And then she stood in front of her mirror and changed herself into her lover.
The intelligent, restless face; the brown eyes; the dark gold hair, tied back with a black ribbon. All these were as familiar to her as her own features, her own skin. The well-muscled body that was such a pleasure to touch—that she could manufacture, too, without a moment’s difficulty. She dressed him in formal black, with touches of the Merrenstow checkerboard at his throat and pocket.
By the Red Lady’s burning hand, he was her idea of the perfect man. She could stand here and stare all night, in love with her own reflection.
A last lingering look, then she spun on her heel and strode out into the hall, automatically adopting Romar’s stance and gait. At the door to the Riders’ room, she paused a moment, hand upon the knob. Then she smiled, and knocked instead.
Justin opened the door, but she brushed past him before he could speak. She addressed the whole room in Romar’s voice. “Is there anything else you need from me before you set off on this ill-judged adventure?” she asked. They all stared at her, uncertain. Well, Cammon was trying very hard not to laugh. Obviously he had not been fooled. “Or have you changed your minds? Where’s Kirra?”
“She’s down the hall, lord,” Senneth said. “Preparing for her part.”
She pivoted for the door. “Then perhaps I’ll check with her.”
Justin moved without much subtlety to block her exit. “No. Lord. I think it’s best you return to Amalie’s room and let us finish our preparations on our own.”
“I just wanted to wish her luck,” she told him impatiently.
“She’s got us. She doesn’t need luck,” Justin said with a little smile.
She swung back to face the others, carefully avoiding looking at Cammon. “I could come with you,” she said, as if struck by fresh inspiration. “I’ll stay in the coach. That way, if no danger threatens, Kirra and I can exchange places sometime in the middle of the evening.”
“Which is exactly when danger would strike,” Tayse said. “Why don’t I take you back across the hall? Where I will be sure to ask Coeval and Hammond why they let you leave your niece’s room.”
She opened her mouth, but before she could reply, Cammon started laughing. That was enough for the rest of them; they knew instantly they’d been tricked. Justin shoved her on the arm so hard she staggered back a few steps.
“We ought to just let you go by yourself,” he said in disgust.
“I’m sorry,” Cammon said, still laughing. “But that was too good.”
Senneth and even Tayse were smiling. “I don’t think we need to worry about you
not
fooling the vassals,” Senneth said.
“Very good,” Tayse said. “Time to go.”
IT was about an hour by coach to the estate of Domenic Ayr, Ariane’s primary vassal. A boring hour for Kirra, since she rode alone inside while the other four accompanied her on horseback. On the trip back, someone was definitely going to be persuaded to sit in the coach with her and keep her company.
She let petty considerations drop away as she disembarked before Domenic’s house, an attractive but not particularly large manor graced by a profusion of roses along the front walk. She was late; the lord was not at the door to greet her. A footman showed her instantly to the dining area, and she took a quick look around before her name was announced.
About twenty men and a handful of women were gathered in the room, already seated around a highly polished table and consumed with debate. Kirra recognized many of them from her earlier visits at Shadow Balls. There was Kell Sersees from Kianlever, Bat Templeson of Coravann, both accompanied by their wives. There was even Coren Bauler, with whom Senneth had had a memorable one-sided flirtation in Fortunalt last winter. Kirra recognized faces from Storian, Merrenstow, and Tilt. None from Danalustrous, thank the great gods. There were a few other individuals who looked familiar, though she could not assign names to them. And that man, portly and self-satisfied, standing by the sideboard conversing with Domenic Ayr—he looked familiar.
He looked like the man who had led the attack against Romar at the bonfire in Nocklyn.
“Lord Romar Brendyn of Merrenstow, regent to the king,” the footman intoned, and all conversation in the room ceased. Chairs scraped on the stone floor as the diners pushed their seats back and rose, some of them bowing or curtseying, some merely giving her cool nods of acknowledgment. Kirra kept her expression grave, as Romar would have, and responded with a slight bow of her own.
Domenic hurried across the floor to greet her. “Regent! I am so pleased you were able to join us after all. Do you know everyone?”
“Some. Not all.”
“Let me introduce you around the table and then we will be seated. Dinner is ready even as we speak.”
She paid close attention as introductions were made. Yes, every House but Danalustrous was represented. The heavyset man was from Storian, though Domenic mangled the introduction and she couldn’t catch his name. Storian. That seemed wrong. Unlike Cammon, she couldn’t automatically tell when someone was lying, but something about this man rang false to her. His name or his affiliation or his face or—
His face. His body. That was it. Like her, he was in disguise. Like her, he had changed himself from his proper form. There was a mystic among the Thirteenth House lords, and he was allied with the rebellion.
He would be the man to watch during dinner.
The meal itself was excellent, a variety of well-cooked dishes chased down with copious amounts of wine. Kirra drank sparingly and did more listening than talking, as Romar would have. Conversation veered from earnest to envious to hilarious as it covered everything from new taxes to the privileges of the wealthy to recent personal disasters that became much funnier in the retelling. Those sitting closest to Kirra made a point of including her in their conversations, bombarding Romar with questions both political and social. From them she got the impression she had picked up on other nights at the Shadow Balls—even at that ill-fated bonfire in Nocklyn. These were people who were eager to better themselves, hopeful that a regime change might improve their fortunes. Most of them, or so she gathered, wanted peaceful change; they were willing to work for recognition and honor.
