Lady Hotspur

by Tessa Gratton

  “For marrying Rowan Lear. Even you can’t pretend that isn’t seditious.”

  “Seditious!” Hal laughed harshly. “Mora’s not a traitor, she’s a hostage, and Mother should’ve negotiated her back here.”

  “Better gone than at home planting seeds of rebellion in our own castle. She never would’ve been satisfied.”

  “What was there to satisfy her here, Vatta? A queen who refused to bring her home? A queen who stripped her of the March—her title and inheritance? A queen who murdered her uncle?”

  The entire second story balustrade fell silent in the wake of Hal’s question. A hush of fear.

  But Vatta was unafraid. She shoved off her stool, steadying herself against Ysso’s bare shoulder. “It is not murder when queens do it. It is not murder when it is justice.”

  “Not … murder,” Hal breathed, refusing that memory of blood, of her shaking hands frantically smearing splatters off her cheek. (The spots felt burned in, scarred on her skin forever.) “If it is what makes you a queen that’s a fairly fine line.”

  “Watch yourself, Hal, you’ll go too far,” Vatta said.

  “Hal’s nature is to go too far,” Ianta agreed, slapping her hand on the polished arm of Hal’s riot throne.

  Hal heard her friend’s warning. She shrugged, forcing a dangerous smile. “Barda, are you too drunk to walk my sisters home? I fear letting them leave on their own, not knowing how to spot a murderer.”

  “What!” Tigir heaved to her feet. “Don’t send us home, Hal! I want to stay with you!”

  “We’re going,” Vatta said.

  Barda appeared at Hal’s shoulder, bowing to the princess. “I’ll show you the best way this time of night,” the woman promised.

  Vatta met Hal’s eyes, a hundred emotions seeming to whirl there, but Vatta added no more. Hal was glad of it, and wished she were significantly more drunk.

  Tigir dragged her feet. “But Hal! It’s not fair. You get to do anything you want! I want to stay!”

  Hal clapped both her hands on her sister’s shoulders. “Don’t be like me.” She kissed Tigir’s cheek. “Just ask Vatta.”

  Her middle sister crossed her arms over her chest and couldn’t quite keep herself from saying, “You should be better, Hal, so Tigir could be like you.”

  Hal snorted. “Get out of my castle.”

  They did, one reluctant, the other eager, and Hal stared after their heads long after they’d vanished into the crowd below. Chatter grew again. Nova placed a cup of sack in her hand and Hal stood at the rail drinking it, emptying every drop, wishing her mother would give the March to someone else. Better yet, let Mora keep it. She was a prince again, after all. Equal to Hal in rank and power. If not in foolery.

  Behind her, Nova asked for a wizard story to cheer up their prince, and Ianta cried, “Yes, here, let me tell you of the last wizard of Aremoria, who was also a fox.”

  Groans met Ianta’s declaration, and a few cries of nay, and from the shadowy corner Lip Fata called, “Lady wizards only, Ianta, we want to hear about ladies.”

  “Oh, then, ha-ha, how about the Witch Queen of Innis Lear? Or the Oak Wizard? Or the first Witch of the White Forest? Saint Pear Blossom? The Monster of Cy Gorge? One of those? No, bah! I have it! I shall tell you about my favorite lady, who was famed throughout the land for her impossible charms.”

  Hal drifted toward Ianta, and though the old Lady Knight lifted her brows midstory, inquiring if she ought to heave herself up and relinquish the throne, Hal only sank to her knees and lay her temple against Ianta’s soft thigh, closing her eyes. She knew the subject of Ianta’s favorite story.

  Hal had been the first to tell it, after all.

  “This lady wizard was known for being able to turn the heads of beautiful girls with the magic of her tongue and hands, the handsomeness of her stature and poise, and of course, her battlefield prowess. Her magic knew no bounds when it came to allies and seduction, for it was the magic of longing, pressed into a tea from the bright yellow flowers that turn their faces to the sun—that is the longing this wizard bottled and drank, and every morning—or rather, every very late afternoon when she rose—she swallowed a gulp of the draught and glowed for hours like a very star! And her name was—”

  “Ianta Oldcastle!” cried Nova and Ysso, Lip Fata from the corner, and Miss Quick, who had climbed the stairs at the start of the tale, as well as every other woman on the balcony but for Hal, who snuggled against Ianta’s leg, silent and weary, her mind a blank black void because she commanded it be so, touched only by the laughter of her friends and the boasting of her favorite old knight.

