by M. J. Scott
She threw up her hands, still not understanding what had him so upset. “It is a decision we made together. To proceed with caution.”
“You call that cautious? A flat refusal?” He sounded incredulous.
“I didn’t refuse. I asked for reassurances. I bought us more time.” She scowled at him. “You know as well as I do that they aren’t telling us everything. That something else is going on.”
“And you may have destroyed any chance we had of finding out exactly what that may be.”
“Oh really? You think they’re just going to roll over and tell us everything? Did you have too much wine with dinner?”
He glared at her. “I think that if we had acted as though we were leaning toward going with them, I may have gotten a chance to speak to James alone.”
He hadn’t mentioned that in their conversations. Why not? “What makes you think he would tell you the truth?”
“He’s Jeanne’s family. My family. Or close enough to.”
“And what if they’re threatening him in some way? Do you expect him to choose me over his family? Over your family?”
“He’s an honorable man.”
“Honorable men do terrible things at times. Especially when their loyalty is pulled in more than one direction.” Like Cameron’s was right now, she realized. Between her and his home. Between the vows he’d sworn and maybe what his heart truly wanted.
“James wouldn’t.”
“He’s not your brother,” she said. “He owes you no particular loyalty.”
“But you do,” Cameron snarled. “And you just plowed on and as good as refused them without consulting me. It was foolish. You need to learn to think.” His eyes were a blaze of blue.
“I am thinking. And not just with wounded pride or whatever it is that has you so wound up. I’m thinking that most of the options I have I don’t like, but there are some I like less than others.”
“And now you may have taken some of those options away. You should have asked me first. You have no experience with this kind of thing. You’re so young.”
“I have spent more time in the thick of court politics than you have,” she retorted. “I was at court watching Eloisa and King Stefan. You were off being a soldier.”
“Exactly. I understand tactics.”
“And I don’t?”
“Judging by tonight, no.”
She was growing tired of being surrounded by men who thought they knew what was best for her. Or that she should want what they thought she should want. “I’m not going back there to be bound and contained and dealt with as they please,” she snapped.
“Is that what you care about, your freedom?”
“I care about my safety. And yes, my freedom. You heard the barron. He stopped himself but he was about to tell you to use your marriage bond to make me obey you in some way. Because he doesn’t bloody well know that we’re not bonded in the traditional way. He thought you could compel me to do what you wanted. Which tells me that at least some of what Domina Gerrard told me is right. It tells me that there is reason for Domina Skey to hate me beyond the fact that I stand too close to the throne. I’m a royal witch who can’t be controlled by her husband. But perhaps you’d prefer that not to be the case? Is that what you want, Cameron? For me to go home and let them turn me into something close enough to your slave? If they let me live, that is. Or perhaps you’re planning on being a repentant widower? Or maybe you’d prefer to leave me here and go back to your nice peaceful simple life. Back to Eloisa’s bed? Tell them you left your dangerous witch wife behind. All you have to do is ask. I know you didn’t want this bond. I won’t keep you if you want to go. But I’m not going back until I know exactly what they want of me.” She was breathing too fast, her heart hammering in her ears, hands curled into fists at her side.
Cameron looked . . . frozen. Not giving her any clue as to what he might be feeling. About whether or not her fears had any basis. Not stepping up to deny or to offer comfort or apology. The sight of him made her heart crack a little. It was too much. She had meant what she had said. She wouldn’t keep him against his will. Couldn’t bear it, in fact. But then, she had no idea if she could bear it if he went either. And amongst all the other battles she seemed to be fighting, all the dangers around them, she didn’t think she had the strength for this one. It was the one that could most easily destroy her. Cameron might just be the biggest danger of all.
And if she stood there one minute longer and waited for him to tell her he was leaving, she would break. “Do as you please,” she said, letting the fear turn the words to anger rather than show him the hurt he’d dealt her. She headed for the door and he let her go.
Chapter 17
Cameron splashed cold water on his face and dried it, staring at himself in the mirror. His reflection looked as though it was spoiling for a fight.
“You just had one, you idiot,” he told it. “With the wrong person.”
He bent again and applied cold water a second time. Maybe it could wash away his anger. Or at least the words he’d thrown at Sophie. The words she’d thrown back at him. “Do as you please,” she’d said.
None of it pleased him. Maybe that was the problem. No good options and no way to find a solution. He’d never liked not being able to solve a problem set to him.
But none of his training had prepared him to be set as the toy wedged between two angry rulers. Or an angry wife.
She pleased him. He knew that much. And he hated that he’d given her cause to doubt that. Sophie had made no secret of the fact that she felt guilt over the manner of their bonding and that he’d had to marry her. He thought she loved him, but somewhere within the foundation of that love was a small thread of doubt, waiting to trip her up.
He’d yanked hard on that thread just now. Goddess only knew what damage he’d done to the new-forged trust that formed the heart of their marriage. He’d never considered that a good marriage was a fragile thing, woven day by day by the acts of two people. In one so new as theirs, the threads were so fine to be near invisible, like a single strand of the silks Jeanne and his mother embroidered with. It took time and space to strengthen them into something that could bear the strain.
