Trouble with Kings (4 page)

“Do you desire the consequences, Jaim?” Jason asked wryly.

“No.” The man holding me laughed. “But the thought of putting a hitch in your gallop will warm me those cold nights on the run.”

I felt the rider nod.

The second man in Garian’s livery reversed his blade and brought the hilt down across the back of Jason’s head. Jason dropped soundlessly to the floor. The second man served Garian the same way—shouts, screams—and next to my ear, the rider clucked. An edge of cloak was flung over my head, so I no longer saw the shocked faces of the guests or the shard-framed window. The horse gave a powerful leap, landed, trotted, and then gathered speed.

Chapter Four

After a time the horse slowed, and stopped.

The cloak was pulled from my head and cool, sweet air ruffled across my face. A number of mounted people waited under a great spreading oak.

“Cover ’em.” My rider hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “The rest of us ride.”

I twisted around. In the weak moonlight, Jaim looked a lot like Jason, only without the mustache.

“So you’re Jaim.”

“Yes. We have a long ride. Will you cooperate?”

I said with as much dignity as I could muster, “I have neither the strength nor the inclination to scuffle.” Added more normally, “Where are we going?”

“Away from here.”

He raised a hand. The horses began their gallop.

He was right. It was a long ride. The gallop eventually slowed to a trot and then to a walk. Jaim began turning this way and that.

A sigh went through him when someone rode out from a shaded gully, leading a string of horses. In silence the riders all exchanged mounts, and once again we galloped.

I did not stay awake for the entire night, but drifted in and out of a kind of strange sleep, my dreams disturbed by the rhythm of the horse’s hooves on the road, by the heartbeat beneath my ear, by the memory of those swords reflecting the firelight in blood-red glow. Down and up mountain roads, across bridges that spanned thundering falls, and at last into a narrow tree-protected valley, and thence into an old cave.

At once people crowded around, everyone talking.

Jaim lifted his voice. “How about letting us dismount?”

The press of people eased.

Jaim climbed down, then pulled me after and set me on my feet. “She’s had a rough month. First let me get her settled.”

“If you’re going to talk about me,” I said, “I want to hear it as well.”

“Anon.” Jaim led the way through a narrow crevice into an oddly shaped room lit by candles. It was bisected down below by a dark, rushing stream. At the other end was a kind of shelf, with a pile of woven yeath-fur rugs and pillows. “You can sleep here.”

I dropped onto the inviting rugs. “I don’t understand anything.”

“I’ll explain come morning. And there’s plenty to explain. You have to be awake to hear it all.” He pointed a finger at me. “That means you need to sleep off whatever potions Garian’s been slipping you.”

“Healer’s draughts, he said. In the wine. So that’s why I kept getting sicker!”

Jaim snorted. “Sounds like Garian’s usual trickery, all right. Never mind. It’s over. Sleep!” He left, taking out the light.

I tried to unlace the wedding gown, but it was too much work. So I just stretched out, pulled the soft rug over me, and slept.

I woke when lamplight flickered over my eyelids.

Jaim walked in carrying a lamp. He leaned against the wall, which glinted in layers slanting upward at an angle. “Do you feel any better?”

“A lot better. But ravenous.”

“Food is being prepared. For now, I really want to hear what happened to you.”

“You don’t know?” I asked.

“Not the way you understand it.” His jaw tightened—fighting a yawn.

I paused, looking at him more closely. Bony face—no mustache—long black hair tied back. His shirt was unlaced, rolled to the elbows, his posture the tight stance of someone who needs to sit—has needed to sit for time past counting.

“You’re tired,” I observed.

He nodded. “Very.” Blinked down at the rugs and made a curious grimace. “Since you noticed, mind if I avail myself?”

Surprised, I shrugged. “There’s room for five here, in truth. Go ahead.”

He disengaged from the wall, set the lamp down and stretched out on the blankets just beyond arm’s reach, his nose pointed toward the ceiling and his eyes closing. “Ah.”

“Why do you look like Jason?”

“I’m his brother.”

“He never mentioned that,” I said. “The brief references were more that of an enemy. That’s one confusion. The entanglement of relatives who dislike one another is another. Then there’s my own dilemma, such as: will I like myself when I regain my memory? From what Garian hinted, I might not be so pleasant a person, and I can’t for the life of me see why I betrothed myself to Jason…” I rambled on, mixing questions with observations until I realized I wasn’t getting any answers.

