Warrior

by Jennifer Fallon

  “Who’s Almodavar?”

  “The senior captain of Krakandar’s Raiders.”

  “Isn’t Starros the one you were fighting in the fens this afternoon?”

  “What gave it away?” Damin laughed. He also bore a magnificent shiner, even more impressive than the one he’d given Starros.

  “Just a hunch,” Luciena replied with a smile, relaxing a little with the wine, the tasty soup and the generally convivial atmosphere of the room. Despite her reservations, she felt herself warming to the young prince. There was little artifice about him and no hint of arrogance she could detect. On the other hand, this conversation now meant her total contact with Damin Wolf-blade amounted to about ten minutes. Hardly time to take the boy’s measure. She indicated the dark-haired young man sitting next to Starros. “The one next to him is Travin Taranger, isn’t he, Xanda’s brother?”

  “That’s right. He and Xanda are my cousins. Their mother was my father’s sister, Darilyn. She died before I was born.”

  “And the young woman next to him?”

  “Rielle Tirstone. She’s Ruxton’s eldest. If you want to make friends with her, you’d better do it quickly. Mother’s arranged for her to marry Darvad Vintner from Dylan Pass, so she’s leaving soon for Izcomdar. The chap sitting next to her is Travin’s brother, Xanda, but you already know him.”

  “I met him in Greenharbour,” Luciena confirmed, eyeing the dark-haired young man speculatively. She liked Xanda and was sure he’d gone out of his way to ensure she was comfortable on the journey here. Feeling her gaze on him, Xanda glanced up from the conversation he was having with Rielle and winked at Luciena, before returning his attention to whatever it was Damin’s stepsister was telling him. Afraid she was blushing, Luciena quickly turned back to Damin. “Xanda came to my rescue, actually. He was very chivalrous in my hour of need.”

  Damin laughed. “Good to hear he’s doing something useful in Greenharbour besides drinking all the taverns dry. The girl on the other side of him is my cousin, Leila. She’s Mahkas and Bylinda’s daughter.”

  “The cause of the fight?”

  “News gets around this place pretty quick, doesn’t it?” Damin remarked. He seemed a little put out that it was already common knowledge he’d been fighting Starros over Leila.

  “Are you sorry you fought your foster-brother?”

  “No,” the boy replied with a sudden grin. “I was just hoping that we could come up with something more interesting to brawl over than a stupid girl. I don’t know why Starros sticks up for her all the time. She really is a sissy, you know.”

  Luciena glanced at him warily, but offered no comment.

  Sensing her disapproval, Damin added a little defensively, “She only ever wants to do boring, girly things.”

  “Perhaps that’s because she’s a girl?” his new stepsister suggested.

  “Kalan’s a girl and she’ll try anything we do.”

  “That probably makes Kalan the exception, your highness, not Leila.”

  “I suppose,” Damin shrugged. “And really, you don’t have to keep calling me ‘your highness,’

  Luciena. It sounds a bit odd, actually, coming from a member of the family, as it were.”

  “You’ll have to get used to it some day.”

  “But not today.”

  She smiled. “Very well . . . Damin. Not today.”

  “Good. Now that’s settled, let’s get back to the introductions.” He pointed with his spoon to the small, slender woman on the head table, her dark hair arranged carefully, her clothes more formal than anyone else in the room. “Sitting next to Leila is my Aunt Bylinda, Uncle Mahkas’s wife and, according to my mother, the most patient woman in all of Hythria, because she puts up with us. Next to her is Krakandar’s regent, my uncle, Mahkas Damaran.”

  “I met him earlier, too.”

  “He’s all right,” Damin informed her as they watched his uncle drink the last of his soup. “We can usually get anything we want out of him.” Then he added in a lower voice, “He gets a little crazy sometimes and you don’t want to cross him, ’cause he’s a sore loser. Fortunately, he picks on the Medalonians and not us when he’s in a bad mood, but he’s a good administrator. Mother says Krakandar didn’t do nearly as well in the past, even under the governance of the Sorcerers’ Collective.”

  “Then he must be very good,” Luciena agreed, wondering what the young prince meant by a sore loser.

