The Inadequate Heir, page 14
Keris didn’t comment, sensing that she was lost to her thoughts on the matter, and instead sampled some of the food. They ate in silence for a long time, and only once the old woman had taken away the trays and refilled their glasses did he say, “All the books didn’t disappear from the world because your young self decided to abandon them. They are still waiting for you.”
“I wouldn’t know where to start.” She sipped at her ale. “Or where to find the time.”
“What about right now?” Unfastening his coat, he reached inside and pulled a small volume from the inner pocket.
“You have one with you?”
“Always.” He dragged his chair around so that he was seated right next to her, deeply aware of how her leg brushed against his, feeling the heat of her through his trousers. “This is a book about stars.”
She frowned. “What about them?”
“What they mean. Or groups of them mean, I suppose is more accurate. It’s a translated text from one of the nations north of Harendell, where they believe the stars tell the stories of their ancestors.” Pulling the candle in front of them, he held the book behind it so that the tiny script and sketched diagrams were illuminated. Flipping through the pages, he paused when the sight of a constellation in the shape of a whale caused her to lean forward with interest. Smiling, he read the story to her.
And as he read, Valcotta leaned into him, her knee brushing his and her shoulder resting against his chest, the scent of her hair ensuring that none of the words he read registered in his mind.
None of this would be happening if she knew who you were.
The thought caused him to stumble on a word, and he snapped the book shut. “If I read any more in this bad light, I’ll blind myself.”
She looked up at him, her eyes searching his and making him profoundly grateful for how the darkness turned everything to shades of grey. “You read well.”
“Practice. I’ve a number of female relatives who enjoy stories.” As soon as the words slipped his lips, Keris cursed himself for the carelessness that came with too much drink, but she only asked, “You’ve many?”
More than I can name. “Enough that Nerastis seems peaceful by comparison.”
Valcotta laughed, her eyes shining with delight, and then she froze, her gaze going to the entrance.
And that’s when he heard it.
The solid thump of a large group walking with purpose, and then a female voice shouting, “We’re conducting a roundup, loves! Show us your faces, and if your faces be Maridrinian, you better start running now!”
Fuck.
“Goddammit!” Valcotta dumped a handful of coins on the table, then grabbed his hand and dragged Keris across the space. “Is there another way out?” she demanded of the proprietor.
“Through the kitchen.” The woman smirked. “Better run fast.”
They stumbled through the tiny kitchen, Keris nearly overturning a barrel in his haste. Then they were in a narrow alley, refuse squishing beneath their feet as they sprinted to the end. Instead of racing into the street, Valcotta slid to a stop, Keris nearly knocking her over. God help him, he was too drunk for this.
“Shit,” she hissed. “There’s a patrol out there.”
And staying where they were wasn’t an option, because from behind them, he heard the old woman announce, “A rat went scampering that way.”
“Climb!” He caught Valcotta by the waist, lifting her up to a narrow window, which she scrambled inside before reaching down.
“There he is!”
Keris shoved the book he still held inside his coat and jumped, catching her hand and praying she was strong enough to hold his weight.
He was a fool to have doubted her, because Valcotta heaved, drawing him high enough that he could reach the sill. Keris hauled himself in as the patrol raced down the alley toward them.
“He’s in the building! Go! Go!”
He landed on top of Valcotta, but she rolled him off, whispering, “We need to get to the roof. They’ll surround the building and then come inside.”
Heart racing, Keris climbed to his feet and took her hand, leading her cautiously through the darkness until he found a set of partially collapsed stairs. Balancing on the banister, he jumped to catch hold of the upper level, clenching his teeth as the floor groaned beneath his weight. Valcotta followed, and they eased across the floor to where the roof had collapsed, the sounds of the patrol entering the building echoing from below.
The entire structure seemed to shift and move as Keris climbed out onto what remained of the roof, keeping to the shadows so as not to be seen by those below. “Which way?” he asked softly as Valcotta joined him, her eyes panning the rooftops.
