Twilight's Dawn (22 page)

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Authors: Anne Bishop

Tags: #Fantasy fiction, #Fiction, #Fantasy, #General, #Witches, #Epic

BOOK: Twilight's Dawn
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“Hmm?”
“Is there any honorable work a young Eyrien male can do except fighting? Or does he have to be permanently wounded badly enough to be a liability in a fight before he can do something else without shame?”
Lifting his hand from Rainier’s leg, Lucivar gave the other man a long look. “Why do you ask?”
“Nothing certain. Just impressions.”
“You were Second Circle in the Dark Court at Ebon Askavi, and you’re an observant man.”
Rainier took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I had the impression that Endar was trying to find out how serious this leg injury is. What I could no longer do. He doesn’t like being a guard. He doesn’t like the bloodshed that comes in a fight. I gathered that’s a shameful thing for an Eyrien male to feel. Would he fight to defend his family? Without hesitation or question. But he doesn’t like it as his work, and he’s afraid to say anything because he likes living here and his wife likes living here. If someone can’t offer him a way to keep his standing with other Eyriens, I think the day might come when he drops his guard during one of the workouts, quite by accident, and receives a blow that will make him a cripple who has to do some other kind of work.”
Lucivar resumed smoothing the salve over Rainier’s leg. “Did you get any impression about what kind of work he might want to do?”
“No. The other Eyriens came in at that point, and he shied away from the subject.”
“I’m going to be looking for a teacher. Someone for the Eyrien youngsters. Someone who can teach them reading and writing and their sums, as well as Eyrien history and basic Protocol.”
“Basically the same initial education as any child in Kaeleer, with the history and traditions specific to a race.”
“Yes.”
“Fighting?”
“Hallevar is arms master. He’ll take care of that part of the education.”
If he stays.
“Haven’t worked out how it will be done, but it’s going to be done.”
He could almost feel Rainier putting the information together.
“This isn’t common knowledge yet?” Rainier asked.
Lucivar shook his head. “Not for a few more days.”
“But if a particular person were to ask my opinion about a possible alternative to being a guard?”
“You could mention that you’d heard I was looking for a teacher.”
He left Rainier a few minutes later and went into the bathroom. He washed the salve off his shielded hands and then, dropping the shield, washed his hands again. Then he tapped on the other door.
“It’s open,” Surreal said.
He walked into her room and stopped, feeling his heart kick once.
Short blades, long blades, slim blades and double-edged. Even an Eyrien hunting knife she’d probably had Kohlvar make for her the last time she’d stayed in Ebon Rih.
Her gold-green eyes were focused on him as her hands unerringly stroked a blade over the whetstone. There was something terrifyingly erotic about watching Surreal hone her blades.
“You won’t need those tomorrow,” he said.
She just smiled.
Because of what he saw in her eyes, he didn’t get near her. That was simply caution. He could meet her in a fight and win. They both knew it. He also knew he needed to talk to Daemon very soon.
He could meet her in a fight and win. But outside of a fight, he wasn’t sure what to do with a Gray-Jeweled witch who might be drifting too close to the borders of the Twisted Kingdom.
FIVE
 
