The Twelve Kingdoms

by Jeffe Kennedy

  “He’s never hit me in court like that before.” Never anything I hadn’t been able to conceal from my sisters, disguised as fairly earned bruises from training.

  “That’s not what I asked you.”

  “Of course not.” My stomach, still unsettled from my earlier thoughts, clenched that Harlan brought up exactly that. Danu taught that coincidences were patterns not yet made clear. “He’s a warrior to the core and a sailor before it. Those aren’t gentle professions. They require strength and mettle—qualities his heir must also possess. I’ve met the flat of his hand—or his blade—many times. It’s to be expected. To make me strong.”

  “I’ve never struck anyone, man or woman, outside of combat. It’s not expected. You should not expect that. It doesn’t make people strong—it grinds them down.”

  “We’re getting sidetracked and you’re not answering my questions.”

  “I’m questioning your fundamental assumption. What if the High King’s behavior is not due to Illyria’s influence? It’s my understanding he’s executed people for little reason before. Along with torture, imprisonment, and various other excesses.”

  “Never in front of the whole court at dinner.”

  “Merely an escalation. And I haven’t mentioned how he’s treated you and his other daughters.”

  “What happened to your contractual loyalty?” I accused. “It’s remarkably flexible, it seems.”

  “I’m loyal to the representative of the High Throne,” he returned in a quiet tone.

  “As am I—the High Throne is Uorsin and he is the High Throne. It’s not my place, or yours, to pass judgment on him.”

  “You’re thick skulled is what you are.” He sounded uncharacteristically impatient, an echo of Dafne’s anger. “Can you kill her? I have no doubt you possess the skill. Would anyone in Dasnaria, including the Temple of Deyrr, seek to avenge her? Possibly. Will her death change anything? Probably, but not what you hope it will.”

  “That’s somewhat helpful.” Something to work with, anyway.

  “Ursula, even the best monarch can go bad. Power corrupts.”

  I wasn’t having that conversation. “What do you know of it?”

  “More than you think.”

  Determined to keep on track, I ignored the bait. “I’m focusing on Illyria’s corruption first. You should know what we’ll face as we ascend the pass tomorrow. It’s very likely we’ll hit foul weather at the barrier—and we won’t be able to cross into Annfwn. I’d like to leave a contingent here and at the base of the trail, before it narrows. Only a small party should attempt the border.”

  “All right. But I will be with the group that ascends.”

  “I think it would be more strategic if—”

  “You can order me to stay behind, but I’ll just follow.”

  “So much for you abiding by my commands.”

  “That’s the upside of flexible loyalty—it allows me to justify many decisions.”

  “I don’t understand you, Captain. Loyalty cannot be flexible.” I had to unclench my jaw to continue. “Fine. But I cannot control whether you can cross the border. You might find yourself awaiting my return for some time.”

  “I don’t mind waiting.” His voice held an intimate reminder of his other promises, which I also ignored. “Is that everything you wished to discuss, Your Highness?”

  “Yes. Thank you.” I turned to go, but he stepped up behind me, quick and deadly silent. Should we ever truly cross blades, I’d have to be careful never to turn my back to him. He enfolded me, big arms around my waist, and pulled me against him, mouth pressed hot to the back of my neck.

  “Stay awhile,” he coaxed.

  “I can’t.”

  “You’re riddled with worry and tension. Let me melt you a little.”

  “I thought we weren’t doing this.”

  “Just a bit of love play. Let me tempt you.”

  “I don’t want this.” I steeled myself against the slow blurring, reaching for that place of clear determination.

  “Why not?”

  I groped to remember, my mind already clouding with the pure pleasure of his touch. “It’s distracting.”

  “Oh, yes.” Harlan practically purred his agreement, stroking down my hips, teeth nibbling the muscle at the juncture of my neck, so that I wanted to tip my head and purr also. “Deliciously so.”

