Chapter 9
Sleep had come uneasily to Drystan the last few nights, despite having Ceridwen in residence and playing music for him. That calmed him where little else did. Unfortunately, it didn’t fully ease the worries that kept him up until the late hours.
She was the curious sort, not content to sit idle in her rooms. The young woman liked to keep herself busy and had taken to helping the servants tend the vegetable garden, of all things. Most nobles would have frowned on such unladylike behavior, he supposed, but he admired her willingness to get dirt under her nails, the drive to do something, even so small as picking cabbages. He’d watched in secret the first time she ventured into the gardens. The glass roof overhead trapped the warmth of the sun. Between that and the heat from the kitchens below, the lush courtyard garden sprouted life through the harshest of winters like the one when he’d arrived. It was a marvel, even to someone like him raised in the capital.
The servants said Ceridwen sometimes asked about him as they worked. It both pleased and annoyed him. Digging into his past wouldn’t do any of them any good. In fact, it would only make seeking his revenge harder. Sheltered as she was in this northern city on the edge of nowhere, she didn’t know the horrors the capital wrought, the tangible darkness seeping through the streets and taking innocents down with it, or worse, twisting them to its own ministrations. He’d been a foolish young man once, caught up in the pleasures of life and blinded to everything around him. By the time he saw the darkness worming its way into his life, it was too late, and his family paid the price. Before he was forced to return to the capital at midwinter, per the king’s command, he needed a solution to his problem. It was close. So close. But if he couldn’t conquer the mess of his soul, which Ceridwen’s music eased, it wouldn’t be possible. He’d lose perhaps his one chance at salvation.
Conversation floated through the halls, reaching him before its speakers.
“—put him off much longer,” Kent lamented, his voice carrying around the corner.
“He is the mayor,” Jackoby touted. “He’s in his right to worry.”
“One day, he’ll bring half the regiment with him and force an audience.”
“Not if the king sends them south.”
“You think he would?” Kent asked. “Not that there’s much risk from invaders up here.”
Drystan nearly snorted. To the north lay only some rogue settlements along the icy fjords—their citizens a people unto themselves. They never ventured south, and the residents of Castamar wisely saw nothing but bitter cold and misery in the north. That kept peace in itself. Not that there was anything to capture in this backwater city anyway.
“It’s what Mayor Evans claimed.”
“It’s distressing if what the mayor claimed about the counsel is true,” Jackoby said. “The king dismissing them doesn’t bode well.”
“That wretch,” Kent growled. “We’d all be better off if he tripped over his royal boots and broke his neck.”
“What is this about the counsel?” Drystan asked, rounding the corner and coming face-to-face with Jackoby and Kent. The mayor had demanded an audience again this morning—he’d sent them instead.
Kent paled. Jackoby swallowed thickly before answering. “The mayor says they’ve been dismissed. The king rules without counsel.”
Drystan tightened his gloved hand into a fist. Of course he does. He shouldn’t be surprised. The king had lusted for power, for the throne, even before his brother perished and the former king’s heir was executed for causing his death and becoming corrupted by darkness. Ironic, considering the king was the worst offender of embracing dark magic and the power it offered. But dismissing the counsel was a blatant grab at unchecked rule. How could the people not see the tyrant in front of them?
“And you chose to discuss this in the halls? While we have a guest in residence?” Drystan crossed his arms, staring the men down.
“Apologies, my lord.” The men echoed one another.
The information itself wasn’t important—this time, but such slipups were risky. Ceridwen was an outsider, a sweet young woman, but one wrong bit of information whispered to the wrong ear could be his doom. Jackoby and Kent knew that well.
“My lord!” Another servant raced down the hall.
Immediately, the fine hairs rose on the back of Drystan’s neck. “What is it?”
The young man skidded to a stop, breathing hard.
The mayor?Kent mouthed to Jackoby.
Drystan clenched his teeth as he waited for the servant to speak. It better not be that ridiculous man.
“Trouble at the gate, my lord,” the younger man replied. “A young man demanding to see Miss Ceridwen.”
Drystan’s brows stretched upward. That, he did not expect. A lover? His mood soured at the thought.
“Gwen has already gone to retrieve her, but he’s quite upset and causing a scene.”
A low grumble rumbled in his chest. Yet another problem he didn’t need. “I’ll deal with this.”
Fury simmered under his veins as he stalked down the hall.
Jackoby rushed to follow, falling into a hurried pace at Drystan’s side. “Let me handle this, my lord.” The older man was always quick to sense Drystan’s temper and try to intervene. It was one of the reasons he trusted him so. He knew too well what could happen if Drystan gave in to his baser urges.
The thought of having to dismiss Ceridwen, to lose her music and her presence he’d come to enjoy, angered him beyond reason. But if she had some lover that was going to be a constant pain and storm the gates, he might have little choice.
Drystan and Jackoby reached the side entrance to the yard in time to see Ceridwen rush from the main doors and head with haste toward the man slamming his hands against the bars of the gate. He was young, with dark hair and wearing the military regalia of the city watch.
“Her brother?” Drystan mused aloud. The thought brought him up short.
“Perhaps,” Jackoby replied. “Let me handle this, my lord.”
