“Stay there. Everything’s all right now—or at least mostly all right.” Ostvel held a cup to her lips. “Have some water. It’s a thimbleful compared to what I would have swallowed if you and Cami hadn’t thought so fast. I’m in your debt, Sioned.”
The water tasted of mossberries, and regret sliced through her again. “What happened?” she mumbled.
“Nothing that makes tragic hearing, except for the loss of the horses. The twenty of us are all safe on this side. But we only have twelve mounts left. A somewhat unequal balance, one might say.”
She sat up again, stretched carefully, and winced. “So twelve of us will have to go on. The rest can stay here with our friend of the ‘soft crossing,’ ” she said with a faint smile. “I hope he thinks seriously about building a bridge.”
“I doubt he can think at all just now. He’s incoherent with terror of what Andrade would have done to him if he’d lost us—or what he believes the almighty Lady would do.” Ostvel sat back on his heels and shrugged. “He’s not our problem though.
You
are.”
“Me?”
“Sioned, I can’t take you to Stronghold with only eleven in attendance. You’re going to be a princess!”
“A princess without a wedding dress,” she reminded him. “All my things were on the other horses. Ostvel, we have to go on as we are. She told me to be there in six days.”
“You’re supposed to arrive in a state befitting the bride of a prince,” he said stubbornly, his kind, rugged face furrowed with concern.
She smiled fondly. “I’ll be lucky to arrive at all, at this rate. How’s Cami doing?”
“Still insensible, poor darling. I’m amazed she was able to get up, let alone think of the horses. I’m amazed
any
of you moved as fast as you did. We owe you Sunrunners our lives.”
“Remember that the next time you tease us about crossing water.” Sioned ran her hands back through her damp hair. “We’re losing the day, Ostvel. Prop Cami on her horse. Tie her to the saddle if you must, but we have to get moving.”
Camigwen recovered enough to sit her horse without the measures Sioned suggested, and fretted for the rest of the afternoon about the loss of Sioned’s clothes and consequence. No amount of reassurance could convince her that Sioned did not much care. In truth, she was relieved to be going to Stronghold in simplicity rather than in state. She wasn’t a princess yet, and still couldn’t quite make herself believe she would be.
By the time they stopped for the night, everyone was exhausted. Muscles accustomed to riding were not used to hauling on cables, and muffled groans were heard as the twelve dismounted. They spent the night on a farm belonging to Palevna’s maternal uncle, but the
faradh’im
were unable to do full justice to his wife’s splendid cooking and after dinner dragged themselves out to the barn to collapse onto blankets in the soft hay.
“Just think,” Ostvel said brightly, gray eyes dancing, “we’ll have to go back across the Faolain on our way home again!”
Camigwen glared at him. “Think again,” she said darkly. “I’ll have Mardeem
sing
a bridge into being if I must, but I’m not going to cross that water on anything but my own two feet.” She threw her arms around her Chosen and buried her face in the curve of his neck. “I almost lost you to that damned river!”
Sioned watched him soothe her, and smiled. Goddess blessing was surely on this pair. Her smile faded as she realized that when they married, she herself would be far away, unable to join in the celebrations.
And her own wedding? She could neither visualize it nor believe in it. The man, yes—she could see him in every color of the sky and every gleam of sunlight. But the prince was a stranger. Who was he? Was there a mind to match those beautiful, brilliant eyes?
She lay awake long after the others slept, and stared up at the stars through loft doors left open to the soft night. Such clear, sweet light; to ride that would be feat indeed. If it could be done, then even on nights when the moons did not rise one could still go where there was need by dancing down those pale, fiery trails of light. But it was forbidden to Sunrunners, the glow of the stars. Perhaps the protection of the Goddess did not extend to those faraway pinpoints of light. The Fire of sun and moons was under her blessing, but what of the stars? They threw whispery shadows over the meadows and mountains, mysterious and dreamy. What colors were hidden within them? Sioned, with six rings circling her fingers, was capable of riding both sun and moons. She counted those rings in the starlight, four gold and two silver, plain circles that at Goddess Keep did not set her apart but which out in the world marked as her different. She remembered what it had been like at River Run during her childhood, when her sister-by-marriage had eyed her askance and whispered about her to her brother Davvi. In her maturity, Sioned could think of Lady Wisla with something approaching gratitude, for if she had not been so eager to be sole mistress of the Holdings and their wealth, Sioned would never have been sent to Goddess Keep.
