Sing the Four Quarters (4 page)

"Do you want me to have the kitchen send something up?"

No. Except that she was starving. "Soup and bread. Thanks."

Ceci turned to watch as she started toward the stairs. "You going to make it all the way to your rooms?" she asked dubiously.

"Of course I am. I'm fine. I'm just a little tired. It's my punishment for sitting on my ass all the way from Vidor."

"Riverboat?"

"What else."

"You push?"

"A little."

"Captain won't like that."

"Extenuating circumstances."

Ceci laughed. "They always are. Stasya's out in the city."

"Good for her."

"When she comes in, shall I tell her you're back or let her find out for herself?"

Annice thought about it for a moment, then called down from the top of the stairs. "You'd better tell her. You know how she hates surprises."

"You're the one who wanted to be on the fourth floor," she reminded herself a few moments later, resting on the third floor landing. "And you're the one who wanted rooms at the back of the building not the front. You've got no one to blame for this final effort but yourself."

The soup and bread very nearly made it to her rooms before she did. She'd barely Sung the lamp alight and checked to see that the kigh dancing on the wick was safely contained when the server arrived.

"Just set the tray here," she said, lifting a jumbled heap of slates off a round table and searching desperately for a place to put them. As usual, Stasya had left their common room looking like a storm had recently passed through. Finally, as it seemed to be the only clear space remaining, she stuffed the slates under a chair, stood her instrument case against the wall, and shrugged her pack off to crash to the floor.

The older man clicked his tongue—at the noise or the mess, Annice wasn't sure which—and nudged a pile of colored chalks aside with the edge of the tray. "I brought you some cheese," he said, straightening. "Need more than just bread and soup after a Long Walk."

"I only walked in from Riverton today, Leonas," Annice pointed out, removing a half-strung harp and a pair of torn breeches from her favorite chair. "Not all the way from Ohrid."

Leonas ignored her. "Probably haven't had any decent food for the whole two quarters."

"I actually ate quite well."

He snorted and looked her over. "Gained a little weight, did you?"

Annice sighed. She couldn't win. "Good night, Leonas."

"Good night, Princess."

"Leo…"

"If I can call my Giz
Cupcake
when she never was one," he interrupted, glaring back at her from the threshold, "I can call you Princess when you aren't one no more. Get some sleep. You look terrible." Jerking the door closed behind him, he left Annice no room to argue.

Leonas had already been serving at the Bardic Hall for thirty years when the fourteen-year-old Annice arrived.

Determined not to let it show, lest word get back to her brother, she was hurt and confused and had no idea of how not to act like a princess. Leonas had gruffly taken her under his wing, explaining little things it had never occurred to the bards that she wouldn't know, easing the transition as much as he could. Over the years, he'd slid into the role of trusted retainer and if he wanted to call her "Princess," she supposed he'd earned the right. She tried to discourage it, though; she'd long left that life behind.

Stripping off her wet clothes and letting them lie where they fell, she pulled a heavy woolen robe and sheepskin slippers from the wardrobe in her bedroom, shuffled down the hall to use the necessity—fortunately running into no one with whom she'd have to make conversation—then finally sat down to eat.

The soup was excellent, big chunks of tender clam in a thick vegetable stock. Not entirely trusting her stomach, Annice saved the bread and cheese for later.

She thought about lighting a fire, but—in spite of the rain slapping against the shutters—it just wasn't cold enough to justify making the effort. Besides, once in bed with the curtains closed, she'd be plenty warm enough. Setting thought to action, she picked up the lamp and shuffled into the bedroom.

Blankets and sheets were heaped in a tangled pile. The down comforter trailed on the floor, evidence of a hasty departure, and all but one of the four pillows had been thrown to the foot of the bed.

"I can't believe she can sleep in this," Annice muttered, tugging the mess into some semblance of order. "And I don't even want to know how she tore that corner of the curtain." Bed finally tidied, she Sang the kigh in the lamp a gratitude and, in the dark, slipped off her robe and slid naked between the sheets. Just as they began to warm around her body, her bladder decided to get her up again.

