happen.”
“What do you know?” Cyrus snapped. “I haven’t seen you with a woman in three years.”
“I wasn’t talking about women,” J’anda said coolly. “I was talking about you. Have you not seen me with you in the last three years? Because then I might be speaking of something I know not.”
“Listen-”
“I’m going to ride off now,” J’anda said. “I am not upset with you, though I expect you are with me; I just imagine that you’re running a bit low on people to talk to and I don’t want to make it easy for you to drive another away. We’ll speak again later.” With that, the enchanter rode off, leaving Cyrus staring at him in openmouthed irritation.
Within the hour, the army was beginning to set up camp in the shade of a forest in the hills. From atop one of them, Cyrus could see Enrant Monge in the distance and other armies, smaller ones, encamped to the north and the west, like the three points of a triangle.
Enrant Monge was a castle but not like Vernadam at all. The blocks that it was made of were smaller, yet the design was less ornate and more functional. A simple curtain wall with parapets extended in a perfect square around a courtyard with three towers in the keep. The towers looked to be of different construction than the outer wall, as though they had been added later; cracks in the wall also looked to have been patched with some sort of grout that was visible in the orange light of sunset as the towers cast shade over the whole scene and a cool breeze blew across them. The castle was only a mile or so away, he estimated.
The journey went all too quickly for Cyrus; a few minutes and it seemed to be over. He and the others- Curatio, J’anda, Longwell, Terian, and the Baroness, the latter two trading uneasy looks-rode along with the small delegation from Galbadien to the gates of Enrant Monge. Cyrus had noted that the castle’s four walls each had a gate, one at each compass point. They entered through the eastern gate, and Cyrus looked back to make sure his delegation was still with him as he followed the King’s over the drawbridge. He saw each of them in turn; Longwell, whose gaze was moving around, examining their surroundings with a little awe, Cattrine, who met Cyrus’s look with indifference and turned away after staring him in the eyes for a few seconds. Curatio and J’anda seemed somewhat wary, and Terian was watching Cyrus when he caught the dark knight’s stare. Terian did not look away, however, but continued to watch, Cyrus could feel, even after he had turned back to the path ahead.
The drawbridge was long, a hundred or more feet, and Cyrus pondered the age of the wood with every step Windrider took. It creaked and he looked down into the water. The dark moat rippled as the last vestiges of daylight sparkled across the surface, the orange sky reflected above the ramparts of the castle’s mirror image in the water. As they crossed under the gate, Cyrus saw a few guards standing at attention on either side of them. They carried poleaxes and did not move, their livery something very different than what Cyrus had seen before, a kind of red and yellow surcoat with a coat of arms that had red diagonally at top right and bottom left and yellow at top left and bottom right, with Luukessian writing in the banner across the top. Their surcoats were flawless, their helms a shining metal that gave him a stabbing reminder of Vara. He cast another look back at Cattrine, but she was looking elsewhere, her gaze sliding off the guards at attention.
They passed through a bailey and into a smaller keep, between the guards standing at attention outside it. Once through the gate, there were no guards, only stewards, unarmed, waiting for them, bowing (
“Welcome to Enrant Monge,” the lead steward, a short man in flowing grey robes with long hair that matched them, said, “the heart of unity in Luukessia.”
Cyrus heard Terian snort loud enough to attract the attention of everyone around him. “Sorry,” the dark knight said, “I guess I must have failed to notice the unity in all the battles I’ve fought since I got here.” Cyrus sent him a dirty look, which was matched by Curatio and J’anda. Terian shrugged, unfazed.
The steward ignored him and continued his clearly pre-practiced speech, hands in the air above him. “The delegations from Syloreas and Actaluere have already arrived, and we will begin with the traditional welcome ceremony of peace in the garden in half an hour.” The steward nodded. “I would remind you that no weapons or armor are allowed in the garden of serenity, and that no violence is permitted within the walls of Enrant Monge under penalty of death.”
“That’s usually how my acts of violence turn out anyway,” Terian said, prompting Curatio to shush him.
“Your tower quarters are prepared,” the steward said. He bowed again, causing Cyrus to unwittingly roll his eyes. “Go forth in peace, brothers.”
“But not sisters, eh?” Cyrus heard J’anda mutter to Cattrine, causing her to laugh airily.
“This way to the tower,” Odau Genner said from his place next to Count Ranson, who looked back at the Sanctuary members in amusement. If the King thought anything that had been said was funny, he hid it well, riding atop his horse with only the thinnest hint of expression.
Cyrus dismounted in the courtyard and let a stableboy lead Windrider off with the other horses, back toward the first bailey that they had crossed. Cyrus looked around the inner keep-the three towers he had seen from the ridge above Enrant Monge were visible now, and ahead of him was another walled structure-not quite high enough to be a keep, but through a tunnel he could see trees.
“The Garden of Serenity,” Cattrine said, brushing against him as she walked past. His eyes followed her, sinking lower, to her backside, her riding pants clinging to the lines of her figure after the last long hours on horseback. He blinked and looked up as she turned and caught him, her eyes flashing … something. Before, Cyrus would have assumed lust coupled with amusement, but now it was mixed with coolness. “The center of the castle and the place where the old keep sat in ancient times, the seat of old Luukessia before the schism. Our entire land was ruled from here.”
“I’m sure it was very impressive,” Cyrus said with some tightness. “Did I hear him say we’re not allowed weapons or armor within the walls?”
“Of the Garden of Serenity, yes,” Cattrine said. “You’ll be expected to leave them behind in your room in the tower.”
He started toward the tower and leaned close to her as he passed, felt the brush of her hair against his, sensed her close and fought off the momentary, mad desire to take her in his arms and- He stopped and whispered in her ear, “and will you be leaving your dagger in your room in the tower?”
He leaned back to see her eyes, and when he did he saw ice, pure and cool, her green irises frosted over. “If I didn’t,” she said, “I’d be in violation of the laws of Luukessia and subject to death.”
“That wasn’t really an answer,” Cyrus said, and followed the King and his party toward the tower built into the outer wall of the garden-one of three, but the only one on this side of the keep. Within, he found a dim entry chamber and thick stone walls. The place was lit with small windows, arched but only six inches or so across. Candles hung from the walls and the overhead chandeliers, giving the rooms and the stone within an orange glow, something flickering and dimmer by far than the bright, open-paned windows of Vernadam or even Green Hill. Sanctuary, by contrast, made the tower look even dimmer.
Cyrus waited as King Longwell and his party were escorted to chambers on the lower floors. Cyrus and his party were paired with another steward, a younger one, who led them up several spirals of the staircase, which ran up the center of the castle. Cyrus estimated they were on the fifth or sixth floor when the steward came to a stop and began assigning them rooms. Cyrus deferred to Cattrine, allowing her first choice. The steward opened a door and offered a smallish chamber, not even as large as the bedroom in the suite he and Cattrine had shared at Vernadam.
She nodded in acknowledgment, and the steward blushed. “There is no bath for the ladies in this tower, madam. If you’d like, we can bring up a wooden laundry tub and fill it any time you’d care for a bath.”
“Thank you,” she said. “That will be fine.”
“Where’s the garderobe?” Terian asked, peering into Cattrine’s chambers, drawing a look of annoyance from the Baroness, whose passage through the door was blocked by the dark elf. “Or do you have a communal chamber for that?”
“Ah, no,” said the steward with a hint of embarrassment. “Enrant Monge is an ancient keep, sir.” The steward blushed further at Terian when the dark elf turned his full attention on the dumbstruck lad, who likely had never seen a dark elf before. “We do not have garderobes.”
