Darin.
The mask crumpled. Uncertainty filtered through the cracks.
“How did you know?” he whispered, his voice stark. He met her eyes fully, probing them. She met his search without turning away, and he saw the sheen of tears in her eyes. Had they always been there?
He looked at her cheeks and saw that tears trailed along them. Is it all a game? he wanted to shout.
No. This was real. this stranger, this noble of Veriloth—she was real. His arms shot out and wrapped themselves around her as tightly as they could. It was awkward, but he didn’t notice the way she juggled her elbows out of the way.
“Darin.”
He looked up; she was blurred by the tears—his, this time. Looking at her this closely, he thought that she was limned in a light that left her eyes and surrounded her.
“We’ll take care of each other, you and I.”
He nodded, but he couldn’t speak. The tears were dissolving him. Someone was shaking; he couldn’t be sure who it was.
But the tears became sobs, and the sobs became silence and a haunting peace.
chapter eight
They were very late for breakfast.
Sara, lady of Veriloth, walked hand in hand with Darin, lowliest of slaves, as they made their way from the north wing. It only made sense, she had said, because she certainly didn’t know where she was going.
“Are you sure you want to do this, Sara?”
Sara. She smiled warmly at him. “The lord’s orders were most specific.” Her smile faded. “Are you sure that you do?”
It had seemed a good idea in the comfort of her rooms, but the domineering gray of solid stone made it seem a smaller, colder one.
“He told you that you could do what you pleased?”
She nodded seriously.
“And that I could do whatever you wanted?”
She nodded again.
It was a bad idea. He knew it was a bad idea.
But he wanted to enter the dining room with her. He wanted—he wanted to know that he could walk beside her, and she would treat him like a real person without her own walls to hide them.
“Darin?”
His name. His name, used by someone free—someone who had a choice, as he had once had a choice. That decided him. Heart racing, he said, “Yes, Sara. Yes, if you’re still sure.”
“I’m certain.”
Something about her voice made him glad that she was his friend.
She walked over to the set of small double doors.
These ones? She mouthed at him.
He nodded, and she gave a little grunt as she pushed them open.
The room that unfolded before them was laid out with the precision of a heart board. Heart board? she wondered with a start. A game... Narrow, peaked windows lined the walls even between rounded, decorative pillars. Light hit wooden floors, revealing the intricate inlays that curled around the legs of the long, narrow table. Much design had gone into this.
Lady Sara looked up to see Lord Darclan at the head of the table. He, too, sat precisely. Not rigidly, but not... she shook her head. Like hearts, his presence spoke of power. The black heart, personified, waiting for the move. And like the game, on left and right were two older men, standing in as Servant pieces.
She felt no recognition, but she didn’t like them. One was dressed in a variant of the black that Lord Darclan still wore, the other in green and silver finery. Sara had always hated hearts. As a game, it seemed to trivialize and reduce war itself. Too many people suffered too much to have their pain made so small.
But she thought it fitting, somehow, that she stood directly opposite the black heart piece, playing, instead, the white heart. She looked at Darin, who stood very close to her side, and smiled.
White heart and Servant; we are outnumbered. He has three to our two, and we have no black-blood, no white-bloods to throw between us. Perhaps this was why she hated the game so much. But this move is ours.
She took a step forward and stopped as she realized that she had seen the game played, but had never played in it. Who had played it? Where?
The pressure that Darin exerted on her hand allowed her to put the question aside for the moment. But the thought lost her the right of first move.
Lord Darclan stood and bowed very formally. “Lady Laren. I trust I do not tax your strength with my request for your compansy?”
She sighed and squeezed Darin’s hand to reassure both of them. “Not at all, Lord Darclan. I apologize for taking so long to wake. Please forgive us for being late.”
He smiled, then, and nodded. The man to his left, the one in the dark robes, started slightly in surprise.
“Please, lady, be seated.”
Darin hovered behind her. Sara walked up to the table and immediately noted that there were only four places set—and three taken. She hesitated, running her tongue across the edge of her teeth.
Once again she felt the pressure of Darin’s hand.
She made her move.
“Lord Darclan.” She gave a bow to equal his, low and proper. The man in the green and silver gave her a disdainful look, and she realized that she had bowed instead of curtsied. Bowing, however, had seemed to her the more natural action. She colored, gritted her teeth, and began to speak.
“Lord Darclan, it would please me greatly to be able to continue as I’ve started.”
He raised an eyebrow and waited in silence.
Sara felt awkward. “I would ask that another place be set here for Darin.” She lifted his hand, which shook only a little more than hers did. But he was afraid; she felt anger.
Lord Darclan’s eyebrows rose fractionally higher as he glanced at the slave at her side, seeming to become aware of the link their hands formed.
Both men looked also, and then turned incredulous stares at Sara.
She met their gaze with a brittle smile. Lord Darclan was lord here, not these two, and she cared little enough if she embarrassed or demeaned herself in their eyes.
