Treason Keep

have not been met to my satisfaction.”

“Call it what you like, your Highness, I imagine Cratyn will consider it treason.” Damin drank his wine thoughtfully. “That’s what they call this place you know – Treason Keep. Rather appropriate, don’t you think?”

Nice, Adrina reminded herself. I have to be nice. He’ll send me back to Karien in a heartbeat unless I can convince him to protect me.

“I... I cannot return to Karien, my Lord.” She lowered her eyes as she spoke and made sure she added a touching catch to her voice.

“Why not?”

“My life there was intolerable.”

“So you fled to Medalon dressed as a court’esa, accompanied by nothing more than a slave and a child?”

“I just wanted to escape. I didn’t really stop to think.” Now that was the truest thing she’d ever said. If she’d stopped to think, she wouldn’t be in this predicament.

He obviously didn’t believe a word she said. “There are those who think this alliance is merely a ruse, that your father is simply aiding the Kariens so he can cross into Medalon and then turn south into Hythria.”

“Well, if he is, it’s news to me.” Adrina sipped her wine to hide her alarm. Was Hablet’s treacherous nature so famous that a Hythrun could read him so easily? She composed her features before continuing. “The Defenders don’t have the troops to fight a war on two fronts. If you release me immediately, when I reach Talabar, I will speak to my father. I should be able to stay his hand.”

“Perhaps,” Damin said doubtfully.

Adrina wasn’t sure what else she could do to convince him. “I’ve no love for Karien, my Lord. I just want to go home.”

“Does Cratyn know you were planning to leave him?”

“No. After I discovered what had happened to my troops I made some rather foolish threats. It was then that I decided I should leave.”

“Are you with child?”

“Of course not! What a stupid question!”

“Oh? If you were with child, and Cratyn has his eye on your father’s throne, you might simply be taking the shortest route home, to ensure the child is born on Fardohnyan soil.”

Damn him! Where had he gotten that idea? How could some ill-bred warlord from a thousand leagues away see things so clearly?

“Cratyn had some... difficulty... in fulfilling his conjugal duties.”

To her surprise, he laughed with genuine humour. “Poor Cratyn. An inexperienced Karien princeling is no match for a court’esa-trained Fardohnyan princess.”

“No match at all, I fear.”

For a fraction of a second, they were not enemies, but conspirators, sharing laughter at the expense of a hated adversary. The moment lasted just long enough for an uncomfortable silence to descend between them.

“I don’t trust you, Adrina. You’re trying to play both ends against the middle. You claim to be running home, yet a week ago you were standing at Cratyn’s side, throwing your troops into battle for him. You are allied in marriage with Karien on one hand, while offering to hold back your father’s troops with the other. You expect me to believe Cratyn doesn’t know where you are. I know he’s inexperienced, but nobody is that stupid. Your story is so full of holes I could use it as a fishing net.”

“Perhaps the intricacies of politics are beyond you, my Lord,” she suggested with saccharine sweetness, forcibly hiding her annoyance. Her tale had sounded quite reasonable when she’d tried it out on Tamylan. She never expected a Hythrun to have even a basic grasp of politics.

“I understand you better than you think. You’re Hablet’s daughter. Treachery has been bred into you.”

“Don’t make the mistake of judging me by my father.”

“I’m not likely to. I have a feeling you are far more dangerous.”

For some contrary reason, his comment pleased her. “You can’t keep me here forever, my Lord. Eventually you will have to release me.”

“Not until I’m good and ready, your Highness. And not until I can see a profit in it.”

“I do not intend to sit here and wait upon your mercenary pleasures, my Lord,” she retorted, silently cursing her temper. Be nice.

“I suggest you rethink your position, your Highness. Right now, you can wait on my mercenary pleasures, or you can go back to your husband. Neither prospect bothers me unduly.”

Adrina did not answer. She sipped her wine to hide her expression, afraid that Damin Wolfblade meant exactly what he said.

Nice, she said silently. I have to be nice to him.

“I have asked for your protection, my Lord,” she said with a demure smile. “Is that too much to ask?”

“The Kariens are prepared to go to war over the death of an Envoy, your Highness. I hate to think what they’ll do over their crown princess.”

“But you could protect me,” she suggested with wide-eyed admiration. In her experience, there were few men who could resist a woman who believed in him so ardently.

Damin Wolfblade was apparently one of them.

“Protect you? And while we’re protecting you from the wrath of the Kariens, your Highness, who’s going to protect us from you?”

Chapter 35

Mounted on sorcerer-bred Hythrun horses, R’shiel and her companions reached the small village of Lilyvale in time for dinner on the first day. Joyhinia, Mahina and Affiana rode in a covered wagon, one Garet suggested they replace with something more auspicious as they neared the Citadel. Although the wagon slowed them a little, Joyhinia was incapable of sitting a horse safely, so they sacrificed speed for the assurance that the First Sister would reach the Citadel in one piece.

R’shiel rode with Brak for most of the way, letting the horse set its own pace as she listened to him explain the dangers of drawing on her power to bend others to her will. If he was trying to scare her, he succeeded, but he said nothing to change her mind. There simply wasn’t enough time to reach the Citadel and convince the Quorum to accept Joyhinia’s resignation and Mahina’s appointment any other way.

Garet Warner rode with them for a time. He had, somewhat reluctantly R’shiel thought, agreed with her plan, despite Tarja’s objections. The discussion regarding this trip to the Citadel, held hastily and heatedly as the Medalonians prepared for the coming battle, had been strained. R’shiel was fairly certain that if she had waited until after the battle, Jenga and Mahina would have objected, and certainly Tarja, with Brak’s assistance, would have found any number of ways to prevent it. As it was, everyone was so distracted by the knowledge that the Kariens were on the move that her desperate plan was spared close scrutiny.

“The gods’ power is the power of all things natural,” Brak was saying, sounding just like Korandellan. “It’s at its most effective when used to enhance a natural occurrence.”

“A convenient way of getting around the facts,” Garet said.

“The gods are a natural force, Commandant.”

“So anything can happen, and you blame a god for your misfortune. Don’t you people have free will?”

Brak appeared to be enjoying the conversation with the atheist Defender. He seemed to forget about R’shiel. “Kalianah can make two people fall in love, but not against their will. Dacendaran can encourage a thief to steal, but he could not easily make a thief of an honest man.”

“You truly are adept at seeing miracles in the mist,” Garet remarked.

R’shiel listened to the men and realised Brak had not forgotten about her at all. He was trying to remind her of the dangers of what she was planning to do. The gods could amplify a yearning or bring about an event that