  There I was, melting again. This was why Danu’s priestesses took vows of chastity. Not out of a lack of interest, but because the desire could become so overwhelming. Taking away good sense and resolve. A vow served to shore up one’s will when temptation presented itself. I’d never thought I’d need that kind of help, but I could admit to it. Learn from my mistakes.

  If I didn’t have my willpower, I had nothing. Single focus.

  No more indulging.

  “I’m not doing this.” Breaking his hold—albeit not difficult, but I did it with a bit of satisfying force—I stepped well out of his reach. “No more.”

  “All right,” he agreed. “All you have to do is tell me to stop.”

  “Well, I’m telling you. Not for just now, but for always. No more,” I repeated, cementing the promise to myself and Danu.

  “What are you saying?” His voice had gone flat.

  “A final no. I’m not doing this. Leave me alone, Harlan. I can’t afford any distractions. Put a hand on me again and I’ll cut it off.”

  He was silent a long time. So long that I nearly caved and said something more, instead of waiting him out as my ultimatum required. Any good negotiation depended on holding to one’s lines in the sand.

  “What changed?” he finally threw out. A gauntlet between us.

  “Nothing.” I kept my voice even, proud of myself. “I considered your proposition and have decided against it.”

  “This isn’t a negotiation on water rights, Ursula.” He grated out the words.

  “The principle is the same. You made an offer—repeatedly and with various attempts to sweeten the deal—and I’ve given it fair thought, weighed the options, and have decided against it.”

  He cursed, something that sounded most foul in Dasnarian. “You’ve done nothing fairly. You refuse to speak honestly with me, to give me the least measure of your trust. You stand there and lie to me about having considered what I’ve offered you—someone who will love you without reserve or judgment—and you blithely claim you feel nothing even while your blood pours hot in your veins from my mouth on you.”

  “There’s more to life than sex. All of it more important.”

  “You don’t know that because you’ve never had it. No”—his voice shot out of the dimness—“don’t you dare claim that you have, because whatever happened to you had nothing to do with love or desire or real intimacy between two people. You’re just afraid and dressing it up as something else. You deny yourself the least happiness out of blind adherence to some ideal that doesn’t exist.”

  His words stung, far more than they should have. Danu! Such a viciously targeted strike. He’d opened the way to this wound, breaking the scar tissue with his questions, flattery, and attention. A weapon so finely honed I’d never felt it going in. I’d been fine, all of that squarely in the past. Now he’d made that old injury seep with blood and pus once more. With pain. I nearly staggered from the ache. Of course that scared me. I couldn’t keep bleeding like this.

  “Fine. I am afraid. You called me fearless and you were wrong about that, also.”

  “Also?”

  “You thought you could cozen and seduce me. It will never happen.”

  “Ah. I understand. I never figured you for a coward, Ursula.”

  “Think what you like. I’m not interested in having the good opinion of a mercenary.” I hauled myself back, almost regretting that last attack. A clean slice, meant to hurt enough to end this dance between us once and for all.

  He absorbed the strike silently, a warrior to the end.

  “Be ready to ride out in the morning,” I said, an
d turned to go.

  “Ursula,” he called after me.

  Unwilling, I stopped, looked over my shoulder into the shadows. “What?”

  “Do you realize that’s the first time you’ve used my name? And you did it to break my heart.”

  I steeled mine. “Then you know I mean it.” With that, I strode off to take first watch. He would get over it soon enough.

  Better now than later.

  We packed up to leave at first light, the squad I’d picked to establish a camp at the base of the pass to await us moving more quickly than the ones resituating to wait us out in this spot.

  “Your Highness?”

  I raised an eyebrow at Dafne. “This must be serious if you’re using my title.”

  She actually flushed lightly, bearing out my suspicion. “I’d like to ask a favor.”

  “I’m not taking any more of your potions—I slept fine,” I told her, though I hadn’t. After first watch, I’d lain awake, alternately missing the reassuring warm bulk of Harlan’s body and fuming over his accusations. Ridiculous. All my life I’d slept alone, and I sleep next to a man one night and find some lonely part of myself longing to have it again. I’d made a choice I knew to be the right one, then spent a sleepless night dissecting our argument. All the ways he’d muddled me.

