“Oh, treacherous rogue,” Errigal spat. “Let him fly as far as he likes; he will be found.”
“Indeed,” Connley said. “All our strength is for your use, Earl.”
“I am sorry, Father,” Ban said.
Errigal became suddenly woeful. “My old heart is cracking, I think. I know what the king felt, surely, when your once-sister denied him, Lady Regan. How merciful he was in his justified rage.”
Ban turned his face sharply away.
It was Regan, a moment later, who put cool hands on his cheek, stroking tenderly. “There, young Ban,” she said. “You have served your father well. The traitor deserves none of your pain.”
He looked into her cool brown eyes, the color of shallow forest streams. “Thank you, my lady,” he murmured.
Regan soothed him with a sorrowful smile. “Did your star-stained brother not spend this past season among the king’s retainers?”
“He did,” Errigal answered.
“Perhaps, then,” the king’s daughter said, “though I am sure it is no comfort, I can offer some reason: the king’s retainers have become coarse and greedy under my father’s tutelage. They likely put young Rory onto this idea, to get the revenue he would earn as Errigal upon your death for themselves.”
Ban sucked in a quick breath. What a simple motivation the lady offered; he wished he’d thought of it himself. Lay the blame at the king’s feet! He wanted to kiss her fingers, but he kept his gaze low so she did not notice his sudden glee. This daughter of Lear would help him ruin her father, whether she knew it or not.
She said, “Come, let me take you to whatever surgeon can see properly to your wound.”
The duke caught her eye. She nodded, and Connley said, “Then, Ban the Fox, you must return. I’ve been discussing some matters of the future of this island with your father, but I think you should hear them. You’ve shown yourself true.” Connley took his wife’s hands off Ban, but clapped him on the back, asserting his approval. The duke’s handsome face was too near to look away from without seeming weak or rude.
“It was my duty, sir,” Ban said humbly.
Connley smiled. “For such loyalty, you will be ours.”
Ban shivered at the layers of meaning to Connley’s words. “I shall serve you,” he said, bowing, “however else.”
The duke released him, and Errigal poured himself and Connley more wine. Errigal shook his head again and again, and drunkenly sighed. “What cursed stars are trailing in our skies.”
Again, Connley’s and Regan’s eyes met, and Ban nearly read the message they shared. It did not favor the stars, but bloodier desires. Regan offered her hand to him, and Ban leveled his breathing before taking it. He kissed her knuckles, his mind churning with ideas for how to help her. Perhaps there were some details of his plotting that should be left out of the report to his king.
For good or ill, this was the place Ban had landed.
GAELA
GAELA CLIMBED OUT of her bed and flung a thin robe around her shoulders. Her face ached where her husband had hit her, keeping her from rest. The sky was dark, and Gaela’s rooms even darker, lacking stars or candlelight. Her bare feet were cold as she stepped off the rug onto stone, slipping her arms into the sleeves and tying the robe securely at her waist. She lifted her hands to check the scarf tied over her hair remained firmly in place.
The Astore ruby ring gleamed on her finger, and Gaela cradled it as she went to the narrow window. Once an arrow slit, the sill was wide where she leaned, but narrowed to a bare hand-span. A long pane of smooth glass had been set into it, and Gaela beheld the small, dark courtyard from here, but it was impossible to see in from below.
She tilted her head to gaze at the velvet sky. She could make out no stars, and so the sky was a solid shade of purple-black. Did Regan stand under this same sky whispering angrily to the trees? Desperate to find her fertility? Or did she lie with her husband, enjoying the sweaty torment and cursing herself for taking pleasure in what refused to serve her?
There had been a wildness in Regan’s eyes at the Summer Seat, though Gaela doubted any other noticed but perhaps—perhaps—Connley himself. It worried Gaela greatly. She’d seen that fanaticism in another face: their father’s. Though they had always intended a joint rule, with Gaela the king and Regan mother to the next, Gaela now suspected that the sooner she consolidated her power and convinced Regan to give over the crown, the better for all. Curse Connley for agitating Regan, and Lear for declaring both his elder daughters equal heirs in his rash fury.
In the black courtyard below, a pale figure moved.
Behind him, two Astore servants trailed, recognizable by the color of their tunics.
It was her father, drifting like a ghost.
A thing tightened in her gut: irritation, fear? Gaela preferred the former, but the chill of the latter was undeniable.
Drowning it in a flare of ready anger, Gaela shoved her feet into fur-lined boots and pulled on a long linen tunic before replacing her robe around her. She picked up a knife and walked unflinchingly through the dark to the door of her chamber, swinging it open to the surprise of the dozing page awaiting any sudden orders in the night. The girl sprang to her feet and stammered a question at Gaela, who shushed her and ordered her to remain.
The prince swept past, an elegant, strong storm of vivid shadows and flashing pink wool.
A narrow stair led down to this small private courtyard, shaped like a long triangle with one corner bitten out. Some benches were stacked at the short end, and near the point an ancient well dropped through the foundation and rock, toward water far, far below.