"I just went!" she told it.

It didn't seem to matter.

"If it isn't one end lately, it's the other," she complained, groping for her slippers. "I am really getting tired of this."

"Nees? Are you asleep?"

Annice roused enough to murmur an affirmative, then gasped as a cold body wrapped around hers. "Stasya, you're freezing!"

"You're not. You're nice and warm."

"I
was
nice and warm."

"Oh, hush. I'll warm up in a minute and you won't even know that I'm here."

"Not likely." Annice squirmed as the other woman began chewing on her ear. "Stop it, Stas. I'm tired."

"I missed you…"

"I missed you, too, but I'm
tired
."

"Can I welcome you home in the morning?"

"You can do what you want in the morning," Annice muttered, "if you'll just let me sleep now."

When she woke again, weak light shone through the space between the bedcurtains, enough to illuminate the woman propped on one elbow and staring down at her.

"Hi."

"Hi yourself." Stasya smiled and waggled dark brows. "It's morning. Welcome home. Remember what you promised?"

"

She remembered a cold body very clearly, but the rest only vaguely. "Stas…"

"Stas…" The other woman mocked and leaned forward. "It was witnessed by a bard," she whispered, breath tickling Annice's lips.

"Stasya." Annice shoved her aside as her stomach rose to greet the day. "Get out of my way. Now!"

"How long has this been going on?"

"I don't know." Panting, Annice sat back on her heels, steadying herself against the toilet. A while now."

Stasya leaned against the open door of the cubicle and frowned. "What do the healers say?"

"I haven't seen one."

"You are
such
an idiot. Why not?"

"I figured I'd see one when I got home."

"Fine. You're home. Are you finished?" Stasya stepped forward, bent, and helped Annice to her feet. "You can go see one right now."

"But I haven't talked to the captain yet."

"So?"

Yanking the chain that flushed water through the pipes with one hand, Annice secured her robe with the other. "In case you've forgotten, I just got back from a Long Walk; I'll be in recall all morning."

"Healers take precedence."

"But I'll likely have to sit around the Hall for hours before they can see me."

"Not at this time of the morning." Fingers locked around Annice's arm just above the elbow, Stasya propelled her down the corridor and into their rooms. "Get dressed," she commanded. "You're going to see a healer if I have to drag you, so you might just as well go comfortably on your own two feet."

Realizing that Stasya had made up her mind and resistance was therefore futile, Annice sighed and surrendered. "It's going to be a waste of time," she muttered. "They won't know what it is. They never know…"

"When was the last time you had your flows?"

"My flows?" Annice frowned as she shrugged back into her clothing. "Oh, come on, Elica, I can't remember that."

The healer rolled her eyes. "You're a bard. You can remember if you want to."

"Well…" The frown smoothed out as Annice slid into a light recall. "I was between Adjud and Ohrid. Four days out of Adjud and thirteen from Ohrid."

"How long ago were you in Ohrid?"

"Nine weeks."

"So you've missed two, almost three cycles." Elica pushed a carved wooden box out of the way and sat on the edge of her table. "Didn't you ever wonder about that?"

"I was on a Long Walk. I had other things on my mind."

"You shouldn't have."

"Why?" Annice's head came up and her tone sharpened defensively. "What have I caught?"

"You haven't caught anything," the healer sighed. "You're pregnant."

"You're WHAT?"

"Keep your voice down," Annice hissed, pushing past her. "Do you want the whole Citadel to know?"

Stasya hurried to catch up as Annice stomped down the corridor of the Healers' Hall. "You're kidding, right?"

"No."

"Well, how did it happen?"

"How the empty Circle do you think? The
usual
way."

"What about the teas the healers gave you?"

"I gave them to a woman who'd had seven babies in six years. She seemed to need them more."

"Very commendable, I'm sure, but none of her babies were committing treason in the womb." Together they pounded out of the Healers' Hall and across the courtyard. "Annice! Slow down. Where are you going?"