For once, Drystan agreed. He nodded, sliding back into the shadows and watching from the doorway. Somehow, the thought of the man being her brother, not some desperate lover, changed things. He tuned his senses to the conversation and listened.
“Did Father not tell you?” Ceridwen implored.
“He told me everything,” the man replied. “But you can’t stay here. It’s improper, even if he’s our Lord Protector. Having you stay within his manor like this is wrong.” He dipped his hand to the pommel of the narrow sword sheathed at his side.
The act had Drystan’s lips pulling back in a snarl.
“Please don’t cause a scene, young sir,” Jackoby commanded, advancing on the gate.
“Let my sister go.”
Drystan rolled his shoulders, releasing some of the tension stringing him tight. Definitely her brother, then. He tried to recall his name. Adair, was it?
“I chose to be here. I’m staying.” Ceridwen crossed her arms and stared her brother down.
Unexpected warmth spread through Drystan’s chest, a protectiveness of this woman who would choose to stay despite his rules.
“Don’t mess this up for me,” she implored. “Not now.”
But she might as well have not spoken at all. Adair drew his sword and pointed the tip between the bars at Jackoby.
The barely leashed fury of minutes ago flared back to life within him.
How dare he? Brother or not.
“Please go,” Ceridwen begged.
“You cannot be serious,” Adair replied, not lowering his blade. “What have they done to you?”
“Nothing. I’m fine here.” Ceridwen stepped closer to her brother, the blade barely inches from her face. Too close. Far too close.
Something in Drystan snapped, and he found himself racing across the yard with inhuman speed.
“I can’t just leave—” Adair’s words cut off, his gaze flying wide as it settled on him where he stopped behind Ceridwen.
“You can.” Drystan wrapped an arm around Ceridwen, pulling her back from the gate and against his chest. She gasped, going absolutely still at his touch.
“You will,” he continued.
“You just… From where…” Adair stuttered as his shaky sword clanked against the bars. He shook his head, recovering quickly. Instead of retreating, as any wise man would do, the arrogant idiot slid his sword farther between the bars. “Let my sister go.”
Drystan flexed his arm around Ceridwen, cradling her tight against him until he could feel the racing of her heartbeat and hear her sharp little intakes of breath. She stared at her brother, unspeaking and still, possibly in shock.
“You should listen to your wise sister and leave us,” Drystan said. “She chose to come here. If she wants to leave—”
“I don’t,” she snapped.
The strength in her resolve shivered through him, igniting a desire low within his abdomen that he did not expect. Something about her made him almost feral, possessive.
Adair adjusted his grip as his lips pulled back from his teeth in a snarl. Metal inched forward.
No more of this.
Drystan backhanded the tip of the sword with all his strength, bending the metal such that it did not return to its proper form.
“You dare raise your blade at me and those under my keeping?” Drystan demanded.
Ceridwen shivered against him, leaning farther into his embrace. “Please, Adair…” she begged, a breathy wobble to her voice.
He hadn’t meant to scare her, this delicate woman unaccustomed to the strength his kind could possess, but he needed to send a message to her brother.
Adair jerked the sword from the metal bars. “If anything happens to her”—he tilted the sword up again—“I’ll come back with a new sword, and not alone.”
Laughter filled the air and vibrated through his chest. “Please do.” Let him try.
Wisely, Adair held his tongue, though his lips pulled thin before his gaze sought his sister’s. “I’m sorry, Ceridwen… That you had to come here, to degrade yourself like this… I…”
“Thank you,” she whispered, her voice so weak he feared she might faint.
When Adair was some distance away, Drystan slowly released Ceridwen from his embrace. There was a reluctance to let her go, but he’d already held her far longer than he really should, the closeness stirring up all sorts of inappropriate ideas.
“Back inside,” Drystan ordered. “Everyone.”
Kent and Gwen waited just inside the main entrance.
Gwen stopped pacing when Jackoby closed the main doors, her eyes glassy. “I’m so sorry, my lord. Her brother was putting up such a fuss. We didn’t want to attract unwanted attention. I thought that if Ceridwen could calm him down and send him on his way without—” She sniffled.
Drystan sighed. Once he might have flown into a rage, but something about holding Ceridwen close had calmed the dark desires within him.
“If perhaps you’d let me out to visit—” Ceridwen began.
“That would only garner attention.” Drystan whirled on her, suddenly annoyed. The young woman stepped back, clearly on edge, and that sight instantly killed his fury. “Do you want people asking why you, and only you, are allowed in?” he asked more calmly. “Inquiring about me and my staff at length? Demanding knowledge?”
She stepped back again, her brows pinching together. “What are you afraid of?”
So much, Ceridwen. More than I hope you ever have to know. But he couldn’t tell her that. Not only because it could compromise him and his purpose, but it might alter the easy companionship they’d settled into over the past few days while she played music for him.
“Should we expect anyone else storming our gates? Family members? Suitors?” he asked, voice gravelly and quiet.
She shook her head. “No, I don’t believe so. You’ve met all my family now, and I have no suitors.”
The comment stirred up a mess of both sorrow and joy that he couldn’t quite sort out. “Take Miss Ceridwen back to her room,” he said. “She’s had a trying morning.”
As had they all. With any luck, they’d avoid more visitors for a while.