  “Well, the next two at the table you know already—my mother and Ruxton Tirstone.” He leaned back a little so that Luciena had a clear view. “On this side we have my half-sister, Kalan, sitting next to Ruxton, and the boy next to me is Narvell, her twin brother.” He nudged Narvell in the ribs. “Say hello to Luciena, Narvell.”

  “Hello to Luciena, Narvell,” his brother said through a mouthful of bread, winking at Luciena.

  Damin elbowed him a little harder and grinned. “Idiot.”

  “The twins don’t look much alike,” Luciena remarked.

  “Don’t let that fool you,” he warned. “They’re like opposite sides of the same coin. Hurt one and you’ll have the other down on you like a falling building before you can blink. Kalan’s smaller, but she’s older than Narvell by twenty minutes. She never lets him forget it, either.” He leaned forward and pointed to the two boys sitting on Luciena’s right. “Those two reprobates on the other side of you are Ruxton’s sons, my stepbrothers, Rodja and Adham Tirstone.”

  On hearing their names, the boys looked up from their soup. The younger boy, Adham, who was sitting next to Luciena, grinned at her and added in a loud voice, “Don’t believe a word he tells you, Luciena. Damin’s full of sh—”

  “Adham!” Ruxton cut in loudly before his son could complete the sentence. “This is a dinner table, not a backstreet tavern.”

  “Sorry, sir.” Adham winked at Luciena and finished off his soup with a loud slurp.

  “So, there you have it,” Damin announced. “The entire clan.”

  “And you don’t mind living here in Krakandar? Even though your parents live in Greenharbour?”

  she asked, rather overwhelmed by them all. Raised an only child in an almost entirely female household, she was finding this dinner a little more than she’d bargained for. They were all so boisterous. So loud .

  “You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Adham laughed.

  “Don’t you miss your mother, Damin? And what about you, Adham? Don’t you miss your father when he’s away?”

  “Not really,” Adham said after thinking it over for a moment. “Anyway, this place is heaps more fun than our old place in Greenharbour.”

  “We’ll have to show you the slaveways while you’re here,” Damin offered. “Then you’ll see what we mean.”

  “The what?”

  “The slaveways. They’re the tunnels that connect all the rooms in the palace. I think the one in your room comes out next to the bookcase in the sitting room.”

  Luciena felt thoroughly bemused by the idea. “I have a secret tunnel in my room?”

  Before Damin could answer, his mother tapped the side of her glass with her knife to call them all to attention. She rose to her feet and raised her glass in a toast. Nobody looked surprised. This had the feeling of a ritual; something done the first night she came home every year, Luciena thought.

  “To Hythria and the High Prince!”

  “To Hythria and the High Prince!” they all echoed dutifully, rising to their feet and raising their glasses.

  Luciena sipped her wine and glanced at Damin. He was quite the opposite of what she’d been expecting. He seemed no more dangerous than poor Mankel, the kitchen boy she’d had to sell before Princess Marla paid her debts.

  Marla raised her glass once more, and her voice softened as she glanced around the table. “To my family!”

  “To family!” they responded, much more enthusiastically.

  A few moments later, Mahkas Damaran raised his glass in the direction of the princess, bowing
to her respectfully. “Welcome home, Marla.”

  Everybody cheered as Mahkas proposed his toast, the words obviously another family ritual.

  Luciena sipped her wine, still feeling a little lost in her new surroundings. As she resumed her seat, the reality—and the magnitude—of Princess Marla’s offer to adopt her began to sink in. For the first time, it occurred to her that if she wanted it, she could become part of this family.

  Just as I imagined when I was nine, sitting on my father’s lap as he explained how things would be different now he was marrying the princess . . . how he wouldn’t be able to live in our house any more, but that was all right because soon I’d have brothers and sisters and be a princess, because Papa is marrying the High Prince’s own sister . . .

  Luciena caught herself daydreaming and took another good swallow of wine. I must be careful, she reminded herself sternly, while in the back of her mind a disturbing echo bounced around her thoughts, taunting her, tantalising her, as if there was something she had forgotten to do. It whispered to her like a lover coaxing her out from behind a screen to reveal her nakedness in the cold light of day.

