The Hollow Crown: A Novel of Crosspointe (39 page)

They’d been riding near two turns of the glass when suddenly the horses spooked. Margaret’s horse reared and lunged forward, galloping away through the thin trees as if a pack of wolves was after him. Nicholas’s horse tried the same, but he held the animal with iron control. The carriage horse squealed and reared back, snapping the lead rein. He whirled, hurtling away down the valley, his tail raised high like a flag.

Nicholas let him go, vaguely hearing an echoing rumble in the distance. He urged his bay into a gallop, following Margaret. His heart was in his throat as he hunched down close against his bay’s mane. There were too many low-hanging limbs and he expected to see Margaret lying in a heap beneath one at every moment.

He came out of the copse into a clearing and found her. She was on her feet beside the panting gray. Sweat turned his hide to pewter and his eyes were ringed white. As Nicholas pulled up sharply, the gray leaped back to the end of his reins, his haunches bunching. Margaret held him tightly and talked soothingly to him. She followed him, stroking his neck and shoulder. He settled slowly, finally dropping his head and pushing his face against her chest. He gave shuddering sigh, his skin still twitching like he was being stung by flies.

Nicholas slowly dismounted and came closer. “Are you all right?” he asked.

“My legs are pudding,” Margaret said, scratching behind her horse’s ears. “And I didn’t duck fast enough.” She turned to look at him and he saw a bloody scratch ran across her cheek and along her neck. “But that’s about the worst of it.” She drew a shaky breath. “Do you think they succeeded?”

He didn’t need to ask what she was talking about it. It could only be Keros and Ellyn. He remembered the growling rumble he’d heard when the horses had panicked. He nodded. “They made the slide. I heard it.”

“Good.” Then she frowned. “That could have brought Forcan down on them.”

Nicholas was digging in his pack. He had no reassurances to offer her. Anything he could say would be hollow at best, downright lies at worst. He found a wadded shirt and pulled it out. He dampened the sleeve with water from his flask and dabbed at the scrape on Margaret’s face. She winced, but didn’t pull away.

When he was through he returned the shirt to his pack. “We should get going. They’ll be hungry and tired when they get to the Maida. We should have things ready for them.”

She looked at him, then gave him a bare smile of gratitude that he presumed their friends were safe and on their way. “Let’s go.”

He stood beside her to help her into her saddle. She gave him a startled look, but bent her leg obediently. He levered her up. Her gelding snorted and sidled, but she gathered the reins firmly and patted his shoulders. Nicholas mounted and this time they rode beside each other as they headed to Sylmont.

They found a wagon track that took them back to the city. Rain started in a slow drizzle, then turned quickly into a downpour. Nicholas had long since lost his hat—he had no idea where. He pulled his coat close, but the wet ran down beneath his collar. Margaret was no better off. She hunched, her head bent dogged and low. She was wrapped in a blanket, since her cloak had been left behind in Molford and she’d refused to take either Nicholas’s or Keros’s. But even the heavy rain couldn’t suppress the rising smell of smoke. The hair on the back of Nicholas’s neck prickled. He’d seen from where they had camped that things in Sylmont were bad, but he was about to find out just how bad. There was
a lot
of smoke.

The two of them came over the final hill at the edge of the city, just north of the Mystery of Hurn. They pulled up as one and stared.

“By the gods,” Nicholas murmured in shock.

Smoke and rain hid a great deal, but fires burned all over the city, some in unnatural colors that indicated majick. Their spotted glimmers extended far out, all the way to the headlands. In places, entire blocks of buildings were razed. Nicholas couldn’t see the Riddles. It was hidden in a pall of smoke. His gaze slid out to the harbor. It was full of the detritus of sunken and broken ships. All the wet docks and piers were gone. It looked like someone had taken a spoon and madly stirred the entire harbor to bits.

“Look,” Margaret said. Her voice was thick and Nicholas was certain that the rain hid her tears. She pointed north toward the Maida of Chayos.

