StarCrossed. Part 18

"Celyn - mulled wine! How clever of you." Meri crossed the room and shed her gloves, dropping them on the tapestry tuffet.

"Did you and your father have a good ride?" My voice sounded sharp.

"Snowy," she said, sinking down beside me. "It got a lot colder than I expected." She looked out the window, into the thickening snowfall, and I wondered where her gaze tracked to.

"Meri, you would tell me, wouldn't you, if you had a secret?"

She blinked at me in surprise. "A secret? What do you mean?"

I shrugged. "You know, anything. Like if you had - a lover, or something?"

"A lover? Celyn, what in the world are you talking about?" She seemed guileless, confused. "If I had a lover, you can be sure I wouldn't keep him a secret!" She laughed. "And anything else? Of course I would tell you. Unless I was commanded not to by my lord father and lady mother, of course. But those would be official secrets that really weren't my right to dispose of any way I wished to."

And that was the crux of the problem before me. The things I knew, I had no right to know. They weren't my secrets to keep or give away. "I'm no good at secrets," I said, looking at the patterns in the red and gold of the tuffet. "I always have to tell somebody, or I'll go mad with the feeling - it's like holding on to a hot ember."

Meri gave me an odd look for a moment, and then smiled. "Well, then," she said, "I guess I shan't be telling you any of my secrets, after all!" She stood and brushed droplets of melted snow from her skirts. "I'm soaked," she said. "Help me change?"

She raised her arms expectantly, so I came to her side and unlaced her wool riding gown. The folds of heavy damp fabric slipped easily to the floor. Beneath the wool gown and her linen kirtle, her smock was very sheer, and as I helped her step out of the kirtle, I thought I saw something strange. Crossing the boundary between curiosity and shocking rudeness, I pulled her smock down off her shoulder, exposing the bare pale flesh - and the tiny tattoo, still slightly pink and swollen, at the base of her shoulder blade.

The purple tattoo.

Of a seven-pointed star.

I stood there like an idiot, the corner of her smock still in my hand, too stunned to say anything.

"Celyn!" Meri pulled away, tugging it back over her shoulder.

"Meri, are you crazy?"

"What?" She held the smock closed with one hand balled up at her breast. "It's nothing."

"Nothing? A tattoo? And - and of -" Ridiculously, I almost couldn't bring myself to say it. I had to whisper. "The Mark of Sar? When did you get this? Where did you get it? Who gave this to you?" Who would have the skills - and the nerve - to commit such a work of madness? Brand ing the Mark of Sar into the heir to Bryn Shaer?

"I don't have to tell you anything!"

"No, you don't, but - what if someone saw it?"

She frowned. "Who's going to see it?"

"Anyone! Your mother - a seamstress! Your husband?"

She made a sound, but I couldn't tell if it was derisive or hopeless . . . or something else. "You have one."

Now how in the world would she know that? It was just my Guildmark, three tiny black dots on my hip. I'd had it since becoming a thief. Officially.

"I saw it once. In the bath." She sounded defensive.

"Meri, I don't think you realize how dangerous this is."

"I do!"

I grabbed for her shoulder again. "No, I don't think you really do! That's not something you do on a lark, for a thrill! What do you think would happen to you if someone found that?" I shoved my own sleeve back from my arm, revealing the gash that had faded into a long pink stripe on my forearm. "Look. Look! I didn't get this falling into some rosebush at the convent. I got it from Greenmen. Greenmen, Meri. I'm lucky that's all they did. And I don't have the Mark of Sar branded into my body."

Meri's eyes were wide and sober, but I saw a flash of defiance in them. I wanted to be proud of her. I also wanted to slap her, shake her, club her upside the head and drag her down the mountain by her hair. I wanted not to feel anything about this.

"Stagne," she whispered finally.

"The Sarist boy," I said, and she nodded. "Oh, Meri."

"But he's not my lover," she insisted. "At least - I don't know, Celyn. It's all so strange."

She didn't have to explain it to me. But apparently she was going to, anyway. They had met, entirely by accident, soon after Daul's arrival when she started riding out alone in the morning. Stagne had been gathering firewood near their camp and had foraged too close to the castle grounds. They had been meeting ever since, and - When she faltered, I realized Meri was trying to figure out how to tell this story without mentioning magic. And I was just so tired, and I didn't have the energy to lie anymore, or keep one more secret. So I pulled off the silver bracelet and caught up her hand, holding it tightly right before both of our faces, so she could see the tendrils of magic weaving our fingers together.

"I knew it," she whispered.

I shook my head. "No, I just see it. It's not the same."

Her eyes were wide and eager. "Durrel said -"

"Durrel! What are you talking about?"

She was nodding, transfixed by the air swirling around our hands. "In the boat, he thought you had magic, and that's why you ran away from the Celystra, and he told my parents -"

"Your parents think I have magic?" I yanked my hand away so fast she stuck her stinging fingers in her mouth. "Pox and h.e.l.ls."