“We’ll have to be fast,” she murmured. “Keep up and don’t fall.”
Then she jumped.
“They’re on the roof!” Keris heard the shout as he leapt after Valcotta. He rolled across the neighboring roof, on his feet in a flash and running. Adrenaline drove away the effects of the ale, but he was still hard-pressed to keep up. Valcotta raced across the rooftops, pausing only occasionally to listen for pursuit before sprinting onward.
By the time she pulled him down in the shadows next to a broken chimney, Keris was panting for breath.
“We wait here,” she said softly. “They’ll have given up by now in favor of easier catches, so we need only wait until they’ve rounded up the quota and you can get out of the city.”
It had to be close to the third hour of the morning, which meant only a few more hours until dawn. If he didn’t get back across the Anriot before then, he’d be stuck. And once his escort came knocking at Aileena’s door and realized Keris was not in with the courtesan, there’d be a panic.
Yet as Valcotta leaned back against the rubble next to him, her hip pressing against his, Keris couldn’t find it in himself to regret coming with her.
“I take it this roundup wasn’t planned?” he asked.
“No.” Her tone was sour. “Smacks of Bermin’s doing.”
The familiar way she spoke of the Valcottan prince pricked his interest. “You don’t care for His Royal Highness?”
“He’s an idiot fueled by pride rather than intelligence,” she scoffed.
“Most princes are.”
Her body shook with a silent chuckle, but then a cold south wind blew over them, and she shivered. Pulling off his coat, he handed it to her. “Here.”
“That hardly seems fair.”
“It’s fine. The cold doesn’t bother me.” Which wasn’t the slightest bit true. He was Maridrinian and despised being chilled. But she didn’t need to know that.
Valcotta took the garment, toying with the sleeve for a moment before slipping it on.
Then she shifted so that they were pressed together. His heart leapt, and after a moment’s hesitation, he put his arm around her shoulders, drawing her against him. The flickers of desire that had been tempered by the pursuit of patrols flared back to life, but he kept his hands to places that would cause no offense.
It was a clear night, the stars an ocean of sparkles, and taking her hand, he used her finger to trace a constellation. “Do you see it?”
“The whale.” There was wonder in her voice. “So strange to think we can see the same shapes in the sky as those living half a world away, and in the seeing, know the stories of people we’ve never met.”
“Some of them.” He traced the outline of a bear. “Some you can only see in certain parts of the world. Or at certain times of the year.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.” Their fingers interlocked, and his eyes moved from the stars to their hands, taking in the image of it. Committing it to memory lest it never happen again. “Perhaps there is some higher power that knows which stars we need to see when we look up, which stories we need to hear. That knows which constellations will lure us to travel the world so that we might see them with our own eyes, adding them to the map of sparks in our minds.”
“A map of where we’ve been,” she murmured.
“And where we might go.” He lowered his arm, keeping hold of her hand as he turned to look at her.
Kiss her.
God help him, but he wanted to. But he wouldn’t do it unless she asked, and she had not. Very likely would not.
“Where would you go?” she asked. “If you could?”
Always, the answer had been somewhere, anywhere, other than where he was. To escape.
But that had changed. “If I had the choice to be anywhere in the world, I would choose right here.”
She exhaled a soft breath, half laughter and half surprise, then curled tighter against his side as the wind gusted over them. “Show me another shape in the sky.”
Keris scoured his memory for every constellation he knew, which was many, for he’d always been the sort to look up and see things others didn’t. He spoke until his voice grew hoarse and her breathing deepened, her arm growing limp as her head drifted down against his chest, sleep taking her.
For a long time, he remained still, holding her against him and listening to the city grow quiet as the soldiers retreated back to the garrison. Soon there was only the sound of the wind and the warmth of her breath against his throat.
You need to go, he told himself. You need to get back before you are missed.
But he didn’t want to leave her. Didn’t want to let go of this woman who should be his enemy and yet had somehow become the one person he could trust with everything.
