We donned the layers of our cold-weather gear once more and went out into the night.
Above, the same nearly full moon that had shined on us the night before ducked in and out of tattered clouds. Only a few stars pricked the sky, with pale white gleams.
“Why do even the stars look different here?”
Crunching through the snow beside me, Ash shrugged his shoulders. “Why should I know?”
We reached the ring of trees and he pointed to a pile of fallen logs. When Ash led me toward the semiprivate screening, I tipped back the hood of my cloak, letting my hair spill free. A glint from the shadows of his cowl confirmed that my gambit worked. I had his attention. Taking his hand, I tugged him along with me.
“What are you up to, Princess?” He tried to sound stern and genuinely confused, but the way his desire thickened the space between us told me all I needed. He’d lost that calloused membrane of anger that he’d used to wedge us apart, and before he could raise his guard, I slipped inside.
“I’m cold. Can I get under your cloak?” I had already parted the folds and burrowed inside by the time he broke through the shock and tried to refuse me. Then my hand found that hard ridge of his cock that never seemed confused about how it felt, and I had his pants open.
“Ami!” He gasped, a harsh whisper. I stripped off my glove and wrapped my fingers around his length, hot in contrast to the cold night. He made a strangled sound and then buried his hands in the long fall of my hair. “You can’t—oh, Moranu.”
Because I’d found him with my mouth. He felt as velvety as I’d imagined and I ran my tongue over his smooth flesh, savoring the sensation. Not sure what to do, for surely his techniques wouldn’t work in reverse, we were so differently shaped, I followed instinct, letting his intensifying desire guide me.
It seemed to work, because his fingers tightened with brutal strength in my hair, pulling on my scalp. He caused me pain only when he lost his caution, and this was how I wanted him. Just like this. Harder. Bucking his hips and clinging to me as if he were dying.
With a low growl, he tore himself free of my mouth and pushed me to all fours in the snow. He shoved up my skirts—which I’d changed into with expressly this in mind—and groaned to find me naked beneath. Then reached around to cover my mouth with his hand and plunged into me.
He took me as he had at the end the night before, with ruthless strength and wild abandon. Pressing low over my spine, one hand clamping my hip into place, he pounded into me, hot breath in my ear. Coming at me from behind, the pleasure worked me in a different way, and I bit down on the meaty part of his hand because I couldn’t stand not to.
And then I shattered, dissolving under his thrusts, sobbing into the palm of his hand. His body went rigid and he moaned through clenched teeth—so it sounded. Flexing my one bare hand in the snow, I made myself stay awake and alert, enjoying the way he milked himself in and out of me, those last few finishing shudders of his muscles and the way the bitterness of his longing smoothed into sweet satisfaction, if only for a few moments.
“Don’t move,” he whispered in my ear, and I shivered in delight at the gravelly command, then in earnest as the cold air hit my naked bottom when he pulled away. A tearing sound and then a woolen cloth, scraping my thighs and spread tissues, tenderly wiping away the fluids of our union. He must have done this for me the previous night, before he wrapped me up in the blankets. The thought moved me.
He helped me up and, not looking at me, cleaned himself with a fistful of snow before the cloth, then fastened his pants. “You might do the same,” he said, almost as if speaking to himself, “or they might smell it on you.”
“Let them.”
His hands stilled. “It’s a reckless game you play, Princess. Unfortunately I will be the one to pay the forfeit.”
Winding up my hair, I tucked it behind my neck and pulled up my hood. “You will be beyond anyone’s reach tomorrow. And this was no game for me.”
“What is it, then?” His strained voice reached across the gap between us. Nothing of him showed but his cloaked silhouette. But my body still throbbed from his touch and that was enough. It would have to be.
“I wanted more. Something to remember you by.”
“You didn’t have enough already?” He sounded wry, a hint of bitter flavor in the air.