A pale green glow rose like a bubble over the broad domed hill of the Maida. Inside was a strange, wondrous place where night and day and every season existed all together at the same moment. The exterior was evergreen and ever fruiting. The poor lined up every day for fresh fruits, vegetables, grain, eggs, milk, butter and cheese, which the delats—servants of Chayos—handed out freely. Nicholas wiped a hand over his mouth as nearly unbearable relief swept over him. If Chayos was protecting her Maida, then Sylmont still had hope. His gaze flicked to the Mystery of Hurn. The windowless, black stone tower of the stranger god was as unrelentingly quiet as ever. Nicholas could not see the Ysod of Meris or the Font of Braken.

“Come on,” Margaret said and turned her horse to follow the ridge toward the Maida.

She made no effort to ride down into the city. Whether because she feared that someone might attack them again to steal the horses or for some other reason, Nicholas didn’t know, nor did he ask. He thought of his family. Most of them were outside of the city. But everyone else—his servants, his employees . . . He glanced again at the devastation, then up toward his manor. Smoke hid it as well as the royal castle and all of Salford Terrace. A chill ran down to his toes. What horrors would be seen when the smoke cleared?

He urged his bay into a trot and quickly pulled up even with Margaret. Her lips were pulled into a fierce snarl and her eyes blazed. Her chiseled features—sharpened by the loss of weight during her ordeal with the Jutras—were harsh. Her entire expression was one of ruthless fury. Her hands flexed on her rain-slicked reins. She looked at him as if feeling the weight of his gaze. He wanted to say something, though he didn’t know how to reassure her, or even what to reassure her about—that her brothers had survived? That the Jutras would not suddenly arrive and take the city? That the people of Sylmont had escaped the devastation? That the majicars who must have done this had killed each other and now were no threat? And then there was the question of Forcan—did the unnatural animal even now prowl the city, slaughtering everyone in its path?

Something in her eyes made him go cold. Then as he watched, her face changed. Her jaw relaxed, her mouth softened, the grooves running from her nose to her mouth disappeared. In a moment, a bland mask of kindness and confidence settled over her countenance. Only her eyes continued to burn, and that fire was slowly banking.

“What did you do?” he asked, his mouth dropping. She looked more like the princess he’d known before—the one made of porcelain, whose conversations were always about fashion and the gossip of court, who didn’t know how to wield a knife and who shrieked in fright when a mouse ran across the floor.

She straightened, pulling in on herself so that she looked positively regal. Even in the travel-stained clothing she wore, everyone would recognize her, which no doubt was the point. “Ryland may be dead. Vaughn is in Brampton. The rest of my family is dead or enslaved. There is no one else for the people to look to and someone has to lead or we will have chaos.” She scanned the wreck of Sylmont. “More chaos. I must take command until one of my brothers can.”

The words were cool and deliberate, but Nicholas heard the bitter tang to them. “Do you
want
this?” he asked.

For a moment the fires flared in her eyes. “I have
never
wanted to rule,” she said. “But I am a Rampling, and this is my duty. I am the only one here and the only one who can do it. I have no choice.”

“And if your damned duty gets you killed?” It was a stupid question. He knew it even as it left his lips. Her life had been in constant danger since she was a child. She didn’t need to say the words; her shrug and the sharp quirk of her mouth was eloquent.

He reached out and grabbed the right rein, pulling both of their horses to a halt. He put his hand over hers. They were cold as ice. “You aren’t in this alone. We’ll do this together.”

Her brows rose. “You’ll help me out of the kindness of your heart?” She shook her head, and a fleeting expression of something that looked like hurt or possibly sadness was replaced by prickly suspicion. “And when this is done—if Crosspointe survives—then what? Business as usual? You’ll have me poisoned or knifed in the dark? Murdered like my father was? We’re friends just for now, remember?”

Fury rolled through Nicholas with searing heat. She was right—she had no reason to really trust him. And he could offer no guarantees. Except—

The feelings that clenched his heart in a killing grip drove him. He legged his gelding close into hers. He put his hand around the back of her neck and jerked her close. His lips pressed against hers. They were cold and wet from the rain.

