The Lyre Thief

by Jennifer Fallon

  They waited nearly an hour before the king deigned to appear. He led the way with Alaric close behind, looking around at everything as if he owned it. The woman behind Hablet and Alaric, however, made Rakaia’s heart skip a beat.

  Although a sheer, pale blue veil covered half her face, Rakaia would have recognized her anywhere.

  The woman with Hablet was Princess Sophany.

  Mica rose to his feet as the king approached. This was the danger period, Rakaia knew. Mica could sing stars down from the heavens, but he hadn’t sung a note yet. There was plenty of time for Hablet to recognize her. Or Alaric. Or her mother.

  The minstrel bowed extravagantly to the king as he took his seat. “Oh, mighty king,” he cried, “greatest of all monarchs living and dead! Thank you for allowing a poor minstrel such as I the chance to bask in your presence and perchance, to entertain you for a moment or two.”

  “He’s full of shit,” Alaric announced as he took his seat at his father’s right hand.

  “Aye, lad,” Hablet agreed. “That’s part of what they do.”

  “Can we kill him if he doesn’t please us?”

  Little monster, Rakaia thought as she watched him from the shadows, an unexpected surge of hatred for this child she no longer had to pretend was her adored only legitimate brother. You haven’t changed a bit since I left, have you?

  Turning from Alaric, she focused on her mother, reading the fear in Sophany’s rigid posture. Why had Hablet brought her with him on this trip? As far as Rakaia knew, he had not called for her mother in years. Hablet tended to lose interest quite quickly in wives who only gave him daughters.

  “Ah, noble prince,” Mica exclaimed. “If I fail to entertain you, there will be no need to take my life. I will throw myself on your sword for the disappointment I have caused you.”

  Hablet chuckled. “You’re right, son. He is full of shit.” Then he turned to look at Mica and noticed Rakaia standing in the shadows behind him. “Perhaps the dancing girl will make things more interesting. Step forward, girl. Give us a look at you!”

  Rakaia couldn’t move. She was frozen to the spot in fear. Mica took her hand, however, and coaxed her forward. “This is no dancing girl, your magnificence. This is my wife, Aja.”

  Mica led her forward a few steps. Rakaia curtseyed as low as she could manage, keeping her eyes downcast, but she was trembling so hard she stumbled and landed on her knees, which Alaric thought was hilarious.

  “She looks like Rakaia,” he said, laughing. “If she was a peasant with no breeding or wit. Don’t you agree, Mama Sophany?”

  The princess was staring at Rakaia with wide, horrified eyes as Mica helped her up. There was no need for her to say anything. She knew.

  Hablet studied Rakaia for a moment and then shook his head. “You think so, Alaric? I suppose there is some resemblance, but it’s tenuous at best. Does she sing?”

  “Alas, the gods have played a cruel jest on me, your worthiness. While the Great Gimlorie gifted me the voice of an angel, he chose not to give my precious Aja a voice at all.”

  “She’s a half-wit, is she?” Alaric asked.

  “Mute, O mighty prince, that is all.”

  Hablet seemed to be growing bored with the discussion. “Let us hear this voice, then” he said, settling back into his seat. “I will tell you when you’re done if it belongs to an angel or not.”

  “As you command, O precious one,” Mica said with a bow. He took Rakaia’s hand and led her back to the railing. She didn’t say a word, couldn’t even think of anything intelligent to say. Once she was safely behind him, he picked up his lyre and began to sing.

  Rakaia wasn’t sure what song he sang first, although she was sure she’d heard it before, and at sometime in the night she heard the familiar strains of the song Mica always sang as she was passing out the collection hat.

  He sang until his voice cracked and Alaric was nodding off in his chair. When he was done, apparently entertained, Hablet ordered his captain to pay them and send them on their way.

  He left them then, Alaric close on his heels—yawning and surprisingly silent—to pack up and leave.

  Princess Sophany waited until her husband and stepson were below decks before she stepped forward to address them.

  “You have a rare gift, minstrel,” she said, although Sophany’s eyes never left Rakaia.

