Out of the Faold (Whilst Old Legends Fade Synchronicles) (34 page)

He sighed heavily. The look on her face was one of hurt and anger and sadness and confusion. He felt exactly the same way. He
didn’t know what to say to her.

“I had some thinking to do.”

She leaned forward. In a forced whisper she said, “You asked me to marry you a hundred times and when I gave myself to you, you ran away.”

“I didn’t know if it was real. You’d always said no before, always gave me excuses. It was a game between us.”

“So I was a game to you?” she cried.

“No, no. I mean the asking and the excuses and the ...that was fun. And you haven’t really given yourself to me. I know that. And you know that.”

“What do you mean?” she demanded. “You never came to me to find out. I laid it out in front of you and you walked away and hid.”

“What did you give, Pearl?” he asked, his temper rising. “You stood in front of your old demon enemy, waving your hatchet, offering up yourself instead of Krisa. You gave yourself to me to save her. You didn’t give yourself to me as a woman, but as the god-
smiter
.”

“That’s not true,” she shouted at him. “Do you think I would have given myself to you if I didn’t want to? If you don’t really want me, if you just want the damned robes and the god-
smiter
just say it. I stand behind
you as a symbol, as your dricken
backbone most of the time. I would never have gone to you as the god-
smiter
. I wo
uld have gone to you as a woman
and then
you’d see.”

“See what?” he yelled.

She wouldn’t answer. She just stood there, tears in her eyes, her face red from anger and the effort of no
t letting the tears fall.

“Pearl,” he said gently, stepping forward. “Why aren’t you wearing your robes?”

“Is that all you care about?” she aske
d, her chin rising in defiance.

“Where is your hatchet?”

She didn’t answer but brushed a loose tear away from her cheek with her hand. She stared him straight in the eye and said, “After all this time why didn’t you want me?”

He had made a terrible mistake. He’d been stupid. She was just a girl. She didn’t know how to be a woman, how to show or tell a man she wanted him. Her innocence and naiveté was hidden by her confidence and power. She’d taken away her robes and hatchet. She wanted to be a normal woman. And he hid from her.

“Because I didn’t think you wanted me,” he told her honestly. “I thought you were only doing it to…I was sure you didn’t want me.”

She stared at him. “You are too old,” she told him.

“And you are a street rat,” he argued. “You slept with dogs.”

“I still do,” she shrugged. “Glory would kill me if I married you. She’s the next queen.”

“You don’t know the difference between a fine goblet and a watering trough.”

“Tomas and Jimm would have to call me mother.”

“Coral would have my knockers if I touched you.”

“Coral would have my knockers if I let you touch me,” she laughed.

“There is no one to marry us. You can’t marry yourself.”

“You’d have to learn to ride a horse to come visit me at home.”

“What do you mean ‘learn to ride a horse’?” he blurted, “I can ride a horse.”

“After riding around in that fancy carriage all your life? I think you need a few calluses on your backside, Your Majesty.”

“Well I can’t marry you if you have calluses on your backside,”
he told her wrinkling his nose.

“You should know if I do,” she said, “my skirt was up around my ears enough as I swung from trees in your garden.”

“You want to go do that again?” he asked leaning closer. “I’ll even carry you over my shoulder.”

She blushed and turned away. Yes, she was still a girl in so many ways. He laughed and tugged at her braid. She swept a hand back to swat at him as she started up the corridor. She looked back and smiled as he opened
the door to the practice yard.

The Marshalls stopped their practice as Fredrick
entered
all smiles. Amias and Kel shared a look. At their rapt attention, the King announced, “I informed her who wore the crown in this castle.”

“Ah, well I’m sure her neck is strong enough to hold it up,” Amias told him, tossing him a practice stick.

The King stopped mid-stride to stare at his Marshall Captain menacingly. “Didn’t I threaten to behead you at one time?”

“A few times,” Amias told him.

“Yet you still live,” the King said, shaking his head.

Vunn fumed as he squatted in front of the arch. Caris stood behind
him, a smug smile on her face.

“Are you playing with me?” he demanded, rising menacingly. “Are you interfering?”

“Not at all,” she told him. “I thought it went rather well. We had a good fight going there, anger, passion, lies and truth, got me all worked up to the climax. But did you...? It just went flaccid.”

He grabbed her arm, pulling her face close to his, “I don’t go flaccid.”

She nodded toward the arch. “I beg to differ.”

He looked down at her body then around at all the blank eyes of the other gods standing around them. “Are you playing with me?”

“Always,” she smiled. “But not with them. I am keeping my hands off so you can see what they are made of.”

He left her, angry.

“You need to be careful,” another god’
s voice said softly behind her.

She nodded. “I know.”

“He’s right,” he whispered. “They can end us.”

She turned to him and said quietly. “They won’t end us. They will end him.”

He nodded slightly, realizing the real game she played. The god-
smiter
s would end the torment they’d
all suffered. Especially hers.

Pearl entered the room where Amias and Coral were just stirring to get up for the morning. She grinned, straigh
tening the skirts of her dress.

“Coral, can you do the flipped plate for me today?” she as
ked, turning her back to Coral.

Amias lifted his eyebrows at his wife in amusement. He asked, “You don’t want the normal style you wear, pieces hanging out, leaves and mud adornment?”

“Who are you to talk to me about sloppy appearance?” she blurted. “Have you seen a barber lately?”

“You sound like the King,” he said with a mischievous smile at Coral.

