‘But we don’t want to look handsome,’ she cried. ‘We want to look beautiful.’
She touched her hair with regret. Gargarin looked at Froi and then back to Quintana.
‘Did you know the Queen of Lumatere’s head was bare when Froi first met her?’
Why did he do this? Froi wondered. Make Froi hate him one moment and then change his mind an instant later.
Quintana sat up, suddenly interested.
‘Less hair than Lirah’s?’ she asked, looking over Gargarin’s shoulder at Froi.
‘Much less,’ Froi said.
‘She must have looked ab-solutely ridiculous.’
‘Thankfully I’m drawn to ab-solutely ridiculous-looking girls,’ Froi said, sitting beside Gargarin before her. He saw a flash in her eyes. Their irises were tinged with yellow today. He had lost count of how many times their colour had changed.
‘Lirah said my father would never let her cut her hair and that it was just a different type of shackle. Isn’t that strange, Sir Gargarin? That her beauty was her downfall and my plainness is mine.’
‘You’re just fishing for compliments,’ Froi said, annoyed.
‘You said I was plain,’ she said, pursing her lips. ‘I heard you on the balconette.’
‘Princess –’
‘Queen,’ she corrected.
He leaned forward, his mouth close to her ear.
‘Quintana,’ he said instead. ‘You haven’t been plain since I saw those teeth.’
Later, Froi made sure the stables were secure and walked back into the godshouse baths the way they had came through the underground passage.
Inside there was no one and Froi went into the room where they had undressed and found their clothing. Retrieving his dagger and short sword he placed the pack on his back. In the adjoining bath chamber he heard a sound and walked to the door. Torches illuminated the space, giving it a ghostly hue in this light. From where he stood, he was surprised to see Arjuro in the water, his bony body even paler than Gargarin’s.
Froi approached and was about to call his name when he saw the true horror of what Arjuro’s long black robes concealed. The Priestling’s back was a mess of puckered white flesh. It was as if someone had torn strips from every part of him. Worse was what lay scorched across Arjuro’s pale shoulders.
It was the Charyn word for traitor.
Chapter 30
‘Lady Beatriss,’ Beatriss heard Tarah say gently from the door of her chamber. ‘Lady Beatriss, you have a guest.’
Tarah came to the bed and removed the blanket from around Beatriss and began laying out some clothing.
‘Tell them I’m not myself today, Tarah,’ Beatriss murmured.
It was what Tarah had told anyone who came to the house for the past week.
‘But Lady Beatriss, it’s the Queen.’
Beatriss did the best she could to look presentable, but nothing could be done about her limp hair and dull complexion. Tarah had chosen her favourite calico dress, but these days she resembled a scarecrow in it.
Beatriss was even more shamed to see the Queen sitting in her kitchen.
‘Come into the solar, my queen,’ she said quietly. ‘My apologies that I was not here to meet you at the door.’
The Queen embraced her, pressing a kiss to her cheek, and dismissed the idea of another room with the wave of a hand. ‘And when did you stop calling me Isaboe?’
Outside her kitchen window, Beatriss could see the Queen’s Guard scattered to ensure Isaboe’s safety. Those who knew the land were running their fingers through dry dirt, shaking their heads.
‘I can only stay a while,’ Isaboe said. ‘I have to get back to feed Jasmina.’
‘Perhaps a mug of buttermilk and honey,’ Beatriss said, making herself busy. ‘It’s Vestie’s favourite when the weather becomes cooler. I’m afraid it will be a short autumn, and next thing you know, we’ll all be confined indoors because of the cold.’
Despite her ridiculous chatter about weather and her refusal to look at the Queen, Beatriss felt the younger girl’s eyes on her. When it was difficult to ignore her any longer, she turned to face Isaboe.
‘Why do you look at me in such a way?’ she asked huskily.
‘Because I’m worried for you, Beatriss,’ Isaboe said, not one to play with words. ‘So is Abian, but she says you won’t see her. And we don’t want to write to Tesadora. You’ll only end up living in that cursed valley, like every other woman or girl who comes in contact with her.’
They both managed a smile. ‘I miss her,’ Beatriss said, searching for the sweets she had hidden from Vestie. ‘It’s an ache I feel. Who would have thought that Tesadora and I would form such a friendship?’
She placed the mug and sweets before the Queen and sat opposite, fighting to keep back the tears. ’She gave me purpose.’
Isaboe gripped both her hands. ‘You’ll always have purpose, Beatriss.’
‘It shames me to think highly of those days … those awful, awful days,’ Beatriss said, tears biting her eyes. ‘But … in the last five years of the curse I knew who I was for the first time in my life. Not the daughter of a Flatland lord or even the woman loved by the Captain of the Guard. I was Beatriss of the Flatlands.’
The tears did fall and Beatriss despised her weakness.
‘My people are scattered and miserable, Isaboe. I’ve failed them. I’ve failed everyone I love.’
The Queen stood and led Beatriss to the window, pointing outside to the dead field.
‘That is not failure, Beatriss. That is something beyond your control. Beyond any of our control. That land will not yield and it’s not because of anything you did or didn’t do. Perhaps it will never yield, but you cannot stay here in ruin, waiting for that day.’
Beatriss shook her head. ’I can’t leave this place, Isaboe. I can’t.’
‘Why?’ Isaboe asked, frustration in her voice. ‘For pride?’
Pride? Beatriss’s pride was long gone. It was smothered by the smugness in the expressions of the Flatland lords. It was shattered by the disappointment in Trevanion’s eyes.
‘My daughter is buried here,’ she said quietly, pained to say the words. ‘Down by the river. I can’t leave her spirit alone. I feel her every day, Isaboe. I can’t leave her behind.’
Beatriss saw a wince of regret in Isaboe’s eyes. In exile, the Queen had taken the name of Beatriss and Trevanion’s first child to keep her safe. Evanjalin had been the name of Trevanion’s mother and Beatriss knew that each time the Queen or Finnikin passed through Sennington, they visited the babe’s grave. She also knew that Trevanion didn’t.
‘Forgive me, Beatriss. I beg of you. Idiot that I am,’ Isaboe said.
‘Nothing to forgive.’
Isaboe returned to the table, nursing her buttermilk. Once again, Beatriss felt the dark eyes studying her.
‘Can I tell you of an idea I have?’ the Queen said. ‘I keep Finnikin awake with ideas, you know. I’ve been thinking of the tales Rafuel of Sebastabol has told Finnikin about Charyn during his interrogation up in the mountains. Even my idiot cousin Lucian is captivated. Our neighbours had schools of philosophy and art and studied the books of the Ancients. It wasn’t only Charyn. Belegonia is a place of learning too. The stories Celie comes back with fill Finnikin and I with envy. We can’t begin to think of the way they see us. Backwater cousins.’
‘We’re no such thing,’ Beatriss said, firmly. ‘Our healers are gifted, taught by Tesadora. They’ve kept the fever out of this kingdom these past years and we lose fewer women to birthing now than any other time.’
Isaboe shook her head. ‘But their talents are wasted. I can understand why Japhra followed Tesadora to the valley. It’s what you said, Beatriss. It’s all about purpose. And look at the Priestking. He manages to see the smartest of our kingdom in his overgrown garden. And for what? Where does a learned man or woman go in Lumatere? To quarry stone? To milk a cow?’