THEIR MYSTERIOUS WAYS
Karigan limped away from the practice field, tired
and soaked through from mud and sweat. Flogger had made her pay for
the kill point she got on him earlier. At least she hadn’t
disgraced herself in front of the king.
It occurred to her
King Zachary hadn’t stopped by the practice field to observe her at
all, that it was just coincidence he came by when she was there for
her session. Maybe he paused there long enough only to spare her a
quick glance, if even that much. She had not seen him at all, so
she did not know.
She slicked loose
hair back from her forehead. Did she really want him to see her
looking like this anyway? Painfully, she just wanted him to see
her, but even after her experiences in
the tombs, even after her knighting, he had not called upon her to
attend him.
All for the best, she decided, but such reasoning
did not assuage her feelings, only made her more
miserable.
So absorbed in her
thoughts was she that she nearly walked into someone. Someone
well-dressed and clean.
“Sorry, my lord,”
she mumbled, and stepped aside to go around him.
But he moved into
her path, blocking her. She looked up, startled.
“Well, well,” he
said. “If it isn’t the vanishing lady.”
It took a moment for
Karigan to recognize the man, for he was attired in a fine frock
coat and breeches, with a spotless silk shirt and cravat. He wore
his raven hair tied back, and his light gray eyes glinted with
amusement. The last time she’d seen Lord Amberhill, he’d been in a
much more travel-worn and ragged condition.
“If I did not know
better,” he continued, “one would think you were trying to dance
with me.”
“Hardly,” she
muttered, annoyed by his mocking tone. “I didn’t even see
you.”
“I suppose I
shouldn’t be surprised you can’t see through all that
mud.”
Karigan blushed,
even more acutely aware of how she must look.
Lord Amberhill
placed his hand on his hip, pushing his frock coat aside as if to
display the tightness of his breeches.
Karigan’s blush
intensified. “Excuse me,” she said. When she started to walk away,
he pivoted and stood once more in her path.
“What? No friendly
words for one who saw you through a bad night in the Teligmar
Hills?”
“I’d forgotten,”
Karigan replied, though it was untrue.
Amberhill placed his
hand over his heart. “I am wounded you should forget. After all,
without me, your hand would no longer be attached to your
wrist.”
It was not a memory
Karigan was fond of recalling, her hand on the chopping block,
Immerez standing over her with hatchet at the ready to take from
her what she had once taken from him. Yes, Amberhill rescued her,
but she’d already thanked him for it. Perhaps he expected her to
fawn at his feet and tell him how wonderful he was. He may be
accustomed to that from other women, but he wasn’t going to get it
from her.
“Good day, my lord,”
she said with finality. This time she feinted right, then left to
evade him, and hurried away.
“What?” he called
after her. “Are you going to just vanish again? You are the
vanishing lady, aren’t you?”
Karigan gritted her
teeth and kept walking without a backward glance. If only she could
vanish in plain daylight! She strode for a servants entrance,
ignoring the complaints of sore muscles. It wouldn’t do to travel
the public sections of the castle looking like this.
She sighed, amazed
to think that King Zachary and Lord Amberhill were related. They
couldn’t have been more different.
When she reached the
Rider wing, desiring nothing more than a hot bath, she found at her
door a pile of papers. More work. She began to wonder if she’d been
called to the messenger service just to keep its ledgers
balanced.
Someone moving about
down at the other end of the corridor caught her attention. It was
Elgin, and he was pacing. He saw her and strode over to
her.
“Hello, Rider,” he
said. “You’ve some good moves on the practice field.”
“You were
there?”
Elgin nodded. “Your
captain, too. She was most pleased.”
“Really?” Karigan
smiled, delighted to hear of her captain’s approval.
“The look on that
fellow’s face when you knocked the sword from his hand!” Elgin
laughed, and Karigan’s own smile broadened.
“He made up for it
after,” she replied, thinking of the bruises she’d have to show for
it all.
“You did well when
it counted, what with the king watching, too.”
So he had watched her! Pleasure flowed through her. Elgin
gave her an odd look and she realized something must have shown on
her face. She cleared her throat and changed the subject.
“Something wrong? You were pacing.”
“Oh.” He scratched
his head. “I’m due to take the young ones out to Gresia for arms
practice, but ...”
“But?”
“Ty’s still in the
common room with ’em. Making ’em bow and scrape.”
Karigan raised an
eyebrow and felt dried mud crack. “Bow and scrape?”
Elgin grumbled
something under his breath, then said, “Too much
etiquette.”
“Ah,” Karigan
replied, remembering her own sessions on the subject with
Ty.
Elgin motioned for
her to follow. She obliged, her bath and paperwork temporarily
forgotten. They stopped at the doorway to the common room. Ty stood
at the hearth, and the new Riders faced him in rows. They’d moved
the big table out of the way against the wall, along with all the
chairs.
