“Now . . . now I am yours,” she whispered beside him.
He turned his head and saw the sweet joy illuminating her face. The dizziness increased. False, all of her false, some part of him repeated, and now that he was not touching her he could hear that voice again. He rose and went to the windows. The night air froze the sweat on his naked skin.
“My lord?” Her voice was soft, hesitant, half-fearful again. “Have I displeased you?”
Pol clenched his fists. Moonlight and the cool breeze washed him in pale silver, and he shivered. “Why would you think that?”
“I-I know nothing of the ways of a man after—after. ...”
He spun around. “Liar!” he hissed. “Who are you really? Not that timid frightened child you’ve been at such pains to show me! Who are you?”
“My lord—why are you angry?” She sat up, her hair tumbling around her, clutching the sheet to her breasts. One hand stretched out, pleading with him. Her eyes were like two black hollows in her face, filled with night.
“What’s the plan now?” he demanded in a fury of betrayal and wounded pride. “Claim that I raped you, so your father can invoke the law? You were the one who came to me, my lady! Who’d listen to a rape charge from a woman who slinks into a man’s bedroom dressed like a hired whore?”
She gasped and cringed back. “Why are you being so cruel?” she breathed. “I thought you w-wanted me—”
“I want you to get out. Now.” He stayed where he was in the clean moonlight, knowing that if he approached her he would probably strike her. Besides, there was a better repayment. In silken tones he said, “I doubt your father will be happy with your failure.”
“Oh, no! Please don’t tell my father about this! He’d kill me!”
Pol nodded. “Yes, I think he might.”
“My lord—oh, Pol, please, you must protect me from him—”
He laughed aloud. “You can’t be serious! Looking to me for protection? Is there no limit to you?”
She gave a terrified sob. He turned his back and stared sightlessly down at the fountain.
At length she stopped crying, and he heard the rustle of her discarded nightdress. “My lord?” she asked in a small voice. “Will you at least help me return to my chambers without—without anyone seeing me? I could not bear the shame.”
“A little late for that, isn’t it?” he snapped. But a lack of witnesses was to his advantage, as well. In fact, he had been wondering why no one had burst in on them yet. Perhaps Miyon had counted on his being so besotted that one taste of Meiglan’s sweet white flesh would bring a formal Choice, in which case witnesses to a “rape” would be unnecessary.
He said, “Very well. I’ll make sure—”
He forgot what he’d been about to say as a wave of nausea swept over him. He staggered back against the window frame, barely hearing Meiglan’s cry of his name. Colors whirled all around him, catching him up in their brilliant power, drawing him helplessly along thick ropes of woven light far from Stronghold.
21
Dragon’s Rest: 33 Spring
Ostvel was beyond exhaustion. This morning he had awakened from a brief rest—more like a dead faint—to find abused muscles stiff, his very bones bruised. The damp spring night had put an ache into every joint in his body, but the pain was so familiar by now that it was as if he had never felt anything else. Oddly enough, his head no longer swam with the thick confusion of weariness. Everything had become clear as Fironese crystal. All considerations of trusting or not trusting Andry, all political permutations of an army’s march on the palace, all intricate webs of motive and reason and responsibility had resolved into a very simple thing. It was so obvious, really. He must ride to Dragon’s Rest. He supposed he was lucky he still had some idea why.
The two guards, Chandar and Jofra, were doing better than he. But then, they were younger. Donato had looked awful during the whole journey—which might have been three days or three years by now, for all Ostvel knew. The Sunrunner had struggled bravely but uselessly against his reaction to crossing water. Ostvel had a vague memory of holding his friend’s head over the side of the boat as Donato vomited and then collapsed in groaning misery. The Faolain’s swift current had taken them downstream faster than Ostvel had calculated, and they had almost missed the landing. Still, any time gained had been offset by the difficulties of getting Donato fit to sit a horse. They had ended by having him ride pillion until noon, which had slowed them down even more. But then he had declared himself equal to holding the reins instead of merely getting a mindless grip on Jofra’s belt. And they had been riding ever since, with stops only for a little food, a few moments’ rest, and fresh horses.
These were more difficult to find than Ostvel had thought. Though as lord of Castle Crag and former Regent of Princemarch he could commandeer any horse he chose, he knew animals of better quality would be forthcoming if money were offered as well. He’d been in luck with the first change, for the minor athri whose possessions included the landing had an eye for good horseflesh. But inspection of another holding’s stables the next day had produced nothing worth riding, let alone risking a princedom on.
He had been lucky again this afternoon, finding four sturdy mountain ponies perfect for the approach to Dragon’s Rest he had in mind. It had taken the greater part of his purse to secure them, their owner being naturally suspicious of a man he’d never even heard of, but Ostvel had not allowed Jofra to convince the man with his sword. Especially not after the news that a great many horses and soldiers had been seen passing that way only the previous night.
“We’re not too far behind them, then,” Ostvel had sighed as they rode off. “They should get there by dark. And so will we.”
They could not enter the valley the usual way. They must go up over the hills and approach from the western flank. And now, at midnight, when Ostvel was barely conscious and sodden with weariness, he reined in very suddenly at the sight of the palace down below him.
“All serene,” Jofra muttered. “Shall we ride down and warn them, my lord?”
Ostvel rubbed his throbbing temples and upended his water skin over his head to wake himself up. The shock of cold water made him shiver. But it did not entirely clear his head: Now that his simple goal had been reached, his mind infuriatingly muddled again. The hillside wood was protection from a chill breeze, but the darkness felt thick and menacing.
“Too serene,” Chandar said, frowning.
“Donato? Donato!”
The Sunrunner jerked upright in his saddle and mumbled something. He looked worse than Ostvel felt.
“Wake up, man. Tell us what you see down there and at the valley entrance.”
“What? Oh—yes.” He swung off his pony and groaned softly as a joint cracked. “Goddess in glory! Sitting this brute is like being in a sailboat during a storm.”
“How would you know, Sunrunner?” Ostvel smiled faintly. “Tell me what’s going on down there or I’ll take you back to Castle Crag the way we left it.”
Donato gave him a black look. “If so, I’ll make damned sure to throw up all over you.” He walked gingerly toward the moonlight at the edge of the trees.
“My lord?” Chandar asked. “Has anyone ever even thought about defending Dragon’s Rest?”
Ostvel had helped plan the palace. Familiar thoughts came easily enough to reassure him about the state of his wits, and he consciously polished them on well-known ideas. “Its situation is its best defense. The valley narrows to the south, the only approach for an army. You can ride four horses abreast, but that’s it. The area is regularly patrolled, even at night. The two towers are placed to defend against frontal assault, which is the only kind that can be made here. There’s a guardhouse halfway down the valley on the eastern slope. Invaders could make things difficult, but they can’t possibly take the place.”