Children of the Blood (18 page)

“What?” Her face brightened and tensed. There was something of hunger in it.

“It is—” He shook his head. He could not name it. “It is something you knew. Walk further into the garden’s center; you will see for yourself.”

They began to move together. But she no longer paused at each bush, each flower. She no longer bent to let their fragrance touch her the more closely. He felt her tension, her anticipation, in every step.

The sun made odd shadows that cut and blended. Her fingers curled more tightly into his arm, cooling even in the sun’s warmth.

He understood.

They walked on, and the circles grew tighter as the center drew closer. The path seemed enclosed and more twisted than it had; the flowers, for an instant, seemed an empty, perfumed facade.

Then they were gone.

She had said that this garden seemed more “wild,” and the truth of it, absolute and undeniable, was here. They had reached the center.

Sara gasped, and her nerveless hands fell slowly to her side. She stood a moment in his shadow, then walked out of it to approach the crumbling, rounded wall of rock that might once have been a well.

It stood, a forgotten monument, beneath a twisting wreath of ugly vines. She stepped forward, avoiding the thorned mass of small plants that sprung up around the circumference of weathered stone.

He did not move to follow. A sharp breath cut his lips as her hands very delicately touched the old, pocked stone of the ancient well. As hers, his eyes fell on the wild vines, the uneven grass, and the brambles. He knew she found nothing of beauty here.

“What—what is this?”

“The oldest part of all my lands.” His voice was muted, absorbed by the small island of wilderness. Not even birds flew here. “It has stood thus for centuries. I will not let even the master gardener tend it.” Much to the master gardener’s grief.

“But why not? It’s so ...” Her words trailed away; they hadn’t the power to describe what she felt.

“I know. And it was not always so. It is a matter of interest to me to see how long it takes these vines to eat their way through solid stone. I have watched them for much of my life, making a little progress here, a little there. The rock still prevails.”

“But if you value it, why don’t you tend it? Why don’t you preserve it?” Her voice was rising and tightening. He liked it not, but still did not move.

“Ah, lady.” He bowed his head a moment. “It is not my art. Do you understand this?” He looked down at his weathered
hands, clenched them into white fists, and let them slowly unfurl. “I have no power over it; it stands or it falls.”

“But I don’t understand! The gardeners could remove these!” She stepped forward, gripping a large, gnarled vine. Dark against her white, it trembled in her grip, creaking and straining to maintain its hold on the pockmarked stone. With obvious effort, she yanked the vine away. She did not look back at him; he knew he was forgotten in the sudden urgency of her labor. She mouthed something and reached to her side. Her hands fluttered there uselessly.

Lord Darclan watched her intently. He made no move to interfere. She stopped her scramble for something that didn’t exist and turned once again to the vines. She yanked another free, threw it aside, and began on a new tendril. Sun glinted off the sweat of her brow as she worked herself into a frenzy. The well was large, and the stranglehold of the foliage was complete, so she chose to clear off one section completely.

Bitterly, Lord Darclan noted which area she fought to free. It faced his castle, and cleared, it might even be visible from the window of his study. Twice he caught himself when the urge to stop her caused him to start forward. He kept his hands at his sides, and his mouth in a clamped, grim line.

But he said nothing. This woman, not the child who had run free in his garden, was one he knew well.

She worked for two hours; the sun marked the passage of time. He spoke only once in that time, moved only once, touched her stark face only once. She shrugged him off, in a silence heavy with determination and motion. He was left standing, the tears in his hand catching the breeze.

At the close of two hours, her dress was scored with multiple tears and rips; her hands torn and blistered. She turned glazed green eyes to him and spoke in an old, dead language—line language; the heritage of the Light that had faded.
“Help me
. ”

He stepped quickly forward and caught her in his arms as she staggered forward, shaking his head.

He gazed at her with shuttered eyes, not certain to whom she thought she spoke. “I cannot, Sara.” His voice was more rigid than his arms. “I cannot touch it.”

He heard the low rumbling in the back of her throat, half
snarl, half whimper. “Come, lady. Come and rest. Tomorrow—”

“Yes.”

Her knees crumpled. He gathered her up; she felt weightless. He knew a moment of panic when her eyes suddenly widened; when the sun’s rays seemed to pass through her as if she were translucent. He turned away from the burning orb, shielding her from its light, his grip tight and defiant. Then the moment passed, her eyelids closed, and sleep eased the pain from her features.

He shivered, knowing the mortal answer.

But what had he truly spared her? Even in Rennath she had never come to this frenzied pass.

You will know peace, Lady. And I shall share in it
. Tenderly, with infinite care, he brushed her tangled hair aside and kissed her forehead.

He carried Sara in from the garden. The castle was conspicuous
in its severe and sudden silence; if any saw him enter, they did not trouble him with even the sight of their frightened faces. He strode through the main hall, up the stairs, and down the corridor to his room—Sara’s room. He stopped outside of the wood of her door, bowed his head briefly, and cursed beneath his breath.

The door swung open, and in the center of the room that was to be his much needed privacy sat the slave that Sara had named. For a moment the lord wanted to kill the boy for daring to be present to see his lady in such a state. And it would be easy—just a word, the briefest of gestures, and the boy would be gone. His eyes wore his intent openly as he glared, his anger too deep for words.

Darin asked himself the same question as he met his lord’s dark gaze. He saw clearly what was in that gaze; had seen it before in the service of House Damion. Each time, someone had graced the altars and the stones. It had not been turned on him.

But he saw, as well, the bruised and bleeding form of Lady Sara as she lay unconscious in the arms of his lord. He couldn’t breathe. He could only wonder if his decision to accompany her in the morning had brought her to this.