She ignored his comment. “Amias, can you arrange a ride this afternoon? And invite Fredrick.”

“A ride?” he asked, baffled.

“Horses, dogs, friends.”

“Isn’t Glory better suited to arrange that?”

“No, I don’t want it to be a dinner party with a bunch of courtiers. I want to take a ride.”

Coral finished Pearl’s hair and said, “Amias, she wants to feel the road under her horse, listen to stories and the voices of men. Hear the sounds of leather and tack and feel the air on her skin. She wants to catch the eye of her man across a camp fire and smell the pipe smoke in his beard.”

“Yes,” breathed Pearl, smiling at Coral.

“I want to come too,” Coral laughed.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he told her. “It might give us a chance to break Darius into a pony.”

“You’d better go practice with him,” Coral demanded. “He’ll fall off as sure as he trips on his feet.”

“Hmm…” he nodded. “He’d better ride with one of us.”

After he left, Coral told Pearl, “I miss those days. Riding for hours and hours and stopping to sleep. Tucking you girls in and making sure you were happy. Listening to the men, feeling safe even though there was danger. Falling in love.”

“I miss it too.”

“I think Glory would have a problem with us building a campfire in the gardens,” Coral said and they both laughed.

Pearl met with Krisa in the ladies’ brunch room, ignoring the courtiers but whispering to each other. Krisa complained about having no privacy with Pat at all in the Marshall quarters. Pearl agonized over it with her.

“Coral told me to take him, but I have nowhere to take him,” Krisa laughed.

“I will ask the King for a room,” she told Krisa, “And you can use it.”

Krisa hugged Pearl, both of them sharing a tear. An alarm rose in the corridor. A bell rang and there were running feet. A fist pounded on the door of the brunch room. One of the servants rushed to open it.

“Pearl Doran!” the page yelled. “Miss Doran needed immediately. King’s orders.”

Both Pearl and Krisa jumped up, rushing to the boy, who led
them out and down the corridor.

“What is it?” she asked, running beside him.

He shrugged. “I just know its King’s orders. You have to come.”

He swung them down to the hallway that led them out to the horses and kennel. Pearl panicked someone had been hurt. Maybe Darius trying to ride a pony. Sh
e ran faster, passing the page.

When she skidded around the corner to the outside she saw Fredrick standing with the kennel master
. Fredrick was holding a puppy.

She stood with her hands on her hips, “You scared me!”

He smiled. “I meant to. Look, their eyes are open and they are trying to walk.”

She slowly approached so she didn’t startle the mother. Krisa bent to look at the ones in the crate. Pearl stroked the head of the little one in Fredrick’s arms. It had little round eyes and floppy ears. Fredrick watched her face. She looked into his and smiled.

“Are you going to hold me to our bargain?” she asked.

“No. I would have given you one anyway.”

“I would have taken one anyway,” she said.

“So the bargain stands?”

“I’ll let you know.”

She placed her face up against the puppy’s and it sniffed her nose. Fredrick’s thumb brushed her cheek. She leaned in more so her cheek rested against his hand. He smiled.

“I have a favor to ask,” she whispered.

“Anything.”

“Can I have a room of my own?”

He looked at her curiously. “Come stay with me,” he whispered.

She lifted her head and stared at him. “I just need a room. For myself.”

He smiled then nodded. “Anything else?”

“Maybe,” she told him, kissing the puppy’s head then kissing the back of Fredrick’s hand.

Invitations to the ride arrived mid-afternoon. Amias arranged it for a Marshall two night trip to the outpost garrison to the south. They’d have to stop for the night partway there, reach it by midday then stop again the next night on their return. Coral made sure to insist on two nights. She had Darius help her pack bed rolls and clothing. He’d always ridden in the carriage with her so this would be a new experience for him.

Fredrick made excuses for not attending. He made a list in his mind. He was the King, he couldn’t just take off on a horse for two days leaving things un-attended. But Amias insisted telling him to give Tomas some responsibility. His main advisors were there. He couldn’t get into too much trouble in two days. When Pearl and Darius arrived in his library wearing their riding clothes and Pearl pointed her finger at him saying she wanted some evidence of
calluses he laughed and agreed.

Fredrick waved off the offer of extra guardsmen. Seventeen Marshalls were protection enough, he insisted, as well as the god-
smiter
s Krisa and Pearl. No courtiers were invited and it was kept hushed. Glory stayed behind with Tomas so the King set extra guards on the two of them. She pouted but Coral had swatted her and they laughed.

The main southern gate let them pass and soon they were out on the road, in the Marshall traditional double row of horses, Amias and the King riding together, Kel with Coral, and the rest stringing along behind. Darius had taken a seat in front of Denon, the archer. Pat and Krisa rode in the rear. Other travelers on the road made way for the Marshalls, no one noting in particular that their king rode with them. At first it surprised Fredrick but then he felt liberated, not constrained by his station. He relaxed and started to enjoy the ride, as he was now with friends rather than just an official escort. He looked back to search for Pearl. The girl sat
on her horse, her eyes closed.

“It
was her idea,” Amias told him.

“What was?” Fredrick asked.

“The ride. I think she misses being on the road. It’s been a few months since we traveled from home.”

Fredrick nodded. “I’ve been selfish in keeping you all here.”

Amias smiled. “We don’t mind. Father is probably happy to have us out from under his feet.”

“She looks happy,” Fredri
ck told him looking back again.