The Queen's Gambit (8 page)

A sneer twisted Dianthelle's lips. “Why should I help you? Never have you done what I wanted you to do.”

“You wanted me to prostitute myself to become popular at court,” Pheresa said angrily. “You wanted me to lie, cheat, and scheme. You would have made me into your spy, and married me to some drab baron for a reward when I was no longer of use to you.”

The princess uttered no denial. Her fingers dug even tighter into Pheresa's arm. “If you'd listened to me, you'd be married now and free to act as you please. You'd have money and jewels of your own, instead of living off the king's charity. You'd have influence and position, all the comforts of life. Instead, you have nothing. Your father has washed his hands
of you. You're left without husband, status, or income. You nearly lost your life in that Thodforsaken country, and you caused Gavril's death. Even Nether's barbarian king didn't want you. He refused your hand in marriage, did he not?”

Pheresa gasped. “How did you—” Too late, she cut off her sentence.

Dianthelle smiled in triumph. “Ah, thank you for confirming that rumor. Well, my dear, I've always considered you a fool. For you see, were I on the throne, your succession as
my
heir would be certain. But as usual you have not thought things through. You're as selfish as you are stupid, and when Theloi succeeds in getting you cloistered, despite your little maneuvers today, I shall rejoice.”

Before Pheresa could reply, her mother shoved her from the carriage. Catching her balance clumsily with the servant's startled assistance, Pheresa glanced back at the princess, but there was no point in saying anything else. The battle lines were drawn clearly now. Her mother, incredibly, was jealous of her. Bitter resentment was etched in every line of Dianthelle's face as she yanked the door shut in Pheresa's face. “Drive on!” she commanded, and the carriage rolled away.

Pheresa hurried inside through the pouring rain. She had no doubt that her mother would cause her as much trouble as possible.

Both ruthless and without scruple, Dianthelle was capable of doing anything, even falsifying an order from the king that would send Pheresa off to Batoine in the dead of night. Swallowing hard, Pheresa told herself that she must take every precaution to guard herself, until she learned whom in the palace she could trust.

Darkness . . . cold, icy darkness. Pheresa awakened with a start and sat up. Her heart pounded, and she held her breath to listen hard. No sound penetrated the quiet stillness of her bedchamber. Nothing stirred. The hangings had been closed by her servants when she went to bed, but now they hung open. She could see embers glowing faint red among the ashes of a
dead fire. The room had grown chilly, nay, icy cold, as though winter had returned.

Pheresa felt as though an invisible hand clamped her in place, keeping her from moving. She could not tell what had awakened her. Surely no sound, no movement had disturbed her slumbers, yet what instinct stirred within her, urging her to get up, to get away?

She shivered, and that involuntary movement broke whatever spell held her frozen. Nothing appeared to be out of place, except that her bed-curtains were open. She knew they'd been shut when she went to sleep.

Who, then, had come in here and opened them? Why?

A tremor of something she could not name quivered across her heart. Was it Sir Brillon, come here by stealth to abduct her?

If so, where was he? At what moment would he come looming back?

A sound came from the antechamber outside her door . . . a soft, dragging step as though something shuffled her way. “Pheresa,” a voice whispered. It was a ruined husk of a voice, foreign yet familiar. “Pheresa,” it called again.

The sound of her name terrified her. She scooted to the edge of her bed, her heart pounding harder. “Gavril,” she breathed aloud.

The dragging footsteps abruptly halted. Pheresa could not breathe. Her every sense strained to hear. She gripped the bedclothes so hard her hands trembled. Thod's mercy, she had known it was a mistake to bring his tainted corpse home to Savroix. He had risen, and now Nonkind walked in lower Mandria.

“Pheresa . . . come forth to me.”

A little sob escaped her. She whirled around and reached frantically beneath her pillow. What she was searching for had vanished, however. Fear swept her like fire. Flinging her pillows aside, she hunted her dagger and salt purse with increasing desperation. What had become of them? She never slept without both items close by. Who had taken them?
Who?

Perhaps the same hand that had opened her bed-curtains.

The thought crossed her mind like something cold and stopped her frantic search.

Across the chamber, her door creaked open. Pheresa jerked her gaze in that direction, yet she could not bear to look at Gavril's ruined face. She shut her eyes, her breath rapid and ragged now.

“Get away from me,” she tried to say, but her words tangled in her throat. She lacked sufficient breath to speak them aloud.

“Pheresa . . . long have I searched for you. Come forth to my hand.”

It was a horrible, hollow voice. The words echoed in her mind. Worst of all, she wanted to obey, wanted to climb from her bed and go running to the creature that summoned her.

Against her will, she opened her eyes. She had to see him, had to know despite her fear.

Shadows concealed his ruined visage. It was as though evil itself stood in her room. The air grew even colder, making her shiver uncontrollably. He reached out his hand and beckoned to her.