Except his name.
Chest aching, Keris eased his arm out from under her, gently lowering her head so that it was cushioned by the hood of his coat. Then, with the faint glow in the east beginning to light the sky, he traced a word in the soot of the broken chimney before abandoning the building to race the dawn back to his side of the Anriot.
SHE WOKE TO the light of dawn glowing in her eyes, a slow smile rising to her lips as she turned her head.
Only to find herself alone on the rooftop.
Zarrah’s stomach hollowed, but then her eyes latched on a word written in large letters in the soot stains on the chimney.
Midnight.
Warmth filling her, she pulled the collar of the Maridrinian’s coat up, inhaling the spicy scent of his cologne. Heat flooded through her veins, chasing away the headache caused by too much ale and replacing it with an aching need that could only be satisfied in one way.
By one person.
“You’ve lost your mind,” she muttered to herself. “And clearly forgotten the purpose of all this.”
Forgotten the reason she was seeing him, which was to facilitate an end to raids across the border. To stop the senseless slaughter of civilians.
Not to fall in bed with a Maridrinian who was more handsome than any man had a right to be.
Yet all the chiding did nothing to temper her lust, the memory of his velvet voice rippling across her thoughts, the sensation of his body pressed against hers making her burn hot despite the cool morning air. Lust in its purest form, but that wasn’t the limit of what she felt. And it was those other sentiments that simultaneously thrilled and terrified her.
Climbing to her feet, Zarrah peered over the edge of the building. Seeing it was clear of traffic in the alley below, she climbed down and headed toward the palace. Though she didn’t want to give up the warmth of his coat, wearing it would raise questions, so she tucked the expensive leather under one arm.
But she took the book out of his pocket first.
As she walked through the streets, Zarrah flipped through the pages, her eyes drifting over the writing, the stories making her smile.
It was a forgotten joy, reading for pleasure.
One of many things she’d given up in her desire to be strong, in her desire for vengeance, in her desire to please her aunt.
When was the last time she’d done something for no reason other than it made her happy?
Seeing an approaching patrol, Zarrah tucked the book back into the pocket, nodding at her soldiers as they stopped to salute. More salutes as she strode through the empty gates, and Zarrah forced her thoughts to what needed to be accomplished today. To the endless reports she needed to read and drills she needed to oversee.
“Where in the name of God have you been?” Hands closed over her shoulders, pulling Zarrah sideways into a corridor.
Yrina.
Her friend shook a finger in her face. “All damned night, I’ve been searching for you, Zar. All. Night. Had to organize a bloody roundup to hide what I was doing, but you were nowhere to be found.”
Zarrah opened her mouth to lie about where she’d been, but Yrina’s eyes latched on the Maridrinian’s coat. “What’s this?” She jerked it out of Zarrah’s grip, holding it up. “This is a man’s coat.” Her fingers moved over the leather. “An expensive man’s coat. Does it belong to your lover?”
“Give it back, Yrina.” She reached for the coat, but her friend danced backward. “I borrowed it from a civilian friend and didn’t have the chance to return it.”
Yrina lifted the leather to her nose and inhaled. “Bergamot. Ginger. And red cedar, if my nose does not mistake it.” She inhaled again, then rolled her eyes back, groaning. “My God, Zar. If you aren’t sleeping with whoever owns this coat, there is something deeply wrong with you.” Then she frowned. “Except this isn’t … this isn’t a Valcottan cut. It’s—”
“Harendellian,” Zarrah snapped, trying to curb the rising panic in her stomach. “And it takes more than expensive cologne to get my trousers off, Yrina. Now perhaps you might explain why you organized a roundup of Maridrinians for the sake of tracking me down?”
All humor vanished from her friend’s face. “Because she’s here.”
She. The Empress. “When? And why? She was supposed to return to Pyrinat.”
Yrina exhaled a long breath. “She does not keep me in her counsel, Zar. All I know is that she was not pleased to discover you absent, especially given no one knew where you were. And I’m not sure there is a lie in the world that’s going to get you out of this one.”
