Misery's Child (The Cadian Chronicles) Read online

  “My father asked me to stay close by in case you had need of me. No doubt when he does not find me, he will guess what has happened and will comfort your mother with that knowledge.”

  “Do you think so? Oh, this will be a long night! I hope Yanna is all right.”

  “She has the look of a woman who can take care of herself.”

  “Yes, I suppose she does.” She couldn’t dispel the image of her cadia-techa putting the knife to that man’s throat. Yanna had done it as expertly as Tesla dispatched hens and pigs bound for the dinner table. She wondered if Scearce had seen it. Some instinct told her not to speak of it. Yannamarie was cadia, and whatever a cadia did in the course of duty was no one’s business but her sisters. It was part of the creed that Yanna had drummed into her.

  He stood without speaking and walked to where the horse was tethered just outside their shelter. When he returned, he carried his saddle blanket.

  “You should rest.” He laid the blanket over her shoulders and retreated to the mouth of the cave. “I’ll keep watch.”

  “I don’t think I can sleep.” It occurred to her that perhaps he would prefer her silence to this senseless chatter. “But I’ll try to rest my eyes at least. Aren’t you going to be cold?”

  “No. I have my cloak.”

  She stretched out on the stones, pulling her rolled up wimple and kerchief under her head. They made a poor pillow, but the saddle blanket was thick and heavy, smelling comfortingly of horse and rider.

  “Talk to me, please. Just until I feel sleepy. I feel better when you’re talking.”

  “What should I talk about?” He did not turn towards her. All she could see was his back and the fine line of his shoulders.

  “Tell me about Jeptalla. I barely remember it, except for the flowers in your mother’s garden. Sometimes I dream of them.”

  “Yes.” He was quiet for a long moment. “She loved her garden. I think it took the place in her heart where other children should have been. But my entire kingdom is like a garden, in a way. In the spring, there are so many colors it hurts your eyes, trying to decide where to look. And in the summer, everything is a thousand shades of green.... I’m afraid I’m not a very gifted conversationalist.”

  “Don’t be silly. Besides, I don’t get to talk to many people.”

  His shape rocked with laughter. “So you have nothing to compare my conversation to? I’m grateful.”

  “I didn’t mean that!” Oh, surely, it was wrong that they laughed so easily together. One minute, they were painfully uncomfortable with each other, and then the next it was as if they were children again. “I’m sorry about your mother. She was very kind to me.”

  “She was kind to everyone.” He turned toward the night sky once more. “She enjoyed having you and your family at the Seat that summer. She said the echoes did not sound so lonely when they rang with the voices of many children.”

  “She wrote the most wonderful letters to my mother. She had a way of setting down words that sounded as if she was really speaking to you, right there in the same room.”

  “Really? What did she write about?”

  “Oh, everything and nothing. Mostly about you. The funniest one I remember was when you first started your swordsman’s lessons. She said you kept attacking the shooma stalks in the field, but that you were so very serious that she was afraid none of the crop would see harvest.”

  He laughed again, the sound sending the strangest tickle of warmth into her stomach. “I remember. I pretended they were Torian invaders. I didn’t know that mother knew about that.”

  “You must miss her dreadfully.”

  “I do. But the river flows on.”

  “Yes,” she said softly. “Much has changed since we last met in Margarie.”

  “Aye.” His words were edged with bitterness. “My mother and Jonil were both alive then.... I’m sorry about Jonil. I didn’t mean to bring that up.”

  “It’s all right. He was angry and unhappy during the last. But he was happy that summer. He thought the fair was glorious, so did I.” Her eyelids closed. “You bought me a peaberry tart with your own pocket coin, do you remember?”

  He laughed. “You gave it to Jonil. It made me angry at the time. You gave him anything he asked for. It made me wish I’d had a sister.... Do you miss him?”

  She thought long before she answered. It somehow seemed important to speak truthfully.