  “Thank you, my lady.”

  “Is it a happy life you lead, this life of a traveling minstrel?”

  Mica glanced at Rakaia and smiled. “It has its compensations, my lady.”

  “Then I wish you both well in the future,” she said. And then she reached up and took the emerald earrings from her ears and handed them to Mica. “Consider this a bonus. For the . . . comfort you have bought me this evening.”

  Before either of them could reply, Sophany hurried below, leaving them staring after her.

  Mica opened his hand and studied the earrings, mouth agape. They were worth more than he earned in a year. “Why . . .”

  Rakaia was supposed to be mute, so she couldn’t answer him. She tugged on his arm and indicated they should leave the ship. Bewildered by the princess’s unexpected largesse, he nonetheless nodded and took her hand.

  As soon as they were down the gangplank and wrapped in the darkness away from the ship, Rakaia broke into a run. She didn’t stop until they were three streets away.

  When she finally halted, she leaned against the wall of the tannery to catch her breath. Mica was only a step behind her, grinning. “Why so anxious to be gone? I told you nobody would recognize you. Although we came close when your brother first saw you. Quick thinking, by the way, being so clumsy.”

  “I wasn’t being clumsy,” she said. “I fell. And he’s not my brother. He’s a spoiled little monster.”

  “Well, whatever the reason. It worked. Why do you think the princess gave us such prize?”

  “Because she recognized me.”

  “She didn’t say anything.”

  “Of course she didn’t say anything. She’s my mother.”

  Mica didn’t seem to have an answer for that.

  “Can we go now?”

  “Go where?”

  “Krakandar,” Rakaia said. “Tonight. Thanks to my mother we have enough there now to buy a whole herd of horses and the stable to go with them. I want to be gone from this place.”

  Mica nodded and took her into his arms. Rakaia laid her head on his shoulder, surprised at the comfort she felt, knowing he was with her. “We’ll leave tonight then,” he promised. He took her face in his hands and kissed her then before adding with a grin. “I did what you asked, by the way.”

  She pushed him away. “No you didn’t. You said you would sing away any chance anybody on that ship would recognize me. Sophany knew exactly who I was, even after you were done.”

  Mica shrugged and shouldered the lyre case a little higher. “That’s because I didn’t know she was your mother. You can’t sing away a parental bond like that easily, and I didn’t know I had to. But that’s not what I was talking about.”

  “What, then?” she asked as she fell into step beside him, unable to think of any other boon she had asked of Mica, other than Hablet not recognize her and have her put to death.

  Mica took her hand and smiled at her. “I tried to make Alaric less of a brat,” he said.

  Chapter

  42

  KIAM STOPPED ON the hill overlooking Greenharbour to give Charisee her first view of the city. She gasped with surprise when she saw it. The vast, white-walled city with its sparkling harbor beyond spread out over coastline almost as far as the eye could see, dominated by the domed cupola of the Temple of the Gods and the Sorcerers’ Collective compound in the center.

  She rode up beside Kiam and reined in her horse, staring in wonder for a time, the enormity of what she was attempting assaulting her all over again, just when she thought she’d gotten used to the idea.

  “Behold the city of Greenharbour,” Kiam said. He wa
s smiling at her reaction, which was a marked improvement on his attitude since they’d left Warrinhaven. Ever since her foolish visit to his rooms he’d treated her differently, as if she’d disappointed him somehow.

  “It’s . . . very big.”

  “Not that much bigger than Talabar.”

  “Have you been to Talabar?”

  “Once or twice.”

  She eyed him curiously. “On business?”

  He smiled. “Ah, now that would be giving away guild secrets. Did you want to stop and freshen up before we arrive, your highness?”

  “Would you mind?” she asked, a little surprised he had even thought of such a thing. She had the gown Rakaia intended to wear on her arrival tucked into her luggage and if she was going to enter Greenharbour and confront her sister Adrina, she had better look the part. That meant dressing like a princess, wearing the small amount of jewelry Rakaia had left her, and applying the traditional Fardohnyan eye makeup that only a rare Fardohnyan woman would dare venture into public without.

