Quintana of Charyn

She felt Quintana’s strange gaze and met it. Months on the mountain had made Phaedra less afraid of bullies and no people knew how to intimidate her more than the Monts. But as she returned Quintana’s stare, all Phaedra saw was that the mother of their future King was nothing but a broken, bloodied girl.

‘I think he’s dead,’ the Princess said quietly.

Phaedra froze. ‘The babe?’

The Princess shook her head.

Phaedra waited, gently scrubbing Quintana’s face clean.

‘I looked back once,’ the Princess continued, ‘and counted eight arrows, and I heard his cries and saw his spirit fight to leave his body.’

Phaedra was confused. She had heard the Princess tell Rafuel that the father of her child, the heir Tariq of Lascow, had been slaughtered in the underground caves of the Citavita. Who was this ‘he’ she was speaking of?

‘Is there a chance that Tariq of Lascow is alive?’ Phaedra asked, hope in her voice.

‘Tariq’s dead,’ Quintana said. ‘I saw his corpse. I saw them all. They died protecting me … protecting this,’ she said, pointing to her belly. ‘Maybe I’ll see your corpse, Phaedra of Alonso. Everywhere I go, I leave behind corpses.’ There were tears of fury in the girl’s eyes. ‘I left him behind, dying.’

Phaedra failed to hide a shudder. ‘Who are you speaking of?’ she dared to ask. She thought of Rafuel’s warning on the day Quintana of Charyn had entered their life. The less they knew, the better it was for them all.

‘Who, if not Tariq of Lascow?’ Phaedra persisted.

The Princess leaned forward, pressing her lips against Phaedra’s ear. Phaedra smelt the stench of hare’s blood.

‘Froi of Lumatere.’

Phaedra stumbled back into the water, stunned. She remembered the story she had heard of the rescue in the Citavita. He had swung through the air to save Quintana. The audacity of his actions had made Phaedra like Froi even more than she had the one or two times they had met on the mountain. She knew what he meant to Lucian and Tesadora, as well as Perri, the guard who shared Tesadora’s bed. Some said the Queen and her consort loved the lad as if he were a brother.

And then Phaedra remembered Rafuel’s strange words: Did you mate with the lastborn?

‘Is he the father?’ she asked, horrified. ‘Froi of Lumatere?’

‘Don’t let me have to kill you for knowing that, idiot girl,’ Quintana threatened. ‘Don’t let me hear you speak it out loud to those parrots in the cave.’

‘Then why tell me?’ Phaedra cried, getting to her feet and following the stepping stones across the stream to get as far away from the girl as possible. She couldn’t bear the idea of what the Lumateran’s death would do to those on the mountain and beyond. Worse still, it would mean true war between the two kingdoms.

When they returned to the cave, Phaedra heard the hushed fighting in an instant. They called it their prison. It was a small shrinehouse that from the outside looked like any other cave, much like those upstream, half- concealed with shrubs and vines. But once inside, there were two chambers. The larger one was dedicated to the Goddess Sagrami, a fact that unnerved them all. Sagrami was the goddess of blood and tears and was said to have cursed Lumatere. It was also further proof that despite Phaedra’s people being allowed in the valley, the earth still belonged to their Lumateran neighbours. Through a narrow walkway, the cave opened up to another smaller chamber. It had a wind hole that gave a view of downstream, but most of the time they kept it covered with vines and shrubs to keep out the cold. No one dared sleep in the shrine room, so here they were, living in too small a space for five women who could hardly endure each other’s company.

‘I can’t stand this,’ Phaedra heard Ginny cry. ‘I didn’t ask to save Charyn. When Rafuel returns I’m going to ask him to tell Gies that I’m alive. I don’t like being without my man.’

‘From the flirting I saw the fool do with those Mont girls, I dare say he’ll cope,’ Cora said in a nasty tone.

Cora loved nothing more than riling Ginny, whose only sense of worth came from having a man. Phaedra had known girls like Ginny in Alonso. The type who rarely took the side of women in an argument. They feared it would make them unpopular in the eyes of men. She remembered Ginny in the camp and realised that most of the acquaintances the girl had struck up were with the camp leaders Gies seemed drawn to.

‘You’re a liar,’ Ginny shouted at Cora, who was still taunting her about the Mont girls.

‘And you’re one of the greatest idiots I’ve come across, and believe me when I say I’ve come across many.’

‘Enough!’ Phaedra said from the entrance. ‘Our voices will carry upstream.’

They stared at the Princess over Phaedra’s shoulder.

‘Tell her to stay put,’ Cora said.

‘You’ll have to tell her yourself, Cora,’ Phaedra said firmly. ‘She’s not deaf to your voice, you know. Now, enough of this fighting. We have a little king to protect.’

‘If you ask me, the only thing keeping her alive is that little king,’ Ginny said. ‘That’s what my Gies would say.’

‘Shut it, you idiot girl,’ Cora said.

‘You shut it. You’re an ugly hag. There were women in my village just like you. Hags with nothing left to offer a man.’

‘Well, it’s a good thing the men in the village had you,’ Cora said.

‘Shut up, both of you,’ Jorja hissed. ‘I’d crawl through those sewers one hundred times over not to have to listen to any of you.’

This was Phaedra’s life now and she wondered what she had done to the gods for them to punish her in such a way. And in the corner, Quintana of Charyn sat staring at her, shaking her head. Phaedra recognised the look directed at her. She had seen it on the mountain before she had proven her worth. It was disappointment. You’re useless, Phaedra. Useless.

She closed her eyes and went to sleep with the sound of Florenza’s retching in her ears. And a small part of her begged the gods not to let her wake.

Chapter 5

Froi was summoned to see the elder of the compound, Simeon of Nebia. The Priest had come to visit him once when he lay injured and in pain, but Froi remembered little of that time except for the constant questions regarding Quintana’s whereabouts.

But this time Froi was well enough to visit the leader’s residence and it was the first time he was able to study the underground galleries. They were unlike Tariq’s compound under the Citavita. Here the ceilings were high and the rooms were wide. Froi could see that they had not always been a hiding place. The archways seemed about six feet high and large enough for a pushcart to fit through them. The walls were made of limestone and Arjuro had mentioned the galleries were once used to quarry chalk.

They entered a long, wide corridor with a dozen or so small alcoves on either side where the collegiati slept. In each cubicle was a bedroll, a stool and books scattered around. The passageway led to another cavern referred to as the chamber of reflection, which was much like a small godshouse where they assembled for prayer or to find solitude. Froi watched as Arjuro stood at the wall and traced his finger against the stone, as if he was writing a secret message that only the gods could decipher.

‘What were you doing?’ Froi asked quietly as they stepped out of the chamber onto a landing.

‘That’s between me and them.’

They finally came to a vertical shaft that led down to a lower level, and it was there that Simeon lived.

‘I’ve not been invited,’ Arjuro said. ‘So speak to him as you would the Lumateran Priestking.’

‘I yell at the Priestking,’ Froi said. ‘I’ve thrown manuscripts at him when he’s forced me to read the jottings … or droppings, as I preferred to call them, of the ancients on their visit to the off lands. You do not want me