  “Sometimes. He was so unpredictable. One day he’d bring me a whole bushel of wild flowers so I could paint them. He’d spend hours describing the ships in the harbor since.... Well, I hardly ever get to see the harbor anymore. He knew I missed it. Then the next day, he’d step on my skirt just to hear it tear or say something awful or —oh, anything at all to be spiteful. But it just because he was so unhappy.”

  “What about your other brother? Paul?”

  “Oh, Paul is as sweet as a brother could be... Though he’s almost thirteen now, and has little time for his stuffy old sister.”

  “It would have been nice to have a brother, though Gordas—you remember Gordas? He is practically a brother to me. Or maybe a sister like you. Someone who hung on my every word the way you did Jonil’s. I don’t think he knew how lucky he was.”

  His flattery sounded sincere. She blushed in the dim firelight, thankful that her face was hidden. Nevertheless, it stung, somehow, to know that he had seen her only as sister. She was being a dolt. What had she wanted him to see her as?

  “It must have been lonely for you.”

  “More a kind of burden than anything else.” He sighed deeply. “Being the only child means you have to be everything. Do you know what I mean? I’m not putting it very well.”

  “No, no. I do understand. You’re the only one, so you must carry all their hopes and fears—”

  He turned towards her finally, his face eager. “Yes, that’s it exactly. Everything is piled onto me. Of course, you would understand.... I’ve been so stupid, talking on and on so. You need to rest. Go to sleep, Lilli.”

  “I’m not sleepy....”

  But she was and she did.

  ***

  It took no effort to stay awake; he wasn’t sure he would ever sleep again. As a man of twenty summers, Scearce was not unacquainted with desire but never had it shaken all his senses as it did now. The earlier twinges of his manhood, the stir of his blood at the sight of lovely maiden crossing the village green, had been but a pale intimation of this.

  By Oman, she was so beautiful. As delicate as any sprite in a calla mundie, as lovely as any flower that ever dared to bloom in the lush gardens of his own homeland. That first stolen glance had not prepared him for the sheer wonder of her with hair uncovered and unbound, her eyes moist and wide....

  Sweet Mother, I must stop thinking of her. I have held Oman’s bride in my arms and felt her heart beat against mine. Surely I have committed some sort of blasphemy.

  The first time they’d met, she’d been seven. Seven and as sturdy as a boy-child, running after him on strong legs whose chubby knees peeked out from beneath her short play skirts. She’d been a pretty child, yes, but sexless as an angel fallen from Oman’s heaven. Unlike other younger children he knew, she didn’t cry and whine all the time, not even when she stumbled and skinned her knees or elbows. She didn’t try to make him play with her dolls the way Whimal’s daughters did, always begging him to sit at the little table in the nursery and drink make-believe tea.

  The next time they’d met, she was barely ten summers along. She was beginning to grow tall and slender, her face having lost the baby fat of infancy. She no longer ran, having changed her play skirts for longer ones. But she still laughed, gaily and often. He had enjoyed her company far more than Jonil’s, who was already the kind of boy who liked to push and shove for no reason at all.

  He realized, guiltily, that neither of them had mentioned the two summer’s worth of letters that had passed between them. Or how they had stopped. By the beard, they must have written twice a fort
night, filling the pages with any and every thought that passed through their heads.

  And here she was again. Transformed and yet the same. Beautiful and yet not proud. Sweet and yet not simple. Charming and yet completely guileless. She seemed to have no idea of her effect on him. The innocence and trust in her wide, blue-green eyes had only made the fire inside burn hotter.

  A lock of your hair would be prize enough.... He could have bitten his tongue off in shame. How could he have said such a thing?

  Perhaps, he thought, he’d said it so plainly because he meant it. The truth in his heart had unlocked his tongue at long last.

  Did his mother ask him to stop writing to her before or after Lilli’s dedication? He did not know and didn’t dare ask Lilli. Oh, he must have loved her all along, a true match for his heart and soul who now stirred his body more than he had thought possible.