  “Your wish is my command, your highness,” he said.

  He’s mocking me, she thought. But she wasn’t going to let him know how much it hurt her.

  “Then if you would be so kind as to have your men set up a screen, fetch me some water to wash, and fetch my red bag, I would very much like to prepare to meet my sister.”

  “And your future husband?”

  “Naturally. Him, too.”

  “Your wish is my command, your highness,” he repeated, wheeling his horse around, leaving Charisee to stare at the vast city of Greenharbour and wonder how she was going to survive it.

  KIAM SENT ONE of his men on ahead to warn the city they were arriving so as they approached the huge open gates of the city the silver-liveried guards stood to attention as another troop of soldiers, with an officer and a civilian in the lead, rode out to greet them.

  The troop stopped and parted, lining the way into the city with a guard of honor, while the civilian rode forward. As he neared them, Charisee’s palms began to sweat. Although he was dressed like a Hythrun lord, he was Fardohnyan.

  The man reined in his magnificent, golden sorcerer-bred horse and bowed to Charisee. “Welcome to Greenharbour, your highness.”

  “Thank you, Lord . . . ?”

  The man smiled. “I’m sorry, where are my manners? I am Gaffen Sharkspear, Warlord of Greenharbour and half-brother to the High Princess Adrina. I believe that makes me your half-brother too, Princess Rakaia.”

  Of course. This was Gaffen. Hablet’s bastard son who’d followed Adrina to Hythria, lifting the siege on the city that almost cost Damin Wolfblade his throne. The man had been rewarded with a province and a seat on the Convocation of Warlords.

  While he wasn’t exactly a forbidden topic in the harem, Charisee had only ever heard him spoken about in whispers, and certainly nobody in their right mind reminded Hablet of what his eldest living bastard was up to these days.

  “I’m so sorry, Lord Sharkspear. I didn’t recognize you.”

  “That’s perfectly understandable,” he said. “I wouldn’t have recognized you either had I not been told you were arriving. You must have been, what . . . only nine or ten . . . when I saw you last?”

  “I really don’t remember, my lord.”

  “Well, you’ve certainly grown since then. What happened to your little friend?”

  “Little friend?”

  “As I recall, you used to be joined at the hip to another one of father’s bastards. Pretty little thing she was. Had blue eyes, like you. What was her name? Sharilee . . . Marilee . . .”

  “Charisee,” she told him. “Her name was Charisee.”

  “That’s right.” He glanced over the rest of Kiam’s small troop with its distinct lack of entourage or any of the trappings of a traveling Fardohnyan princess. “Did you not bring her for company?”

  Her mouth dry, Charisee gripped her reins until her fingers cramped and shook her head. “She was never going to be happy here. It seemed cruel to force her to come.”

  “That’s remarkably considerate of you,” Gaffen said, nodding with approval. “And please, there is no need to keep calling me ‘my lord.’ We’re family, after all.”

  Fortunately, Charisee wasn’t required to respond, because Gaffen turned to Kiam then, leaning across his horse to grip Kiam’s arm in a firm handshake, which was a relief, because she had no saliva left in her mouth at all and doubted she’d be able to get out another word for a while.

  “Welcome home, Ky,” Gaffen said, obviously a friend of the assassin’s. “Good journey?”

  “Good enough,” Kiam replied, glancing at Charisee. “How are things here?”

  Gaffen’s smile wavered for a moment. “Interesting,” he said, after a very telling pause. “I’m sure Adrina will fill you in. Shall we proceed?” He looked back at Charisee and resumed his friendly, welcoming smile. “Your highness?”

  “Ready when you are . . . Gaffen.”

  He wheeled his horse around and made a signal to the rest of the guard of honor. Some of them remained by the road waiting for them to pass, while others took up formation in front.

  Charisee rode in the center of the guard of honor, flanked by Gaffen on her right and Kiam on her left with Broos trotting faithfully beside him, the rest of the troops falling in behind as they entered the momentary cool darkness of the entrance before emerging on the other side into the chaos that was Greenharbour City.

