“May I inspect your wound?” she said, trying to rein in her emotions. “I noticed you beginning to limp.”
Marc released a soft laugh. “I can’t hide anything from you.”
“It’s my healer’s eye.”
The king pushed his chair back from the table. Branwen stood and pressed her fingers around the wound. The tan material of his left trouser was stained nearly black. Kahedrin’s sword had pierced Marc just above the knee.
“I need to remove the pant leg,” she said. Marc nodded. Branwen retrieved a scalpel and cut away the fabric. The gash was the length of her forefinger.
“It’s barely a scratch,” Marc said.
“If you don’t want to lose the use of your leg, you’ll follow my instructions.” He laughed again at the severity of Branwen’s tone. “This scratch needs stitches.”
“You keep me honest, sister.”
With a gulp, Branwen filched a decanter of Mílesian spirits from a sideboard at the far end of the room. She splashed some on Marc’s thigh to cleanse the wound.
“Either I’ll have to ask the King of Míl to send me another bottle of his finest spirits or I’ll have to stop being shot with arrows and stuck by swords.”
The king was attempting a joke but it was no laughing matter. Shortly after the royal wedding, an Armorican assassin had attacked King Marc in the forest. Branwen had never been convinced that he’d been sent by King Faramon, but nobody would share her doubts after the siege of Monwiku. The assassin had been poisoned in the castle dungeons before he could reveal who’d hired him.
“Branwen,” Marc said more seriously, as she returned to his side. “The magic you used last night. Are you … do you need anything? To recover?”
“I’m tired, but we all are.” In truth, Branwen didn’t know if she’d ever recover.
“I’m in your debt. Again. As is my kingdom.” He paused. “I’d like to know more about your magic.” His silver eyes were kind, yet Branwen’s stomach pinched. “When you’re ready,” Marc added.
She nodded, although she didn’t understand her magic herself.
Branwen poured a few drops from the vial Alba had rejected into a goblet of wine for the king.
“We call this Clíodhna’s dust in Iveriu,” she said. “She’s an Otherworld queen whose song heals the sick. Andred found it for me in the forest. It will ease your pain as I sew you up.”
The Kernyveu added a spice to their wine that never failed to tickle her nose. She sneezed as she handed Marc the goblet.
“Mormerkti.” He took a long sip. “Would you consider asking Andred to be your apprentice full time? I fear that being the king’s cupbearer is putting him in too much danger. I know he thinks he’s a man, but he’s only fourteen.”
Branwen heated the tip of a needle with the flame of the oil lamp.
“I think he would be devastated,” she said. “And I don’t know who else you could trust so completely?” She shook her head to clear the fog of exhaustion.
Marc pursed his lips. The king’s cupbearer was his only defense against poisons.
“You may be right.” He hissed as Branwen slid the needle through the flesh. Despite her weariness, she worked quickly and deftly. “Someone paid the pirates to make the attack on Karaez look like I’d sanctioned it. But who stands the most to gain?” Marc mused.
“Some would say Tristan,” Branwen said quietly.
The king glanced up. “Do you believe him capable?”
She pulled a stitch through and his flesh whimpered. “I don’t, Marc. I don’t think he’d betray you.” On purpose, Branwen added in her mind.
“Mormerkti. I value your opinion. If Tristan has spent more time with Eseult since the miscarriage than I have, then that is entirely my fault.”
The king didn’t know that the child his wife had lost wasn’t his, and Branwen could never tell him. She loved him as a brother, had forgiven him for his part in her parents’ deaths, and yet she couldn’t test their bond that far.
“I pray they’re together tonight,” he said. “Tristan would defend his queen to the death.” Marc swallowed. “I also pray it hasn’t come to that.”
His eyelids fluttered from the Clíodhna’s dust. “When you stepped off the ship from Iveriu, I thought that you and Tristan might be well suited,” said the king, and Branwen felt as if the needle in her hand were piercing her own heart. “But I can see why you and Ruan found each other. You both like to be right.”
“Courtship is hardly the most pressing subject at hand.”
Marc laughed, a tad more dreamily. “Fair enough. I’ll apologize to Ruan for shouting at him. He’s only trying to protect me.”
“A king doesn’t need to apologize.”
“No, but he should. When he’s in the wrong.” Marc sighed. “Your cousin told me something her father said—that a king’s subjects keep him in power. King Óengus is a wise man.”
Branwen nearly missed a stitch. It was Lord Caedmon, Branwen’s father, who had said that, and it had been Branwen who relayed his counsel to Marc when she came to his marriage bed disguised as her cousin.
To prevent the kordweyd from discovering Eseult was no longer a maiden—that she’d lain with Tristan on the voyage from Iveriu—Branwen had taken her cousin’s place on the wedding night. To keep the peace, Branwen had resolved to give the king her virginity instead. And yet, lying next to Marc who was good and kind, she couldn’t betray him so grievously.
Branwen had tricked him, Tristan, Eseult, the kordweyd—everyone—into believing the deed had taken place. She offered her blood to the Old Ones, bartering. Praying they would be appeased, satisfied. That her gods wouldn’t let war come to Iveriu because Branwen had been foolhardy enough to conjure the Loving Cup.
The weight of her many deceptions pressed more heavily than a mountain on Branwen’s chest.
“Tomorrow is Eseult’s birthday,” she said.
Marc scrubbed a hand over his face. “I won’t rest until she’s found. Until they’re both found.” He took Branwen’s hand, his movements less precise than normal. “When Eseult is back at Monwiku, I’ll fill her bedroom with every honeysuckle in Kernyv.”
“Why honeysuckle?” Branwen said. She finished suturing the wound and smeared some of Andred’s salve over the stitches.
“You said it was your cousin’s favorite flower.”
“Ah, of course. I must be more tired than I realized.”
“We both should rest.” Marc kissed Branwen on the cheek. “Sleep well, sister.”
“Nosmatis.”
Branwen collected her things and tidied them into her satchel, but she had no recollection of Eseult’s favorite flower or why her cousin might have chosen it.
WHITE RAVEN
A BROODING PRESENCE FILLED THE HALLWAY.
Ruan leaned against a tapestry that depicted the burning of Isca. When the Aquilan Empire had retreated from the island of Albion, Meonwara—Kernyv’s neighboring kingdom to the east—staged an invasion. The king known as Great King Katwaladrus repelled the Meonwarans from Kernyv’s borders, and then followed them home, setting their capital city of Isca alight.