  CONNLEY

  The Summer Seat, late summer

  SOMETIMES CONNLEY ERRIGAL felt like a ghost.

  He drifted from one place to the next, one person to the next, on a whim that might have been his own, or a whisper from Ashling, or the nudge of rootwater in his veins. The place he most often haunted was the ruined star cathedral with its ancient well, there in the heart of the White Forest. As a child it might have been said he haunted his sister, Banna Mora, and then his grandmother Sin, existing only where they existed because they needed him; as an adult he frequently lived in the shadow of Rowan Lear, because Rowan Lear loved him.

  Connley knew the folk of Hartfare had begun to name him the Witch of the White Forest because it made more sense to them than calling him by a human name—an infamous one at that, for both the ambitious duke and the wandering prince who’d carried it last on the island. But he liked his name because it gave measure to his only aspiration: to be as much a piece of Innis Lear as it was possible to be and live. For Connley was not only a name, it was a history, it was the stones of a castle, a memory, and a legend.

  It was her favorite name.

  He knew what she was. Rowan had explained it, several years ago, after digging through every story written down in every crumbling library on Innis Lear; after consulting the stars and roots; after interrogating Grandmother Sin, the oldest person alive on the island.

  “The Ashling ghost should have been an earth saint,” Rowan had said. “But since the sundering, there are not earth saints on Innis Lear to help her transform, and so she is just dead, but with enough island magic to make her voice strong. Be careful, because she is wily like them, needy like them, and once she knows your name she will never want to let you go. But unlike them, she is alone.”

  “I won’t let her be alone,” Connley replied. “Maybe that will make her less angry.”

  He’d first heard her as a baby. She had cooed at him from the leaves rustling outside his parents’ bedchamber window, where his cradle rocked under the patient watch of a nurse. Her songs had been soothing and pretty, distracting him from tears, from food even, until his nurse complained. It wasn’t that the nurse feared voices in the wind—that would be ridiculous for a woman of Innis Lear—no, the nurse had disliked her small charge paying more attention to the wind than to her authority. So she’d been replaced with another who did not mind the extra help.

  The ghost became Connley’s true nurse. All the children of the island’s trees are my children, she’d murmured to him when he was old enough. Once, he’d asked how she died, and Ashling flew into a rage, spinning up a whirlwind violent enough to rip the roof off one of the outbuildings. She swore and swore she did not know, she did not care, and nor. should. he.

  Since, he’d only angered her once else: with his mouth on Rowan’s mouth.

  Ashling had never liked Rowan. You only should love one prince, the spirit had insisted, voice acid with jealousy. He had argued, The more love I have, the more I can give. Rowan Lear is no threat to you, my lady, my island heart.

  She did not agree, and made it known in tiny ways: hearths gone cold, rain spilling through his cottage roof, and cracked pots. Little goblin trespasses. But Rowan had seemed to appreciate the competition, and spoke directly to Ashling, though she never, ever answered. He called her broken earth saint, and promised if she ever harmed Connley he woul
d find her bones and destroy her. The prince was never afraid.

  Sometimes when they were together, Rowan would kiss Connley softly and whisper in the language of trees, This is a prayer for the spirit of ashes, then make love to Connley like it was a holy rite.

  “Do you love her? My sister?” Connley asked Rowan, resigned and hurting, the day Rowan said he would marry her.

  “I do, Conn. Listen: Since Banna Mora was thrust before me, bleeding across her cheek, bound in rope and iron, her mail shirt bright as moonlight, everything has been scraped from my heart but for her and Innis Lear.”

  “I was in your heart.”

  “I’m sorry. You knew we loved each other because we wanted it, not because it would last. I kissed you and pressed you down into the earth because you are the island embodied: rootwater shines from your eyes and the wind is always alive in your voice.”