  Welcome to the family, it whispered. Welcome to the family . . . welcome to the family . . .

  Chapter 17

  When Luciena finally retired for the evening, exhausted both mentally and physically by the ordeal of her first day in Krakandar, it was to find Aleesha poking into every nook and cranny of the impressive suite, ooh-ing and aah-ing over each new little thing she discovered.

  The room Orleon had allocated Luciena was vast. Located on the second floor, it was decorated with a carefully chosen mix of expensive Fardohnyan silks and Hythrun tapestries, while the furniture had clearly been influenced by Krakandar’s proximity to Medalon. It was dark and heavy, and there were padded leather sofas either side of the marble-faced fireplace rather than the more traditional low table and scattered cushions she was used to. Even the existence of the fireplace reminded Luciena that she was far from home. Nobody in Greenharbour had a fireplace, unless they were pretentious beyond words or so poor they were living in a one-roomed apartment where the lack of space meant they were forced to cook in the same room where they lived and slept.

  “This place has internal plumbing!” Aleesha announced as Luciena sagged against the door, the day finally done.

  She treated the slave to a weary smile. “This is supposedly one of the greatest palaces in Hythria, Aleesha, and all you’ve noticed is the plumbing?”

  “Wait until you see the size of the bath,” the slave predicted. “Then you’ll understand why I’m so impressed. How was dinner?”

  “Only marginally less trying than lunch.”

  “They seem nice people, though,” Aleesha suggested cautiously.

  Luciena glared at her slave in irritation. “What happened to let’s get out of this while we still can?”

  Aleesha shrugged. “I’ve had time to rethink my position.”

  “Rethink your position? What about: You hate these people? You don’t belong with them? What was the other one? Oh, that’s right! Princess Marla’s just inviting me along to get me out of the city so she can have me killed, wasn’t it?”

  “I may have been a little hasty . . .”

  “You’ve sold out, you traitor,” Luciena accused, pushing off the door and heading across the sitting room to the bedroom. “You have no moral fibre at all, Aleesha. A few weeks ago, you would have cheerfully had me working my debts off by lying underneath Ameel Parkesh. One glimpse of a gold-plated stopcock and now you’re telling me to throw my lot in with the Wolfblades.”

  She walked past her treacherous slave and the large four-poster bed and opened the door to what she guessed must be the bathroom. She stopped dead and gasped. The bathroom was built on the same scale as the rest of the suite and covered with tiny blue-glazed tiles. Rather than the usual geometric pattern Luciena would have expected, she was astonished to discover the golden figure of a kraken worked in mosaics into the floor, its sinuous body winding around the base of the bathtub, its scales highlighted in emerald and gold tiles.

  And it wasn’t a bathtub so much as a small pool.

  “See!” Aleesha declared. “Now tell me that isn’t worth a little compromise?”

  Luciena turned back to stare at the slave. “You’re hopeless!”

  “Elezaar says this is called the Blue Room,” Aleesha explained. “He says it’s reserved for only the most important visitors to Krakandar.”

  “The Blue Room, eh?” Luciena remarked, walking back into the bedroom. The curtains on the bed were blue Fardohnyan silk, as was the matching coverlet and the pillows. The rugs were a complementary shade of blue, worked in a diagonal pattern, and hanging from the base of the brass candle-holders set into the walls were blue crystal teardrops. “I bet someone was up all night thinking up that name. What else did Elezaar tell you?”

  “Just general stuff, really. You know . . . where things are, what the routine is here. I’ll be sleeping in slaves’ quarters in the other wing. If you need anything, you just have to pull this cord here,”

  she informed her mistress, indicating a plaited blue and gold cord hanging near the bed. “It rings a bell in my room and, if I use the slaveways, I can be here in a few minutes.”

  Luciena looked at Aleesha in surprise. “They showed you the secret tunnels?”

  “I don’t think they’re much of a secret. Everybody uses them. Even the children, according to Lirena. Orleon did give me a rough map, though. Apparently, it’s not hard to get lost in them and I don’t think he wants me bursting in on Princess Marla by accident, clutching an overflowing chamber pot.”