"I've got to talk to the captain."

"I'll say. Can you get rid of it, or has it gone too far?"

"I can. But I'm not going to. That's why I have to talk to the captain."

"This," Stasya said with feeling, as they raced up the stairs to the captain's chambers, "is what comes of sleeping with men."

Liene stared up at the young woman standing on the other side of her desk.
Why me
? she asked the Circle silently.
Or
more to the point, why her
? "You're positive?"

"Healer Elica is."

Wonderful
. The Bardic Captain closed her eyes and heard King Mikus ask in memory if she had known about his youngest daughter's boon. It had been a fair question. The old scoundrel had bloody well known she'd been after his permission to recruit Annice for almost a year. Practically every time the child opened her mouth, kigh flocked around her. Allowing that kind of talent to remain untrained would have been criminal. Even more so considering how badly Annice had wanted to be a bard.

Eyes still closed, Liene rewitnessed the old king's declaration and the new king's conditions. She'd strongly disapproved of those conditions, but the king had refused to listen to her counsel. The child had been only fourteen, so she'd decided to deal with both conditions and king later. As Annice threw herself into her studies, becoming less the princess and more the bard,
later
moved farther and farther away.

Later
, Liene sighed silently,
seems to have come home to roost
.

The Bardic Oath stressed the responsibilities of power but mentioned nothing about celibacy, and Annice was not the first bard to conceive. While it didn't happen often—the healers thought it had something to do with Singing the kigh

—babies had been raised in Bardic Halls before. Bards had even occasionally left to raise babies with nonbardic partners. Babies happened. Sometimes, they even happened on purpose. Personally, the captain rather liked having children around, although not to the extent that she'd ever thought of having her own.

She could hear the young woman fidgeting and reluctantly opened her eyes to meet a cautiously defiant gaze. "You do realize that, considering the king's edict, what you did was, to say the least, irresponsible?"

Annice tossed her head. "I didn't do it on purpose." Liene leaned back and slowly lifted one brow. "My point," she said, "exactly." When understanding registered, she sighed and leaned forward again. "I realize why you gave away the tea, Annice, although, as we've been importing it from the south at ridiculous prices to prevent exactly this situation, I'm sure
you
realize that I wish you'd never met the woman. The deed being done, however, didn't it occur to you to temper later actions?" A blush stained Annice's cheeks deeply pink in spite of color left by two quarters on the road.

"It only happened the once. There just weren't any alternatives handy, and…"

"Never mind." A chronicle of spontaneous passion was more than Liene felt up to at the moment. "You're certain about the father?"

"Yes, Captain."

"
And it's none of my business. Succinctly put
. Annice's voice control was a credit to her training. "Do you feel any obligation to let him know?"

"No, Captain. It was a casual encounter. He'll have no interest in a child from it."

Because a difficult situation would be marginally less difficult if the father never knew, Liene was willing to go along with Annice's assessment. "And you're determined to continue the pregnancy?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Why?" Annice repeated, looking confused. "You're still within the healer's limits. Why continue when, considering His Majesty's edict, it would be easier—not to mention less dangerous—to terminate?"

Annice paced the length of the room and back, then bent over and placed her palms very precisely on the edge of the captain's desk. "Look, Captain, I'm twenty-four years old. I'm in excellent health. I haven't got a family anymore and I suddenly find that I want one now I've got this chance."

"I thought the bards had become your family, Annice."

She caught the older woman's gaze and held it. "Have they?"

Liene recognized the challenge. One family had turned their backs on this young woman already. Would a second? "If I support you in this, it is my treason, a bardic treason, as much as it is yours."

"I know that."

"The king would be within his rights to have everyone who knew and who didn't tell him put to the sword."

Annice almost smiled. "Then tell everyone."

"Your point," Liene acknowledged. "As he certainly can't execute us all, we're safe enough. But, considering it objectively, you're probably just as safe. You don't honestly believe that His Majesty would have you put to death over this matter, do you?"

"I can't afford not to believe it. I have my baby's life to consider."