Sword (21 page)

Who
was
this Devin, that he had such an effect on a prince of Cassdall?

Was this magic?

Devin's eyes had gone wide. "Then you—”

"My lord," Annan said, sounding genuinely worried now. "We should sleep on this decision."

"Yes, of course." He said it, but he was staring into Devin's red-rimmed eyes when he did, and the urge to agree with anything Devin said—to get on his horse and ride with him in any direction he chose—had become so strong it was almost painful. Kinsey shivered, genuinely afraid for the first time since he'd fled his kingdom toward freedom. He'd read more of magic than anybody in Cassdall, but he'd never in his life imagined he'd run headlong into it.

This wasn't like the faery tales. This was dangerous.

Across from him, Devin Corwynall shivered, too, and pressed a hand to his belly as though in pain. His weary face was a mirror of the alarm Kinsey felt.

"Yes, we should rest, and think on this," Kinsey said again, trying to make it true just by saying it out loud. He could feel Annan's stare radiating at him like unfriendly sunlight and he tried to put a less worried expression on his face. He stood, horrified to find his knees were wobbly, and pulled Devin to his feet. The lieutenant got Devin's other arm and held him steady.

"I'm asleep on my feet," Devin murmured. "I'm sorry."

"No need. Sleep a night; your men can rest in safety here, you have my word. Our sentries will keep watch. We'll talk again in the morning."

Kinsey watched Devin shuffle off, his head low, steps weaving with exhaustion. He didn't look at Annan. He didn't want to meet that accusing stare. He knew he hadn't done well or been clear.

But he'd already made up his mind, and he was fairly sure Annan knew that much.

C
HAPTER
13

T
he Cassdall prince was a man of many thoughts, not one of which had made it past his teeth.

They rose early and rode hard, exhausting the horses and themselves, and Prince Kinsey's faint, thoughtful frown never wavered. They had made the mountain's windy top at dawn and were now picking their way down the steep path on the western slope in a grim silence that Devin did nothing to break. He could feel Kinsey's gaze on him, those oddly clear gray eyes full of intelligence and worry. This was a scholar, a man who deliberated before rushing into a breakfast, let alone an alliance—and yet here he was, riding with a defeated company of complete strangers into what might become a war.

He should probably be wondering about that, but he didn't care.

His thoughts were all with Taireasa, with that sense of deep sorrow that flooded her brave, tired heart. Sensations and sights came to him in vivid flashes, along with the constant working of her remarkable mind, like a conversation he couldn't quite hear.

It was so very strange.

Her horse swayed out of time with his own. All around her were trees, an endless green that told him nothing of where she might be, except no longer in Faestan. 

Next to her was Kyali, so empty of expression she might have been a statue.

His sister's face held no grief, no worry—no emotion at all, in fact. It terrified him. It terrified Taireasa, too. Kyali's face came to him in quick little sidelong flickers, as though Taireasa were afraid to look at her for very long. Every time he thought of his sister, Taireasa shied away from him. She was obviously more skilled than he at managing this odd new connection between them, and just as obviously avoiding his question.

What had happened
to them? And what was wrong with Kyali? He was sure he should be able to sense her the way he could Taireasa: if this damned rhyme that had ruined so much of his life were true, then it should be all three of them dealing with this. Together.

Taireasa's grief came to him, too, a drowning heaviness she constantly struggled to push aside. In sympathy and mutual comfort, his heart reached for hers, bringing them into much closer contact. Taireasa was sore from riding, in places even someone well-versed in the mystery of women might blush at. Devin tried not to notice that, tried to offer what solace he could—and tried, with a maddening lack of success, to discover what was behind the chilling absence
he got from Kyali whenever he searched for her. His sister was like a hole in the world.

The saddle slid under him as Taireasa pulled free of him again, hiding.

"Devin… are you well? Do you need to stop?"

Kinsey eyed him, eyebrows drawn together, and Devin blinked the world into place around himself. Everyone in this company probably thought he was a madman by now. He couldn't exactly argue the point.