  Good thing I’d cut his pursuit short when I had. I should have nipped it in the bud.

  “This is for me.” Dafne took a breath, clearly squaring her resolve. “I want to come with you up the pass.”

  “No.” I checked the saddlebags and moved a few things to a pack I’d wear on my back, just in case I became separated from my horse.

  “Your Highness.” Dafne looked less hesitant, more determined.

  “What? You asked, I answered. It’s not safe. There’s a reason I’m leaving most everyone here or at the base camp. We’re not going on a picnic, librarian. You’ll stay here.”

  “Don’t insult me,” she snapped back. “I’m aware of the dangers and will be responsible for myself. This is important to me and it’s my life to risk. Didn’t you say much the same thing last night?”

  “It doesn’t work that way. Anyone not a trained fighter will be a liability. Your presence would force the rest of us to focus energy on your safety instead of keeping our attention where it should be, on ourselves and the mission. I can’t afford any distractions. You’re staying behind.”

  “I’ll be responsible for Lady Mailloux.” Harlan’s smooth baritone grated on my nerves. Tempting not to look at him at all, but I would be better than that. And would have to practice, regardless. I gave him a cool, dismissive glance, making my displeasure at his interference clear. He returned the gaze with apparent neutrality, his expression set as it had been when I first saw him standing guard at Uorsin’s side. But I knew him better now. A glint of anger in his pale eyes, challenging me. A hunger, too.

  Part of me answered to it, warming, and I ruthlessly froze that away. I would not feel it.

  “You’re lucky I’m letting you come along,” I informed him, taking a savage pleasure in goading him with an imperious tone. “Don’t forget who you answer to here, mercenary.”

  “Shall we confer privately, Your Highness?”

  “No. We need to set out and there’s nothing to discuss. Lady Mailloux stays with the main group.”

  “You’re being stubborn for the wrong reasons, Ursula.” Harlan’s eyes glittered with building emotion, that impassive shell showing cracks. “You can’t shut us all out.”

  “Actually, I can do that very thing. Lady Mailloux understands my decision.”

  “No, she doesn’t.” Dafne stepped between us, making me abruptly aware that we had closed on each other so we stood nearly nose to nose. Not good that I’d forgotten something as basic as maintaining a perimeter outside his reach. If it came to a fight between us, I needed to be outside that range to have a chance of winning. He’d lulled me into forgetting those boundaries. Repeatedly. Reestablishing my distance, I gave Dafne my attention.

  “Do we need to have that conversation about insubordination after all?”

  “You said you didn’t expect military obedience of me.” Her brown eyes snapped, brimming over with more emotion than I’d seen in her before. “Have I ever asked you for anything?”

  I considered her, how her petite body vibrated with the strength of her feelings. And no, she’d really asked nothing of any of us, but had given a great deal. True loyalty. To Andi, then to Amelia, and now to me.

  Blowing out a long breath, I acknowledged to Danu that I’d let the situation with the mercenary affect me too much and prayed to her for clarity. “Why do you want to go so badly?”

  “I want to see Annfwn.”

  She phrased it simply, but her fingers had knotted together, her voice full of a lifetime of yearning. So much more than simply wanting it.

  “You might not be able to cross the barrier,” I told her gently, not liking how hope suffused her face that I seemed to be relenting.

  “If I can’t, then I’ll know and go on with my life. But I might never get this close again. Please, Ursula—let me try. I truly don’t care if I lose my life in the attempt.”

  “You have a lot of life still ahead of you.”

  She laughed, a bitter sound that came out of a deep unhappiness, stabbing at my own raw heart. “An empty life. A meaningless one in most ways. Sometimes I feel like a ghost living on the edges of everyone else’s lives—yours, Amelia’s, Andi’s, even the people in the books and histories. I have no family, no prospects, no real value to anyone. The only thing I’ve ever really wanted was to see Annfwn.”