“Once again,” Ty
told his students. He placed his hand on his thigh, and bowed at
the waist. “Thank you, my lady.”
The young Riders
imitated him, bowing, and saying in unison, “Thank you, my lady.”
Karigan could not
see their faces, but by their fidgeting, she could tell they’d had
enough.
“My pleasure, my
lord,” Ty said, bowing again.
This time when he
bowed, a spitwad flew through the air and caught in his hair. He
appeared not to perceive it, and this time, as the Riders attempted
to imitate him, there was muffled laughter.
“Attend,” Ty said,
straightening. The spitwad did not fall from his hair, and he
remained oblivious to it. “We’ll do this once more.”
When he bowed again,
spitwad and all, Karigan had to duck away from the door and cover
her mouth to mute helpless giggles. “Rider Perfect” with a spitwad
in his hair!
Elgin followed her
with a rumbling sigh. “See what I mean? Too much etiquette. I need
to speak with Mara about the training, but she’s as hard to get a
moment with as Red.”
Karigan wiped tears
of laughter from her eyes. “Well, etiquette is
important.”
“That’s about what
Red said, but I’d think after what happened to Osric, and what may
be coming with this Second Empire, a little more emphasis on arms
training wouldn’t hurt. They’ve gotta learn to
survive.”
On that sobering
note, Elgin paced back toward the common room, leaving Karigan to
ponder the pile of paperwork in front of her door. Elgin was right,
of course, but learning to placate an angry noble with proper
deference had probably saved a Rider or two in the
past.
She shrugged, then
scooped up the papers.A letter dropped out of them, and when she
retrieved it from the floor, she discovered it was from Alton. Her
bath, she thought, could wait a few minutes more.
Once she was
ensconced in her room and kicked off her boots, she tore the seal
with a certain amount of pleasure mixed with trepidation. They’d
already had one exchange of letters since the fall, he asking
forgiveness for the way he treated her when last they saw one
another. His mind had been poisoned against her, he explained, by
Blackveil, by Mornhavon. He did not, however, offer it as an
excuse, instead placing the blame on himself, saying that he’d been
a fool to believe such evil deceptions. How could he ever doubt
her?
The humility of his
apology dissipated any confusion, any hurt his behavior had caused
her. They were still friends, but...
But.
Maybe she had read
too much into his letter, but she sensed he wanted to be more than
just friends. Maybe it was how ardently he expressed his desire to
see her, how much he wished to make up for his poor conduct of the
past. She shook her head. No, there was more behind his words, not
to mention a little history.
They’d almost become
“more than friends” once, but their schedules were so often in
conflict that it never worked, and Karigan discovered she was
actually relieved. She couldn’t explain exactly why, but somehow
she couldn’t imagine herself and Alton that way together. It felt
funny, and he was too dear to her to ruin their friendship with the
complications of romance. In the end they settled for friendship,
though there was always that tension between them, the hint of
possibility on the horizon ...
In that light,
though she was pleased to receive another letter from him, she also
felt uneasy about what he might choose to express. Would he
indicate a desire for being more than friends again?
Alton started the
letter with the usual greetings and grumbled about the winter. He
spoke of how much easier his work would be if only the king and
captain would send him a small contingent of Riders, one for each
tower. He and Dale had been hard-pressed to visit the towers in the
bad weather, and made it only to those closest to
them.
He complained about
the tower mages and their penchant for partying. He mentioned names
and personalities Karigan had a hard time keeping track of, except
for Merdigen, whom she’d met.
He was pleased to
report, however, the wall guardians seemed content. Frequently he
checked them to ensure the song that bound the wall together
remained strong and harmonious.
And then it came:
Perhaps the captain could assign you down
here. I will suggest it. Then we could spend much more time
together—it would be far better than letters to have you here with
me. We could work things out between us in person. I have thought
continuously of you all through the winter and really want
to—here he broke off and scribbled something out, writing
instead, see you and start over. Please come
soon.
Karigan swallowed
hard. He thought continuously of her?
And what had he scribbled out? She tried angling the paper toward
the little bit of light that filtered through the arrow slit that
served as her window, but he’d been too generous with the ink and
she couldn’t make it out. What did he really want?
What was clear was
that he wanted her there. She had no
idea if the captain would actually consider assigning her to the
wall. On the one hand, Karigan would be away from the castle and
King Zachary and all the wedding festivities. On the other, she
would have to deal with Alton and any expectations he had of her.
Maybe while he thought “continuously” of her, he’d built her up in
his mind into someone she wasn’t. Time and separation sometimes had
that effect, instead of distancing two people.
But time and
separation hadn’t alleviated her feelings in regard to King
Zachary, as much as she hoped it would. She didn’t know why, only
that just thinking about him tangled her all up
inside.
Men were confusing.
King Zachary, Alton, Lord Amberhill, and even her father. They were
mysterious in their ways and she would never understand
them.