  But now she was already pledged to another with whom he dare not compete.

  Chapter 11: Lillitha’s Return

  She woke to find him sleeping a few feet away, still leaning against cold stone with his cloak wrapped about him. She sat up. The pressure of her bladder made her wince as much as the soreness of her back. The mean bedroll of the pilgrimage camp would seem a luxury after sleeping on rock.

  She sat for a moment, uncertain. She did not relish the idea of going out into the open alone, but neither did the dimmer recesses of their hiding place look particularly inviting. The cave continued around a sharp bend, gradually narrowing to an impassable fissure in the rock.

  Then she reasoned that if there were any wild animals in there, they would have shown themselves before now. She had no idea who or what might be outside. She crept as far into the cave as she dared and relieved herself, grimacing at the indelicacy.

  She felt much better as she returned and sat back down on the saddle blanket.

  She did not know how long she watched him sleep, perfectly content to study the lines of his face.

  Finally the sun crept into the mouth of the cave, falling with full force into his face. She saw his eyelids flicker, the long lashes twitching as wakefulness came to him. For a moment he looked at her as if he’d forgotten who she was. Then he smiled shyly and rubbed a hand over his face.

  He rose stiffly, his mouth tightening as he took a step.

  “Good morn to you, sir.”

  “Good morn to you, lady.”

  Suddenly they both laughed at how ridiculously formal they sounded, as if they were in a reception hall and not a grimy cave.

  “Excuse me.” He looked uncertain, his cheeks reddening. “I have to—um. Well, just excuse me for a moment. I’ll be right back.”

  “Where—? Oh,” she said lamely, realizing the meaning of his embarrassment. He obviously needed to relief himself just as she had. Her own face flushed and she turned quickly into the shadows of the cave as he ducked into the sunlight. She wondered just how much more intimate they could get.

  “Are you hungry?” he asked cheerfully as he returned. His hands rummaged in the saddlebags. “I still have that bread and the paggie.”

  She nodded. “Famished.”

  They shared the bits of food and passed the flask between them.

  “As soon as we find the rest, I’m going to find a scalding hot mug of tea,” she declared.

  “You can have the tea,” he grinned. “I could use a good stiff drink.”

  “Have I driven you to drink, then?” she teased.

  He grunted, chewing the hard bread. “Not you. The bandits. As long as you were awake, I had to at least pretend to be the brave rescuer. Then you fell asleep and I realized I had actually drawn my sword on Torian bandits. If I had stopped to think I never would have done it.”

  “Lucky for me that you did,” she said softly.

  “I didn’t mean—“ He looked stricken again. “I only —”

  “I know, Scearce.” She smiled at him gently. “I know what you meant.”

  He sighed.

  “Well, that hasn’t changed. You always did know what I really meant no matter how my tongue might mangle it. It’s only that I’ve never been in a fight before. Only drills and competition. I suppose that’s what the old veterans mean when they talk about battle blood.”

  “At least you know that you can do it,” she said. “Handle yourself well in the heat of the moment, I mean. My father always says that’s real courage—forgetting that you’re scared out of your mind long enough to do what’s needed. You certainly reacted better than I did.”

  “Oh, no,” he said hastily. Then he grinned again. “You were brave enough to bite one of them. It was probably lucky for that fellow that I hit him with the hilt of my sword when I did. No telling what damage you might have done to him if I hadn’t.”

  She shook her head. “No. Yanna told me to stay in the litter but I didn’t. I just panicked.”

  She thought, too, about the small dagger the cadia had pressed into her hands. She had not even thought about using it. She couldn’t have used it even to save her own life. She had dropped it somewhere outside the litter as soon as the hands had grabbed her.

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself. I’ve been trained to fight all my life. You weren’t.”

  She shrugged.

  She repaired her wimple and kerchief as best she could as Scearce saddled the horse. In the daylight, she saw that her burlang was streaked with dirt and one sleeve was ripped at the seams. What a sight she must make!

