Banner of the Damned (23 page)

“Stake?”

A hesitation. All were aware of how much Ananda had lost by wagering she could win a lovers’ cup from Lassiter.

Isari said, “A gown’s length of rose lace. Gold-edged.”

Rose
. Gold-edged, as for a formal court appearance—or for a princess.

Ananda laughed, thinking that Isari might be kind, but at least she covered her kindness with wit. “Done.”

Carola, Duchess of Alarcansa, permitted herself a quick, reassuring glance at the stream channel pooled at her feet and the scene mirrored there: ferns and flowers framing her own dainty figure, setting off the fresh spring green of her gown; her hair, its curl more regular than Lasthavais’s clumsy curls which were surely hot-ironed; the curve between waist and hip a far purer arc than the princess’s; her bosom higher and rounder, her under-lip fuller. The princess’s earlobes curved outward in a most vulgar manner, unlike Carola’s own, which lay elegantly flat to her head. And her own over-lip was much more shapely, especially when she pronounced the difficult consonants. Lasthavais was often quite careless in her speech, but no one professed to notice—but then courtiers were sheep. Carola had proved that! As for that face, Carola’s own face was shaped in a perfect heart, it needed no arrangement of hair to suggest it. So
why
…?

It didn’t matter why. She had only to get Kaidas away from that royal grasp—more likely now that there was no chance of a future crown. If the queen assented to the match—and Carola was certain that Hatahra was in the mood to assent to almost anything—he would gain a coronet, and from someone who could make him into the greatest duke in Colend’s history.

Carola said behind her fan to her cousin Tatia, “I believe I will gain my wish.” She sent a fast glance at Kaidas, lounging by the fountain with most of the other young lords, the provocative bones of his profile drawn against the granite as if by an artist’s hand, his dark hair tied back, with no flourishes or even gems to adorn it. But he did not need adorning—except for his hair to be bound by the white ribbon of fidelity to Carola Definian.

As the queen beckoned to Carola with a welcoming smile, the Duchess of Alarcansa stepped toward her triumph, blind to the bitterness in her cousin’s face.

FIVE
O
F
R
OSES
U
NDONE

J

ust after the bells of Midday, Kaidas slipped free at last. As soon as he reached the terrace behind the conservatory, he ducked through servants’ unadorned halls to evade courtiers who strolled outward in order to gossip. His mind burned with questions, his eyes burned with exhaustion. His heart panged with the knife-sharp irony of memory, how he and Lasva had longed for Midsummer’s Day to be over, so they could set out for the journey south.

Well, Midsummer Day had brought its own surprise.

Lasva had looked so solemn at the Rising, so… lost. He’d watched her obliquely while pretending to listen to chatter about the trip to Sartor. He’d ignored everyone but Lasva, who had given him no signals, but he was used to that. Surely their situation was better, now that Hatahra had her heir. Surely the queen would release Lasva to do what she wished?

After all, Kaidas never expected a title—didn’t want one. Though she said she would marry him, he didn’t care. He’d be Lasva’s footman, or stable master, or whatever she wanted.

Yes. But in spite of all these arguments, he’d seen that look in her eyes.
Something
had happened, and it wasn’t her being displaced by that infant, because one thing he did know: Lasva cared nothing about being
queen. She never talked politics, she had no ambition. The birth of that little scrap of humanity would be seen as her freedom.

Wouldn’t it?

Impatience impelled him toward the safety of his rooms. He had to contain it. They were still at court, and courtly etiquette ruled the outward forms of their lives. He had to wait for her invitation to talk, for she was still a princess, and he the heir to a debt-ridden barony. Another thing he knew for certain: he was ready to run if she wanted it.

He made it to his rooms, dismissed his servant, removed his plum-colored brocade overvest, and his violet damask undervest as well. Who knew when he’d ever have the wherewithal for another new suit? Life was like a mad dash down a river—exciting, but there were submerged boulders or logs to shoot your boat up into the air and toss you into the rapids.

He rolled back the sleeves of his fine cambric shirt, glanced down at his trousers, then shrugged. If he got paint on them, he got paint on them. Instinct set his heart racing. Something was going to change, he felt the same poised tension of an impending race. No, it was more severe than that, more like the moments before the single battle he’d ever been in.

Meanwhile, there was duty. Reckless as always, he took out a porcelain cup. He’d bought half a dozen in case he ruined the painting of Lasva’s—a ridiculous expense—but then when your debts were already mountainous, what was a few hundred twelve-siders more?

Now he was glad to have the extras, for he knew what he must do.

He had taken up his paints when the first visitor arrived. There was no scratch at the open door, only a flicker of color, then his father sauntered in.

Kaidas dipped his tiniest brush in liquid gold.

The baron lounged against the table, as was his habit, but he knew enough of painting to stay out of the light. He scrutinized the fine porcelain cup in his son’s hands. “Nice,” he said, his eyebrows aslant. “But you’re a strumming hummer to be painting that thing with the door wide open.”

“The intended recipient is unlikely to complain, as she was born this very day,” Kaidas retorted.

“Ah!” His father gave a crack of laughter. “For the royal brat. Of course.”

Kaidas shrugged. “The announcement of a Name Day party is sure to be circling soon. One must have a gift.”

“I hope,” his father drawled as he kicked the door shut, “you realize what it means now that your princess lost her crown.”

Kaidas did not pause. “Come to impart wisdom on the subject of princesses?”

“I am not such a hypocrite,” the baron retorted. He leaned back against the door, his gaze sardonic. “The poets say history sings a repeated chorus if we have the wit to hear the tune. Something I always doubted.”

