CHAPTER 39
“You’re upset with me?”
I don’t know why I asked him this, I already knew the answer. Jerris never got upset. Like our mother, his concern touched every thread crisscrossing my life. Yet, the weight of his disappointment was crushing me.
“No,” he said, and I scoffed. “I only ever wanted you to live.”
—Recounting from the private diary of Patriol, Dragonbound
SERAE
Late Autumn, Beymon 1036
I stood before Father in the family parlor, feeling fifteen again. He was seated in one of the plush armchairs before the fire. I kept my eyes downcast, and I held my tongue, clenching my jaw shut for good measure.
“What were you thinking?” he asked. His voice was low, but his tone was livid.
This wasn’t a question he wanted me to answer, so I kept my silence.
“I’ll tell you what—you weren’t. You can’t seriously expect me to believe the two of you have never gotten up to any dalliances with all the times he’s stayed at this house.”
“Tychon!” Mother hissed. She sat on one of the couches behind me, just out of view from where I stood.
“Enough! I don’t know what insane Rihtlondish tricks you’ve employed, but you’re going to go back to that boy and make this right. The arrangement is signed.”
“I won’t marry him,” I said, not raising my eyes.
“You will. You should’ve thought of that before you turned him away.”
My eyes snapped up, and I knew they were full of the rage I was failing to quell. “You would rather have had him force himself on me?”
“Of course not!” Mother cried out.
Father stood. He moved in close, looming over me and lowering his voice to a dangerous tone. “You watch how you speak to me, girl. I have given you more than you deserve. Going forward, you have two jobs. Please that idiot boy”—he paused, holding my eye—“and start giving me the truth.”
I furrowed my brow.
“Aye, yes. I know very well the game you’re playing.
I’ve been wise to you since you stopped using our code to send anything vital.
I was patient when you started sending nonsense—clothes and food and the like.
I gave you time to come to your senses and return to your true purpose.
It was you who failed to keep up the bargain.
It was you who forced my hand in allowing Ingleton to bring you home. ”
“Lord Ingleton wanted my return?” I asked.
He nodded. “Since you’ve been home, I’ve played along, giving you niceties and biding my time, but that time is up. You’ve had your chance, and you’ve squandered it.”
“I can’t just pretend to know things—”
His open hand flew across my face. My head snapped to the side as fire erupted down my cheek. I was no longer a stranger to pain, though. I turned back to him, unmoved and unimpressed.
“Really, Tychon,” my mother admonished, but she didn’t move to stop him.
“No more games,” he declared. “By this afternoon, you’ll have good information for me. Until then, you’re confined to your room. I suggest you use that time remembering where your loyalties lie.”
True to his word, I was led away and brought breakfast on a tray.
Locked in my room, I used my time exactly as he suggested—thinking about Eldreth and the Riht.
I ran through every dowsa I could, remembering the flow of each movement.
My injured arm ached and protested, but I ignored it as I moved through each form with controlled precision.
I paused only briefly when a lunch tray was brought up to me.
I laughed out loud at the irony of being brought a tray while trapped in my room now that I was back in Cavendaffe, my supposed home.
I sat on the floor, barefoot and cross-legged, and focused on my breath. When I had mastered the steadiness of my heart and the depth of my breathing, a knock sounded at my door.
“I’ve been asked to escort you to his lordship’s study,” Kiral said. Her face was pale.
I had expected this. I nodded and followed her downstairs to the back corner, where my father’s private study was tucked away from the rest of the house.
The curtains were drawn shut, allowing only scant strips of light to bounce off the walls and ceiling.
The sconces were lit despite the afternoon sun.
My father sat at his large, mahogany desk. At its center, a ledger with gold-dusted pages lay open, quill and ink at the ready. Across from his desk, a single chair had been placed.
“Sit,” he commanded as Kiral shut the door behind me.
I obeyed, collecting the red folds of my cote around me.
“We begin small.” He lifted his quill and opened the ink bottle, but he did not dip the nib. Instead, he looked up, analyzing me with his dark blue eyes. In this light, they might have been black. “Eldreth, son of Auldren. What is his role in Rihtlond?”
“Future dane.”
He scratched out a small note. “Any siblings?”