His mouth ground harder. Whether in surprise or desire, her lips parted. His mouth slanted over hers in triumphant eagerness. His tongue licked hungrily inside her mouth. She tasted faintly of the tea they’d drunk that morning and something else—something purely Margaret. It send a scorching shaft of need through his gut. He pulled her closer, wrapping his arms around her and lifting her off her horse. He settled her onto the saddle in front of him, her legs dangling over the left side. He held her tight, one arm across her back, the other hand sliding up to hold her head as he deepened the kiss.

Her tongue slipped inside his mouth, tracing his lips. It was unbearably exquisite. He gentled his touch as she grew more bold. Her touch was deft and sure. She slid her arms around his neck and he found she was clinging as tightly to him as he was to her.

The kiss went on far longer than he dreamed she would allow it. But at last he felt her start to draw away. His arms tightened; then he loosened them slowly. She leaned away from him, but she did not release him. The expression on her face was anything but controlled or indifferent. Fires burned in her eyes again, but this time not with fury or hatred. This time the fire was for him and it was breathtaking.

“This is—”

Impossible. He didn’t need to hear her say the word. He shook his head, refusing it. “This
is
,” he said, giving her a gentle shake. “It
is
and by the black depths I won’t let it go. I won’t. I
can’t
. I don’t give a damn if you’re a Rampling and I’m a Weverton or what’s happened between our families or anything else. We’ll find a way.”

The words were as much a question as a declaration. It didn’t matter what he wanted if she didn’t want it too—if she didn’t want it more than her damned Rampling duty. His body filled with ice. Everyone knew that Ramplings put Crosspointe above all personal concerns. It was in their blood, it was inscribed on their bones. It was why Geoffrey had enslaved them rather than let them run loose. He’d known he could never make them betray that innate sense of duty to their land and people.

She licked her lips and rain ran down her cheeks like tears. Nicholas wanted to crush her back against him and steal back that moment that was now forever lost.

Suddenly she leaned forward and kissed him again. Her mouth was urgent against his and demanding. He responded with all his frustration, need, and desire. This time when she pulled away, they were both breathless. She said nothing, but pushed out of his arms. She slid down to the ground and went to catch up the reins of her gray gelding who was cropping grass a few feet away. She swung up into her saddle and nudged her horse into a trot, never saying a word.

Nicholas followed, feeling as if he’d been clubbed in the head. He ached with a pain that drove down into the depths of his soul and it hurt like nothing he’d ever imagined.

She wanted him, he told himself, trying to find some comfort to ease that bloody wound. But it didn’t matter. She had the strength and will to walk away, no matter what she might feel for him. His jaw clenched. He didn’t make a habit of giving up on what he wanted. Somehow he’d sap the walls of her defenses. He didn’t let himself think about what would happen after that.

 

The Maida of Chayos was a broad, tall hill standing alone on the edge of the city. It was more than a quarter of a league across and was just west of Cheapside and south of Blackstone. A pale green nimbus surrounded it now, extending out forty or fifty paces from the base of the hill. Knots of people huddled within its glow, clustering at its foot and hiding among the bushes and trees along its top.

Delats wearing their green and brown robes stood around the perimeter just inside the protection of the light. They were armed with swords and spears, alternating every other one. But the weapons were nothing like Nicholas had ever seen before. The swords were a clear green—like sharp emeralds. They twisted slightly in a hint of a spiral and tapered to a deadly point. Each was four feet long. The two-handed hilts were made of what looked like a dark wood.

The spears—no, they were lances—had the same twisting green blades, except that they were about six feet long and attached to a shaft that was five feet long and made of the same dark wood of the sword hilts. The delats held them with one hand near the butt, the other near the base of the blade.

Every single one looked like he or she knew how to use them. Nicholas found himself smiling grimly. He had always prided himself on the extent of his information-gathering network. But in the last sennight he’d discovered just how very much he didn’t know, and it was humbling. He would never have believed that Chayos’s delats were anything but meek acolytes whose entire lives revolved around the peaceful worship of Chayos and giving aid to the poor. He would never have imagined that they could wield anything more than a pitchfork or a hoe, and then only in agrarian purposes. But looking at their ready stances and the deadly set of their faces, he could see that they knew very well what to do with the weapons that they held.