The Twelve Kingdoms: The Mark of the Tala (26 page)

“I’m learning that there are many shades of gray in life. Mine has always been the middle path, neither here nor there. You’re part of that, Rayfe. I think you always will be. Just promise me that, when the time to fight comes, you’ll tell me.”

“I will make sure you know,” he promised, and distracted me with a kiss.

F
or once, I awoke before he did.

Not surprising, because I think he paced for much of what remained of the night and into some of the morning. I fell asleep the moment my head hit the pillow. I barely saw anything of the bedchamber Rayfe led me to, the one between our suites of sitting rooms, accessed by both, that we would share. From time to time, I surfaced from deep sleep to see his silhouette by the window, gazing out into the early dark or the pearly dawn.

“Rayfe?” I asked once, fighting past the cobwebs of slumber.

He turned and shushed me, brushing the hair from my forehead and urging me back to sleep. Which really took no urging. When he finally came to bed, curling his body around mine under the light sheet, I sighed and murmured, “Good,” and he kissed the back of my neck.

So when I awoke in late morning, I lay still, so as not to bother him. He snored a bit, something that amused me, from this remote and cool man. A man who only seemed cool and remote on the surface, I was learning. I savored this intimacy with him, the parts only I could see.

Now I noticed the enormous four-poster bed, carved from polished stone. The ceiling, inlaid with a mosaic tile, arched overhead. In the design, fish swam in aqua water, brilliantly colored and exotic, like nothing I’d ever seen. I wondered if the artist had shifted into a fish, to see such creatures. As I watched, the tiles seemed to swirl and change, showing another underwater scene. More magic. I could have watched it for hours.

Unfortunately, I had to answer the urgent call of nature, so I slowly extricated myself from Rayfe’s embrace. He grunted, reaching for me, found the pillow instead, and subsided back into sleep, long black strands of his hair snarled over his face, so much softer in repose.

My heart sighed.

In the dressing room, I brushed out my hair and sang softly to myself.

Not really a love song, with the ominous lines about scars and corpses, but somehow it felt like one. Appropriate for Rayfe and me, a thought that made me smile. And then I realized that envy of Amelia that I’d carried for so long had somehow faded away. She and Hugh belonged in their world, of true love, adulation, poetry, and crowds tossing roses. I’d found my own place.

Today would be for strategy. And for meeting more people—taking my role in this place. I poked through the closet of flowing dresses, looking for something more . . . queenly. I chose one of ruby red because it made me feel powerful.

When I emerged, Rayfe was sitting up in bed, bare chested and heart-stoppingly seductive. He raked the tangled hair back from his face and assessed me.

“Don’t you look fresh and lovely this morning. And—dressed up?”

“Too much? I thought there might be court. Or courtlike things. Do you do court here?”

He grinned at me. “Yes. We do courtlike things here. I think the dress is perfect. And you left your hair down.”

Self-consciously I smoothed a hand over the long fall. “Too informal? Should I put it up? Normally I would, but I don’t have anyone here to help me with it. I could braid it, though, and—”

“Andromeda.” He climbed out of the big bed and stalked toward me, gloriously naked and male. “Relax. You look perfect. They will love you.”

He lifted my chin and gave me a brief kiss, then moved past to his own rooms.

“That’s not true,” I felt compelled to remind him. “Many of your people are not happy that I’m here, a foreign princess foisted upon them. Who maybe is not capable of being queen in truth.”

He glanced back over his shoulder. “
Our
people. And remember—you are not foisted upon them. You are Salena’s gift to them. One she destroyed herself to give. Keep that in mind.”

Those words helped. Though, as the day wore on, I had to remind myself more and more often.

“Court,” as I suspected, looked nothing like Ordnung’s throne room. No looming throne dominated the room, no fastidiously dressed ladies hovered. Instead, all public meetings took place in an open-air pavilion that overlooked the sea. Comfortable benches and small sitting areas were scattered throughout. Rayfe led me to a pair of chairs behind a desk piled high with various scrolls and papers.

Terin, who had been sitting there, stood as we approached and scowled at me. “You missed the morning sessions.”

“We were busy.” Rayfe stared him down. “Is there a problem?”