I felt stupid; thoughts died only half formed. "I did leave the Celystra because of my magic," I said slowly. "Because that's where they torture people with magic. You have to be more -"

Behind us, the door slammed, and we both jumped. In a flash, I draped Meri's gown across her shoulders and spun to face the door, my heart racing.

"Well, don't you two make a pretty picture," Phandre said, crossing the room. "I heard you yelling from halfway down the hall, and here I find you, practically naked in each other's arms! Is there something going on I don't know about?"

Her voice was teasing, but Meri's white skin flushed pink.

"I - got wet. In the snow," she stammered, her defiance evaporated.

"You don't have to explain it to me," Phandre said, raising her hands and walking through to her own room. "Let me know when the wine is hot." Her door shut with a click.

I didn't say anything else to Meri after Phandre was gone. What would have been the point? She had the tattoo - it was hers for life.

Until some Inquisitor's fire burned it off of her.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE.

I approached Marlytt after dinner that night. I had to secure some free hours in which to balance my growing list of insane responsibilities, and the prince was already eating into my schedule. "I need you to look after Meri for a while tonight," I said.

"I thought that was your job," she said, s.h.i.+fting in her seat. "What are you doing? It's something for Daul, isn't it?"

I leaned closer. Across the room, Meri was playing chess with her father; but she'd likely follow me if she saw me leave abruptly. "Just stay near her. Keep her entertained."

"And what will I tell her when she asks after you?"

"Anything. I don't care. I'm sure you'll find a way to keep her so busy she won't even wonder."

Marlytt's brow creased. "What's this all about, Digger?"

"Nothing. He's convinced himself the Nemair are up to something, and I need to get him off my back. So try and keep Meri out of trouble for a couple of hours, can't you?"

She softened. "All right. But what sort of trouble do you think she'll get into?"

"Don't ask that."

She fingered the necklace at her throat, her expression calculating. "Wait - is this what you were asking me earlier? About Cwalo - and guns? What are you involved in?"

"Nothing," I repeated. "And stop asking me questions you don't want the answers to. Can I count on you?"

She rose and shook out her skirts, giving me her sunniest smile. "Of course. Lady Meri and I will be close as sisters tonight."

I probably should have asked Marlytt to keep an eye on Daul instead; he was still skulking about, and I had a feeling he was expecting something from me. I hadn't come up with anything new since stupidly handing over Chavel's letters, and he'd be getting bored and restless. So I dodged him too.

I slipped upstairs to swipe Meri's journal, then lit off for an unused guest room in the old part of the castle. It was poorly furnished and freezing, with a broken window whose low stone sill I could use as a desk. n.o.body was likely to find me up here. I'd need a few days at least for what I was going to do, and privacy and light to do it in. I kept waiting for Lady Lyll to ask me where all her candles were going.

Kneeling by the window, I spread my supplies on the cold floor: a stack of papers of approximately the right size from Cwalo's rooms, black leather and needles from the tack room, a variety of inks and pens I'd gathered here and there. I wrapped my fingertips in strips of cloth, to keep as much ink from my hands as I could. I didn't want Meri or Lyll to ask what I'd been writing, and I absolutely didn't need Daul sniffing around my fingers and getting suspicious.

Most thieves - common street sc.u.m, anyway - couldn't even read, let alone write. But I'd been clever with a pen since I'd first nicked one from my brother, wondering why he was carrying a feather around, when he scarcely ever went outside and certainly didn't care for birds. But he'd shown me that feather's amazing secret power, helping my little fingers master it. He'd sit for hours at one of the high Celystra desks with me in his lap, shaping my hand around the pen, tracing the letters on the page, until the day finally came when he judged me good enough to get me work in the ma.n.u.script room. My first memories were of those candlelit hours bent over words together. It was hard to believe we took such different lessons from our days writing out scripture.

Tegen had been fascinated by my writing, curving his lean body behind mine as I worked, swiping the pages before they were dry and holding them up to the light. "What's this say?" he'd ask, kissing the back of my neck to try and make my hand slip.

"It's a harbormaster's report, and if you don't give it back, it's going to say Lord Verin has been s.h.i.+pping Talancan pigs into Gerse instead of Talancan gold."

Harbormasters' reports, forged pa.s.sage licenses, copies of sensitive letters - Tegen found me work doing all of it. I was good, and I knew it. Lord Taradyce had never found out the incriminating letter from Minister Engl he'd paid so handsomely for was a forgery. Tegen had gotten a better price from Engl to keep the original out of unfriendly hands. She's just that good. I could still remember Tegen telling the doubtful minister those words, how he'd laughed later over the double cross.

Daul's journal was a mix of strangely varied handwriting - in places smooth and precise; in others untidy, like it had been done in the dark, during a rainstorm, possibly by someone with a fever or a broken hand. And I had to match those bits, letter by letter, ink blot by ink blot, constantly recutting the tip of my quills to match the thickness and precision of the original text, testing on sc.r.a.ps to make sure I had the proper pressure on the pen.

It would have been an interesting challenge, if not for the sparkling pages that kept reminding me how important it was that I get this exactly right.