  “I’m not the island, I am a man,” Connley whispered back.

  “As am I, and also a prince, and you were never a solution for my crown.”

  Rowan Lear could be as cruel as the winter storms.

  After the prince had gone, the Lady of Ashes enveloped Connley in gentle breezes, warm and earthy, and whispered with great sadness, I always knew he did not love you as I do. You were only ever practice for your stranger sister. Connley didn’t believe it of Rowan, but that did not cushion him from the pain of Rowan’s choice.

  And now, here he was, faced with the same choice.

  “Say something,” his sister said. Banna Mora leaned back against the table in her study, which served to put them at eye level.

  Connley held her gaze. Her eyes were the same mix of green-brown colors as his own, but harder, always sparking and fixed on something; Connley felt like he never fixed on anything. He blinked several times and tried to remain still. His fingers moved, though, slowly as if playing a delicate harp against his thigh.

  His sister had just informed him that she’d offered him in marriage to the Wolf of Aremoria.

  “She is strong, and will be loyal, and I need her,” Mora said. “You must do your duty, Connley Errigal.”

  Indignation halted his ability to speak. That she thought she had to argue pointed specifically enough at how she found him lacking. Of course he would do his duty, of course he wanted the best for Innis Lear, of course he expected to marry and become a father—he desperately wanted to be a father someday. Being a witch—and in love with Rowan—did not discount such things.

  “I wish you had asked,” he finally said, chiding very gently.

  His sister frowned back at him, a very dour, deep frown that spelled danger.

  He held up a hand, and though he knew tears had begun to gleam in his eyes and the timbre of his voice shifted toward thick, he said, “I will marry your knight, if she wants me. But you should have asked before commanding.”

  With that he left.

  But the hall outside Mora’s suite was blocked by her husband, and Connley hit into him with a small grunt.

  “Go with me,” Rowan said, taking his hand.

  “You knew already,” Connley murmured as he allowed himself to be pulled through the narrow passage to a turret stair, and up, up to the ramparts. The ocean wind hit them both, blasting the tears from Connley’s eyes and pulling at Rowan’s hair so it rippled and twisted like tentacles against the deep blue afternoon sky.

  The prince banished two retainers from the stretch of wall joining the family tower to the guest tower, in order to claim it for only themselves.

  Connley freed himself of Rowan’s touch. “You didn’t think to ask me, either.”

  “I knew you would agree.” Rowan glanced at him, puzzled seeming. “Was I wrong?”

  Though he wanted desperately to say yes, to cry out Yes, curse you, sometimes you are wrong, Rowan Lear, it was not the case. Connley crossed his arms and leaned against the age-smoothed crenellation. From here, the Summer Seat wall cut down in line with the cliff itself, and the high sun washed the rippling ocean vivid blue. A hundred and more feet below, waves clawed at boulders and narrow, tide-filled caves.

  “Good,” Rowan said. He lifted Connley’s hand and kissed the dry knuckles. “I have a thing to show you.”

  Connley refused to look, but in the corner of his eye he saw Rowan tap a thin book against the rough stone. It was leather-bound and imprinted with pale green and yellow hawthorn leaves. This was the secret book Rowan often carried, but never had let Connley inspect. He turned a shocked face to Rowan, and the prince smiled very slightly. He paged it open and offered the whole to Connley.

  It was written in the careful lines of the language of trees; neat, precise hash-marks. Connley read:

  Grandson, either my own or that of my granddaughter—it is difficult to say by my prophecies and dreams. But—Grandson. This book is for you, though I did not know it until now, when the large bluebird I dreamed of again and again finally found me this morning. I dreamed of you, too, a child with hair like the sun, brighter than any earth saint’s child should have. How handsome you will be, and tall. Strange that I should dream of you, and strange that all my mother’s blood will be gone from your looks. Do you dream? In my dream you are dreaming, too, spread across a field of gray-green grass, grown to a man, at peace as you listen to the trees gossip. And then in my dream you are in a different land, hearing different gossip, and you are not sleeping, but dead at the crown of her ancient church.

  My dreams are not prophecy, understand. They are stories the stars whisper to me as I sleep, apprehensions of my own heart that I cannot discover while awake.

