her. She had just been convenient. She’d thought he was insane at the time. Now she was sure of it.

  ‘Bastien even gave you his ring.’

  She covered the ring with her other hand. It didn’t mean anything. Not now. It couldn’t. ‘I’m an Academy officer, Jehane. Just… no one.’

  He smiled at her, an understanding, but sad smile. ‘You aren’t no one, my lady…’ He caught the glare starting in her eyes and corrected himself, still smiling. ‘Captain.’

  She sat down on the wall beside him and stared off down the road.

  Beside her, Jehane pulled at the same white flowers and then somehow spun them together with shadows. They rose into the night air and then came to rest on her head, tangled in her hair. A crown of flowers.

  ‘Shadows aren’t all bad. You owe me, remember?’

  Back on the canalside, when he’d first saved her, he’d told her she owed him her life. He’d been joking, so arrogant and amused with himself. Like a different man.

  ‘My life, I believe.’

  He shrugged. ‘I’d settle for friendship instead.’

  Grace couldn’t help but smile then. The laugh was unexpected, that was certain, but she couldn’t help that either. Friendship. Yes, after all they had been through she could offer him that.

  Not that she could just say it outright like that.

  ‘Stop it. Maybe you’re a Charm rather than a Shade, Jehane.’

  His grin didn’t fade, not exactly. But it wasn’t the same. ‘It would have been easier, wouldn’t it? Charms don’t face the same things Shades do. Like Flints. People expect us to be destructive, difficult, or dangerous. My family certainly did. Oh, they couldn’t get rid of me fast enough.’

  Grace frowned. It was a familiar tale. ‘They threw you out?’

  ‘They didn’t have much choice. The town didn’t want a Shade around. Bad for the crops, the herds, everything. They figured it was only a matter of time before I did something awful. So… I ran away. I ran as far as Rathlynn.’

  ‘Where you became a…?’ She couldn’t say spy.

  He gave a rueful grin, understanding anyway. ‘Eventually. I found a new family, in service to the crown.’

  Like her. She didn’t know if he’d almost been killed before he ran away but somehow she figured he might have. Same story, almost exactly. But he’d kept his magic. Hers had been stolen. Now it was back, it felt like a parasite inside her. Maybe it was.

  She turned to look at Jehane to find he was watching her, his gaze fixed on her. For a moment she thought he’d lean forward and try to kiss her. She didn’t know what she’d do, how she’d stop him. She’d offered friendship, but nothing more. And he wasn’t Bastien.

  She leaned back, pulling the flowers from her head. When her hand crushed them that scent returned, overw
helming her senses, blocking everything out.

  Jehane didn’t kiss her though. He wrapped his hands around hers. ‘They’re called snowflowers. They say the scent can calm a fever, send good dreams and ease a troubled heart.’

  ‘I remember them. From when I was young.’

  ‘Maybe you lived nearby then. They only grow here, in the mountains. Do you have family here still?’

  She shrugged. Not a memory she wanted to dwell on, however curtailed her memories of that time were. Even if they hadn’t been wiped away like chalk from a blackboard, the snatches that she had recovered were traumatic. Seeing your family home burn, your parents murdered, and then being drowned tended to do that. But she didn’t want to tell Jehane the details either.

  She slid off the wall, back onto her feet, still holding the flowers only because she didn’t seem able to let them go.

  ‘Put them under your pillow,’ Jehane said, with that same flirtatious grin. ‘Maybe you’ll dream of me.’

  ‘I doubt it.’ If she hadn’t seen him weave shadows to his will she’d be sure now that he was a Charm instead of a Shade. Perhaps the two were related.

  ‘One day, Captain,’ he teased. ‘Other girls would take me up on the offer.’

  She cast him an arch look. Teasing was easier. It was almost like being back at the Academy, with the banter and camaraderie she loved. She was on firmer ground again. ‘Better go and find those other girls then, hadn’t you?’

  ‘My current options are Ellyn and a princess and I don’t think either of them are particularly interested in the likes of me.’

  ‘Oh, so I’m your third choice. Flattering. Just as well I’m not a queen then, isn’t it? Thanks.’

  ‘Never. You’re the moon, my lady, the star in my sky.’ He stood up, one hand in the air, declaiming his bad poetry.