She waited for the move that would answer hers, her green eyes staring into his dark ones. Silence stretched out between them; it felt odd. And then, strangest of all, he smiled.
“Lady Sara,” he said softly.
“Stefan.”
His smile deepened. “We need not bother to set another seat. Calven is just finished, and his place will be cleared. The boy may sit there.”
She cleared her throat softly and looked once more at Darin. He met her eyes, hesitated once, and then nodded almost fiercely.
The man in the dark robes, presumably Calven, rose. With a not quite silent sputter, he turned a venomous glare at Sara. She turned it with the edge of her smile.
Without thinking, he took a step forward, toward her.
Lord Darclan’s hand caught his arm. Even from this distance, it did not look gentle. “Go,” he said, in the exact tone that he had used to dismiss Darin from her quarters yesterday.
“For the sake of a slave? ”
“For the sake,” Lord Darclan said quietly, “of your life, Priest.”
Calven’s eyes widened, and his robes swirled as he attempted to pull away. Then he stopped, suddenly, as if struck. He turned to look again at Sara. His eyes widened and then narrowed in quick succession.
Bowing was difficult with Lord Darclan’s hand still entrenched in his forearm, but he managed to do so, stiffly and formally. Then he left.
Lady Sara looked for a long while at her host.
In the game of heart, if a move was too easily made, or a victory too easily won, each side had to be careful before accepting the fruit of it. Traps were often set so, if one player was more experienced, and one too eager.
She sighed. Perhaps it was time to abandon the game; reality was dangerous enough. She pulled out Calven’s chair and sat lightly in it, motioning for Darin to take the seat before hers.
His hands shook as he pulled out the chair, but he showed no other sign of what he felt until he was truly seated in it. And then he loo
ked at Sara.
His smile, shaky, almost stunned, made the game worth everything.
Lord Darclan clapped his hands, and slaves appeared. At his word, they moved forward to clear Calven’s place.
But they were not as efficient this morning as they were on every other. Each of them—and there were four—stopped to stare at Darin. Then they turned to glance, much less obviously, at their lord.
Darin said nothing, but he swallowed. Later, there would be questions to answer, a lot of them. Cullen alone could probably demand his time for an evening.
But some of his triumph evaporated as he realized that eating at this table meant that he, too, would be waited on by slaves. As if he weren’t one of them. As if there were a difference. He didn’t like it at all.
He glanced at Lady Sara and saw what he felt mirrored in the still lines of her face. Wordless, she apologized, and he accepted that there were things she could not ask—not yet.
The table before him was set with silver cutlery—the very silver that he had spent his first month cleaning. His appetite deserted him as the slaves filed out.
But it returned when they did, bearing a plenitude of trays with a variety of foods in large quantities. At the nods of those seated, they began to place these foods carefully and precisely upon the plates, forming patterns with them that eating would only destroy.
Sara tried to keep a cheerful disposition as the slaves hovered like shadows around her. She succeeded—but only briefly.
Her knife and fork clattered to the table, and she looked up to meet Lord Darclan’s eyes. They had not left her since she had entered the room, but this did not make her uncomfortable. She felt that she had always been under his gaze, and the familiar sensation gave her an anchor.
Taking a deep breath, she said, “Lord Darclan, I must ask you a question.”
He smiled. “Another like the last one?”
“No,” she replied gravely. “I want to know if I ever owned slaves.”
His smile faltered. His voice did not. “What do you mean, Sara?”
“Exactly what I said. Did I ever own slaves?”
“Owning slaves is common in our culture, lady.” He picked up a fork.
“That isn’t an answer.”
The fork returned to the table. “No, lady. It is not. If you must know, yes, yes you did.”
He watched as she shut her eyes. Watched the way her hand trembled on the tabletop. Watched the way her shoulders curled inward. Gifting of pain.
No. He reached out one hand to touch hers. Both were cold. “Lady,” he said.
She nodded.
“You did own them, yes. You often said it was the only way you could protect them within the Empire.” He felt her hand relax slightly, a reward for his effort at honesty. “You were always too gentle with them. I believe this was a point of contention between your father and yourself.”
Her eyes narrowed at something his voice betrayed.
“And between us, lord?”
He smiled. “I will not lie about this, lady. It was indeed a point of some bitter difficulty between us. You often said I resembled your father in many ways.” A distant look touched his features as he stared through her. “You never did admire efficiency.”
“I don’t believe efficiency is the art of forcing another human being to do everything for you.”
“So you have often said.” He turned his gaze upon Darin.
The boy didn’t notice the scrutiny—he was watching Sara, listening to her words.
Yes, Sara. It starts here, and not in the way I had planned.
But in the afternoon, he was prepared to do his best to ameliorate the damage to his plans. He felt anger, but it was not directed. No plans that had involved her ever worked quite as he expected. He asked for her presence in the garden, knowing that she would be happy to join him in the outside air on a day such as this.
And in this, at least, he was correct.