Then who were the rebels? Was this really a meeting of conspirators? Did anyone here truly want to kill Romar Brendyn?
When conversation became general, as it did every twenty minutes or so, it tended to revolve around universal preoccupations—land, the succession, and power.
“Els Nocklyn promised us,” one of the vassals’s wives was saying in a stubborn voice. “Before he got sick. He promised us another hundred acres. I know serra Mayva would honor the promise, but I can’t get in to see her, and her husband—” She made a fatalistic motion with her hand.
“Gisseltess lords keep their promises,” said a guest who was wearing a vest embroidered with the hawk and the rose. A Gisseltess man. “But sometimes you have to wait till it’s convenient for them to be fulfilled.”
“I’m tired of waiting on promises,” said the Storian man in disguise. He looked straight at Kirra. “Lord Romar, what can the king promise us that our own lords can’t? What can he grant us?”
That was blunt. But she had seen Romar field this same question before, and he hadn’t flinched. “I can promise nothing on behalf of the king except that I will tell him you want a conversation with him,” she said, her voice firm and ringing. “Make up a delegation. Come to Ghosenhall. I will guarantee you an audience. But more than that I cannot guarantee.”
The Storian man leaned forward, his bulk displacing some of the plates before him on the table. “But will he listen? Will his daughter listen if her father is dead? Will
you
listen, once the king is gone?”
“The king is still very much alive,” she said in a pleasant voice. “I would not consider negotiating elsewhere, if I were you.”
“The king will not live much longer,” said the Gisseltess man. “We all wish him well, of course. But he is old. What happens when he is gone? We have the patience to wait—but not if waiting brings us nothing.”
“Send a delegation to Ghosenhall,” she repeated. “Ask to meet with his majesty and his daughter. I will join the negotiations.”
“Yes, but will you argue for us?” a pale woman demanded.
“I will if the proposals you put forth are reasonable.”
“Thirteenth House yourself, or very near to it,” purred the false Storian man. “You own fine properties and your blood is pure, but you’ll never inherit Merren Manor. How does that feel? Don’t you hate your marlord cousin—just a little bit?”
She was shocked at her own reaction, which was one of arrogance and outrage.
I am Twelfth House, you ratty upstart pretender,
she wanted to say, on Romar’s behalf as well as her own. Well. That was telling. She had always believed herself an egalitarian, open to every man’s virtues, and here she was poised to defend bloodlines at the slightest hint of insult.
Romar, she thought, would not have felt the same uncharitable emotions. Romar would have shrugged and said, “I honor my cousin. I respect him. I manage my own affairs and let him manage his.” Therefore she said the words anyway, in his voice, and thought it was a much better response than her own.
The heavy man still sneered, but Domenic Ayr toasted her with his wineglass. “A diplomat,” he said. “Just the kind of man we need sitting next to the king—or next to the princess.”
Conversation turned to less dangerous topics then, though Kirra caught other people at the table eyeing her speculatively for the next few minutes. She waited until no one was paying much attention to her, then signaled a servant.
“I need to speak with one of my guards. Can you fetch him? I will wait at the doorway.”
“Certainly, regent. One in particular?”
“Yes, the younger one. Cammon.”
She excused herself from the table and left the room, standing just outside the doorway in the outer hall. She could still watch the diners eating and arguing. None of them seemed alarmed by her brief absence.
Cammon came bounding up seconds later. He didn’t look alarmed, either; he knew she wasn’t in danger. “What?”
“There’s a man in there. I think he’s clad in magic. Can you tell me what he really looks like?”
Cammon peered inside the room. “Well—where is he?”
“Between the man in the maroon jacket and the man with the white beard. Right now he’s tearing apart a piece of bread with his hands.”
“He’s overweight but not huge. Almost bald, but not quite. What hair he has is blond, going a little gray. His cheeks are very red, as if he’s been drinking a lot, or shouting at someone.”
“That could describe a lot of people. Not wearing any House colors? Doesn’t have a huge scar across his face? Anything that would help identify him?”
“No.”
“I wish I could see him. I wonder if I’d recognize him.”
“Do you have your little lion with you? Give it to me.”
She fished it out. “You’re always surprising,” she commented, and dropped it in his hand. Instantly, she felt her veins quiver with fire; the muscles along her back strung with tension. “Now what?”
“Look at him,” Cammon directed. “I think, when I touch you, you’ll pick up some of my magic. Maybe enough to help you see him truly. I don’t know. I’m only guessing.”
She focused on the portly man, just now gesticulating with some energy at the lord across the table from him. Cammon moved behind her and laid his palm along her spine; she could feel the pressure of his hand even through the links of chain mail. For a moment, she was dizzy. The room before her danced as if she viewed it through waves of heat. Then her vision sharpened and her eyes felt hot and she was staring across the room at a man she knew.
Heavyset, ruddy, fair—that was how he had always appeared. Angry, purposeful, calculating—that was a side of him she had rarely seen. Berric Fann, her uncle. A man who hated her father and who was, or so it appeared, plotting against the king.
She said nothing for so long that Cammon prodded her with his free hand. “Kirra? I mean, my lord? Is something wrong? Do you know him?”