  “I’d be rather put out, too,” Luciena agreed. “Particularly as this place has internal plumbing and therefore no need for chamber pots. Overflowing or otherwise. Who’s Lirena?”

  “The children’s nurse. She and Veruca were showing me around while you were at dinner.”

  “And who is Veruca?”

  “The other nurse,” Aleesha explained. “Although I think she’s retired now. She looked after Xanda and Travin when they were small.”

  Luciena frowned at Aleesha’s familiarity. “That’s Lord and Lieutenant Taranger to you, my girl. I must say, you seem to be getting along rather well with the rest of the household, considering you’ve been here less than a day. Are you sure it’s me they want to adopt and not you?”

  Aleesha shrugged. “They’re a lot more . . . I don’t know . . . It’s like . . . well, they’re not as snobbish as I was expecting, I suppose. Except Orleon. And they all seem to get along. At least they do below stairs. If it wasn’t for the slaves wearing collars, it’d be hard to tell the free servants from the indentured ones. And I couldn’t believe how helpful they were. Elezaar said it’s because Princess Marla brought you here. It’s like she’s given you her seal of approval, so her slaves are honour-bound to do the same to me.”

  “I have Princess Marla’s seal of approval, do I?” she asked, flopping onto the bed. She was exhausted and the feather mattress welcomed her like the arms of a long-lost lover. Luciena sighed with relief for a moment and then pushed herself onto her elbows and looked at Aleesha. “That’s very big of her, particularly as I’ve yet to give her mine.”

  “Did you meet the young prince?” the slave asked, kneeling down to help Luciena off with her shoes.

  “Who? Damin Wolfblade? I sat next to him at dinner.”

  That seemed to impress Aleesha no end. “What’s he like?”

  Luciena shrugged. “Like any other twelve-year-old boy, I suppose.”

  “So you’ll be staying then?”

  “You say that like I have a choice, Aleesha.”

  The slave stood up, holding Luciena’s shoes. She smiled hesitantly. “I think . . . maybe . . . you should think about doing what the princess wants.”

  “Do you now?”

  “This place isn’t so bad, you know, Luciena. And it’s a damn sight better than living on the streets in Green
harbour.”

  “Really? Three weeks ago you were accusing me of betraying everything I believed in for even thinking of coming here.”

  “I hadn’t seen this place three weeks ago.”

  Luciena shook her head. “I swear, Aleesha, I’ve never seen anybody seduced by a bathtub before. Suppose Princess Marla wants me to marry some filthy old brute who’ll beat me every night before dinner?”

  “Can I check out the plumbing in his palace before I answer that?”

  Luciena laughed and hurled a pillow at the slave. “Get out of here, you wicked wretch!”

  “Don’t you want my help getting ready for bed?”

  “I’m sure I can manage.”

  “You didn’t want a bath?”

  “I’ll have it in the morning,” she said. “You’re far too eager to get in there and start sloshing around in my bathtub as it is. I’m going to make you wait a while. Consider it punishment for being so impudent.”

  Aleesha looked disappointed. “Are you sure you want me to go?”

  “Yes! Now leave me!”

  The slave put the shoes down by the door and glanced around the room uncertainly.

  “Out!”

  “Good night, Luciena.”

  “Good night, Aleesha.”

  Luciena flopped back onto the bed and closed her eyes. Somewhere in the other room, she heard a sliding panel move and then snick closed as Aleesha let herself into the slaveways. The bed seemed to embrace Luciena, drawing her down into pleasant slumber, even though she was still dressed, the candles still burned brightly and she hadn’t even let down her hair.

  I wonder if my Uncle Warak ever got my letter, she wondered, suffering a moment of guilt for not sparing her Fardohnyan cousin a thought since leaving Greenharbour. She had written back before she left the city, explaining she had no money, but now Luciena was beginning to worry that she’d done the wrong thing. Perhaps I should have told them to wait a little longer. If she accepted Marla Wolfblade’s offer, she wouldn’t need to send money to help her cousin. She could send a whole damn ship for him. If I accept her offer . . . If I marry the man she chooses for me . . . If I’m willing to swear allegiance to the Wolf-blades . . . The thoughts faded into oblivion as sleep overtook her.