Revealing my magic to Meri didn't seem to change things between us, except she now considered me her confidante, which brought a whole layer of intimacy I could happily have done without. That night in bed, I heard more details of her tryst with Stagne, which sounded more heart breakingly innocent the more I learned. And she wanted to talk about magic - what she was learning from the people in the forest, what it felt like, how it was to use it freely, to have a friend who understood her.

It took me a brief, paralyzing instant to realize that she meant me.

Lady Lyll knowing somehow bothered me more. As I worked beside her in the stillroom the next few days, preparing medicines I now gathered were going to treat the prince, I kept stealing sidelong glances at her, willing her to give up some clue that she suspected - had always suspected - me of harboring magic, like her daughter. It made my skin itch unpleasantly, thinking that I'd been working side by side all these weeks with someone who knew my secret.

And the more time I spent with Daul's journal, the more confused I became. I'd hoped copying it out might give me some hint at its importance to him, but I was more than halfway through and still couldn't see how it connected to the Nemair's secrets.

I wanted to put all the pieces together, and I had a feeling that the prince was at the heart of them. But I certainly couldn't just ask Lady Lyll what I wanted to know, so it seemed my only option was to keep slipping down to the hidden chamber under the stillroom, and prodding at the only person who seemed to know even less about what was going on than I did.

Those first few days the prince was still drifting in and out of fever dreams, and half the time I wasn't sure he even believed I was real. I expected him to slip up any moment and tell Lady Lyll - or whoever was tending to him - that a maid named Celyn had checked his bandages and dosed him up with poppy. But days went by and Lord Antoch's guards never seized me by the hair and had me flung into the dungeons, so I figured I was more or less safe.

"Someone's bound to find out I've been here," I said on my third or fourth visit. He was clear-eyed and lucid, but his face still had that ragged, sickly look. "I'm not helping you, and I don't even want to think about what they'll do if they catch me." I'd had the good sense to stop playing nurse, at least.

"You're helping. Look, I'm getting stronger already." He pushed himself up in bed to prove it, though the movement left him pale and breathless. "Besides, you're the only person who stays long enough to talk to me. The others hardly say anything - and I think that one of them doesn't speak any Llyvrin."

Yselle. So that answered one question. "She's Corles," I said. "I don't understand a word she says either."

"Tell me more about this place, Celyn just-a-maid. Where is it? What is its name, who are its keepers?"

"I -" I hesitated. I still wasn't sure what he knew, or was supposed to know - but then, he was the one in the most danger here, and Marau's b.a.l.l.s, if the man was ever going to be king, starting off completely ignorant about his own situation was a stupid way to begin such a career. But maybe we two befuddled wretches could help each other. "Only if you tell me what happened to you."

Finally he nodded. "What I remember, anyway."

"You're at Bryn Shaer," I said. "It's a fortress in the Carskadon Mountains."

"I know it. I was in Olin . . ."

"Bryn Shaer is held by An -"

"Antoch Nemair." The prince gave a cough that sounded weak and strained. "Right. His wife - what's his wife's name?"

"Lady Lyllace." He mouthed the name even as I said it, his face screwed shut as he fought for the words. "Do you know them?"

"No, I just -" He didn't have to finish. He just knew the names of major n.o.bs and landholders. Of course he did. "It's hard to remember," he said. "Thank you."

"Olin?" I prompted gently, the name twitching at my memory.

The prince looked at me a long moment, and I couldn't decide what was in that steady, unnerving gaze. Why didn't people mention that about him, when they told tales of what kind of a man he was? Finally he dropped his head back and spoke to the ceiling. "It's a hunting lodge. It belongs to an old friend of my mother. I was there for the stag."

I wondered what kind of figure he must have cut, just weeks ago, riding through the forest on his great royal horse, a bow in his hand. Suspecting this might be a long story, or at least a difficult one, I poured him some water. His hand lifting the cup to his mouth was steadier than it had been even a few days ago. Fighting with the silver in his wounds or not, that medallion he wore must be very powerful. I wondered what such a thing might be worth - a charmed pendant, to keep a prince alive.

"We had chased the quarry into a clearing, but when I got there, it was empty. My - companions were nowhere to be found, and nor was the deer." Wincing, he said, "I heard a shot, and I remember falling, and that's it. I don't know about -" He gestured to the bandages binding the gruesome sword wound. Then he turned to me, and the expression on his face was anguished. "Celyn," he said, "we don't use firearms for deer."

"No," I said gently, and although I had no idea if that were true or not, I understood what he was asking me. "Nor swords, I imagine."

"No." He looked into the distance then, and his eyes were damp. I fought a weird urge to reach out to him, although there wasn't a thing I could do to make what had happened to him any better. Lured by his friends into an a.s.sa.s.sination attempt? What did you do with that?

"You're very lucky," I said, though the words were hollow. How lucky did I feel when I got away from the Greenmen who'd killed Tegen? I pulled away and stared at my knees.

Finally I heard a sigh. Thinking it was my cue to leave, I rose, but the prince spoke again. "What kind of woman is she?"

I blinked. "Milord?"

"What kind of woman would you say Lady Lyllace is? Is she trust worthy? Scheming? What is she like?"