And she would not be riding now to become the wife of a prince.
Why was Andrade doing this? she wondered. The last trained
faradhi
to marry into the important nobility had been Sioned’s grandmother, who, though not a highborn herself, had married a prince of Kierst. Their daughter had married Sioned and Davvi’s father, having shown no signs of the gifts. Younger sons and daughters of high-borns sometimes become Sunrunners, but usually they stayed untrained despite evidence of talent, marrying rather than coming to Goddess Keep for instruction. A prince or lord wearing
faradhi
rings was unheard of. Sioned did not interest herself overmuch in the affairs of the princedoms, but she knew enough to understand that a Sunrunner prince would be perceived as a threat. But there was a very good chance that one of her children would be just that. Though Princess Milar did not possess the gifts, they had been known to skip several generations before showing up again.
All at once Sioned realized that the son she bore to the prince would rule after him. She cursed her stupidity in not having considered it earlier, for being so wrapped up in her thoughts of him that she had not thought about children at all. And she knew what Andrade wanted of her at last: a
faradhi
prince ruling the Desert, using all the power of his position and his gifts to—to do what? That was what she could not understand. Or, rather, she hoped she did not understand.
Chapter Five
P
rince Zehava died before dawn on the sixth day, his family attending him. He had drifted in and out of awareness all the previous day and night, oncoming death dulling his mind and slurring his speech. But he died without pain, and without fear for the future of the son who became ruling prince when Zehava breathed his last. Ignoring the tradition that forbade him the death chamber, Rohan was with his father when he died. Milar closed her husband’s eyes; Tobin ran her fingers gently over his forehead to smooth out the lines of stress. Rohan bent and kissed his father, then turned and left the death chamber.
Andrade waited a little while, then went after him. He was where she knew he’d be: in the Flametower, helping the servants build the fire high enough to shine out over the Desert and inform Zehava’s people of his passing. The blaze would be seen from distant hills where other fires would be lit in a chain of light that by nightfall would extend the length and breadth of the princedom.
Moisture had become an unpleasant trickle down her spine and between her breasts before Rohan had satisfied himself that the fire was sufficiently bright. She was not in the best of moods anyway, and the heat worsened her temper. Though never deeply attached to Zehava, she had appreciated him and knew the world to be poorer for his death. But now she had a new prince to deal with, and as they left the inferno behind, her voice was perhaps sharper than it should have been.
“Not a single preparation has been made for Sioned’s arrival. Why are you denying your bride her proper honors? I refuse to have the girl slink in here like a common guest, and not a very important one at that!”
“Peace, Andrade,” Rohan said tiredly. “It’s been a long night, and I have a longer day ahead of me.”
“You’ll answer me before it grows any longer, boy!”
A glittering gaze met hers, fierce as a dragon on the hunt. “The girl is coming to
my
keep, Andrade, not yours. Her welcome or lack of it will be arranged as
I
dictate.”
“Rohan!”
But he was off down the stairs, supple limbs setting a pace her older bones could not match. She spat a series of oaths that would have shocked even those who knew her best, then went to her rooms for a fruitless try at sleep.
The signal fire burned throughout the day, but Rohan was not at Stronghold to feel the heat melt slowly down through the keep. At daybreak he rode from the courtyards through the tunnel cut into solid rock down to the desert. With Chaynal at his side and his guards commander Maeta supervising nine more soldiers, he rode toward Rivenrock Canyon.
The sun rose, broiling the air, small updrafts brushing at his clothes and his horse’s mane. Rohan’s fair hair soon darkened with sweat and the thin gray silk of his tunic clung in damp patches to his chest and back. He told himself the salt sting in his eyes was sweat and that the hollow in his body was only the growling of an empty stomach. Over forty measures passed in silence. The sweltering air kept all animals in their shelters with barely enough energy to whimper their complaints to each other. A few birds were aloft on their way somewhere else, as birds always were in the Desert. Sometimes there came the soft shussh of shifting sand or a snort as one of the horses cleared its nostrils. But none of the men or women spoke for a long, tense time.