 
S
urreal set two plates on the table, then poured two cups of coffee and took a seat.
Rainier studied the chunks of chicken and ham on top of a generous portion of casserole. “Didn’t Merry serve this casserole for dinner last night?”
“It has eggs, so today it’s a breakfast casserole. Toast?” Her sharp smile told him what he could do with his next comment about the casserole.
He took a piece of toast and dug in to his meal.
They’d gone down to the coffee shop and bakery every morning, so having breakfast in The Tavern’s main room felt strange. Then again, a lot of things had felt strange lately. When Endar and the other Eyriens came to see Rainier, she’d been ready to fight, almost
needed
to fight.
But there was no reason to fight, because Endar, Hallevar, and the other men had been making an effort to help Rainier, working with him, even being protective of him as he began exercising the damaged leg.
Feeling easier about Rainier after that first workout, she thought she’d gotten over whatever was riding her temper. Then Jillian showed up yesterday morning. The teacher was sick. School was canceled. Lucivar let the girl stay to be her partner with the sparring sticks, having Endar stand as their instructor.
Nothing wrong with Endar. He was a gentle man with an abundance of patience. But she saw him raise a sparring stick and step toward Jillian—which was what he was supposed to do because he’d been demonstrating a move—and she almost attacked him, almost gutted him.
She’d have to talk to Jaenelle before she did something that couldn’t be undone. It was possible there was some unexpected residue from the poisoning. Maybe the poison, and the illness that followed, had stirred up memories that plagued her dreams but disappeared by morning, leaving her feeling tired and vulnerable.
But today there were simpler problems to face.
“I think we should run The Tavern,” she said. “Merry is down with that stomach upset, and Briggs bolted upstairs at the first whiff of food.”
“You’re going to cook?” Rainier asked. “Not that you can’t, but Merry usually makes a significant amount of food for a day.”
“And we won’t. I’ll see what’s left over from yesterday. We can make sandwiches, maybe a soup. And serve drinks and coffee. Anyone who wants more can go somewhere else. You could settle yourself on that stool Briggs keeps behind the bar for the slow times. I’ll wait on the tables.”
“We should check with Lucivar.” Rainier glanced up as the door opened.
“Go away. We’re not open yet,” Surreal snapped without looking around to see who had come in.
“You’re not open
yet
?” Lucivar asked as he walked up to their table and looked at Rainier. “And what do you need to check with me?”
Shit shit shit.
“Merry and Briggs are down with that disgusting stomach illness,” she said. “Instead of them losing a day’s business as well as feeling miserable, I thought Rainier and I could run the place for them.”
“Well, having the two of you running things would either scare away all the customers or bring in a crowd to watch the show,” Lucivar said.
Choosing to ignore him because he was right, she ate a neat bite of her breakfast.
“We could open late, after the day’s training,” Rainier said.
“No training today,” Lucivar said. “That’s what I came to tell you.”
“Is there a reason for that?” Surreal asked.
“Yes, there is.”
She glanced at Rainier.
Something going on here, and Rainier knows what it is. Or at least knows some of it.
“Marian’s making a couple of soups this morning,” Lucivar said. “If you bring a pot and the supplies up to the eyrie, I think she’d be willing to make a pot for you to serve here.”
“All right.”
Rainier called in a leather case similar to the ones Daemon and Lord Marcus, his man of business, used when conveying documents.
“I reviewed them and sorted them as you asked,” Rainier said. “And confirmed what you already knew.”
“Thanks.” Lucivar vanished the leather case and gave Rainier a sharp look. “Daemon should be at the Keep by now. He and I have something to discuss. Then he’ll be coming here to talk to you.”
“Why? I haven’t done anything to annoy him.”
“I know you haven’t,” Lucivar said.
“I haven’t done anything either,” Surreal said primly.
“Don’t push your luck. You, I’m not sure of.”
She laughed, more to encourage him to leave than because she was amused.
The moment he did leave, she leaned toward Rainier. “What’s going on? He’s been flying all over the valley and hasn’t been focused on any of the workouts except yours.”
“And yours,” Rainier said. “He flies around the valley all the time, keeping tabs on the Rihlander villages and the Eyrien camps.”
She shrugged that off. “This is different. Obviously he asked you to do some paperwork for him, quietly. And now Sadi has arrived for an early-morning meeting—and Marian is making a lot of soup, which means she wants something easy that she can offer to a lot of guests.”
They studied each other. She didn’t want him to break a confidence, but she’d seen the same thing that he had during the workouts over the past couple of days: The Eyrien males around Riada seemed to be dividing between two leaders instead of understanding that there was one leader and his second-in-command.
“Let’s just say, for now, that it’s a good thing we’ll be running The Tavern for Merry and Briggs,” Rainier said.
“So we’re all going to find out today?”
“Yes.”
Well, won’t that be interesting?
 
 
Lucivar watched Daemon tap the thick stack of contracts back into a neat pile. “When it was just me and the Rihlanders, I knew what I was supposed to be. I stood for Blood law and honor. I drew the line and defended it. But this?” He blew out a breath. “I’m not sure about this.”
Daemon poured himself a cup of coffee from the pot Draca had provided. “You’re making this difficult, Prick, when it’s really quite simple. You’re the Warlord Prince of Ebon Rih. You rule this territory. And now you’re going to fulfill one of your obligations to the Eyriens who live in your territory by completing the last step in the service contracts they signed with you. And Lucivar? You still stand for Blood law and honor—and you’re still drawing the line and defending it.”
“Even today?”
“Especially today. Once you make your announcement, you’ll have a good idea of who is staying, who is going, who you can trust, and who should never see your back. The ones who think you’re a good leader and want the kind of life and community you’re offering will be pissed off when you toss these papers at them. They’ll be the first to want to talk, and they won’t be polite.”
“Eyriens rarely are,” Lucivar said with a grim smile.
“That’s the first group, the equivalent of your First Circle. The second group is going to be shocked by the possibility that they’ll be cut loose and might have to serve someone who isn’t Eyrien or go back to Terreille. They’ll realize they do like it here and want to stay, and they’ll make some effort to prove it to you. There also will be the ones who aren’t ballsy enough to come to you personally but will seek advice from someone you trust.
“The women will be different,” Daemon continued. “They’ll come to your home when they’re fairly sure that Marian will be around. Easier to talk to you there. Again, the ones who want to stay will make an effort to talk to you quickly. Even the ones who don’t want to work for you but want to stay in Ebon Rih will come and talk soon.”
“If they want to live here, why not work for me?”
Daemon looked amused and exasperated. “Some of them might prefer to pay you a tithe and run their own businesses—and possibly make a better income than what you can provide. Do you resent Merry for running her own business and paying a tithe instead of working for you?”
“No. But she doesn’t pay a tithe to me. She pays it to Lady Shayne’s court.”
“The point,” Daemon said pointedly, “is that Merry and Briggs don’t serve in anyone’s court; they work for themselves, because that’s what they want to do.”
When it was put that way, he wondered how many of the Eyrien women had been waiting to be safely cut loose in order to try out their own ambitions.
“After my chat with Rainier, I’ll come back to the Keep and be available if you need any help.”

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