Mystic and Rider (Twelve Houses) (69 page)

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Authors: Sharon Shinn

BOOK: Mystic and Rider (Twelve Houses)
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“It always feels like this, a little, when you come back from a hard mission,” Tayse said. “You’re at loose ends. You can’t get back to the order your life had before. Give it a week and you’ll feel more normal.”
Justin stared at him. “By then, she’ll be gone.”
“I know.”
Justin shook his head. “Tayse, you never make mistakes. Never. Any Rider would follow you on any desperate mission. I would do what you told me even if I thought it would mean my death. But you’re wrong about Senneth. Don’t let her leave.”
Tayse turned away from him to stare blindly out into the training yard. His heart was slamming against his rib cage, and his head thrummed with tension. If he had expected a lecture from anyone—which he had not—he never would have believed it would come from Justin. “I have nothing to offer to a serramarra of Brassenthwaite.”
Even his cold voice and stony face did not deter Justin from making one last comment. “But you have everything to give Senneth.”
 
 
AFTER dinner in the barracks, Tayse slipped outside and did a slow walk around the perimeter of the palace compound. It was a habit he had picked up years ago, shortly after coming back from one of his first missions for the king. On the road, of course, Tayse was accustomed to circling the campsite at least once during the night, checking to make sure all was well, that no unexpected danger threatened. Here in Ghosenhall, there were plenty of other guards appointed to watch the grounds, but it gave Tayse a sense of rightness to make that nighttime circuit even in this place. It was also an exercise that helped to calm his mind and weary his body whenever he was having trouble sleeping.
Walking at a good clip, he took more than an hour to follow the fence all the way around. He spoke idle words to the guards he encountered along the way, none of whom were surprised to see him. The moon rode high overhead, a small and stingy sliver. The slight breeze was cold enough to make him glad he’d worn his coat, but it carried a faint green scent of spring. Or so he imagined. It seemed he had been hoping for spring ever since the onset of winter.
Done with the outer circuit, he made the inner one, walking the uneven ground all around the palace. Lights flooded from the kitchens, the bedrooms, the dining hall. The formal dinner must still be under way, all the king’s guests making merry downstairs while their servants yawned in the bedrooms upstairs. Tayse wondered who sat at the table tonight besides the king and the queen, and Kirra and Senneth, and the handful of nobles who were always attendant at the palace.
Not that he cared about any of them except Senneth.
For a moment he let himself imagine what would happen if he climbed up the wide stairs, nodded to the soldiers at the front door, and stepped inside the palace. He could follow the sound of laughter to the dining hall or the music salon or the ballroom where the guests were gathered. He was a Rider; he had entrée into every corridor and chamber of the palace. He would bow to his king, make a slightly less sincere bow to his queen, and then locate Senneth in whatever gorgeous and bejeweled crowd had gathered. He would make his way past the beautifully gowned women, the sumptuously clothed men; he would not pause to inhale the rich perfumes or marvel at the glitter of housemark gems. He would find Senneth, and he would bow so low before her that Valri would be jealous and the king would be outraged. He would take her hand in front of all of them, the marlords and the marladies and the royals, and he would tell her, “I love you.”
But though he stood there for five minutes, ten minutes, watching the guarded doors, he could not make himself start forward and climb the steps. He could not bridge the distance; he could not make the leap. He could not change himself so far as to ask her to change for him.
When he turned to go back to the barracks, she was standing a few feet away on the lawn, watching him.
For a moment, he thought it was illusion—hallucination—a flickering manifestation of his own hopeless desire. But then she moved, took a few steps nearer, and he was swept with that wash of physical heat that always warmed the air around Senneth. By that alone he knew she was real.
She was dressed in a slim column of antique white, a lace-colored dress that matched the hue and texture of her hair. Even on this cool night, her arms were bare; the deep neckline of the gown showed the contours of her body more than her riding clothes ever had. She was as bright and unattainable as starlight.
“Senneth,” he said, because she seemed to be waiting for him to speak. “What are you doing out here this night?”
“I grew bored with the king’s party,” she said. “So I came to look for you.”