She swayed forward obediently before she realized what she was doing.

“Pheresa . . .”

“Get away from me!” she shouted suddenly. Fear swept through her, giving her strength enough to fight off the spell being woven around her. “In the name of Thod, get away!”

The creature shuffled forward across the thick carpet. Pheresa rolled off her bed on the opposite side and landed awkwardly in a little huddle on the floor. As she got to her hands and knees, she found a small lumpy object in the darkness next to her. It was her salt purse, fallen onto the floor sometime in the night. She clutched it with a little gasp of relief, then felt about quickly and found her dagger.

As she swiftly unsheathed it, a thud shook the frame of her bed.

Startled, she jumped to her feet, and in the gloom saw the creature shoving against her bed in an effort to pin her to the wall.

Terrible memories flashed through her mind, memories of that day in Grov when Gavril had been consumed by the soultaker, and afterwards . . . and afterwards he had been a mindless, soulless thing, a puppet commanded by a will other than his own.

He came for her now in the same mindless way.

The bed was shoved again, harder, and she scrambled out into the open. She tried to scream for her servants and the guards, but once more her throat would not obey her. Trembling all over, she saw her assailant turn and come at her again.

Digging into her salt purse, she darted at him and threw the salt.

Fire flashed in all directions, making her stagger back. Her eyes were streaming with tears and half-dazzled by bursts of colors, but in that momentary illumination she saw her attacker's face clearly.

It was not Gavril.

Nor Sir Brillon.

She had never seen this man before. Dark-haired, with pallid, unhealthy skin, he cringed back from the salt she'd thrown, his mouth open in a silent scream. He fell against a table and passed through it as though he had no substance. Then he was gone, and the room lay shrouded in gloom and shadow once more.

The icy cold temperature vanished, leaving the room as warm and comfortable as it had been when she retired. Only the scent of something burned lingered in the air.

Pheresa stood there, unable to believe what she'd seen, unsure if any of it had even happened.
Surely I am dreaming another nightmare,
she thought.

Yet never had her dreams been like this.

Frowning, she hefted the salt purse in her hand. It felt real enough, as did her dagger. When she walked forward she bumped into a stool. That felt real. She pinched herself, and pain flared in her wrist.

It
had
been real. It
had
happened.

Her thoughts were spinning, and suddenly her knees gave
way. She clutched the bed for support and dragged herself back beneath the covers. There was no need now to call her servants. She wanted no questions, no lamps lit, no fuss or bother. It was pointless now to reprimand her attendants for having failed to protect her. What could anyone do against an invader of the second world? And if she tried to describe what had just happened, who would believe her?

The folk of lower Mandria did not believe in magic. They lived in complete assurance that nothing Nonkind could reach them south of the Charva. So it had always been; so it must be now.

But Pheresa no longer had such convictions. Not since her days as a hostage in Grov had she felt entirely safe. The fact that salt had driven this mysterious visitor away only confirmed its evil.

Shivering, she pulled her blankets close and clutched her salt purse tightly. After a long, long while she forced herself to lie down, but she could not close her eyes or relax. The intruder might come back, seizing her the moment her guard went down. He had nearly mesmerized her tonight, and had she not found her salt purse . . .

With a shudder, she closed off that thought hurriedly.

What was he? she wondered. Ghost, spirit, evil wraith from the second world? He had come to her, summoned her by name. Why?

She shivered again, weeping in fear. What did he want? Why had he sought her here tonight?

And, most frightening of all,
when
would he return?

Icy cold water ran beneath Talmor, filling his mouth and nostrils. He jerked up his head, snorting and coughing, dragged himself forward a few inches, then sank down. More than that required too much effort. He wanted only to sleep. Water surged beneath him again, hoisting him a little higher on the beach. Revived a second time, he had better luck this time in keeping his face out of the water.

He did not know where he was, but as he rolled onto his back and gazed at the sky, he expected to see daylight. Instead, the stars were twinkling in an indigo sky. The surf roared in his ears. The usual scents of seaweed and fish filled the air, but when the wind shifted he smelled smoke and the stink of burning hair.

The sea ran under him again, unpleasantly cold, and this time he thought,
tide.
Rolling onto his side, he sat up with a groan. Every inch of his body hurt, his head and side most of all.

Sitting up seemed to make the pounding in his skull more violent. He moaned, lifting his hands to his face, and realized
vaguely that he must have been moaning for quite some time. His throat was terribly dry, and there was sand in his mouth. He spat out the unpleasant, briny stuff and stared at the bay in muzzy confusion. There was something he needed to remember, but memory and coherent thought swirled dizzily through his mind. Just as things started to make sense, they were gone, too elusive to grasp. He did not try very hard.

