Ban had not quite remembered the brutal grandeur of this fortress, nor the huge, rippling black waters of the Tarinnish. As a boy he’d been overwhelmed by its size, the number of families it could contain, and the power embodied in every large chunk of blue-gray stone. But Elia had lived here, and so Ban had loved it.
At the open gate they were challenged, until Osli called out their names and Regan lifted her face in a portrait of disdain. The beardless, clear-eyed soldier who spoke wore white on his sleeve, and said, “The lady will have to be informed of your arrival. None are allowed inside but her retainers, not since Astore’s death.”
Stunned, Ban glanced at Regan, who shuddered and clutched her reins tight enough the leather cut into her palms. Osli began to ask what had happened, but the lady Regan cut her off, caring nothing for another dead man.
“Stand aside,” Regan ordered, suddenly livid and alive, and then pushed her horse on through the long, dark tunnel arch. Ban hurried after on his own steed; the stone floor off the tunnel gave way to a packed-earth yard.Regan dismounted, tossing the reins to a soldier dashing up. “Take me to my sister. See these two loyal retainers fed and sheltered, then in an hour bring the Fox to us.”
Ban slid off his horse. “My lady,” he said, hoping to halt her. He’d rather go into this fortress at her side. But Regan pierced him with a look. She shook her head, and in the language of trees said,I need my sister only.
Bowing, Ban let himself begin to feel the hours of exhaustion, and cold, and hunger. It was a relief, too, to hear the language of trees after four days of silence, even from another human.
As Regan was led quickly away, Osli turned to him and said, “I must make my report to the commander and discover what happened. You’ll do all right on your own?”
A tinge of humor was buried under her words, and so Ban summoned up a small smile. The retainer recognized that Ban had always been on his own, and would continue to survive it well. They’d discovered a tense camaraderie on the journey: nearly the same age, both outsiders on their chosen paths, dedicated to these royal sisters. Osli was as devoted to Gaela and therefore the lady Regan as Ban had once been to Morimaros, for Gaela, too, had given Osli the opportunity to make herself in her own image. Ban hoped, for her sake, that Osli never turned so capable of betrayal as he himself.
She offered her hand, and Ban clasped it.
A young man in Astore pink, but without the trappings of a retainer, fetched Ban and brought him into Dondubhan Castle.
Though the outer wall and barbican was a looming fortress of thick rock peppered with narrow-eyed arrow slits, inside, the castle keep itself spread much more elegantly, with dark wood and pale limestone arches and massive towers of blue-gray stone. It had glass windows as tall as Ban himself, and central trees planted in the interior that lifted high to give shade to the courtyards. Blue banners clung to the walls, most striped now with undyed wool for mourning. Ban was dumped in a lower-level room, one that he suspected by the stark furnishings was often reserved for star priests. Before the servant left, Ban caught his arm. “What happened to the Lord Astore?”
The young man grimaced. “Killed, by our lady,” he said, before leaving swiftly.
Ban shook off his disconcertment and did his best, in the narrow quarters, to rinse his body and scrub dirt from his scalp. He had no razor, but thanks to Ban’s maternal bloodline his beard never grew in thick, covering his jaw only softly with black hair, not too patchy, nor too unkempt. Keeping his mind as empty as possible, he warmed himself dry by the firebefore reluctantly putting his dirty clothes back on. As he waited for his summons, Ban removed the little braids still stuck in his hair. He ran his fingers through for want of a comb, and bound it all back in a single short tail. Chunks and wisps fell around his face.
Ban paced, putting his thoughts in order: he must confess to having seen—spoken with—Elia, at Hartfare. That she was searching for Lear, and she wished to meet with both Gaela and Regan south at Errigal Keep, that she hoped still to find a plan for peace. Elia now knew of his former loyalty to Morimaros—his treason to Innis Lear. Ban considered confessing that, too, but whereas it hurt Elia, it would likely only inspire rage in her sisters. They would deal worse with the treachery.
Ban turned to the window and leaned out. The sky was a cold blue, clouds moving faster than they ought. This room overlooked the choppy Tarinnish, not the inner courtyards and garden lanes, and Ban was glad, since the dark and tumultuous waters did reflect his spirit.
He wasn’t sure he could bear seeing the gardens and verdant nooks, the havens of his fearsome youth. Once in a garden here, Elia had whispered to him that she dreamed of him, that she saw him next to her always. And once they had kissed in the rose garden, near enough to prick their sleeves on the thorns where he had first laid eyes on her, near enough that the early buds had exploded into full blossom. Once, he’d put his head in her lap and let himself doze there; her fingers played against his bottom lip and tangled in his hair. Once Ban had been hopeful, and impossibly happy. Once, he’d not remembered to guard his heart.
And so of course, it did not last: there came the memory of the hardened face of his father at dawn, and the sneering, proud king, and the realization that she would let him go, that he would be forever alone.
Putting his forehead to the wall, Ban tried to empty his mind again. The cold of the stone seeped into his skin.
He must tell Gaela and Regan he’d killed King Lear.
It was a weight Ban could not quite shrug off. Not for loyalty or sympathy for the loss of a father, nor for regrets—this was by no means the first man the Fox had led to his death. No, he was glad the old man was gone, but Ban had not guessed that this utter, devastatingsilencewould ever be the consequence.
Innis Lear itself grieved the terrible old man, despite his rejection of rootwater and magic, his injury to the land itself. The island wept and wailed, but still it did notspeak.
The king’s death should have been a triumph, a gleeful, malicious satisfaction sweet on Ban’s tongue. Instead, his stomach knotted anxiously.
Finally, there came the knock to summon him. Ban leapt at the door, composing himself once more as he was led through the narrow castle corridors. Despite broad windows, Gaela’s room was suffocating and closed up, brightened only by candles and firelight. The dark reds and blues and purples reminded Ban of nothing so much as the innards of a dying man, sprawled across a bloody battlefield. Perhaps that was exactly by design.
“Ban the Fox,” Gaela Lear said by way of greeting, and he liked that she used the name he’d earned, not his father’s bequest.
Ban had not been this near to the eldest daughter of Lear in years.
“Queen,” he said softly, giving her back the title that she, too, had earned.
Both Gaela and Regan sat already in tall-backed chairs, wine in a jug and plenty of steaming meat on their plates. It smelled delicious. Gaela gestured with greasy fingers for him to sit, to pour himself wine. She swallowed her bite. “We did not wait, so please do not worry about any formality now.”
Ban glanced to Regan, who’d bathed, and wore a dark dress of Gaela’s, tied tight enough to pucker at the eyelets, and bound with a wide pink belt in order to fit her slighter frame. The lady’s hair was braided simply in a loose crown, her face drawn still in grief. But her eyes were bright again. She nodded once to Ban, holding his gaze longer than was necessary; Gaela noticed this with narrowed eyes.
He could do nothing about that, and so sat, helping himself to the duck. Ban fed his suddenly voracious appetite while the fire crackled and wind blew hollow and high against narrow windows. Regan picked slowly at her plate, but Gaela finished and leaned back, and Ban knew it was a signal he should stop, too. He wiped his hands and drank deep of the dark wine. For courage.
The lady of Astore studied him, lounging back in her chair. Her dress was cut low and dyed so deep a purple it would be easy to imagine it only an extension of her skin. Some thick twists of hair, free of the white ribbons Gaela wore for mourning, had nestled against her neck and collar. “Well, Ban. You are the Earl Errigal now, besides a wizard, a soldier, and a spy. And my sister claims you’re hers.”