“Stop that,” I snapped, still quiet but with the same demanding force he used. It took him by surprise, the bitterness popping like a soap bubble. “No. I didn’t have enough. I’m starting to learn that we maybe never do. That things and people and pleasures can be yanked away from us at any moment, but it’s not because we had enough. I wanted you while I could have you.
“Also, I wanted something here. Look at the sky, the moon, the stars—even they seem less beautiful. It’s not fair that Annfwn keeps all the magic. I understand you regret our time together, but I needed to know that you still wanted me regardless, outside the sway of paradise. We likely will never meet again. I didn’t want to leave it the way we did.”
“Ami . . .” He trailed off, sounded defeated.
“It’s okay. You don’t need to explain. I’m all right with this.”
In a breath, he closed the space between us, gripping my arms and staring fiercely down into my face from the depth of his hood. “You don’t understand,” he ground out.
“Then explain,” I answered gently. “Tell me, Ash.”
“I don’t regret knowing you. Being with you, touching your skin, and drowning in that insane passion burning in you—I feel as if I’ve been immolated.”
“Burned to ash?”
“Yes.” He laughed soundlessly, under his breath. “That’s what happens when you stare into the sun.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
“No.” He was shaking his head, slowly, from side to side, eyes fixed on mine. “Never be sorry for this. I’m not.”
“But you said—”
“I lied.”
I absorbed that. “Why?”
“Why does anyone lie, Ami? To hide the truth.”
“And what is the truth, Ash?”
“I’ll give you one. The most important truth. That you own me, body and soul. I’m helpless to resist you. My only freedom will be to stay far, far away.”
“Annfwn is far, far away.”
“Yes.”
“Then go.” I’d said it earlier today, but this felt more final.
“I have no wish to burn a man alive, much less you. Go, if you have to.”
“I think I have to.”
“I understand that.”
“You’re different now,” he observed, hands relaxing and flexing on my arms in an almost caress. “I’m not quite sure how to define it.”
“Good. I wanted to change. I didn’t like who I was.”
“I liked you.” He searched my face, his longing as quenching as water in my parched mouth. “I always will.”
“No matter who I become?”
“You will always be my sun.”
“Will you kiss me good-bye?”
Instead of replying, with an urgent gasp of breath, he released my arms, knifed his hands inside my hood, and wound his fingers in my hair. Clasping my skull, he held me tight and plundered my mouth with his. It was less a kiss than a devouring, and I held on to his wrists, though I couldn’t have fallen over if I tried. I opened my mouth to him and let him take whatever he felt safe to have of me.
When he let me go and turned away, I didn’t mind. I would let him go, too.
It was how things had to be.
My internal voice said so, and I was learning to listen to her.
23
I didn’t see Ash again. When I awoke in the morning—because Marin finally shook me, telling me everyone was ready to leave and I could sleep the day away after we reached Windroven—he’d gone hunting to supplement the provisions we’d leave in the cabin for him. Or so Graves said.
Instead I pictured him hiking up the long trail and knocking o
n the door Andi had promised would be opened for him. The image made me happy, so I kept it in my mind and embroidered it as we rode through the stark Wild Lands. Finally I made myself finish it and tuck it away in my mental treasure chest, alongside the sweet memories of Hugh. My touchstones of happiness. My forget-me-nots. Short-lived and hard won.
And all the more precious for it.
The trip back seemed uneventful, even boring, compared to the way in. Graves—mainly due to Skunk’s excellent scouting skills—deftly avoided the patrols from Ordnung. There were fewer than the men expected, in fact, as if Uorsin’s forces were engaged elsewhere. Once we finished our long circuit around the castle itself and made our way to the high road, it became clear that tensions had only risen during our short time away.
Various squads and patrols passed us with alarming frequency, and we were all glad of the decision to disguise me further, as I surely would have been recognized and Uorsin would discover I’d not returned to Avonlidgh, as I’d been told to do. Marin found me a plain gown, apron, and kerchief to wear over my signature hair, tightly braided away and smudged with dirt. Introduced as the midwife’s apprentice to the inquiring patrols, I kept my eyes cast down and earned no more than a few leers and usually a complete lack of interest.