A big wave splashed over him, knocking him flat. He emerged, spluttering, wobbled onto his hands and knees, and crawled farther up the beach to get above the incoming tide. The effort made him weak and breathless. His head was splitting, but he kept going doggedly until he reached dry sand.

He bumped against a shape, half-seen in the gathering darkness, and felt of it without much curiosity. Damp clothing, hauberk, bearded face.

With a blink, Talmor abruptly withdrew his hand from the dead man. He frowned, looking around, and this time noticed more motionless lumps lying scattered across the sand. Out in the bay, a fishing boat was sinking slowly, stern tipped up like a duck diving for fish. The other vessels were gone, and a great deal of flotsam littered the water. He frowned at that, certain there was something important he should remember, but his head ached too much.

The fitful wind brought back the smell of smoke and fire to his nostrils. Only then did he notice the village, burning merrily. A handful of people were silhouetted against the orange flames as they passed buckets from hand to hand and threw water on the flames.

Talmor stared, worried by the sight but not sure why. Surely the huts should not be burning like that. Even the wharf was on fire. There should have been fish racks on it, and nets spread out for mending. Instead, he saw only destruction and bodies. In the distance, someone wailed in grief.

Raiders,
Talmor thought with a jab of anger. The memory crystallized in his head, and he clung to it, trying hard to remember more. They'd come out of the storm and attacked the boats. They'd . . .

A terrible, clammy sensation swept him. He leaned over
and was violently sick on the sand. The pounding in his head became agony. He faded gratefully back into the darkness.

“Sir Talmor.” A hand gripped his surcoat and shook him roughly. “Sir Talmor!”

Angered at being roused back into the pain, Talmor groaned and made a feeble swipe at the hand. Instead, his fingers were gripped hard, and the voice rose in volume.

“Oh, Sir Talmor! I've found ye alive, bless ye.”

Talmor tried to tell the voice to go away, but although his lips moved, he did not think he actually said anything.

“Over here!” the voice shouted. “I've found Sir Talmor alive!”

Talmor winced at the noise and tried to crawl back into the darkness, but now there came other hands, other voices. He felt himself lifted, and something hit his hurt shoulder, making him yelp. There was the sensation of being carried, along with the worrisome potential of being dropped.

Wanting to be left alone, he struggled a little, but found himself held helpless.

Raiders,
he thought again, with a stab of fear, and reached for his dagger.

His fingers found no weapon. A hand squeezed them, and a deep, familiar voice spoke in his ear: “Easy now, Talmor lad. We've got ye. Just bide quiet now. All's well.”

Believing the assurances, he relaxed back into unconsciousness, only to awaken later with a start. This time, he found himself indoors. The air was stuffy and hot. A fire blazed on the hearth, casting ruddy light that hurt Talmor's eyes. He was lying on a cot, hard and most uncomfortable, with a blanket thrown over him. Beneath it, he'd been stripped down to his leggings. His ribs were bound so tightly he could barely breathe. Another bandage swathed his head, hot and surprisingly heavy. He lifted his right hand to gingerly feel the wound through the layers of cloth, and someone pulled his hand away.

“Leave it be, Sir Talmor.”

Talmor found himself peering up into the middle-aged face of Pears, his squire. The grooves on either side of Pears's
wide mouth were cut deep tonight. Ruddy, weathered, and nut tough, Pears looked worried, but he managed a small, not very convincing, smile for Talmor's sake.

“Found ye, didn't I?” he whispered. His voice was rough with emotion. “Guess they left ye for dead, aye, lying there with that great gout of blood on yer noggin. Otherwise, they'd have dragged ye off with the others, aye, and made ye a slave, damn 'em.”

Someone else in the room uttered a moan. Talmor tried to lift his head and look about, but with gentle firmness Pears held him down.

“Nay, sir. 'Tis only another wounded man. Nothing to fret about.”

Bits of memory started to come back to Talmor. There'd been the ceremony preparations, the storm, the sudden arrival of the raiders, the attack. “Seawall,” he mumbled. His mouth ached with dryness. His tongue felt like a piece of wood. “Must defend—”

“Didn't,” Pears said tersely. “Couldn't. Here, have a sup of this.”

A cup was pressed to Talmor's lips, and his head gently lifted so that he could gulp down a few swallows. The water was fresh and cool, and eased him greatly.

Sighing, he let Pears lower him and adjust the blanket, fussing quietly with gnarled hands that trembled. It was unlike Pears to be so shaken. Talmor reached out and weakly held on to his squire's hand.

“We fell back to the hold, I remember. But after that . . . nothing. Something hit me, I think. I heard—”

“Aye, you were hit with a piece of the wall, sir,” Pears said grimly.

That made no sense. Fearing his wits were starting to wander, Talmor frowned.