He’d seen a little of that with his brothers. Seen also, between his parents, what happened when the only things holding a marriage together were obligations and the constraints of society. His parents had been partners in the business of running the erldom and yes, they’d had children, so they had shared a bed at least three times. But there’d been little affection between them, other than the absent fondness you might have for something familiar in your life that made it easier. He’d never seen any sign of love in his parents. Or anything resembling the passion he shared with Sophie. Certainly his father had not seemed to be overly affected that his wife had died when she did. He’d simply moved his mistress nearer and shoved the burden of actually running the household onto Jeanne. As Liam’s—the heir’s—wife, Jeanne could hardly have shirked the duty.
Is that what he wanted his marriage to turn into? A loveless obligation? A resentment of the bond that held them together? She’d offered again to release him. It was entirely possible that here in Illvya she could find out how to do exactly that without his participation. Could set him free if that’s what she decided she wanted.
The thought made his blood run cold.
He was worse than an idiot. He didn’t want to be free. He wanted his marriage to be one of love like those his brothers had built with their wives. He wanted Sophie. Nothing else.
And he owed her an apology.
“Fix it,” he muttered at his reflection before leaving the bathroom. But he’d no sooner opened the door of the receiving room, intent on finding out which way Imogene and Sophie had gone, when one of Aristides’ silver-clad servants came around the corner of the corridor.
“Lord Scardale?” the man asked.
“Yes.” What now?
The man offered an envelope. “For you, my lord.”
&
nbsp; As soon as Cameron took it, the man turned on his heel and headed back in the direction he had come, moving rapidly. Whatever was in the note, apparently it required no response.
He scanned the corridor. In the distance, the guards still stood outside the door of the dining room, which suggested Aristides was still inside with Henri. No doubt plotting whatever step came next in this game that was playing out around him and Sophie.
But at least they were safely out of the way for now. Other than the guards, the corridor was deserted.
Good. But still, he didn’t want the guards watching him reading a note. They would no doubt report that the servant had spoken to him if they had seen the exchange—and if they hadn’t, then Colonel Perrine had a problem on his hands—but he didn’t need to speed the news that he had received a message on its way to Aristides’ ears. Nor did he want to be interrupted while he read whatever this message was, so he went back into the receiving room, closing the door and leaning against it to ensure he wouldn’t be disturbed unexpectedly.
The envelope wasn’t sealed with wax and the paper itself bore no imprinted coat of arms or any other clue as to the writer’s identity. A simple single sheet of plain white paper of no particular quality, folded neatly into quarters.
He unfolded it. It was marked with a single line of text.
The barron’s tale is no mountain. Have care.
There was no signature. And the hand was careful, almost a perfect example of the script in the books his tutors had taught him from as a child. As though the author had deliberately scrubbed it of any sign of personality. It had to be James though.
He rubbed his finger over the words.
The truth and mountains, these things cannot be altered.
It was a northerner saying. One of those that had little meaning, really. But in the north, to say of something that it was no mountain meant it was not to be trusted. Or that it was an outright lie. No one else in the Anglion party was from the north. Nor was anybody else likely to be sending him a warning. Sir Harold had retired by the time Cameron had joined the Red Guard, so he had no reason to offer Cameron any favor. As for Sevan Allowood, well, that seemed as likely as Cameron growing wings and learning to fly.
So James. And a warning. That the barron was not telling them all there was to tell. He’d known that much already, but he hadn’t known how important what was being held back might be. Important enough for James to risk his neck, it seemed.
Danger, then. Some kind of threat. And he was here while his wife wandered around the palace with Imogene du Laq and goddess only knew how many other people. Unguarded.
That was his fault. But one he could rectify.
He hoped.
Ignoring the chill in his guts and the hairs tingling at the back of his neck, he shoved the note into the inner pocket of his jacket.
Then left the room to find Sophie.
* * *
Sophie almost stumbled into Imogene when she left the receiving room. Only the other woman catching her arm stopped them colliding.
“Sophie? Is everything well?”
“Perfectly.” It was a lie and no doubt Imogene could tell, but she didn’t care.
“Where is Lord Scardale?”
“He wanted a moment to refresh himself,” she said flatly. “He said to go on without him.” She had no idea if Imogene had just heard everything that had been said between her and Cameron. Maybe the room was warded, maybe it was not. It didn’t matter. She just needed to be somewhere away from him.
She waved in the direction they’d been walking before they had stopped. “Why don’t we continue our tour? I’m not sure Cameron is all that interested in architectures and furnishings and such anyway.”
Imogene blinked but then nodded, as though accepting the change of topic. Or accepting Sophie’s wish not to discuss what had just happened. The mage smiled at her. “Oh, I have something better to show you than furnishings. Come, I’m sure your husband can find us when he’s ready. I’ve learned in my years that it is often better to do as one wishes and let one’s husband catch up or not.”