“For me?” he said, and strangled his sense of pleasure. “Did you need something?”
She shrugged a little. She seemed unhappy or unsure of herself, troubled by events. “I miss all my companions of the road. I’ve taken Cammon to the house of some mystics, and he’s been gone all day, though he promised to come back and tell me what he’s learned. Donnal has disappeared, disgruntled because Kirra has become—oh, you should see her! Even grander than she was in Helven and Nocklyn. It’s fun to watch her, because she is enjoying herself so much, but it’s not very easy to sit and confide in her. And you and Justin are off with your friends, and even the raelynx is walled up in a garden and it’s—I’m lonely, I suppose. I didn’t think such a thing would happen to me. I’ve been on my own so much that I’d forgotten what it was like to come to depend on others.”
“Maybe that’s not such a bad thing,” he said.
“What? That I’m unhappy?”
“No,” he said, laughing. “That you find yourself missing friends. Maybe you’ll find yourself making more of them.”
She sighed. “And what about you? Do you find yourself happy now that you’re back at the palace, back among your fellow Riders?”
He chose his words carefully. “Justin seems to be feeling much the way you are,” he said. “I told him that the end of every mission brings with it just such a sense of—disorientation. Of malaise.”
“Even for you?” she said, as if she didn’t believe it.
“Even for me. This time, at least. But I also told him the feeling would pass.”
“Yes,” she said. “You would tell him that, I suppose.”
He did not mention that he was pretty sure it was a lie. “I cannot imagine you will give yourself much time to brood about it,” he said. “You’re a restless woman. You must already be planning your next journey.”
A twist of the mouth for that. “In fact, I expect to be leaving in a day or two,” she said.
“And where will you be going this time?”
She came a few steps nearer, and now she was close enough to touch if he had courage to reach for her. On her face was a mix of emotions it was hard to sort out: irritation, resignation, amusement, and something that might be hope. “Brassenthwaite.”
“Ah.”
“Under duress.”
He smiled. “At the king’s behest?”
“Yes. He wants to see me reconciled with my brothers.”
“Well, he’s a smart old man. He knows what’s best for the kingdom. And it might be best for you, too. You’ll see.”
She hesitated a moment. She was toying with some of the lacy edges of her dress and seemed to be reviewing some past thought or experience. “I have fought in sea battles and land battles,” she said at last, slowly. “I’ve faced down angry soldiers and predators with no thought but to kill me. I’ve been sick. I’ve been solitary. I’ve been hungry. I’ve been afraid more times than I can count. But I’ve never been as afraid of anything as I am to walk back into Brassenthwaite to face my brothers alone.”
The words were out before he could stop them. “Take a friend,” he suggested.
She stilled her hands by flattening them on the front of her gown. “Will you come?” she asked.
He stared at her a moment in the dark. There was so little moonlight that she was only visible because of the color of her dress and the candlewick of her hair. Yet he could see the tautness of her face, the apprehension in her gray eyes. He could tell that she was afraid of one more thing, and that was the answer he might give. And that knowledge undid him, cut through all his careful bindings of class and caste and calling; that anxious expression turned him soft.
“I will,” he said in a quiet voice. “I will accompany you to Brassenthwaite, and from there to any other region in Gillengaria, and from there to any country across the sea, named or unnamed. I will protect you with my weapons and with my skill and with my life. Neither your brothers nor your enemies nor strangers upon the road will offer you harm while I am living.”
“I want more from you than that,” she whispered.
“I know,” he replied.
Now she lifted her hands, hesitantly, and the gesture was full of such uncertainty and such supplication that he could not endure it. He closed the short distance between them. He wrapped her in his arms as if she was a child who needed succor and he was the only avenger for miles. Fire flashed between them; he thought for a moment the flimsy gown had gone up in flames, but it was just the heat of her body, or the excitement of his, or the reveling of the night around them, and nothing to be concerned about. He kissed her, and that was the end of it. No more pretending, no more holding back. Life changed by love, life sparkling now with its own peculiar magic. He tightened his hold and let the transformation take over. When he lifted his mouth from hers, he knew, he would be a different man.
He kissed her until the world was changed, and even that was not long enough.

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