  Or sometimes I think they are only what my sister would have me believe. Her voice is so strong, sometimes I speak her name aloud as though to answer. Aefa hates it when I do, and it frightens my family. They fear I go mad as my father did.

  Grandson—this is what I need to tell you: there comes a time when the stars will offer no solace, and you must open them. I cannot be certain what it means, but it is the thing I must say to you. That and: Innis Lear must always have a queen. Not a woman, but a queen. A lover for the island, a partner. Listen to Innis Lear, love the stars, partner with the rootwaters.

  This is how to be a queen of Innis Lear.

  You do not rule, you do not control, you become.

  “This belonged to Elia the Dreamer?” Connley touched his mouth, so full of awe when he said her name.

  “I was nine when the roses in the garden at Dondubhan revealed it to me. I’ve read it through so many, many times since.”

  “Amazing, Rowan. I …” Connley glanced up, smiling.

  Rowan touched his lover’s ear, fingers soft as a breeze.

  It reminded Connley that Ashling was not going to be pleased when he left the island. His smile fell. “Why are you showing me this now?”

  “I want you to believe that I trust you.”

  Connley’s lips parted just enough for a soft sigh. He nodded. “Thank you.”

  “I wish I could go to Aremoria for you, but I also believe you are uniquely suited for the task.”

  “Of marrying Hotspur Persy? I think we’re nothing alike, if the stories are true.”

  “Perhaps she is your undiscovered fire,” Rowan said tenderly.

  Connley smiled sadly, whispered fire in the language of trees, and snapped his fingers.

  Nothing. He scrubbed his palms on his thighs and tried again, but fire still forsook him.

  “What I meant, Conn, was you are so purely you, with every part of yourself, that even walking off the island, crossing the water, and digging yourself into Aremoria, you will remain Innis Lear at your core.”

  “You’re pretty purely you, Poison Prince.”

  Rowan scoffed. “I know what I am. But my ambitions drive me constantly away from myself, and I must always check and safeguard myself, and my emotions. You are like an animal—you know what you need and you seek it out, patiently, without manipulating others or looking too far ahead. You wouldn’t sacrifice others, or ask anyone to sacrif
ice themselves. You don’t need any hemlock crown or star-sign painted on your cheek to remind you what your ambition serves. It’s a gift.”

  “The island embodied. You’ve said that before.” Connley knew Rowan was manipulating him even now, but still wanted to be persuaded. He wanted Rowan to kiss him and push his ribs against the cutting crenellation. He wanted to feel more. Connley wanted the physical sensation, the grounding release—it made no sense that he found such freedom in being rooted in place by someone’s touch. He shivered hard.

  Rowan put an arm around his waist and pulled him nearer. It was not the aggression Connley needed, but it helped.

  The summer afternoon did not bite with sharp teeth, but only gnawed lazily with salty wind. Rowan murmured, “Listen to Innis Lear by listening to yourself, Conn. Love the stars, become—like Elia the Dreamer commands. That is my mission and I’ve followed it all my life. Listening led me to you, to my power, to battle, and to Banna Mora. It will continue to lead me until it leads me to my end.” Rowan’s hand tightened on Connley’s hip. “At the crown of her ancient church.”

  “Do you know where that is?”

  “I think …”

  “Tell me.” Connley glanced at Rowan, at the angle of his strong nose above the curves of his lips.

  “Aremoria. I think her is the first wizard Lear, and her church is in Aremoria. And I believe that before I die I will see Innis Lear and Aremoria joined again. Your marriage is a step on the path.”

  Connley could barely even comprehend something so large as that. “Is there a true prophecy?”

  “They’re all true,” Rowan murmured.

  “The stars all babble now.” Connley caught his breath, recalling the line from Elia the Dreamer’s book. There comes a time when the stars will offer no solace. “No solace,” he said. “Now is the time—she wants you to open the stars.”

  “Opening has been a recurring theme in many of these babbling prophecies.”

  “The island, too, speaks of it. Open your eyes, the roots sometimes say to me, when I am already awake. They’ve never before. But Rowan, how does one open the stars?”