Though she kept her voice light, Venick didn’t think he imagined the resentment there.
“Harmon.” He shook his head. “Your father adores you.”
“He adores the idea of me.” She shrugged. “He doesn’t really know me.”
Her dreams of knighthood. Her father’s decree. Harmon had told Venick the story of how the Elder forbade women from fighting after his wife—Harmon’s mother—was killed in battle. Historically, the Elder’s army had belonged to the entire Stonehelm family, but since Harmon had never learned how to fight, she could hardly be expected to command those men. That duty would fall to Venick.
Venick corrected his earlier thought. Harmon wasn’t just resentful. She wasjealous.
“Even after we’re married,” Venick said, “those men will belong to you more than they do me. You must know that.”
She flashed a tight smile. “I could have been a soldier, maybe, if I’d started training when I was young.”
“Who says you have to be a soldier? Commanders lead without actually fighting all the time.”
“Not in the highlands.”
“I’ve seen how the men act around you. You really think they wouldn’t go to battle for you if you asked it?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe. But I didn’t come to talk about any of that. I came to tell you to be careful.”
“I have been—”
“No, Venick, you haven’t. You accepted my father’s offer, yes, but only after you turned him down. He won’t soon forget that…or forgive it. Any further resistance, any hint of opposition from you—he’ll sense it. And if he thinks he can’t mold you into the son he wants you to be, he’ll find another.”
“You’re not saying…”
“I am saying,” Harmon interrupted with a significant look. “My father has been keeping you close. He’s been showing you what you’ve won. This isn’t generosity, Venick. It’s a test. A game. He wants to see how you play.”
THIRTY-FIVE
The engagement banquet was a massive affair. Highlanders came from every stretch of the region, arriving in twos and threes throughout the week, most of them flushed and excited, all of them boasting about the lengths they’d taken to make it to the capital on time. Appointments were cancelled, harvests postponed. Some had even ridden their horses to death in order not to miss the event. With so little advanced notice, it could be said that the guests had no other choice. The Elder would be deeply unhappy if his favorite lords and ladies were not in attendance at his daughter’s engagement celebration, especially if the price of such attendance was the lives of a mere few horses.
On the night of the banquet, Venick and Harmon arrived to the great hall last, as planned. They stood outside its closed doors, listening to the scrape and chatter of the guests within as they waited for a herald to announce their arrival. Venick stared at the door’s handles, which were carved in the same intricate detail as everything else in Parith. Upon entering the city, Venick had been enchanted by the beauty of that intricacy. Now, it made him dizzy.
“Be sure to greet my father first,” Harmon told him. She was dressed in red velvet, her hair loose down her back. Thin golden chains draped over her shoulders, bringing out the burnished tones of her skin. She looked beautiful, Venick realized. Somehow, that made everything worse. “He expects your eyes to find him first, even if you cannot speak to him right away.”
The herald’s muffled voice lifted within the hall. Harmon slid her hand into the crook of Venick’s arm. He thought, from her next words, that she could feel how he stiffened. “It is expected,” she said, meaning their interlocked arms.
“I know.” Venick tried to relax. “Sorry.”
“You are nervous.”
No, he wasn’t. He was sick. He was drowning in the sudden certainty that he was making a terrible mistake. He felt like he was on the receiving end of bad news, except the news kept coming, and coming.
“It’ll be hectic at first,” Harmon said. “Just stay close to me.”
The doors opened.
There was a flash of light and color and sound. Venick felt Harmon tug him forward. A rush of the crowd’s excitement, a hundred faces pushing in. They were touching him, reaching to stroke his hair, his vest, his arms. Harmon had warned him about this custom, explaining that it was good luck to place your hand upon a newly engaged couple, especially a wealthy one, as it was believed to channel wealth into your own family. Yet Venick was not prepared for this—fanfare. The adoring gazes of men and women he’d never met, the way their faces shone like stars, eager for his words, his nods, his smile, which felt frozen on his lips.
He remembered Harmon’s warning and lifted his eyes to search for the Elder, who stood at the far end of the hall. Like his daughter, the man was strung with thin golden chains, but while on Harmon the affect was demure, on the Elder it was striking, like a crown to be worn against the skin. The man caught Venick’s searching gaze and gave a nod.
For a time—minutes? Hours?—Venick and Harmon merely stood in the hall’s center, accepting the well wishes of these strangers until at last the tide calmed and the guests returned to their seats. A flutist struck up a cheerful tune. Food was brought out on great silver plates, wine was poured, and the feast began.
Venick and Harmon were seated at the end of the long table, the Elder at its other end. This too was tradition, meant to signify the new distance between Harmon and her father. At last, a custom Venick could be glad for. The Elder saw too much, and Venick didn’t think he could fake happiness well enough right now.
When the feast was over, the tables were cleared, and men and women took to the dance floor. Venick, who knew only the boisterous dancing from Irek, was unprepared for this coupled type. It seemed choreographed, partners switching partners, the entire dance floor unfolding like a kaleidoscope.