“It is beautiful out here.” She stretched her hands out toward the sun. Dark velvet absorbed its heat, warming her. “I never want to go back inside.” Her face surrendered a deep, wide smile. It was the first truly open one that she had given, and it was not for him. But he would change that.
Everything smelled green all around, and instead of the gray stone and gray walls, she was surrounded by bursts of brilliant color in the form of flowers and shrubs. Her element, this life.
He walked, in silence, beside her. A faint smile hovered in his eyes as he watched her. She was different, as he guessed she might be. She had always professed to love the sun, had always been able to find beauty in any natural phenomenon that was not inherently destructive, but she had never given her expression with such glee. She had been too adult for it, too responsible.
This, Lady, this is what you should have been like, with no experience to teach you to shield your light beneath age. Perhaps the return of your memory will only play you false and deprive you of joy in such a day.
It was not all of the truth, and he knew it, but he declined to acknowledge it. Here, perhaps, he could enjoy her smiles, her laughter, and her life. And maybe here he could begin to invoke her light.
They walked alone through the immense garden that surrounded the castle. Not even the distant clipping and digging of the master gardener, which never seemed to end, intruded.
Here and there, she would stop suddenly, bending down or reaching out to touch a leaf or petal. Sometimes her face would disappear, caught between hair and color. It would emerge again, brightened.
“I like this garden,” she said softly.
He relaxed, which surprised him, and decided that he would commend the master gardener by ceasing to question his activities altogether.
“It’s—it’s not quite like other gardens I’ve seen. At least I don’t think so.”
“No?”
She shook her head, a frown rippling across her lips. It vanished as she stopped yet again. “It’s not as ... organized. It’s got more of a wild feel to it.”
“I am glad that you like it.”
She stopped. “Do you?”
“Pardon, lady?”
“Do you like it?”
He paused and looked around him. Like it? It was an odd question—a question that she would ask.
She chuckled. “Never mind, lord. It’s answer enough.” She began to walk along the paths again.
He followed, for the moment content.
Until he saw where she wandered. Until he noted that the hedges had sprung up, like walls, along the path.
No, he thought, and tried to lead her elsewhere.
She followed, but again her feet led her back to that path, the one that led, in decreasing green circles, to the center of the garden.
Does she know even now? He took her arm.
“Lady, where do you walk?”
She shrugged delicately. “I’m not sure. But anything in this garden has to be beautiful. Does it matter?”
Matter? he thought bitterly. He regretted his decision to bring her here. But short of forbidding her to walk here, he knew he had no choice.
Even now, he thought as they walked in an ever decreasing spiral, even now it calls you. Ah, Lady, Sara. It had never been his way to avoid the inevitable, but recognizing it was hard, and acquiescing harder.
“Lady,” he said softly, “there is something I wish to show you. It was something you knew.”
“What?” Her face brightened and tensed. There was something of hunger in it.
“It is—” He shook his head. He could not name it. “It is something you knew. Walk further into the garden’s center; you will see for yourself.”
They began to move together. But she no longer paused at each bush, each flower. She no longer bent to let their fragrance touch her the more closely. He felt her tension, her anticipation, in every step.
This is the test of the blood-magic, Lady.
The sun made odd shadows that cut and blended. Her fingers curled more tightly in
to his arm, cooling even in the sun’s warmth.
He understood.
They walked on, and the circles grew tighter as the center drew closer. The path seemed enclosed and more twisted than it had; the flowers, for an instant, seemed an empty, perfumed facade.
Then they were gone.
She had said that this garden seemed more “wild,” and the truth of it, absolute and undeniable, was here. They had reached the center.
Sara gasped, and her nerveless hands fell slowly to her side. She stood a moment in his shadow, then walked out of it to approach the crumbling, rounded wall of rock that might once have been a well.
It stood, a forgotten monument, beneath a twisting wreath of ugly vines. She stepped forward, avoiding the thorned mass of small plants that sprung up around the circumference of weathered stone.
He did not move to follow. A sharp breath cut his lips as her hands very delicately touched the old, pocked stone of the ancient well. As hers, his eyes fell on the wild vines, the uneven grass, and the brambles. He knew she found nothing of beauty here.
“What—what is this?”
“The oldest part of all my lands.” His voice was muted, absorbed by the small island of wilderness. Not even birds flew here. “It has stood thus for centuries. I will not let even the master gardener tend it.” Much to the master gardener’s grief.
“But why not? It’s so ...” Her words trailed away; they hadn’t the power to describe what she felt.
“I know. And it was not always so. It is a matter of interest to me to see how long it takes these vines to eat their way through solid stone. I have watched them for much of my life, making a little progress here, a little there. The rock still prevails.”
“But if you value it, why don’t you tend it? Why don’t you preserve it?” Her voice was rising and tightening. He liked it not, but still did not move.
“Ah, lady.” He bowed his head a moment. “It is not my art. Do you understand this?” He looked down at his weathered hands, clenched them into white fists, and let them slowly unfurl. “I have no power over it; it stands or it falls.”
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