Kerren’s screams echoed clearly in the air all around—Kerren’s screams, and the price he had paid for the last time that Darin had named himself in the presence of nobles.

But Kerren was a slave. The lady was of the nobility—the lord had said so himself. Nobles didn’t die because a slave was named.

Did they?

He remembered the last time he had defied the command of nobility. His arm ached, his cheeks flushed with anger, with shame. His hands were red with the blood of the stones. But he had not died. And he had never questioned again; the pain had been too great, too final.

At least, it had been when he was eight summers.

He knew the rule well. There can be no friendship among slaves. And he had followed it, followed it so dearly to avoid feeling again the loss and pain and guilt of Kerren’s death. Lady Sara was truly the first person, since the death of Kerren, that he had allowed himself to care about, because his mistake could never cost her life. Or so he had thought.

Maybe the beating of the slavemaster had dimmed with the years. Maybe physical pain just couldn’t be remembered that clearly. Or maybe the fear of losing this friendship was just too much.

Too much? If the lord intended to kill her, what could he do? He was as powerless without her friendship as he had been four years ago.

No, not as powerless. For he wasn’t bound; his arms and legs were free; the chair and the gallery did not contain him. With a cry that carried across four years, he launched himself at his lord, his small fists balled and flailing.

Lord Darclan reacted more quickly than even the Swords of the high priest. His hand lashed out, a controlled, even movement that sent Darin sprawling dizzily into the wall.

His head struck, hard enough to stun him, but not enough to silence his cry. “What have you done to her?”

Lord Darclan met the pale face of young Darin with a bitter, chill smile. At the boy’s words, with their mixture of rage, fear, and defiance, the edge of his anger vanished.
Am I not, after all, the cause of this, Sara? Would his loss, his disappearance, not put a deeper wedge between us?

He made no answer, but Darin could see the change that came over his eyes. It was confusing.

“The lady has suffered an accident.”

Darin did not move, although the wall at his back was cold and hard. White lips opened twice, but words would not come.

“Darin.” Lord Darclan nodded to the bed.

Darin felt shock cut through the haze of pain and anger that held him motionless.

Darin
.

Lord Darclan spoke deliberately. “Darin.”

This time Darin gained his feet. He did not know what to think. But hope came, hope that the accident was only that: an accident. He scrambled to the bed and turned the covers down.

Lord Darclan moved past him and with consummate care laid Sara down on the bed. His fingers traced the line of her jaw. He knew that the boy still watched, but he was weary.

What of it, then? Let the slave watch. The boy, after all, had no true idea of who, or what, his lord was. Leaning over, Lord Darclan brushed Sara’s hair aside, and again his lips brushed her forehead. She was so still ...

“Sara.”

That one word told Darin all he needed to know.

“I will go and get water, lord.”

Lord Darclan shook his head briefly, clearing his eyes. “Please,” he said softly. “Do that.”

“Will you stay with her? If she wakes, she might be afraid.”

“I will stay,” he murmured. “I will stay.”

Darin walked to the door and then looked back. Lord Darclan was bent over Sara, his hands clutching her shoulders gently but firmly, as if to hold her. As if to keep her.

The two on the bed seemed bound by the same stillness, the same sorrow. Darin couldn’t understand all of what he saw, but he felt an age about them, and a sense of Lord Darclan’s bitter hopelessness, and love.

For the sake of Sara. Or because Darin loved her, too. The boy wasn’t sure which, but either way, he knew that House Darclan was about to change. And he knew, from the name and the gestures, that Lord Darclan would allow it.

Hope bit him sharply as he went for water.

 

The fire burned merrily in the grate, to protect the room against the lingering chill of night. Soon it wouldn’t matter, but this was as much of winter as the southern castle received.

Lady Sara, dressed in clean bed clothing, slept soundly between thick feather quilting and bed. Darin sat by her side, content to watch over her, as he had watched before.

But this time, the gentle rise and fall of her breath and the
softness of her face meant more than a daydream. When she wakened, he knew who she would be.

Their two shadows, trapped by the flickering flame, moved rapidly in contrast to their stillness.

Lord Darclan watched the sculpture they formed, apart from it, but a part of it.

“Darin,” he said softly. The boy shifted in his seat. “I believe the worst is over.”

“I think so.” The color had not returned to her face, but her breath was not so shallow as it had been.

Lord Darclan could see the question in the boy’s eyes. Concern for Lady Sara had robbed him of fear for himself.

Darin, she called you. And I
. He knew that he could forbid the boy to speak of the day’s events, forbid him to ask of his lady what had transpired—if indeed she woke remembering any of it. He opened his mouth to do so, but the words did not come.

Meeting his eyes, Darin realized that he could ask what had happened, without fear of reprisal. He, too, opened his mouth, but found that the question would not address itself to the wary man—man now, not lord alone. His gaze fell back to Sara.

“Lord,” he said, almost timidly, “I know that you’d never hurt her.”

At the same moment, unbidden, the lord said, “Darin, I would never willingly allow harm to come to my lady.”

The same faltering smile touched their lips, and who it surprised more, neither could say. It was gone from sight in an instant, but it remained, taking strength in the roots of memory.

Lord Darclan walked to the door, paused, and then bowed very formally to his young slave. Darin accepted the bow and returned it, knowing what it acknowledged, and what it could not say in words.

“I will tell the rest of my household to attend your words; she is your charge, and you are now responsible for seeing that no harm comes to her. Is that clear? ”
I am trusting you with my existence, child. Sara, Sara.
If she could have seen how she still wrought changes, in spite of all his best plans, she would have smiled.