I hesitated. He didn’t look up, just waited with his quill poised. This was a test. He must already know that Dane has two sons. “Yes, a brother.”
“When were you last in contact with him?”
“The day I left Rihtlond.”
He nodded. His chair creaked as he leaned toward me. “This is a good beginning. I implore you to keep this level of honesty and forthrightness, and I daresay our conversations will be pleasant. Do you understand?”
I nodded and shifted in my seat.
“Our scouts have discovered two ports that lead to the city of Drakh. How many gates lead into the city?”
“Two. One to the east and one to the south.” The gate to the east they already knew about, and the gate to the south was the most defensible.
The margrave set down his quill. “I have it on good authority there are at least three.”
“I have seen only two.”
He frowned. “Let’s shift topics. Who leads their armies?”
“Dane Auldren.”
“I am sure the dane is ultimately responsible, but who is their commanding general?”
I froze. “I don’t know.”
He rose from his seat and moved around the desk to stand in front of me. “You have been in the heart of the keep where the dane of Rihtlond lives, and you have not seen the commander of his armies?” He crossed his arms and stared down at me.
“I’ve only seen Dane commanding them.” I widened my eyes and looked up at the margrave, hoping it made me look innocent. I’d seen Merria do it dozens of times before.
“You told us you’d been trained to use weapons. Who conducted that training?”
“A woman.”
He leaned back against his desk. “What was her name and station?”
“I don’t know.”
Smack!
I didn’t even see the blow coming. He backhanded me so fast that I couldn’t even brace. I rocked back in my chair as tears welled in my eyes. When I turned back to him, I spoke through gritted teeth. “We called all instructors Master. I was given neither names nor stations beyond this title.”
“Is that so?”
“Perhaps they trusted me even less than you do.”
“And perhaps they, too, grew tired of your cheek.”
I scowled and tapped my slippered foot on the rug, right over a swirling pattern of the Creator. It was one of several new and expensive rugs I’d found around the manor.
“Who was ‘we’?”
Shit. I clamped my mouth shut.
“Answer me, girl!” he shouted.
That was when the hitting began. It started small. The first few days brought more slaps across the face. When bruises developed along my cheeks, he began rapping my knuckles.
But on the fourth day, I entered Father’s study to find him holding a thin reed from the garden. I stared at him, unbelieving at first. Then, he bunched up the sleeve of my yellow cote and tied my arm to the chair, palm up. Dread seized me, and I yanked at the bindings.
“Do not force me to bind both your arms.” His voice was cold and uncaring, freezing me in place. He was really going to do this. He began with questions.
How many ships did you see at their port?
How big is their fleet?
How many men are in their armies?
I held my silence like a shield, but that didn’t stop the reed from snapping across my forearm.
I bit back my scream. Each blow left a stinging trail, and red welts formed into thin, angry lines.
My resolve had been steel—until that first blow.
Instead, fury pooled in my gut, lending me strength.
It was hardest, I learned, when the strikes landed on a joint.
The margrave rolled up the sleeves of his deep blue tunic. “This ends as soon as you allow it, girl. What claim do they have over you that you would rather betray your family and your kingdom than give in?”
“No claim.” My voice trembled only a little. “I have already told you everything I know. It is your choice to abuse me over what I cannot give.”
The reed cracked again, splitting skin this time. I cried out, and blood welled up along the cut.
My father knelt at my eye level. “This is for your own good. I know you’re holding onto more. The sooner you answer, the sooner we return to attending dinner parties and planning for a wedding. You hold the power here. Do you understand?”
I nodded. I understood perfectly that he would beat me senseless until he got what he wanted.
Perhaps I deserved it, making myself complicit in my father’s plans.
Could I not have defied him from the start, finding the courage to cast aside my role as spy before sending that first letter?
Without my help, would they have found the hidden port to launch an attack?
Or Drakh at all? Then again, I had never actually written about the small port.
My damning instructions should have sent them to the well-defended Port Drakha.
I thought of Eldreth, constantly fighting to protect his people, and hardened my resolve.
We never had the chance to work past my betrayal before I left, but I would never let him down again.
I would take ten thousand blows if it meant protecting him—and the Riht.
It was all I had left that I could control.