Jaim was breathing the slow, steady breathing of one who is dead to the world.

I laughed, cast my rug over him, and got up. I’d find that food myself.

I made my way to the other end of the cave, where I was met by a tall blond man dressed in rough forest clothing and mocs. He bowed, which surprised me.

“Good, what, morning? Evening?”

“Good evening, Princess.”

Princess? That explained the bow. Interesting that Garian hadn’t told me and Netta had called me just “lady”.

“Where may I get something to eat?”

“Come this way, please, your highness.”

He led me up a narrow rocky corridor lit at intervals by torches. A sharp angle opened into a huge cavern that had a waterfall at one end, as well as a stream. A group of people turned and one came toward me, a young lady somewhat shorter than I, with a vivid face and lovely figure. She had long, curling black hair and expressive dark blue eyes. She was dressed plainly in a woolen skirt and bodice. Her linen blouse had full sleeves and a low neckline that made the best of her figure.

“Welcome, Flian.” She put out her hand. “I’m Jewel. Jaim tells me you’ve lost your memory, but we haven’t met in any case.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Jewel.” I peered past her, sniffing the air. “Oatcakes! I am famished.”

“You look it,” she said with brisk sympathy. “Far too skinny, if you don’t mind my adding. Felic, would you fix a plate? Where’s Jaim? He said he was going to interview you.”

“He fell asleep.”

“Good! I put the sleepweed he stole into his wine. After all, if it can work for our big brother, it can work for me—not that it took much. He’s been on his feet for too many days.” She cast me a laughing glance. “I hope I won’t have to take care of him any more.”

Food appeared then, plain but well-cooked oatcakes and baked potato with vegetables stuffed inside. We sat on hay-stuffed pillows a ways from the others, who appeared to be young men and women of our own age. Most of them; some were older.

For a time Jewel watched me eat. I gathered the impression that she was endeavoring to be patient—and that patience did not come easily. When I was done, she pounced. “What happened? What lies did they tell you?”

“Lies?” I told her my story from the time I woke up in the cottage. I’d thought it innocuous—I could not really believed that astonishing business in the dining hall had happened to
me
—until I ended with, “So I guess what I really wish to know is, why did Jaim abduct me?”

Her cheeks bloomed crimson, her eyes widened. I almost dropped my fork as she declared, “Oh! I can’t bear it! Lies indeed, worse than I thought!”

I sat back. “I assure you I haven’t purposefully lied—”

“You were not abducted. You were
rescued
.” She jumped to her feet and began to pace, waving her arms. “Absolute, ridiculous, rotten, miserable lies! No wonder you went along with everything. Jaim was afraid Garian had broken your spirit, forced you in some nefarious way to fall into their horrid plans. Oh, Garian’d love that, he would. Only we didn’t think he’d dare, because too many people would know, but how else to explain that marriage? When the couriers went out to the local nobles two days ago, Jaim knew he would have to act fast, or it would be too late—”

“I’m lost,” I said.

Jewel stopped, snorted, looked back at Jaim’s people, some of whom were staring at us.

She put her fists on her hips. “Oh, I ought not to get so mad, I know it, because I exaggerate terribly. But it’s not good to bottle your feelings inside, like
they
do. Jaim does. Jason
has
no feelings, unless you count cruelty, nastiness and evil! Do people really
feel
evil?” She sidetracked herself, looking perplexed. “Well, if anybody does, Jason is the one. If he’d managed to marry you, once he’d gotten his claws on your holdings—” She drew her finger across her neck and made a squelching noise.

I shivered.

“Huh! So, Jaim really did rescue you. He saved your life! Say, you’re finished, and the dishes barrel is here. We haven’t many luxuries, but we do have a kitchen cleaning bucket. And a cleaning frame. Or, would you prefer a nice bath?”

“Oh, would I ever!”

We put our dishes in the water-filled barrel; someone had managed to get a cleaning frame on it, because I saw the sparkle of magic.

She led me down a narrow passage. I smelled running water, and even steam. She stopped at one point and called, “Anyone here?”

“Yes!” Several male voices echoed back.