Kaidas did not pause in the delicate task of painting budding queensblossom round the rim of the cup, though warning gripped the back of his neck. “My intentions remain unchanged, Father. A crown was never part of them.” He paused to count the tiny dots that formed each petal. “So you are here to suggest a different melody?”

His father was tall, rakish, careless in how he wore his clothes, though he wore only the best. He stood beside the curtain, his profile toward the window, through which he saw what he’d expected to see: a diminutive, shapely blonde heading this way with the straight-backed assurance characteristic of the Definians.

He snapped his fan outward, brushing the panes. “Comes your little duchess, as I expected.” He faced his son and spoke bluntly. “The queen was just smiling on the Definian girl. It’s time to give her an answer.”

“I gave you my answer. It’s you who has been courting her on my behalf, so you may tell her no.”

No
, the flat denial that courtiers avoided. Not
ah-ye
, not words rearranged into compromise and ambiguity.

“Kaidas—”

“No.”

His father sighed. “Kaidas. We’re talking about a treaty marriage. You don’t have to live with the damn girl, you don’t even have to bed her, as long as she agrees at the outset. All you have to do is marry her, and when she chooses, partner her in making an heir. I don’t know why she wants you, but she does, and we need that treaty.”

“You mean you need money.”

“
We
need money. And what of it?”

Kaidas paused, sending his father a frowning glance before he resumed painting. “How well do you know Carola Definian?”

“Enough. She’s well born, though we’re an older family. She’s rich. She’s polite, she’s got style, she’s beautiful, and the queen just now gave her Hither.” He held his fan in a mockery of the royal beckon. “Gaszin and the Altans are after her.”

“She scares me.”

His father burst out laughing.

Kaidas painted on.

The baron wiped his eyes. “Hatahra scares
me
. She just publicly favored the suit, my boy. Didn’t you see it?”

No point in saying that he’d only had eyes for Lasva. Kaidas’s hand poised above the gold paint. “Father, I don’t want to marry. Not for twenty years. Thirty.”

The baron drawled, “Of course not. You’re a Lassiter, and we never think of the future if we can help it.”

“Do you want to hear the truth?” Kaidas asked, turning around to face his father.

The baron stared down into those wide black eyes, unblinking, intense, and this time opened his fan full out, angled north toward Thorn Gate in anticipation of dire outcomes. “Not,” he said, “if it will bring ruin to the family.”

The pleasure of speaking aloud the words—
I love Lasthavais Lirendi and will love her until I die
—vanished like smoke. Kaidas made an airy gesture with the paint brush.

His father said grimly, “The only truth that matters is that your princess is no longer heir. She’s a king’s bride, soon’s Hatahra finds her a king. And she intends to, she made that plain to Mathias and the dukes. My guess is that Hatahra won’t have to lift a finger, because the suitors’ll come at the gallop the moment the news gets out. But Hatahra knows that the best treaties aren’t made with princes who have to take their future queen with a worthless baronial heir attached as her lover.”

“Most of those princes probably have their own lovers,” Kaidas pointed out wryly.

“Probably.” His father tapped the table next to the paints. “More important—much more important—the other news going out right this moment is that you won’t be consort to a future crown with unlimited funds. And so our creditors are going to close in.”

Kaidas painted on, his fingers steady, four, five tiny royal lilies, each perfectly formed.

The baron expertly assessed his son’s tight mouth and the tense jut of his jaw. Promise or stubbornness? The boy had inherited the Lassiter will, which goaded them all to ride free—too often straight to disaster.

“You might be thinking of a run for freedom. For love. But what will you do when you climb out of bed?” The baron twirled his fan. “Pretty as you paint, you could never earn enough to even feed that race horse of yours, much less pay servants. Your princess, if she’s hummer enough
to flout the queen, won’t be welcomed in any court on the continent. What can she do besides collect cats? Nothing. And she owns nothing. Every stick in her rooms, every stitch on her body, belongs to Hatahra.”

Kaidas did not look up.

His father said, “You are free to revile me for being lazy and worthless. I am. But listen to this last thing, then I’ll bow out. If you marry yon duchess, you not only save our family, you save Princess Lasthavais from a life of drudgery and indifference. Because this you can believe: so-called true love does not last. If you two run off to Sartor, one will tire of the other—it happens, it’s nature—and what’s left? An old age amid broken furniture, under a leaky roof. Do you really want her to wake up one day in ten years, or five, or next season, and hate you for what she lost? How much better is a quick break, if you can’t manage it with grace?”

He thrust open the door. With a quick swing of gray-streaked black hair, he was gone, leaving the barren truth: the cost of saving the Lassiter family was Kaidas’s life. He had nothing else to offer Lasva. Not even a lifetime of love, if his father spoke the truth. He could bear anything but Lasva waking one morning and looking at him with hatred.

Kaidas dropped the brush and gripped the table. The pain nearly took his breath away. He could not imagine not loving Lasva. It had come by degrees, like the sun returning after winter. He’d fought it, but had no more success than a man fighting against the sun’s warmth and light. First attraction, then the giddy pleasure of her voice, her wit, the unthinking, generous kindness with which she regarded a silly world. And finally the passion as eager as his, as ardent, as inventive. As tender.

Would she really come to hate him? She was young—younger than he by several years of variegated experience. He couldn’t see her hating anyone, but this he could believe: she was so loving that she would easily find someone else to love. Someone who would give her the life she deserved.

Leaving him only honor.

Kaidas went to the door and opened it.

Then he returned to his task.

He was counting queensblossom petals in a soft voice when Carola found him. She paused in the doorway, noting that it was open, noting her intended in shirtsleeves and busy with a paintbrush. He wore a fine court shirt, lace at wrists and throat, not a painting shirt, and she interpreted it thus: he wanted to be alone but did not expect to be.