  IT TOOK ALMOST an hour to reach the palace, an hour in which Charisee’s senses were assaulted from every side by the sheer size and vibrancy of the city. Many people stopped to watch the unusual sight of a Fardohnyan princess riding by; just as many paid her no attention at all. The roads were cluttered, the streets full of people who all looked to have something to do and somewhere to be. Every building in the city was white, crafted from stone quarried farther down the coast—so Gaffen informed her—even the new buildings in the poorer quarter of the city. A lot of the city had been rebuilt since the siege, he explained, giving him a chance to rethink the layout of the streets in the destroyed districts and allowing some long-term thought regarding the city’s plan. Although the city was the capital of Hythria and the seat of its power, as Warlord of Greenharbour it was Gaffen and not the High Prince who was responsible for its upkeep and services. As he spoke, her half-brother seemed inordinately proud of what he’d achieved since coming here.

  She soon forgot about Gaffen’s civic pride, however, as they approached the gates of the palace, a massive, white three-story building with large paved forecourt. As they rode through the gates Charisee could already see the welcoming party gathering on the steps.

  “Is this all for me?” she asked, a little surprised at how many people had gathered to greet her,

  “Of course,” Gaffen said. “It’s not every day we have a real Fardohnyan princess come to visit.”

  Charisee decided not to say anything else, for fear of looking a complete fool. Rakaia would have been asking why there weren’t fireworks.

  But I am not Rakaia and I am not going to be.

  As the troops in front peeled off to either side to allow them closer to the palace steps, a woman stepped forward and walked down to greet them, stopping halfway.

  Charisee reined in her horse, allowed Gaffen to help her dismount, and walked up the steps, her knees shaking, to greet her half-sister, the High Princess of Hythria.

  Adrina was everything Charisee feared and admired. She was a stunning woman in her prime, with emerald eyes and thick dark hair, filled with poise and a confidence Charisee could only dream of. The High Princess commanded simply by standing there, waiting for her little sister to arrive.

  Charisee stopped on the step below Adrina and dropped into a deep, respectful curtsey. The noise of the city fell away. “Your highness.”

  “Welcome to Hythria, Rakaia. Let me look at you, little sister.”

  Charisee stood up and raised her head to meet Adrina’s critical gaze. �
�You grew into quite a beauty, didn’t you?”

  How do I answer a question like that, for the gods’ sake?

  By telling the truth, she could almost hear Jakerlon whispering in her ear.

  The best lies of all are the stone-cold truth.

  “I am my mother’s daughter, your highness. What small amount of beauty I possess, I owe entirely to her.”

  Adrina smiled, as if the answer pleased her. “I remember you as a holy terror in the harem. You and your shadow, Charisee.”

  Interesting that while Gaffen couldn’t remember Rakaia’s companion’s name, Adrina could.

  “I’ve grown up a lot since those days, your highness.”

  “Good thing, too. She’s not with you?”

  “Charisee deserved more than a life as a drudge in a draughty mountain keep, your highness,” she said.

  Adrina held out her arm, smiling. Weak-kneed with relief that she had passed this first, critical hurdle, Charisee placed her trembling hand in her sister’s steady one. “I fear a draughty mountain keep will be your fate for a while,” she said, a trace of sympathy in her tone for Rakaia’s future as the lady of Highcastle. “Was Kiam an adequate escort?”

  “More than adequate, your highness.”

  Adrina turned and together they climbed the remaining stairs until they reached the landing. At the top, Charisee looked over her shoulder at Kiam, who stood at the base of the stairs, holding the horses with one hand, his other on Broos’s collar, staring up at her.

  She felt she ought to say something to him. Thank him at the very least.

  Running down the steps, throwing herself into his arms and smothering him with kisses, she supposed, was completely out of the question.

  “Be careful, Rakaia.”

  She turned to Adrina, afraid her astute half-sister had guessed the direction of her thoughts.

  “Your highness?”

  “It all seems shiny and new here, I know, and it’s wonderful being freed from the harem, but try not to be too enchanted by it. Greenharbour is a dangerous place, as you will learn soon.”