She sighed. “We’ll have a turn later. Let’s go to where I sleep, since Jaim’s asleep in his place.”

“I was using his bed?”

“Well, it was the only empty one, because he knew he’d be staying up, the idiot.” She snorted, plunging up another narrow tunnel. Along the way I saw various cracks and crevices leading in different directions. Some had tapestries hung over them, and some didn’t.

Jewel had laid claim to a small water-hollowed cave with one thin connection of rock left. Stalagmites and stalactites stippled the rest of the cave, except for a smooth area in the far corner on which she had scattered brightly colored quilts and lengths of fabric, including silk and velvet. She also had a small glowglobe, evidence of Jaim’s regard for his sister, for he hadn’t one in his own chamber.

She flung herself down on this magpie bed, and I stretched out next to her. “There’s one thing I can safely tell you, and that’s my story,” she announced. “You’ll understand more about us, don’t you think?”

“Certainly,” I said, though I wondered why I needed to understand her family.

“Jaim can tell you his part,” she added. “You already know that the three of us are siblings. Our mother died a few years ago. Drink. Father was assassinated when I was little. They used to fight a lot, that previous generation. Of them, only your father is left—and he tried to use diplomacy or trade rather than fight, which got him sneered at in the past, but he’s still alive.
And
rich.” She gave me a wry sort of grimace. “We’re not, you see. Ralanor Veleth is twice the size of Lygiera, your kingdom. Larger than twice, probably, but it’s rocky and soil-poor, and we’ve had a long history of fighting to get access to better land. We’ve expanded to the eastern mountains and—”

She tossed her curls back. “This is harder than I thought! Jason took over from our mother when he was, oh, twenty-two or so. That was because he could best all the warriors, and he thought he could rule. He forced Jaim to be as good. Jason wants to keep the army large against others coming against us, or against Norsunder, but actually we think he’s intending to go over and take Lygiera and maybe even Dantherei. It would certainly solve our treasury problems! Jaim says we can’t, that all the fighting has to stop, that we solve our own problems without being grabby with other people’s land and treasury.”

“Where do you fit in?” I asked.

She made a face. “Jason told me early on I’d marry whoever he told me to, for alliance purposes.”

“That doesn’t sound like war.”

“Probably to get more warriors for his plans.”

“Ah.”

“So that horrible Garian arrived in Lathandra to court me. See, Drath’s small, up here in the border mountains, but because of the gem mines and the wine it’s rich. He pays lip service to your father and to Dantherei and the rest of the kingdoms, but we think he’s allying with Jason in order to get some more land that isn’t mountain. We—that is, Jason—provides the army, and Garian the money to equip it.”

“Do I know all these people and problems?” I asked.

Jewel grinned. “I don’t know.”

I laughed. “It does sound odd, doesn’t it?”

“Yes! But you do know you don’t like Garian. Neither do I. He’s arrogant and sarcastic, and mean. He was just pretending to court me. I could tell he thought I was too stupid to see how all his compliments cut two ways. I was as nasty to Garian as I could possibly be, so he would go away. But he wouldn’t go away, and then one night he was bored and drinking and he set one of Jason’s dogs on the castle cat, who was feeding her litter, and I, um, tried to knife him. Jason got angry and locked me in my room, saying I could either learn to behave or sit there and starve. Me! It was not
I
who set the dogs to harry the cat! Well, Jaim tried to defend me—oh, I don’t even want to talk about it. It was horrible. Jason locked us up, but Jaim’s got loyal liegemen same as Jason, and Daraen came with some of his men and got us out, and so here we are, in an old hideout for thieves.”

I shuddered. “That sounds terrible. Garian likes cruelty? He laughed so much. Though when I think back, I really believe he was laughing at me.”

“Of course he was.” She wrinkled her nose. “Back to us. Malcontents—people who won’t stick Garian’s rule—or Jason’s—find their way here. The real criminals Jaim sends away again. The rest, well, some of them are, um, somewhat rough, but if anyone gives you trouble, tell Jaim and he’ll straighten them out.”

“So you live by stealing?”

“Yes—from Garian. And from Jason’s strongholds. Good practice, Jaim says, though it’s risky. And there’ve been times when he’s gone into Lygiera to forage, but I’ll leave him to tell you why and how.”