I discovered an unexpected freedom then, in being someone and somewhere no one thought I would be. It seemed that even the sun can be ignored, lacking the proper setting and legendary status.
You will always be my sun.
It helped, knowing I would burn in Ash’s heart that way, tucked away in his memory box, also. I liked it, too, being this girl who wasn’t worth much notice. The kind of girl who might have heard songs of me and who I would never have known existed. It felt like another step toward being someone I liked better.
As if our positions had indeed reversed, Marin had thawed toward me and resumed her motherly care. We spent more time together, the only two women in this group of military men who preferred one another’s company. Enough so that I finally screwed up my courage to ask what had happened to her in Glorianna’s temple.
She didn’t answer at first, and I thought she wasn’t going to. Staring between her stolid mare’s ears, she fell into thought.
“It’s over and done with. I know you didn’t intend it. No need to dwell,” she finally said.
“But there is a need,” I insisted, keeping my tone apprentice humble. “I’m expected to assume a role in that . . . system. Taking a person and keeping her hostage a day and a night hardly seems something Glorianna would condone.”
Marin laughed, a short, impatient laugh that reminded me of Ash. “Think you that Glorianna and Her temple are one and the same?”
I always had thought so, but it seemed that had been one of my many naïve ideas.
“What the goddess intends and what mortals do with Her representation on our earth are two different things. Being part of Glorianna’s temple is not about the goddess for all who claim to serve Her.”
I mulled that over. “What is it about, then?”
Her fingers twitched and I knew she missed her knitting. “The High King, praise his name, has invested Glorianna’s temple with a great deal of power. There are those drawn to that. If you wish to make changes, look for those who most benefit from access to that power.”
She wouldn’t say more and, really, she didn’t need to. I’d been blind not to see it before, how Kir sought to control me and solidify his power in the temple. He’d removed Marin not to cleanse her soul but to eliminate her from influencing me. Taking me for the fool I’d assuredly been, he’d manipulated me, quite successfully.
At some point in my journey, my eyes had opened and I saw the world more clearly. Perhaps my crystal bubble had shattered.
Best of all, Marin had relented and was teaching me to knit. While the men played their games of chance at the inn tables in the evening, Marin taught me how to judge yarn and the simple stitches that looped together, row after row, each one adding to the next so they made something greater than themselves. Though my work looked pitifully askew, it meant more than I expected to be able to make a thing. To take bits of fleece and turn them into something useful.
Seeing us, other women would bring their knitting, too. Sometimes they traded yarn, telling tales of the flowers they’d gathered to dye it, or taught each other new stitches. Only a girl to them, perhaps a silly one, to be just learning what their daughters had been doing since they could grasp the needles, I disappeared into their conversations.
They knew far more than my ladies had, with their idle chatter about the court dalliances and prettiest gowns. Or perhaps that had been my influence and the ladies had kept to topics that pleased me. But around Ami, the midwife’s apprentice, the common women spoke with insight and intelligence about the undercurrents in the Twelve Kingdoms. They, some of them who’d fought alongside their men in the Great War, worried for their sons and daughters.
It seemed that the High King—spoken of with more fear than reverence—had called in all of Mohraya’s trained soldiers and, worse, had taken a tithe of all apprentices from every practice, from the strength-focused blacksmiths and glassblowers down to the softest arts.
Duranor had sent its due to Ordnung, but no more, not even when word of the additional tithe went out. Avonlidgh and Elcinea hadn’t sent even that much, if the tales could be believed, and the remaining kingdoms were rumored to be cutting off trade and recruiting heavily from their own populations. Information, however, grew thin with the passing days. The High King had proclaimed that, to ensure peace of mind for all citizens, all court minstrels should stick to “happy” songs, and the traveling minstrels should find a sponsor, stay in one place, and do likewise.
