“Don’t make any bets. It took her all that time at Tiglath to say six words at meals. And this is Stronghold. I mean, look at the place.”
Sionell was familiar with its elegance and splendor, but to Meiglan this castle would seem stupendous. Sionell fussed with the flowers, telling herself that at least the girl would not be cowering all alone at one of the lower tables. And with distance between her and her father, at a table populated by people she already knew, Miyon could not possibly humiliate her.
Sionell had reckoned without Miyon’s grasp of strategy. He totally ignored his daughter all during the meal.
It was as if she did not exist, sitting between Tallain and Riyan in her soft pink gown with its high lace collar. Sionell wore a vibrant shade of green that not even Sioned could wear; the bold coloring and dark red hair bequeathed by Feylin allowed her more vivid hues than Sioned’s fire-gold looks could support. But she knew the instant she saw Meiglan that the green gown had been a mistake. More delicate and fawnlike than ever, she made Sionell feel like a plow-elk.
But if Miyon had decided that his daughter did not exist, Pol was fully aware of the fact; frequent glances down to her end of the table proved it. He had to lean over his plate to catch sight of her. Sionell began to wonder if it had been adequately impressed on him exactly who the girl was.
“He must know she’s impossible,” Feylin had said that afternoon.
“He’s not stupid, Mother. But no one must tell him she’s impossible, or he’ll think up a dozen reasons why she isn’t. I can think of one right now—that an alliance would end the disharmony between the Desert and Cunaxa. Miyon could scarcely continue to support the Merida if his daughter is Pol’s wife.”
Pol’s wife. The words echoed in her mind as she intercepted yet another glance from those blue-green eyes. She smiled and fingered the sapphires around her neck—present at Antalya’s birth—as if thanking him once more for them. But he barely noticed.
Tallain, however, did. “You’re wasting your time, my love,” he whispered.
“What are you talking about?”
“It’s impossible to distract a man from the source of his distraction.” Tallain shook his head. “He’s being painfully obvious about it, isn’t he?”
“Disgustingly so.” She signaled Jahnavi to serve her another pastry. “Don’t worry. She’s lovely, of course, but Pol isn’t a fool.”
“Most men are fools when it comes to such things.” She gave him a sidelong smile. “You certainly were.”
“I still am. And you know it. Shall we be foolish together and shatter precedent by dancing only with each other instead of everybody else?”
“Oh, you’ll have to lead poor Meiglan out once or twice to start her off. If Chay or even Maarken is the first to ask her, she’ll faint with the shock.”
“I suppose so. Ell, are you by any chance concealing something from me?”
She froze with her laden fork halfway to her mouth and stared at him. “I beg your pardon?”
He gestured to the pastry. “We stopped for something to eat on the road today, so you can’t be starving to death. And the last time you devoured everything in sight. . . .” He trailed off, one brow arching.
“When was—oh!” She blushed. “No, I’m not.” Then, rallying from her momentary shock, she laughed and added, “Though it’s not from lack of trying!”
Tallain gave a modest shrug. “I’m compelled to admit it, in consciousness of duty done—”
“Idiot,” she accused fondly.
“Well, I try.” He grinned. “But in the meantime, if you’re not eating for two, then stop eating!”
She made a face and finished off the pastry. But when Jahnavi came to pour taze, she shook her head to the sweets that accompanied it. Regretfully; nowhere but at Dragon’s Rest and Castle Crag did one taste such marvels as spice seeds wrapped in candied fruit and covered in caramelized sugar.
Between courses various musicians had appeared singly, but now the whole household orchestra assembled. As servants moved the lower tables out of the way, many of Stronghold’s retainers took up instruments. Rohan’s mother had pleaded for years with his father to hire a suite of musicians, but Zehava’s reply had always been that he did not intend to support twenty or thirty parasites. Rohan was of the same mind. So music at Stronghold was provided not by professionals but by the castlefolk themselves. The quality of the entertainment had never suffered for it. As a lively tune began to set feet tapping, Sionell gave her husband a pointed look.
He grinned again, but obeyed her overt hint and asked Meiglan to dance. The girl blanched, stammered, and was not permitted to refuse. Riyan, without prompting, claimed a dance for himself after Tallain. Seeing her thus securely launched, Sionell leaned back and sipped her taze, satisfied.
The Cunaxan prince might ignore his daughter, but nobody else would.
Rohan partnered Lady Ruala while Sioned did her duty by Miyon. Andry led his sister-by-marriage into the set. Sionell found herself claimed by Maarken, who, having eyes, had noticed Pol’s preoccupation.
“Your little friend is quite a success,” he told her when the figure allowed him close enough to whisper in her ear. “Watch—Pol will be next.”
Pol was indeed casting impatient looks at Meiglan while he exchanged the bows and gestures of the dance with Tobin. Sionell glanced around at the other highborn women in the Great Hall—beautiful, vibrant, confident women, sure of themselves and their worth. Despite the damage done by Miyon’s deliberate cruelties, Meiglan could not help but learn from their example. And, indeed, she made a pretty picture, guided gracefully through the steps by Tallain, her pink gown swirling.
But Pol did not vie with Riyan for the second dance. He surrendered his aunt to her younger son and made directly for Sionell.
It was a slow tune requiring a half-embrace that, with a partner one desired, could become more than mildly flirtatious. Sionell put her fingertips on Pol’s shoulders and looked him straight in the eye. Part of her would always respond to him. But she was no longer a lovestruck child. His first words to her as they glided across the blue and green tiles shattered her notions of his good sense. “Tell me about Lady Meiglan.” Subtle as ever, she thought. “What did you want to know?”
“Everything.”
“She’s very young, very beautiful, and very innocent. But you can see that with your own eyes.”
“Do you like her?”
“Yes.”
“Do you trust her?”
“As far as anyone Desert-born and Desert-bred trusts any Cunaxan.”
Pol frowned.
The dance called for a flirtatious “escape”; Sionell’s hands slid down Pol’s arms until she was poised lightly at his fingertips, connected to him only by that tentative touch.
“Miyon will use anyone and anything to get what he wants.” She made the required crossover step to her left; Pol countered, blocking her. As the movement was repeated to the right, she added, “What he wanted this spring was to come to Stronghold.”
“And here he is,” Pol said.
Her wrists were grasped and she was drawn in close once more. “Yes. Here he is.”
“And Meiglan with him. How do you think he’d react if I showed interest in her?”
“I think he’s counting on it,” she said bluntly.
“So do I.” He spun her around twice so that her green gown flared, then stood behind her with his hands on her waist again. “But I don’t think he’s counting on her reaction to me.” Sionell gave him a startled glance over her shoulder.
“Why, you vain, self-centered, conceited—”
Po1 only laughed. “Don’t be redundant, Ell!” For an instant as the dance ended he pulled her back against him. Then he surrendered her to his father before sauntering over to claim Meiglan right out from under Chay’s nose.
“He’s making a complete fool of himself,” Rohan muttered as a country dance began. “After Tilal and Kostas fought over Gemma, he told me to kick him if he displayed the same imbecility. I have the feeling my boot will connect with his backside rather soon.”