Page 86 of The Priory of the Orange Tree

They stood in silence for some time.

“Do not think me unaware of your intentions,” Roslain said. “I know full well what you are doing. As does Lady Katryen.”

“I was not aware that I had given you offense, my—”

“Do not take me for a fool. I see you moving closer to the queen. I see you trying to curry favor with her.” Her eyes were dark as sapphires in the gloom. “Lady Truyde has said that you are a sorceress. I cannot think that she would make such an accusation without reason.”

“I took the spurs and the girdle. I renounced the false faith of the Dawnsinger,” Ead said. “The Knight of Fellowship tells us to embrace the converts. Perhaps you should listen to him better, my lady.”

“I am the blood of the Knight of Justice. Be careful how you address me, Mistress Duryan.”

Another silence rang between them.

“If you truly care for her,” Roslain said, softer, “I take no issue with your new standing. Unlike many Inysh, I have nothing against converts. We are all equal in the eyes of the Saint. But if you only seek gifts and riches, I will see to it that you are cut from her side.”

“I seek no gifts or riches. Only to serve the Saint as best I may,” Ead said. “Can we not both agree that no more of her friends should be cut from her side?”

Roslain looked away.

“I know Loth was fond of you,” she said, with what Ead could see was a degree of difficulty. “For that, I must think the best of you.” With still more difficulty, she continued: “Forgive my caution. It is wearisome to watch the spiders that surround her, who only think to climb the—”

A cry rose from the Royal Bedchamber. Ead spun to face the door, heart thumping.

She had no movement from the wardings. No cutthroat could have entered that chamber.

Roslain stared at her, lips parted, eyes wide. Ead took the key from Roslain’s frozen hand and ran up the steps.

“Hurry, Ead, open it,” Roslain shouted. “Captain Lintley! Sir Gules!”

Ead turned the key in the lock and flung open the door. The fire burned low in the hearth.

“Ead.” A shape moved on the bed. “Ead, Ros, please, youmustwake Arbella.” Sabran, ravels of hair escaping her braid. “I woke and reached for her hand, and it was so cold—” She sobbed. “Oh, Saint, say it is not so—”

Captain Lintley and Sir Gules Heath appeared at the door, swords drawn. “By the Saint, Lady Roslain, is she hurt?” Heath barked.

While Roslain hastened to her queen, Ead circled to the other side of the bed, where a small figure lay beneath the coverlet. Even before Ead searched in vain for a pulse, she knew. A terrible hush descended as she moved away.

“I am sorry, Your Majesty,” she said.

The two men bowed their heads. Roslain began to weep, one hand over her mouth.

“She did not see me wed,” Sabran said faintly. A tear ran down her cheek. “I promised her she would.”

18

East

The journey to the capital was hideous. Niclays was jounced along for days in the stuffy palanquin with little to do but doze, or squint at bits of scenery between the wooden blinds.

Ginura lay north of the Bear’s Jaw, the mountain range that guarded Cape Hisan. The trade road cleaved to the foothills before it struck a crossway.

Ever since the day Niclays had arrived in Seiiki, it had been his dream to visit Ginura. Back then, he had been grateful for the chance to live in a place few Westerners would ever see.

He remembered being called to Brygstad Palace, where Leovart had broken the news that Sabran had ordered his expulsion from Virtudom. He had thought her rage quenched after Seyton Combe had questioned him at length in the Dearn Tower about his misuse of Berethnet money. Naïvely, he had believed it would be a short exile.

Only after the third year had he understood that the tiny house on the edge of the world was to be his final resting place. That was when he had stopped dreaming of discovery, and had dreamed only of home. Now he could feel his old curiosity in the world awakening.

On the first night of the journey, they stopped at an inn in the foothills, where Niclays bathed in a hot spring. He looked at the far-off lights of Cape Hisan, and the ember that was Orisima, and for the first time in close to seven years, he started to feel as if he could breathe again.

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