  “You have value to me.”

  “I could make a life of that, yes—be Derodotur to you, give my days to that service and be happy doing it. If you survive to take the throne. But I want to make that choice, not be forced into it because I have nothing else, because I believe nothing more than that is possible for me.”

  I pretended to think, studying the brightening cloudless sky, using the moment to master my own turbulent heart. Why her words affected me so, I wasn’t sure. I certainly didn’t want Harlan’s far-too-keen gaze to see how unsettled I felt. He’d no doubt think it had to do with him and it didn’t. It couldn’t.

  “Fine.” I nodded. Then had to look away again from the bright joy that flooded her countenance. I fixed my eyes on the mercenary instead, annoyed that my fingers itched to touch him, that the hard look in his eye pricked my conscience. Let him be angry. I’d withstood worse. “You’re responsible for her, Captain Harlan. See that you don’t fail me in this.”

  A muscle in his jaw flexed, but he simply bowed. “As you command, Your Highness. I would never fail you, in any way. Maybe one day you’ll do me the honor of not questioning that.”

  I glared at him, torn between calling him out for his barbed words and refusing to give him the satisfaction of an answer.

  Dafne looked back and forth between us. Stepped back as if easing herself from the line of fire. “I’ll go get my things and be ready to leave.”

  Neither of us replied—or even glanced at her.

  “Your move, I believe,” Harlan said. A smoothly voiced taunt.

  “I don’t know what you want from me, Captain.”

  “Yes, you do.” Now he let the desire show, the love he claimed to feel. Naked and raw. It thudded into me like an arrow, piercing, unexpected. Somehow I’d lost the ability to shield myself against him.

  Determined to master this situation, I took in a long breath. Centered myself. “I’m sorry if your pride is offended. Surely a woman has turned you down before.”

  “Don’t give me that, Ursula. This isn’t about pride. I gave you my heart and you tossed it back like so much rotten meat.”

  “Because I don’t want it. I never asked for it.”

  “Because you’re terrified you want it too much.”

  “That sure sounds like pride to me,” I snapped back.

  He fingered his sword and I swiped my
thumb over the topaz in the pommel of mine. Warm, smooth, and reassuring. “Do you plan to draw on me, mercenary?”

  “I should. Then you’d be forced to deal with me, one way or the other.”

  “Don’t do it,” I warned him. “I will kill you if I have to.”

  “Do you really believe you could?”

  “I’m fast enough.”

  “No doubt of that.” He leaned in, deliberately trespassing on my careful perimeter. “I’m asking if you really think you could bear to strike me down. You might be successfully lying to yourself, but I know better.”

  “You know nothing about me, mercenary.”

  “That’s where you’re mistaken. Tell me what Lady Mailloux meant about there being a question of you surviving to inherit the throne.”

  The swift change of subject almost caught me off guard, though I shouldn’t have been surprised he caught that. “She worries too much. The pair of you are alike in that way.”

  “I’ll guess then. She believes Uorsin will kill you if you carry out your plan to assassinate Illyria. It’s logical. Why shouldn’t he? Particularly if you deliver your nephew into his hands. Your replacement. The boy he truly wanted all along.”

  The edges of my vision went gray and I pressed my lips against the tremble that threatened. “He’s the High King. Only he can choose who best should succeed him.”

  Harlan lifted a hand and I stepped back, though he wasn’t close to touching me. “I apologize. I meant to make you see, not to hurt you.”

  “You didn’t. You’ve said nothing I didn’t know. Nothing everyone doesn’t know. My father desperately wished for a male heir, but more than that, his accomplishments deserve someone worthy to follow in his stead. If Astar better serves in that role, I trust in the King’s judgment. I told Dafne and I’ll tell you: this is not about me. I don’t understand why you will not see that.”

  “Maybe we see what you don’t, Ursula,” he replied in a patient tone. “As stubborn, hardheaded, and abrasive as you can be, you are the shining star we look to. All of us.”