"Well," he echoed, barely able to form the word. His father was dead, his kingdom taken by traitors, his friends in danger, and his sister was—was ill.

He had never been less well in his life.

"No." He swallowed, searching for words. "Thank you, no rest. We should keep riding."

"Is it this… sharing of thoughts with your queen?" Kinsey sounded as though he had to make an effort to believe that. Devin couldn't blame him. He'd tried to describe it this morning as they began their ascent, figuring these new allies, however temporary, deserved to know why he spent so much time staring off into the distance. He didn't think he'd managed to do it coherently, though. He hardly understood what was happening
himself
; how could he hope to explain it to others?

"Sometimes I can see out of her eyes," Devin said. "It's distracting."

The prince's forehead crumpled, but he didn't say anything else.

The land hit a sharper slope and the great prow of stone they had been riding alongside came to an abrupt end. Wind whipped into their faces. Suddenly, the whole mountain face was open to their gaze.

Savvys came to a halt, ears pricking. Eyes on the view, Devin sat in the saddle like a lump, every muscle gone loose and numb. The wind snatched at the air, making it hard to keep his seat and even harder to breathe. He realized from the sudden cold on his cheeks that he was crying, and wiped his face.

Faestan was a distant darkness on the landscape, nestled in the great bend of the Sainey river. The tiny lines of the castle and the surrounding town were obscured by smoke.

"Damn them," Devin hissed. His hands clenched on the reins. Savvys half-reared. "Damn them, damn them,
damn them
! Oh gods, look what they've done."

He wasn't the only one weeping. The men of the Third were with him, bunching into a messy jumble of horses and soldiers as they came beyond the edge of the rock and saw Lardan spread out before them, burning.

"The barons are holdin'," Peydan muttered. "
Our
barons. Bless ’em."

That was true. No smoke hid the view of Maurynim Castle, closest to the mountains—close enough that he could see even from here that its gates were shut. Devin sucked in another breath, fumbling for sanity.

"My lord," the Cassdall lieutenant said sharply, and pointed down, toward a valley halfway up the mountain. Deep forest ringed it, and within the trees on the eastern rise, metal flashed back up at the sun.

Taireasa,
Devin realized, hope flaring—but clear reason followed that. There were too many, and they were too well-armed. That was no group of refugees. He squinted, leaning forward in the saddle, and saw a banner at the edge of the treeline, yellow and green.

Sevassis.

"No," he said. "Oh, no."

"
Devin
," Kinsey said, all the mildness gone from his voice. He truly sounded like a prince now. Devin followed Kinsey's gaze and saw, on the other side of the valley and deeper in the trees, more glints of metal moving between branches.

That
was Taireasa and Kyali… heading for an ambush there was no way they could see coming.

"
No
!" Devin shouted, and reached back to where his helm was tied to his saddle, ready to
fly
down there if that was the only option. He couldn't lose any more. Not Taireasa, not Kyali. He'd rather die. If that was cowardice, fine.

Kinsey's horse bumped his, squashing his leg against Savvys's side. Kinsey's hand closed over his arm, a grip hard enough to hurt. "Tell her," the prince snapped. Devin scowled, not understanding, and the other man shook him hard. "
Tell your queen
, Devin—
use
this thing between you and tell her what you see."

"I
can't
!" he cried, wrenching his arm free of that iron grip. "We can't speak, it's only images, I don't know
how
—"

"Then
show
her!"

Oh.

Oh.

In the midst of his fright, Devin had to marvel at how quickly Kinsey had grasped the essentials of the situation. "Yes," he breathed. Kinsey let him go with a wary look.

Shutting his eyes, Devin reached for Taireasa again—reached this time without any hesitation, with all the desperate force of his fear. She was with him wholly in an instant, thundering over him, her startled concern for him so strong he could feel it speed his own pulse. He opened his eyes and felt her dizzy response to the view before him, then her joy at that glint of metal in the trees, the fact that they were within sight of one another.