Sophie imagined that any man married to Imogene might well decide that it was easier to let her take the reins a certain percentage of the time. And besides, she had no idea if the du Laqs’ marriage was based on politics or affection. There had to be at least some of the former in it. If duqs were anything like erls, then they weren’t completely free in their choice of spouse.
“That sounds very wise,” she said. “So, show me your better thing.”
She had no idea what Imogene’s better thing might be. But whatever it was, it took quite some time to travel through the palace. They walked through a series of grand hallways and corridors, down several flights of stairs and then through what Sophie suspected was a tunnel used by servants. Imogene had paused a time or two to point out features of the palace, but when Sophie had kept her responses brief to these explanations, she’d given up and picked up their pace.
When they emerged from the last hallway, Sophie wasn’t even sure they were still within the main building of the palace or whether they were now in one of the outbuildings she assumed must surround it. The hallway was much simpler, lacking the elaborate decorations of the palace, and the floor was gray stone tiles rather than marble. The ceiling still soared far above their heads, so wherever they were, it was still a large building. In her experience, palaces and other grand houses were usually surrounded by a network of stables and workshops and military barracks and servants’ quarters and storehouses. Even the Academe had some of these. There was no reason to assume that Aristides’ palace would be any different. This building could be almost anything. But before she could ask where they were, Imogene stopped in front of a pair of extremely tall doors. Exceedingly so. They must have been twenty feet tall or more.
But if the doors were large, the room they led into was enormous.
It would have fit several of Aristides’ ballrooms within it easily. In the middle of the room, a hive of activity centered around a framework of scaffolding that held a . . . well, she wasn’t entirely sure what.
“What is it?” Sophie said, staring up at the massive structure, Cameron and everything else forgotten for a moment as she looked up in wonder at the object resting in a vast frame above them. It reminded her of the hull of a ship, only fashioned from wood and leather and metal, joined together by some means she couldn’t even begin to fathom. But instead of masts and rigging, there was . . . nothing. Not that she could see. She could see people climbing around the frame, balanced on scaffoldings or dangling over the edges on complicated rope and leather harnesses.
“Something new,” Imogene said, eyes shining as she gazed upward as well. “I call it a navire d’avion.”
Sophie parsed the Illvyan carefully. “A ship of air? But how can a ship float on air?”
“Ah. Well, that is a very good question. Very good, indeed. But come, let me show her to you.”
Her? The thing didn’t look particularly female to Sophie, but Anglion sailors referred to boats as female. Perhaps Illvyans did as well.
“Please,” she said and followed Imogene across the room, intrigued.
The workers they passed bowed or curtsied at Imogene. Men and women, Sophie realized. Working with wood and metal and leather. Boatbuilding in Anglion was a male occupation. As were most forms of carpentry. Women got to furnish the insides of houses and palaces, not decree what they should look like outside.
The navire only grew larger in scale as they approached it. Imogene led her over to a row of long tables set up about fifteen feet from the outer edge of the scaffolding. A wide roll of paper lay flat across the surface of the center table, its corners weighted down with a china cup, a smaller hammer, and two large iron bolts. Drawn on it were diagrams of the structure before them, shown from various angles, both inside and out. Sophie had never seen such a thing before. She bent to take a closer look.
The drawings were skillfully rendered, the deta
ils intricate. She didn’t understand all the markings and numbers that surrounded each diagram, but that didn’t matter.
She pointed to the image that looked most like a completed ship’s hull. It showed sails of a sort, though they protruded from the sides as well as from two masts in more usual places. “Is this what she will look like when she’s finished?”
“Yes,” Imogene said, grinning. “Is she not beautiful?”
The vessel looked more like the result of some strange mating between a giant fish and a ship. But there was an odd sort of elegance to the lines. Easier to see on the drawing than on the scaffolding-draped edifice before her. “Astonishing,” Sophie said diplomatically. “But what will it be used for?”
“The empire is large. And travel is slow,” Imogene said. She gazed up at the navire, expression hungry. “This will be faster. It doesn’t need water or tides or good roads. Just a little wind.” She looked back down to the image of the ship, her finger tracing its lines. “Wind and a little magic.”
“Is that how it will rise into the air, magic?” Sophie looked from the diagrams to the giant bulk of the hull before her. There was nothing else that suggested how such a creation could do anything but crash to the earth.
“Yes,” Imogene said. “The sanctii say it is possible. If we can find the right combination of powers. We have experimented with other means. There are gases that are lighter than air. That will float if contained.”
“What’s a gas?”
Imogene’s mouth opened. Then closed. Then opened again, her expression horrified. “What do they teach you Anglions in school?”
“Reading, writing. Some arithmetic. Anglion history and geography. Deportment and various artistic and domestic pursuits for girls. Some magical theory if it is likely that you may manifest.”
Imogene scowled. “No sciences? Nothing of the natural world?”
Sophie shook her head. “Not that I was taught. I learned some from my mother and father, of course. About herbs and crops and looking after the animals on the estate.”