Several seemed to have gone missing.
Rumors were, there would be more tithing to come. The worst stories spoke of press-gangs sweeping through outlying villages and taking all the able-bodied young people unfortunate enough to be out and about.
“Best watch out for yon missy, there.” One of the women angled her chin at me while she advised Marin. “She’s weak and clearly no fighter, but that doesn’t seem to matter to the recruiters. They want warm bodies, they do, and none cares so much how long they’ll be able to keep themselves alive.”
The tales became more lively once we crossed into Avonlidgh. For the first time on the journey—one that took much longer without Ursula’s charging-bull style of travel and without the right-of-way royalty commands—a minstrel played in the inn’s common room. No one in our party commented on it, though Graves and his men knew about the High King’s edict as well as I did. Never had it been more clear to me that their loyalty belonged utterly to King Erich.
“I don’t care for the way times are changing,” an older woman clucked over her knitting, her foreboding an odd contrast to the silly nonsense reel the minstrel sang. He kept to that part of the new law, at least.
“We can’t afford to give more to Uorsin’s vendetta against the Tala,” another agreed. “All of my neighbors along the High Road? Burned out—and by Uorsin’s troops, too. He cares naught for Avonlidgh.”
“Never has.” Another nodded along, needles clacking with her anger. “We pay our taxes and tithes, and what do we get? The hope of Avonlidgh, slaughtered in the midst of nowhere.”
Several paused and drew Glorianna’s circles, murmuring a prayer for Hugh. The moment made my heart burn in my chest with all those tears I still hadn’t shed. At this point, it seemed I never would. Hugh’s people remembered him fondly, and I clung to that solace.
“There’s the Princess, though—and the heir,” one mused.
The first one paused in her knitting to take a draught of wine. “That one. She’s her father’s creature—mark my words.”
“I hear she’s still at Ordnung and will hand over Hugh’s babe to the High King. Avonlidgh has lost all. She’d never have the spine to defy him.”
“Even if she did, she never loved Avonlidgh. Did you ever hear of
her learning anything of us, visiting any other place but Windroven?”
“The poor thing was still on her honeymoon.”
“Ach, she’s naught but a pretty face. If only Prince Hugh had kept his head and married the eldest as he ought to—none of this would have happened. Mark my words.”
“King Rayfe would never have shown up to demand his due?” a middle-aged pregnant woman scoffed. “I’m not so old as you and even I understand that was part of Salena’s price for handing us over to Uorsin.”
“I can’t speak to that, but I do know that Princess Ursula is the best of those two. She wouldn’t have pranced about Windroven having picnics while her people suffered. At the least she would have been out fighting, shoulder to shoulder.”
“I hear Princess Amelia isn’t at Ordnung, but returned to Castle Avonlidgh with Old Erich.”
“Old Erich,” cackled another woman. “He’s a clever fox. Perhaps he’ll keep yon pretty princess under lock and key until he extracts the babe.”
“After that, it hardly matters what happens to Hugh’s fancy piece of ass. She’s worth nothing to us.”
“Erich has a way of dealing with those who aren’t useful. He’s not so old he’s lost his mean edge.”
“I almost feel sorry for the Princess,” the pregnant woman said. “Surely she has no idea the danger she’s in.”
The old woman snorted and quaffed her wine. “I wouldn’t waste your sympathy on her. She’d have none for you. She doesn’t even know we exist.”
“Besides, she’ll have enough troubles just birthing that child, if you take my meaning.”
They all nodded wisely, and questions burned in my throat. What did they understand that I didn’t?
“Didn’t you say you’re a midwife?” The pregnant woman eyed Marin. “What say you about the Princess’s babe?”
“What’s to say?” Marin huffed, eyes on her knitting. “She’s a woman as any other. Women grow and birth babes all the time, bless Glorianna.”
The Tears of the Rose Page 23