Shit. Zarrah closed her eyes, knowing that she’d gotten herself into this mess and had no one to blame but herself. “Put those in my room for me, please. Somewhere the servants won’t find them.”
“Those?” Yrina lifted one eyebrow, then fished the book out of the coat’s pocket, reading the cover. Her other eyebrow rose to join its mate. “Stars,” she murmured. “Color me intrigued.” Then she wandered down the corridor, flipping through the pages of the Maridrinian’s book.
Straightening her clothing and praying the smells of her prior night’s activities didn’t cling too strongly, Zarrah headed to the training yard to face her aunt.
EMPRESS PETRA OF Valcotta stood at the center of the nearly empty yard, only her bodyguard, Welran, and a servant holding a pitcher of water in attendance. She wore training leathers, her eyes closed as she moved through the same exercises she’d completed every morning for as long as Zarrah had been alive.
Zarrah stopped at the edge of the sand, standing at attention while her aunt finished, trying to keep her racing heart in check. Not once had she disappointed her aunt, not like this. And though her aunt didn’t know the half of what Zarrah had done, what she did know still smacked of defiance.
Which was something the Empress had no tolerance for.
Without speaking, her aunt went to a rack of weapons and selected two staffs, one of which she tossed to the ground at Zarrah’s feet before accepting a glass of water from the servant. Eyes on Zarrah, she drank deeply before setting the glass back on the tray.
Her mouth dry as the sand they stood upon, Zarrah retrieved the staff and moved to the center of the space, taking her position.
The Empress attacked.
A blinding whirl of wood, which Zarrah barely managed to block, her arms shuddering from the impact. Then another and another, her aunt putting her on the defense and giving her no respite.
She never did.
At her best, Zarrah was barely a match for the older woman, who made up for the strength age had sapped with a lifetime of experience. But today, Zarrah was far from her best. She was exhausted from nights of little sleep, her body stiff from lying on a rooftop, and her mind sluggish from ale.
Crack.
The blow caught her across the ribs, ripping a gasp from her lips and sending her staggering. Zarrah rolled as her aunt swung at her again, trying to give herself the space to regain ground, but her aunt relentlessly pursued.
Crack.
Pain spidered down her hip and she staggered, struggling for balance, but her head was spinning with thirst. Her aunt hooked her leg, sending Zarrah toppling onto her back and knocking the wind from her lungs.
Before she could suck in a breath, her aunt’s staff whirled, driving straight toward Zarrah’s face. She lifted her own weapon to block the blow, but it tangled in her ankle, and she braced for the pain.
The staff stopped a fraction of an inch from her cheekbone.
“Shameful!” Her aunt threw the staff to the sand, then spit on it for good measure. “Not since you first picked up a weapon have you fought so poorly.”
“Apologies, Your Imperial Majesty.” Zarrah climbed to her feet, head lowered, stomach filled with self-loathing for having embarrassed herself so horribly. “I—”
“Oh, I know exactly what you’ve been up to, girl.” Her aunt inhaled, then wrinkled her nose. “Rumpled, stinking of liquor and sweat and man, your eyes dull from lack of sleep.” She rounded on Welran and the servant. “Leave us.”
They departed without question, leaving Zarrah and her aunt alone in the silent yard. For a long moment, the Empress said nothing, and Zarrah’s mortification grew with every heartbeat. Her aunt had raised her, had given her everything she wanted and guided her on her chosen path. To her aunt, Zarrah’s behavior must appear as though she were spitting in the face of all those gifts.
“I arrived to word of a great victory against the Maridrinians who dared to step onto our soil, victory delivered by my chosen heir,” the Empress slowly said. “An heir that I expected to greet me with plans for how we might capitalize on this win. Except instead you were out drinking and rutting in the slums of the city like some common soldier. If I wanted an heir like that,” her voice rose, “I’d have named my own cursed son!”