He showed her the army on the other side of the valley then, the Sevassis banner flapping in its midst.

He was afraid his heart might stop altogether, her terror was so profound. Then the methodical intelligence that he was beginning to know her for overlaid that fear, and she left him in a welter of dread and determination. He came to with both hands braced on the pommel of his saddle and tears on his face once more, this time not from grief but in awe of Taireasa's defiant courage.

He had lived most of his life with her, and never known until now how brave she was.

"She knows," Devin coughed out, remembering that more than three hundred men were waiting on his word.

“Good," Kinsey said. "See to it, Annan."

Devin had no idea what that last was about. He needed to gather his wits, have Peydan muster the Third and get them ready. He didn't know what Kinsey would do—stay up here and watch a battle, probably—but he had to part from his new allies only a day after meeting them. He wasn't going to leave Taireasa and Kyali to face the Sevassis ambush alone, not when he had a chance to get there in time. Three hundred men could make a difference in a battle.

There was a deep, heartfelt sigh from near him. Devin raised his head as Annan spun his horse around, a look of grim resignation on his face.

"Arm and form up!" the Cassdall lieutenant shouted. The order echoed back, then was repeated by his own men as Peydan took charge.

Devin looked at Kinsey.

"Well," the Cassdall prince said, frowning at his horse's ears. He looked down at the valley below them, where two armies were on their way to a bloody meeting, and his gray eyes widened. "Magic, isn't it?" Kinsey asked, sounding just as young and just as terrified as Devin felt.

Four hundred men.

Speechless for once in his life, Devin got Kinsey's arm in a fierce grip and managed a smile. "My friend, your guess is as good as mine," he said.

Laughing and petrified, they rode down the mountain toward battle.

* * *

The sun had reached its zenith and was beginning a slow slide down the sky, heralding another night with only the hard ground for a bed. Taireasa cared nothing for the bedding, but she dreaded the nightmares: vivid and wrenching, full of the screams of friends, they left her curled up in frozen terror, sweat beading on her skin.

She didn't sleep alone, but she might as well have. Kyali, once woken by little more than a breath on her part, slept through all this without a twitch—slept so soundly Taireasa had begun to wonder if she were ignoring a friend's suffering.

That was a worse thought than many she'd had today… but she had to admit it wasn't impossible.

Kyali had cut herself off entirely. Someone far colder lived behind her eyes now: someone who could order soldiers and plan routes, who could set bones and bind wounds—but who didn't remember friendship, or love, or grief. Kyali moved through the days of their journey without a hint of expression, without anger or fear or any acknowledgment of what they had been to one another. What they had lost.

What she had given up, apparently, to survive the things the barons of the West had done to her.

Tell us, girl! Tell us where the princess is and it will end, you will live…

I will
NOT
!

Taireasa bit her lip until she could taste blood.

The memory haunted her, and not just when she slept. She refused to weep, because Kyali hadn't, and didn't, and perhaps couldn’t—and what Kyali had done for her had made every hurt she lived with seem trivial.

She'd never before had someone give their life for hers. She didn't know how to live with herself now. She didn't know how to speak of it, even if Kyali were willing. What could she say?
I'm sorry? Thank you?

I didn't leave you?

I stayed, I saw what you saw and felt what you felt, I used my Gift for this, and now I struggle to live with what you have chosen to forget?

It was a confession that had welled up in her more than once, not only because the memory of Kyali's torment haunted her so, but because her conscious use of her new Gift felt like an intrusion, like a betrayal of trust. And yet it had been necessary. She had held grimly onto Kyali's presence, unnoticed and half-mad with the echo of pain, waiting until the barons of the West left long enough for her and Marta to steal Kyali away.

And Kyali had a right to know this. The truth might even wake her from this frozen silence. But Taireasa was terrified of what it else it might do. If the memories gave
her
nightmares, what would they do to Kyali?

Did someone ever come back from such a thing?

"Kyali," Taireasa said, and clutched convulsively at the reins. Kyali didn't reply. She rode along as though dreaming.