The woman pointed away downhill. “Well, off you go. Steer clear of the villages. Don’t want to scare the children, do we?”
The slap of sword on buttock sent the archimandrite lurching away.
Even before he was lost to sight, the laughing wolf’s-heads began bundling up the discarded clothes. Leaving them to it, Melanna slipped away uphill. The night was young, and she was determined not to waste it.
Three
The city of Tressia, bastion of the north and heart of the Republic, lay cloaked beneath the gloom of night. Barnacle-crusted kraikons stood waist-deep and motionless in the dockside’s tidal waters. The evening sun, still a-glimmer through the Silverway tavern’s leaded windows at the first pull, had long since slunk beneath the horizon. The vibrant bustle of day had retreated alongside. The great city was subdued, and its river wharves a haunt for dubious endeavours. It was no place for the sons and daughters of quality to seek their pleasures, and it was therefore inevitable that many did so.
Malachi Reveque stared into the brimming tankard, awash with that peculiar caution born of inebriation. Jeers, arguments and snatches of dockers’ shanties burst from the fug of conversation and echoed beneath the Silverway’s sunken beams. Malachi knew it would continue well into morning.
As would he, if he wasn’t careful.
“I should be getting home.” He strained to be heard over the hubbub. “I promised Lilyana I’d not make a night of this.”
Across the table, Kasamor leaned back in his chair. Eyes widened in mock affront. “What? You’d leave me to celebrate alone?”
Rosa snorted and fixed him with a cold stare. “Thanks.”
Kasamor waved an airy hand in dismissal. “I love you as a sister, but there’s a bond between men that you couldn’t begin to understand. Especially when that bond is tempered in battle, as was ours.” Matter settled, he raised his tankard for a generous swallow.
Rosa’s expression didn’t flicker. “I see. When did you last stand your place in the line, Malachi?”
Long enough ago to know he’d no place there. Malachi winced. How had he ended up the villain? Not that it was a surprise. United, they four were the closest of friends. Divided by absence – as they were that evening by perennial lateness – and conversation turned inevitably to contest.
“I fight with words these days.”
“And I fight with steel.” Rosa leaned low across the table. “In fact, I recall my sword saving Lord Kiradin’s hide at Tarvallion. And at Tregga’s Dike.”
Kasamor bristled. “And Lord Kiradin remembers someone’s effusive thanks after that bloody business on Fellhallow’s southern edge. Might it have been you, oh storied Reaper of the Ravonn?”
“Hah! My point precisely. You and I have shared a score of battlefields. Malachi hasn’t so much as held a sword in ten years.” She cracked a sour smile. “Tell me again how our bond is the lesser.”
Knight of the Republic though Rosa was, she wielded her wits every bit as skilfully as her sword. She’d one day serve the Republic well on the Grand Council – if she could bear to forgo the green surcoat of the Essamere chapterhouse and her chamfered armour for a velvet gown. That she’d abandoned the former for the subtleties of civilian garb was a rare honour. She seemed softer without steel, but Malachi wasn’t fooled. He knew just how many Hadari she’d sent into the mists. And besides, even now the sword-belt remained. No amount of reason could have persuaded her to strut about unarmed.
Kasamor would never reach council rank. He’d a tendency to speak without thinking, strong drink or no. It was part of his charm. But on this one occasion, Kasamor held his tongue and glowered at Rosa. She arched a knowing eyebrow.
Malachi stifled a grin. The lines of battle were shifting. The kind thing would be to deflect Rosa’s ire. Then again, Kasamor’s escape would only hasten Malachi’s own turn as underdog. So he glugged a mouthful of ale, wiped his lips, and stoked the fires.
“You mustn’t mind him,” he said. “Kasamor’s worried he’ll not resist your charms if I leave you alone.”
Joking aside, Rosa and Kasamor would have made a handsome couple. They shared hair the colour of ripened wheat, and eyes as pale and blue as the winter skies. Rosa’s face was that of a divine serathi – if that serathi was given to scowling. Kasamor had a lantern jaw and heavy brow that echoed portraits of kings long dead. But they’d been friends too long. They all had. Any lingering attraction lay buried beneath a lifetime of faults and foibles witnessed at close hand.
Malachi was content with his own unremarkable looks. Even if his dark hair was already flecked with grey. A honed mind was a far more valuable tool than a handsome face, and lasted longer.
Rosa snorted. “I’d sooner kiss a goat.”
Malachi grinned into his tankard.
“And why not?” mused Kasamor. “We all know you’ve a thing for beards.”
“Just as we all know that you can’t grow a beard worthy of the name.”
Kasamor slumped against the chair’s backrest. He clapped his hands across his chest in mock pain. “Your words . . . They’re a blade in my heart.”
Rosa chuckled. “It’s a large target. You’ll survive.”
Hands still to his chest, Kasamor closed his eyes. “Not so. Even now, I hear the flutter of sable wings. Lumestra sends her handmaidens. They’ll weep golden tears as they carry me off.”
“I’m not sure the serathi weep tears for anyone, much less for a man.” Rosa hooked an eyebrow. “Then again, you’re barely a man, are you?”
Kasamor’s eyes flickered open. “Is that curiosity I hear? Alas, my dear, beautiful sister-at-arms, you’ve missed your opportunity. I’m pledged to higher things.”
With an exasperated sigh she turned to stare out across the room. “You’re impossible.”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.” Kasamor grew unusually sincere. “My heart belongs to another.”
Rosa offered no response. Enough, Malachi decided, was enough.
“So you’re still going through with it?” he asked.
“Without a flicker of hesitation.” Kasamor straightened up. “My mother’s mood will soften once she meets Calenne. How could it not?”
That aspiration struck Malachi as totally unfounded. A son saw much that remained hidden from acquaintances, but in this case . . .
“Is your mother much given to softening?” Rosa’s expression could have been carved from stone.
“On occasion. Why, I once saw her smile at Marek.”
“Her steward?” Malachi tried to picture Lady Ebigail Kiradin favouring a servant with anything resembling warmth. He gave up. There were limits even to imagination. “I don’t believe it.”
“It’s true.” If Kasamor was at all offended on his mother’s behalf, nothing of it showed. “He happened upon one of the indentured maids making off with the silverware. Girl looked like death by the time he was done scolding her.”
“Ah.” Now that did sound like the sort of thing to coax a smile from Lady Kiradin. “I wouldn’t have thought your mother would have trusted a southwealder near the silver.”