  He mounted and extended an arm, lifting her easily to sit in front of him on the horse. Last night she had scarcely been able to think but now she realized just how improper this was. She practically sat across his lap with her back pressed so hard against his chest that she could feel his heartbeat without even trying. She could feel, too, one hard muscled thigh against her buttocks, the other under the crook of her knees. Her legs, crossed as modestly as she could manage, dangled against one of his calves.

  She could sense his discomfort in the way he brought his arms gingerly around her to pick up the reins.

  Talking it made it easier not to think about it. So she talked.

  Conversation must have helped relax him as well, for he was far more talkative than he’d been last night, though his voice had a grim determination to it. After a time of awkwardness, she felt herself leaning into him, sinking into the rhythm of the horse’s gait instead of tensing against it.

  He talked about how silent his father had been since his mother’s passing. She nodded, remembering the silences at her own family’s house in the days that followed Jonil’s death.

  “He was always so loud,” he said. “My mother used to tell him to hush all the time, that she was standing just two jackles away, not two parsecs. After she died, he just... closed up. I don’t know. He wanders her gardens and sometimes I find him just sitting at her dressing table. He hardly talks to anyone.”

  “I know,” she said softly. “I never saw my father cry until the day of Jonil’s funeral. Then he just stood there, his arm around my mother, staring at the pyre with tears running down his cheeks. He didn’t make a sound, but it scared me, I think.”

  She felt him nod into her wimple.

  “We expect our father’s to be able to withstand anything,” he agreed. “I was so afraid of his grief, I didn’t even try to talk to him at first. It was as if I thought the sound of my voice might cause him to break somehow. I never thought of my father as breakable before. Why is it that sorrow makes it so hard to speak?”

  “I think it’s because when someone we love passes, we feel guilty that we are still here while they are not. Talking, smiling, eating. It all seems so wrong that we should go on as if nothing has changed.”

  Twice Scearce paused to check the direction, squinting into the steadily climbing sun and studying the lay of the land around them.

  “I know we came this way. I remember that hill and that dead fen tree over there —”

  “I don’t remember any of this. I must have had my eyes closed.”


  “Don’t worry, we’ll find them.”

  Finally they crested a small rise.

  “See? What did I tell you? Right where we left them.”

  “Rowle! Rowle! Come quickly!” Ersala wept and laughed at the same time, wringing her hands. “Lilli, are you really all right? Oman be praised, I cannot believe it—”

  It had taken longer than Scearce predicted to find them, but here they were, at last! Lillitha slipped down from the horse nimbly, intending to run to her mother. But as soon as her feet touched the ground, loss overwhelmed her and she could barely stand.

  How could she have dismounted so swiftly, so thoughtlessly! In one careless moment, she’d left him, without thinking. She looked up at him, but he was staring over her head, still as stone. It was as if last night and this morning had never happened.

  She realized abruptly that they had to act as though it had not. She was consecratia once more. She would never see Scearce again except in a crowd of onlookers. She would probably never be able to speak to him again.

  Her mother threw her arms about her, wetting her face with tears, then touching her gently all over as if to assure herself that Lilli was really safe and of one piece.

  “I’m all right, muma, really and truly.” People gathered around her, shouting praises to Oman and Mother Leah and laughing with relief. She was suddenly claustrophobic and clutched her torn veils around her as best she could. “Is everyone all right? Father and Paul, Marta? Iafrewn, is she safe?”

  Rowle shoved his way into the circle and grabbed her a fierce hug, lifting her feet from the ground. “Oh, my dearest child, thank Oman you are safe!”

  She giggled happily, not caring who saw her in the arms of her father or what they might think. She held to him tightly and kissed his rough cheeks with tears streaming down her own. Over his shoulder she spied Paul, beaming so widely that his face seemed about to break in two. Even Marta seemed to smile a little.