Gargarin gripped Froi’s hand, a gentle smile on his face.
‘We’ll do it your way, Gargarin. All of it. I’ll never doubt you again.’
Froi tried to sit up, but pain shot through almost every part of his body. Gargarin gently lay him back down and Froi held onto him with a fierceness that spoke of never letting him go.
‘Where’s Lirah?’ he whispered. ‘I want to see my mother. I want her forgiveness.’
Gargarin cleared the emotion from his throat.
‘You’re in the mountains of Sebastabol, Froi. Someone left you here. Someone who didn’t want you to die no matter how many of their arrows pierced you.’
Gargarin’s voice was so tender it made Froi weep.
‘I don’t know where Lirah is, lad. Nor Gargarin.’
Arjuro. Froi reached out a hand and touched his face. The Priestling’s hair was cropped and his beard not so wild and his eyes more lucid than Froi had ever seen.
‘You’re in a bad way, beloved ingrate,’ his uncle said. ‘But we are going to put you back together.’
In the Flatlands of Lumatere, Beatriss and Trevanion walked home with Vestie between them, who swung their arms as if she had not a care in the world. Beatriss had never seen her child so happy, but, despite it all, she knew that Trevanion would leave soon and she already felt the day’s sadness.
‘Are you going to go searching?’ she asked quietly, having heard talk that day of Charyn.
‘I have to,’ he replied. ‘I sent him, Beatriss, and I won’t rest until he’s returned to us.’
‘Who?’ Vestie asked. ‘Are you going somewhere, Trevanion?’
‘Father,’ he corrected gently.
Beatriss brushed hair out of her daughter’s eyes. ‘The Guard have lost their … dearest pup, Vestie, and they’re very sad without him so Trevanion will travel soon to bring him home.’
Trevanion lifted Beatriss’s hand to his lips.
‘You’re stretching my arm, silly,’ Vestie giggled.
‘We can’t have that,’ he said, lifting her into his arms.
Up ahead, Beatriss could see the family of Makli of the Flatlands approach on a horse and cart. They now had a future together and although it would be a long while before she would forget Makli’s harsh words, she had come to respect him. But as they rode by, Vestie poked out her tongue at Makli’s boy.
‘He’s my father!’ she bellowed, pointing to Trevanion.
‘Vestie!’ Beatriss said firmly, stopping to stare up at her. ‘I’ll snip at that tongue if I ever see it in such a way again! Trevanion, speak to her.’
Vestie hung her head, shamefaced.
‘Vestie,’ he said, his voice still gentle.
‘Yes, Father.’
‘Shout it out louder, my love. Shout it out louder.’
In the valley between two kingdoms she sat on the rock face and waited for the day to begin. It was always at this hour that she thought of him, and wondered how those they loved were faring. But she knew they had made the right decision. That what they were doing was for the greater good of Charyn, no matter how much heartbreak it brought.
‘Do you think it will rain again?’ a voice asked from within the cave.
‘No,’ Phaedra of Alonso said, turning with a smile. ‘You should all come out. It’s beautiful. I think I see the sun.’
Acknowledgements
A special thanks to my editor Amy Thomas for her intelligence and musical taste and for sometimes loving these characters as much as I did.
Also much thanks to Cathy Larsen who made sense of my maps, Marina Messiha for yet another beautiful cover, and Jean-marie Morosin for her proofreading.
To my manuscript readers, Barbara Barclay, Brenda Souter and my mum, Adelina Marchetta, for dealing with early drafts. To Anna Musarra, for the tattoo that inspired the day of weeping.
Thanks always to the Penguin gang especially my publisher Laura Harris to whom this novel is dedicated and Kristin Gill, Anyez Lindop and Erin Wamala.
For my US editor, Deborah Wayshak, and everyone at Candlewick and my agents Sophie Hamley, Jill Grinberg and Cheryl Pientka.
And thanks always to friends and family and the writers in my life who allow me to purge.
A note about the setting: Finnikin of the Rock, the first of the Lumatere Chronicles, was inspired by the landscape around the Dordogne area of France. It was during my visit to this region that the novel found the second half of its title. With Froi of the Exiles, I knew the physicality would have to have a different type of beauty. The town of Matera in Basilicata, Italy, with its amazing gravina (ravine) was the first place I researched when I knew that Froi would be set in a world of stone houses and cave frescoes. The rest of my research centred around the castle of Conwy in Wales and the truly sublime Cappadocia in Turkey with its unique landscape and underground cities.