Finally Chay, who had let his horse lag behind Rohan’s to give the young man some privacy, caught up to him again. They rode ahead of the troops, out of earshot even in the profound stillness. Rohan glanced around at him. “Yes?” he prompted.
“You’ve never hunted a dragon before. It’s past mating now, and he’ll be even more vicious.”
“I promised Father.”
“Rohan, I wish you’d let me—”
“No. This dragon is mine.”
Chay glanced away. “As you wish, my prince,” he said stiffly.
“No! Chay, don’t—I never want that from you!”
The cry from the heart softened Chaynal. “I’ll have to call you that around the others, you know. But we’ll stay to each other as we’ve always been, if that’s what you want.”
Rohan nodded his gratitude. “I need that, Chay. I’m going to need your help.”
“You have it. You don’t need to ask.” Chay shrugged his shoulders against the heat. “I can almost hear the Merida getting ready. They’ll have seen the fires by evening and know Zehava’s dead. There’ll be trouble, Rohan.”
“I have a few ideas,” the young prince responded. “And not just for them.”
“Roelstra?” Chay guessed, and saw confirmation in the set of Rohan’s jaw. “You’d better be in one hell of a secure position before the
Rialla.
”
“I’ll be in what he’ll think is an untenable position. He’ll like that. He’ll think I’m ready to grab whatever support I can get, even from him. And support will come in the form of one of his doubtlessly charming daughters as my wife.”
“But Tobin said that Andrade—”
“Don’t believe everything you hear.”
“You’re going to disobey the Lady of Goddess Keep?” Chay whistled softly between his teeth.
“I’m scared to death, if you must know,” he confessed. “She loomed over Tobin and me like a she-dragon when we were little, and the feeling lingers a bit. But I’m going to live my own life, not her version of it. And that’s why I’m going to need your support, especially at the
Rialla.
”
“I’ll do whatever you want, of course. But do you know what you’re doing?”
“Yes,” Rohan said flatly. “I’m going to build a princedom that doesn’t depend on my sword. Father said the promises of a prince die with him. Not
this
prince, Chay! When I die, my sons will inherit peace, not just the absence of war for a few seasons or years while enemies think up new ways to attack.” He paused for Chay’s reaction, and when none was forthcoming remarked, “You’re not being very enthusiastic.”
“It’s a fine idea,” Chaynal said carefully. “But I don’t think it’s very practical.”
“I’ll make it work. You’ll see.”
Rivenrock rose up before them. The reddish striations in the stone might have been dried blood, dragon or human. Rohan drew rein, contemplating the mouth of the canyon with its great spire.
“He’s still here.” Rohan pointed to dark patches of plants. “See the bittersweet along the cliff? He’s been cropping it to keep up his strength, because he’s not done mating. Usually it grows back almost overnight, but this is eaten right down to the ground.”
“It doesn’t take a dragon six days to mate his females,” Chay protested.
“Father wounded him badly. Can’t you sense that he’s still back there in the canyon?”
Chay saw and heard nothing, and said so. Rohan only smiled. All at once a shriek echoed off the canyon walls, its force clattering loose stones down to the gully. “He’s here,” Rohan repeated, and rode forward. Half a measure into the canyon he dismounted and unsheathed his sword, gesturing for Chaynal to do the same. “Maeta,” he said to the commander, “Keep everyone else back. You’re here to help me drag this monster home, and that’s all. Chay, come with me.”
“Your grace,” Maeta began, her eyes narrowing with worry—black eyes like Zehava’s, whose kinswoman she may or may not have been depending on which family rumor one believed. Rohan gave her a long look and she subsided with an obedient nod.
Rohan and Chaynal climbed the narrow shelf that passed for a trail along the canyon wall. The acrid odor of dragon mating was in the air. Caves lined the cliffs, many of them walled up by females who had already laid their eggs within. Eight caves on the opposite side of the canyon were sealed, and Rohan wondered how many dragons curled within shells there, baking in ovenlike heat to maturity. Dragons, with broad and graceful wings for flight, long throats for calling to each other on the wind—and deadly talons that ripped flesh to shreds. Rohan had to think of the dragons as killers today, not as the soaring, beautiful creatures that had enchanted him from childhood.