Chapter 41
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
EVONY
The last letter would have arrived in Krestwood, where you should be by now. I wish you’d write back.
Evony – Aedrialis, Sultira
My legs dangled over the stone edge of the balustrade as I dug into a turkey leg and watched the soldiers spar in the courtyard below.
Summer had landed, and I savored the warmth that plunged into the capital.
I wiped the juicy fat from my lips as my gaze found its way back to the warriors below.
A lone cloud broke from the sky, casting a bright net of sunshine into the courtyard below, and to my great pleasure, urged the shirts off the back of the fighters.
My brows rose as their sweaty muscles shone, their powerful bodies twisting as they launched themselves at each other.
This was not a bad way to spend an afternoon.
I tossed my turkey bone to the side and crossed one thigh over the other as I leaned forward to enjoy the show.
“Soldier!”
I jumped as Ronan’s voice barked from the corner of the courtyard. The high steward strode around the fighters, aiming for just beneath where I sat. His light brows were narrowed, and his lips drew a hard line.
Wonder what got his breeches in a bundle…
My eyes darted around, snagging on the handsome fighter who stood just under the overhang of my balustrade.
Damn, how did I miss Vander?
I slid my legs around, slipping behind the thick railing and crouching to hear better.
“Where the hell have you been? This is the second shift you’ve missed this week,” Ronan snapped. “I shouldn’t have to tell someone who grew up in Aedrialis that there should never be an empty watch post on the walls.”
“I’m so sorry, sir,” Vander replied, his voice bent with sincerity. “It won’t happen again. I swear.”
“Good,” Ronan muttered, his voice softening slightly. “Don’t forget, we need you outside the doors for the council meeting tomorrow evening.”
“Will Evony be there?” Vander asked.
My stomach just about dropped out from my ass. Butterflies chased its departure, and I craned my neck to hear better as silence slipped through the space.
“Why do you want to know if Evony will be there?” Ronan asked quietly.
“I just—”
“You’ve been spending quite a bit of time with her,” Ronan cut in. “Need I remind you where your duties lie?”
“No, sir,” Vander said quickly. “I just enjoy her company.”
My heart jumped, and I smiled.
“Vander,” Ronan warned in a low voice, “Evony is only sixteen. She’s too young for a soldier your age.”
My stomach pitched.
What in the actual FUCK, Ronan?
Vander was what? A year older than Lyvia? So he’d be twenty-five or twenty-six? Honestly, who gives a shit? And I’d be seventeen in just a month. I was going to murder the high steward…
“Young…” Vander mused, his voice becoming lethally quiet. “Some may say she’s too young to be a high steward’s ward. Unless there are other reasons you’re keeping her so close.”
I blanched.
What the fuck?
My mind reeled. Ronan would definitely be too old for me at thirty. I shook my head. No, Ronan had never looked at me like that, had never flirted. In fact, I had to beg for him to let me stick around longer than he felt necessary in these meetings…
“What are you implying?” Ronan asked, a sharpness edging his words.
“I’m implying that some leaders in this kingdom might…question,” Vander said softly, letting the word dangle, “why a high steward they did not choose keeps a girl so young close at hand.”
My stomach tangled. Was Vander threatening Ronan? I shook my head at the abrupt shift in his demeanor. He’d been so kind to me since his arrival, and he now spoke to Ronan with such spite. My heart lurched at the whiplash.
I had to get the hell out of here… I shouldn’t be listening to this. A bead of sweat slid down my brow as I twisted and hurried into Mount Telum.
Marian’s fingers scribbled across the parchment before sliding it over to me. I stared at the arithmetic problem and willed myself not to grimace. I hated these studies.
The last golden ray of the sunset slipped beyond the angle of the sole window in the small room, and Marian stood to light a few more tapers. I begrudgingly turned back to the problem, running the numbers through my head before dipping my quill and scratching the first answer.
Marian had insisted Ronan allow at least two hours for daily study, despite formal education for girls ending at age fourteen in Sultira—one of many things Ronan planned on changing.
I slid the paper back to her, and she slipped on her spectacles, pinching her brows before giving a firm nod. Good enough, I guess.
I rubbed the exhaustion from my face as she cleared the table of today’s work. My mind replayed the conversation I’d overheard at the sparring courtyard. Why did their argument leave me so edgy?
“You all right?”
My periphery caught on the last of Marian’s hand movements, and I shrugged, not wanting to talk about it. Why was it so hard to feel comfortable here? I missed the mountains. I felt more at home when I was trekking through the tunnels with Gork.
Ronan had been a comforting presence since Ezrich and Drystan left on their errand. And ever since Vander arrived… Gods, I’d spend any free moment I could get with him, but after overhearing their conversation… My stomach wound in a weird mixture of nerves and anxiety. What they’d both implied…
“Join me to visit Father Marcus?” Marian asked, her brows softening as she scanned my face.
I dragged my eyes to hers, and she slipped a stray strand of gray hair behind her ear before crossing her arms.
My brows narrowed.
“Why do you take care of him?” I asked, arching a brow, certain I was stomping on eggshells. Marian could be prickly. But why should I open up if she wouldn’t?
Marian’s jaw feathered before she dropped her gaze to the floor, as if considering. She frowned as she stared at the stone tiles.
“Father Marcus was my husband’s brother,” she finally replied. Her soft brown eyes shifted back to mine. “It’s been twenty-five years since my husband learned of the tribute, and he decided to leave the Order of the Death Scholars. Marcus urged him to keep quiet about it.”
A glossy sheen coated her lower lids as she heaved a sigh.
“He didn’t,” she finally signed. “And we were targeted for the next tribute.”
My lips parted as I stared at Marian in a new light, someone who had been on the run from Sultira for twenty-five years…
“But you escaped,” I murmured, realizing we had that in common.
“Because of a friend.” She nodded, a fat tear plopping to the stone ground as she blinked. “My husband didn’t make it.”
“I’m sorry,” I muttered, unsure what else to say. “I get it now. Father Marcus is family.”
Marian’s head hung for a moment.
“I’ll come with you,” I finally said, standing and leading us to the door.
My thumb ran across the jagged surface of my lucky arrowhead, the comforting sensation quelling the anxiety that had filled me since eavesdropping. Its weight plopped into the deep pocket of my tunic as I reached for the door to Father Marcus’s chamber.
Marian strode to his bed in the corner, adjusting the sheets and tucking them neatly beneath the thin mattress.
The old priest’s frail form stuck beneath the sheet like a mourning shroud over a skeleton.
Lyvia’s mentor had continued to lose weight in the months we’d taken Aedrialis back from King Saros.
I moved to the counter, setting down the basket of strawberries we’d snagged from the center city market earlier in the day.
My eyes caught on the bottle of winter wine.
I tipped its contents into the pewter goblet sitting next to it, glancing over my shoulder to ensure Marian was occupied with her brother-in-law.
Sometimes, it was better to ask forgiveness than permission.
I brought the goblet to my lips, inhaling the spicy-sweet wine, just before Marian’s scream ripped across the stone walls. My stomach knotted at the sound, and I whirled around, moving my hand to the dagger at my belt.
Marian’s knees crashed to the floor beside Father Marcus, whose hazy eyes stared at the ceiling. His gaunt mouth hung open, his jaw twisted to the side in a silent scream wrenched from his unmoving lips.
The pewter goblet slipped from my fingers, the deep red of the winter wine spraying across the floor in a crimson pool as Marian wept over Father Marcus’s dead body.