Terin gestured at the piles. “I’ve answered all the queries after those who are yet unable to come home. What remains is only all the business of Annfwn that you’ve let slide all this time that you’ve pursued your . . . quest.” His foxy eyes slid to me and away again.

“Good day, Uncle,” I said. “I’m feeling quite well. And yourself?”

He flicked his gaze to me, now looking me up and down. “Good day to you, Salena’s daughter. Do you think to fill her shoes along with her rooms?”

“I hope to one day become someone she would have been proud of, yes.”

Grudgingly he nodded, but he turned to showing Rayfe which knotty problems he’d been able to work through and which he’d set aside for consideration. They conferred, Terin nodding to various waiting groups and summarizing their petitions.

“Later this afternoon,” Rayfe told him finally, “we’ll meet in the inside rooms, to discuss next steps. I know everyone just arrived home, but I’ll need all the higher officers.”

Terin glanced at me, raising his eyebrows.

“Andromeda will join us.”

“If she doesn’t tear us apart,” Terin muttered, before striding away.

“Pay him no mind. Now, let’s deal with some of these issues.”

In truth, he dealt with the issues while I watched—especially since many of the petitioners spoke only the liquid Tala language and only a few were presented in the common tongue used by the Twelve Kingdoms. One of Terin’s lieutenants, whom I recognized from the journey, stood by my elbow and translated quietly. Thoughtful of Rayfe, but the multisided conversations were not always easy to follow, regardless.

With a mental sigh, I moved
learn the language
up my list. Right after
learn to shape-shift
,
rescue the Tala stranded outside the barrier, plug into Annfwn’s magic somehow, figure out how to use the visions to good purpose
, and, oh,
stop the greatest warrior in recorded history with the might of Twelve Kingdoms behind him from making Annfwn into the thirteenth
.

All in good time. Rapidly vanishing time. And yet, here we sat, dispensing with what amounted to gripes.

Most of the problems that ascended to Uorsin’s attention had involved property disputes and political alliances. Here, those problems seemed to be entirely absent. Most of the thorny problems seemed to do with lineage and, sadly, family arguments. Many of the issues seemed like the sort of thing Ursula or even the lower courts would have decided in the Twelve Kingdoms. But I could see many had waited for Rayfe’s particular input.

It seemed beneath him, but I grew to understand.

I watched him handle the problems with the same evenhanded wisdom he used with me. He thought differently than I did, but then, I hadn’t contemplated these questions much.

On a project involving the carving out of new quarters, apparently quite a ways down the beach, so far down that the proposed residents brought up the distance frequently in their complaints, Rayfe turned to me. I confess I’d fallen into a bit of a dream, contemplating Terin’s animosity mixed with how to stop Uorsin, what the barrier might be made of and wondering where I might find Fiona and if she would like running on the sand. The mosaic over my bed came to mind, with all those brilliant fish. If I swam, would I see them? More likely I’d drown.

“In the Twelve Kingdoms,” Rayfe asked, “are the property taxes prorated for distance from the population centers?”

He raised an eyebrow at me, and I knew he’d realized I wasn’t paying attention. A gleam of challenge also glimmered in his deep-blue eyes. It was on the tip of my tongue to tell him I had no idea, that I’d never paid attention to such things, but I held the remark back.

The Tala making the petition were a small family group of several males and two females, representing a much larger group that hoped to create another set of cliff dwellings. A large-eyed little girl clung to the hand of one of the men, peering at me with that odd combination of admiration and trepidation I remembered feeling for the glamorous court ladies. I smiled at her and she hid her face against the man’s leg. The adults studied me with frank curiosity—and a hint of wariness.

Our
people.

“Each of the Twelve Kingdoms has its own tax structure.” I turned back to Rayfe, calling up memories of court petitions from the lesser kings. “And each then tithes, quite heavily, to the High King.” Bitter complaints in the back hallways over that, despite the bowing and scraping before Uorsin. “In most of the kingdoms, the rural folk bear the brunt of taxation, though they often provide it in the form of food or other supplies for the population centers.” If they had food, I realized, remembering some of the more specific arguments and Rayfe’s caustic comment about people starving in the Twelve Kingdoms.

