“What?” I burst out laughing and smack his chest for worrying me like that. “What in the gods’ names brought this on?”
He settles more comfortably, lifting the arm which does not hold me to support the back of his head. “It occurred to me today,” he says, “during those awful, endless hours of separation, that I know so little about you. I know your name—Ilsevel Cyhorn. And I know your courage, your determination, your strength in the face of adversity. I know the beautiful timbre of your voice, the voice of heaven itself. But there is still so much I know nothing of. And I want to. I want to know everything that can be known about you.”
I bite my lip, uncertain how to respond to such ardor. “The person I was before . . . before I met you . . . she wasn’t particularly worth knowing.”
Taar turns his head to look down at me more closely. “Don’t say that.” His voice is stern but somehow still so full of love, it makes me ache inside. “Don’t say that. Please. Everything about you, everything that shaped your life and made you into this wonderous creature . . . all of it matters to me. Good, bad, what difference does it make? If it is part of you, I want to know, to understand.” Then he leans over and kisses the top of my head ever so lightly, so chastely, so as not to compromise that damnable vow of his. “But for tonight,” he says, “I don’t need to know everything. Just something. Something small, something beautiful. A good memory.”
I want to please him in whatever way I can. But it is difficult toknow what to share. My childhood was not a happy one. There are fond memories, however, of Faraine, of Aurae. And even of Lyria.
“One day,” I say softly, falling into a space of musing recall, “when I was nine years old, I took it into my head to find the dungeons of Beldroth Castle. I don’t know what it was that intrigued me about the notion. Some grim fantasy, perhaps. I tried to convince Faraine to join me, but she had one of her headaches again. And Aurae was still just a little tot. But Lyria . . . Lyria was as eager as I and took the lead.”
“Who is Lyria?” Taar asks.
My stomach knots. I don’t want to admit the truth about my bastard half-sister. That revelation, which struck me like a thunderbolt, still hurts. But for many years, I lived in ignorance of our true relationship, and Lyria and I were close.
“She was a companion,” I say. “A sort of lady-in-waiting, and . . . my best friend. Faraine, you see, was so often sick, and Aurae was just a baby. But Lyria and I were a match in temperament. We got into a lot of scrapes together, and I admired her tremendously, for she was a year older than I.”
From there I spin a story for him of two little girls, searching the castle grounds for a secret entrance to the old dungeons. Beldroth was long ago converted to a pleasure palace and had not been used to house prisoners in several generations, but we had visions of dark cells and iron chains dancing in our imaginations and were determined to follow through.
“Our initial foray merely led us to a rootcellar, where we surprised a footman and scullery maid, who seemed to us to be acting very silly.” I snort at the memory of flying skirts and scarlet faces, which makes rather more sense to me now. “We had enough good grace to retreat and were chased out of the lower levels by an angry cook. So it seemed our adventure was at an end.”
Taar chuckles softly. “Something tells me you did not give up so easily.”
“Oh, certainly not. It occurred to me, you see, that the entrance to the dungeons must be in an older part of the castle, built long before the main structure in which we now lived. There is a hidden courtyard deep in the gardens, walled off from everything else. It’s considered sacred ground and is used for solemn ceremonies.”
I go on to describe for him how Lyria and I boosted and hoisted each other over the secret wall and into the sacred garden. There we found a large basin of water and, in the center of it, an ancient statue of a couple in an amorous clinch. Quite shocking to our young eyes, more so than anything we’d half-glimpsed in the root cellar. It sent us into peels of giggles, and we hastily ran to the far end of the courtyard. There we discovered a little doorway, half-hidden behind a curtain of ivy. Pushing this back, we uncovered a stairway leading down into the cool dark underground.
“What could it be, we asked ourselves, other than the sought-after dungeons entrance?”
“And was it?” Taar asks.
“No. It wasn’t particularly good logic anyway. Why wouldanyone stash prisoners underneath sacred ground?”
“But you found something else more interesting, I imagine.”
“Much more interesting. Listen.”
I tell him how Lyria led the way down the little stairway, me trailing close at her heels. The only light came from the doorway behind us, and it was soon very dark. But when we reached the bottom of the stairs, the space around us opened up into a strange grotto, lit by patches of sunlight falling through carved holes in the ceiling. Water poured down the stone, shaping it over the eons. And the shapes the water had carved shocked us with delight.
“The walls,” I tell Taar, “were covered in images. Not carvings—they were naturally shaped, you could tell, somehow. And yet they were clearer than any image I’ve ever seen in either chapel or shrine. The faces of the gods—each one as tall as a grown man. The way the water dripped, it seemed as though they were crying great tears.”
“Sounds frightening.”
“It was, I suppose. But also very solemn and very beautiful. Both Lyria and I felt it, the gravity of that place, though even now I don’t pretend to understand it.”
Numerous passages led out from that grotto, and we were keen to explore down each and every one. I would have gone running off down the nearest dark turn without a thought, but Lyria, who had a bit more sense in her head, stopped me.
“She said we should go back, get a torch and a ball of twine, just in case. I agreed, reluctantly. We retreated up the stairs and climbedback over the garden wall. But in our efforts to find a ball of twine, we were collared by our nursemaid and forced to sit and stitch for the rest of the afternoon. We didn’t make it back to the garden for many days, and when we did, we simply could not find that secret door again.” Lyria and I went back several times over the years, searching for our lost hideaway passage, but never found it. “Sometimes,” I admit, “I wonder if I dreamed the whole thing up.”
“And yet this is your most cherished childhood memory?” Taar asks somewhat dubious.
I smile. “I liked feeling so daring, so dangerous. Lyria and I fed off each other’s energies in those days—she made me believe I could be far braver than I ever realized.”
“What became of Lyria? She was not with you on your Maiden’s Journey.”
“No.” I frown and chew the inside of my cheek. “We . . . we are no longer friends.”
“Ah.” Taar rests his chin on the top of my head again. “There is a story there as well.”
