guard, a woman of the minor nobility whose husband ignored her.
Well, he thought, perhaps her wish will come true. Perhaps this journey will provide me with a chance to die honorably and everyone will be satisfied.
No, not everyone would be satisified, he realized. What Ferras Vansen really wanted was to live honorably, even happily. And to marry a princess, although that would not happen in this world or any other he could imagine.
He was meeting her near Merolanna’s chambers, in the back hallway of the main residence, known as the Wolf Hall for the faded tapestry of the family crest that took up a large portion of its south wall. It had too many stars and a mysterious crescent moon hung above the wolf’s snarling head, showing it to be a remnant of some earlier generation of Eddons. How long it had hung there no one could remember or even guess.
Like Briony, he had promised Merolanna he would come alone—no guards, no pages. She had been forced to speak sharply to Rose and Moina to get them to let her be, of course. Clearly her ladies feared she had an assignation with Dawet, but their resistance upset her just enough that she did not bother to tell them otherwise.
She watched her brother saunter up the corridor through the slanting colums of autumn light that filtered down from the windows, uneven light that made the passage seem as though it were under water and which turned the bucket and mop left inexplicably in the middle of the floor and the small offering-shrine to Zoria on the broad table into dully glimmering things that might have spilled from the belly of a sunken ship. For a moment, as Briony noted by the way her twin held his arm close to his body that it was hurting him, they might have been children again, escaped from their tutors for a morning to play scapegrace around the great castle.
But something was different, she saw. He seemed better—he no longer moved like a dying man, draggled and slow—but instead of becoming again the disdainful, unhappy Barrick Eddon she knew nearly as well as herself, he had a bounce in his step that seemed equally foreign, and his eyes as he neared her seemed to burn with a mischievous vigor.
“So someone in our family finally agrees to speak to us.” Barrick did not stop to give her a kiss, did not stop at all, but swept past, still talking swiftly, leading her toward Merolanna’s door as though he had been waiting for Briony, not the other way around. “After our stepmother, I begin to think they fear taking the plague from me.”
“Anissa said she did not feel well herself. She is pregnant, after all.”
“And it came on an hour before we were to dine with her? Perhaps that is all it is Perhaps.” “You are jumping at shadows.”
He turned to look at her, and again she wondered if the fever had truly left him. Why otherwise this eye bright as a bird’s, this strange air, as though at any moment he might fly into pieces? “Shadows? A strange word to use.” He paused and seemed to find himself a little. “All I’m saying is, why won’t our stepmother talk to us?”
“We will give her a few more days. Then we will make it a command.”
Barrick arched an eyebrow. “Can we do that?”
“We’ll find out.” She reached out and knocked on Merolanna’s door. Ellis, the duchess’ little serving maid, opened it and stood for a long moment stock-still and blinking like a mouse caught on a tabletop. At last she made a courtesy, found her voice. “She’s lying down, Highnesses. She wants me to bring you to her.”
Inside, several older women and a few young ones sat doing needlework. They rose and made their own courtesies to the prince and princess Briony said a few words to each. Barrick nodded his head, but smiled only at those who were young and pretty. He was bouncingly impatient, as though he already wished he had not come.
Merolanna sat up in bed as the serving maid drew the curtain. “Ellis? Bid the other ladies go, please. You, too. I want to be alone with Barrick and Briony.” Their great-aunt did not look ill, Briony thought with some relief, but she did look old and tired. These days Briony was not used to seeing Merolanna without face paint, so it was hard to know for certain whether the changes were real or just the ordinary punishments of time left unhidden, but there was no mistaking the swollen eyes. The duchess had been crying.
“There,” the old woman said when the room was clear. “I cannot abide being listened to.” There was an unusual violence in her voice. She fanned herself. “Some things are not for others to know.”
“How are you, Auntie? We’ve been worried about you.”
She manufactured a smile for Briony. “As well as can be expected, dear one. It’s kind of you to ask.” She turned to Barrick. “And you, boy? How are you feeling?”
Barrick’s smile was almost a smirk. “The grip of old Kernios is a bit more slippery than everyone thinks, it seems.”
Merolanna went quite pale. She brought her hand to her breast as though to keep her heart inside it. “Don’t say such things! Merciful Zoria, Barrick, don’t tempt the gods. Not now, when they have done us so much mischief already.”
Briony was irritated with her brother, not least because it did seem foolish to make such a boast, but she was also puzzled by Merolanna’s reaction, her frightened eyes and trembling hands. All through the time before Kendrick’s funeral their great-aunt had been the strongest pillar of the family and the household. Was it just that her strength had run out?
“I’ll say it again, Auntie.” Briony reached out and took her hand. “We have been worried about you. Are you ill?” A sad smile. “Not in the sense you mean, dear. No, not like our poor Barrick has been.” “I’m well now, Auntie.”
“I can see that.” But she looked at him as though she did not entirely believe it. “No, I have just . . had a turn, I suppose. A bad moment. But it frightened me, and made me think I’ve not done right. I’ve spent time, a great deal of time lately, talking to the Hierarch Sisel about it, you know. He’s a very kind man, really. A good listener.”
“But not to Father Timoid?” It seemed odd—usually Merolanna and the Eddon family priest were a conspiracy of two. “He’s a terrible gossip.”
“That’s never bothered you before.”
Merolanna gave her a flat look, almost as though she spoke to a stranger. “I’ve never had to worry about it before.”
Barrick laughed suddenly, harshly. “What, Auntie? Have you begun a love affair with someone? Or are you plotting to take the crown yourself?”
“Barrick!” Briony almost slapped him. “What a terrible thing to say!”
Merolanna looked at him and shook her head, but to Briony’s eyes the old woman still seemed oddly detached. “A few weeks ago, I would have been after you with a stick, boy. How can you talk like that to me, who raised you almost like a mother?”
“It was a jest!” He folded his arms and leaned against the bedpost, his face a resentful mask. “A jest.” “What is it, then?” Briony asked. “Something is happening here, Auntie. What is it?” Merolanna fanned herself. “I’m going mad, that’s all.”
“What are you talking about? You’re not going mad.” But Briony saw Barrick lean forward, his sullenness gone. “Auntie?” she asked.
“Fetch me a cup of wine. That pitcher, there. And not too much water.” When she had the cup in her hand, Merolanna sipped it, then sat up straighter. “Come, sit on the bed, both of you. I cannot bear to have you standing there, looking down on me.” She patted the bed, almost begging. “Please. There. Now listen. And please don’t ask me any questions, not until I finish. Because if you do, I will start crying and then I’ll never stop.”
It was finally Godsday, with Lastday to follow; Chert welcomed the days of rest. His bones ached and he had a hot throb in his back that would not go away. He was glad to bid the tennight good-bye for other reasons, too. The prince’s funeral that began it, with its weight of hard work and terrible sadness, had taken much out of him,