The petitioners watched me closely, clearly not understanding my words. They flicked anxious gazes to Rayfe, waiting to hear what this foreign queen had said. It occurred to me that a fine method of governing might be to do the opposite of what Uorsin did.

“But I don’t think this system works very well.”

“No?” Rayfe’s face was solemn, but amused interest lightened his eyes.

“Well, that system is in place to sustain an empire. That’s not the situation here, is it?”

“True. What, then, do you suggest would be an equitable structure?”

How should I know that? Surely there were people who understood this sort of thing better. Like those very sharp women I’d seen when I arrived, a legal team, Rayfe had called them. “Turn the question over to one of your judicial groups?”

He gave me a little nod and turned to the family, speaking in their language. “So be it. We will send the matter to the judicial group for consideration. Until then, you may continue with your efforts—abiding by Tala building principles, please—at the old level of taxation.”

With relieved smiles and gratitude, even directed toward me, the group left and we had a moment alone.

“Your Wild Lands are not nearly so wild as I was led to believe.”

“You know far more of Twelve Kingdoms law than you led me to believe.”

I flashed a smile at him. “I didn’t know that stuff was in my head.”

“There’s a great deal in your lovely head that you haven’t been using, I believe.”

I felt my smile fade. Back to this. “I don’t know if that’s true, Rayfe. I’m not Salena.”

“No,” he countered, “you’re more.”

And then another group of petitioners was before us.

Rayfe cut off the hearings by midafternoon, promising the remaining groups overnight lodging in the capital city. It seemed the Tala used “Annfwn” to refer to both this cliff city and the overall kingdom. Dafne would have pronounced it imprecise. The more I picked up, though, the greater the sense of hugely rambling territory formed in my mind.

“Just how big is Annfwn?” I asked Rayfe as he escorted me to a small table on the terrace set with a late lunch. We had the little balcony to ourselves, in a perfect spot in the sun, overlooking the water. People ambled by on the roads set a distance away, looking at us and whispering to one another. A public appearance, then.

Rayfe poured some golden wine into a lovely glass for me, then for himself. “Nobody really knows. We don’t perform detailed censuses. No need to count and quantify every citizen.” He raised an eyebrow at me, waiting to see if I would rise to his jibe about the ways of the Twelve Kingdoms.

“How big is your army?”

“Didn’t you ask me this before?”

“Yes, and as you no doubt recall, you gave me a vague answer.”

He shrugged, sitting back and sipping the wine. “Why is it important to you to know?”

I tamped down the impatience. “
Why?
Uorsin is bringing the might of the Twelve Kingdoms down on your heads, and instead of planning, you’ve been listening to petitions on taxes all afternoon, and here we sit, eating lunch and drinking wine in the sun and—”

“
Our
heads. And I might point out that you are neither eating nor drinking. Here I’ve gone to such lengths to keep my promise to see you properly fed and you don’t even notice.”

How he could tease me at this moment, I didn’t know, but I set my jaw and dug into what turned out to be a most succulent fish. Rayfe leaned forward and laid his hand over mine, where it rested on the table.

“This is not wasted time, Andromeda. The people need to see you. They need to know you care about their daily troubles. And they need to see us enjoying the treasures of Annfwn. Seeing their king happy will set them at ease. Seeing their queen will give them hope.”

He picked up my hand and kissed it. My heart melted at the affection in his deep-blue gaze, and I thought I heard a chorus of sighs. I followed the sound to a nearby balcony that overlooked ours. A trio of young girls hung over the edge, watching us with avid interest. When they saw me look, they burst into giggles and scurried off, talking to each other rapidly.

“Life goes on. The Tala love to enjoy life, more than anything else. I want you to know what it is I’m asking you to help save.” Rayfe released my hand and nudged my wineglass toward me. “Relax, my queen. Enjoy.”

I did, after all. Rayfe told me entertaining stories, recounting the histories of some of the petitioners we’d heard earlier. More than once he made me laugh, drawing approving smiles from the passersby. I began to see his point. This was not solemn Ordnung, where power and might ruled. This was Annfwn, a warm land of pleasure, magic, and loveliness.

Wherever that vision of Rayfe was, it held snow. Therefore, it could not be Annfwn. All I had to do was keep him from leaving. And keep Uorsin out.