“Them flaming arrows set the scaffolding on fire, over where the new part of the hold was being added on,” Pears said. “Aye, and of course some fool had stored the saltpeter there. It went off like the world coming to an end. Killed ever
so many knights, and Lord Pace, too, bless 'im. Ye were nearly sent to Beyond yerself.”

There were too many pieces of news to hang on to at once. Talmor's frown deepened as he struggled to grasp it all. “Lord Pace.”

“Aye. A grim day this is, sir. A very grim day.”

“Killed by raiders—”

“Nay. Killed by his own demon powder. He would have it. None could tell him different, not with him so sure he knew best. Ye know all too well how he was, sir. Never listened to good advice, did he?”

Talmor felt suddenly too weary to speak. His eyes drifted closed and in that soft place of half awareness before sleep, he heard another come near his cot.

“Has he roused?” a quiet voice asked.

“Aye, sir,” Pears replied. “This time he seemed to know who he was.”

“Then his wits are coming back. What does he remember?”

“Not much.”

“Just as well. Have you potioned him?”

“He'll sleep natural now, sir. No need to pour that nasty stuff down his gullet.”

“The pain will rouse him. Best to keep him dosed and quiet.”

“Nay, sir. He heals quick, Sir Talmor does. The less fussing with salves and potions, the better he mends. I know what to do for him, sir, bless 'im. Indeed I do.”

“Well, see that he rests. We need him on his feet as quickly as possible.”

“Aye, sir. I know.”

Talmor opened his eyes and saw the man's back walking away from him into the shadows. “What—”

Pears's hand gripped his good shoulder. “Hush, sir,” he breathed. “He's going out. There, he's gone. No need for you to talk to him now, for all his high-and-mighty impatience.”

“Inthiere,” Talmor said weakly.

“Aye, Sir Inthiere, damn 'im.”

The fortress commander was unpopular among the men, and Talmor didn't bother to reprimand Pears. Recalling Inthiere's drunkenness this morning and how his sentries had first failed to keep watch, then botched the warning signal, Talmor felt like damning the man himself. But not now. He felt terribly tired and shaken.

It was the latter that worried him. Pulling his attention away from Inthiere's faults, for all the sorting out of blame and fault could wait until the morrow, Talmor felt sweat trickling down his throat and chest. “Must it be so hot in here?” he asked.

Pears stared at him without expression. “Must it?” he echoed, but with a careful voice.

Shame burned through Talmor then, with humiliation dragging in its wake. He thought he'd managed to leave the past behind, yet this morning he'd had that premonition of trouble before Lutel sighted the boats. And now . . . it seemed some problems could never be solved, or escaped.

Sighing, he clenched his fist and felt the heat coiling there inside his palm. He could feel the violence building, both anger and shock entwined and ready to strike out. The air felt hotter than ever, as though the room were on fire. It was oppressive heat, the kind that was painful to breathe. But he knew it could get much, much hotter.

When he glanced up at Pears, he saw a glimmer of fear in the older man's eyes, fear swiftly hidden. But he could read the thoughts inside Pears's mind as plainly as though they were written on a scroll. If he chose, he could read deeper . . . every wish, every fear, every emotion. Swiftly Talmor averted his eyes. It was wrong to soulgaze,
wrong.
He had sworn he would never do it again.

A shudder passed through him. Gritting his teeth against the forces he could no longer reliably control, he said, “Quick! Fetch some water.”

Pears hurried to bring a wooden pail of water. He lifted the drinking dipper, but Talmor glared at him. “Get back!”

Dropping the dipper, Pears stumbled back just as Talmor felt the violence inside him escape. It spewed from him, a
blazing heat that shot down his arm with such power he cried out. A ball of fire burst into flames in mid-air, the force of it pulling him nearly upright. With all the willpower he possessed, he threw the flames at the water pail.

The fireball extinguished with a sharp crack of sound, and the bucket rocked back and forth. Steam rose from the wood. As Pears crept forward cautiously to peer into the pail, Talmor already knew it was bone dry.

The air in the sick room cooled at once. The violence in him was gone, spent. Exhausted, he dropped down on his cot and flung his arm across his stinging eyes. He hadn't lost control like that in years, not since the day he lost his temper with his half brother Etyne and burned him. Although Etyne recovered from his injuries, Talmor's father had beaten him, starved him for a week, then told him he must leave forever. Ten years had passed since then, and although he kept the hurt buried deep, it remained sharp. Talmor sighed. Ten years of ironclad control, with never a slip while he followed Sanude's training faithfully, yet tonight had proven his hard work for naught. He might as well still be that awkward boy of sixteen—angry, tormented, and frustrated in trying to find a way to belong and earn his father's love. He did not want to imagine what either Sanude or his father would say were they here now.

A faint, rational voice in the back of his aching head reminded him that he hadn't forgotten his training. He'd been too weak to hold his curse in check. That was all.