CASSIA WAS ALWAYS ONE maneuver away from her last breath.
Every day was like a siege. Each decision she made, no matter how small, must fortify her
defenses. She excelled at the practice of protecting herself. She lived by it.
One wrong move, and the king would destroy her.
Challenging him was always the wrong move. She hoped she lived to regret what she was about to
do.
Today, she would cast aside all her hard-won defenses and place herself within death’s reach. The
king’s reach.
She sat utterly still in her chair, but her breath wanted to rush in and out of her lungs. She forced
herself to inhale deeply. Then a slow exhale.
She rearranged the cloak upon her lap, the better to display the hole in the otherwise flawless
lambskin. Such a simple thing, but it would cause a chain of events that would accomplish her
purpose.
Heat flashed under her skin and broke through in a sweat. She must not dwell on the fact that this
encounter with a servant would soon lead to an audience with the king.
She couldn’t afford fear. She had to see her plan through.
The seamstress stood over her. A band of late afternoon light slanted in from the high slit of one
window and gleamed in her narrowed eyes. With a single glower, she judged the plain brown gown
Cassia wore.
The wizened craftswoman had taken her time getting here. Her message was clear: she had more
important tasks than mending for the king’s bastard daughter. Yet she had come to this back corner of
the palace, though it was Winter Solstice, when she could be spending the holiday off her feet.
Cassia had been right. The woman could not resist finding out what was to be gained by granting
the favor. Other people’s ambitions were very useful.
Cassia knew better than to have ambitions. A king’s bastard had few resources and less power. A
daughter had none at all. So why was she sitting here with this cloak, ready to move the sun and
moons to achieve her ends?
Her pulse hammered through her body. She thought back over each step of her plan. She had taken
every precaution. Nothing she did today would seem out of the ordinary to the king or anyone who
might report to him.
No one would question why she called upon the most skilled seamstress in the King of Tenebra’s
household rather than attempt to mend the cloak herself. No one would doubt she mourned the loss of
the finest mantle she might ever have, which had cost her suitor Lord Adrogan a number of prize
shearlings.
The king would not suspect her. Would he?
Cassia’s expression felt brittle on her face, a thin mask over the alarms sounding inside her head.
She ran a hand over the cloak, knitting her brows as if she actually cared about the hideous thing.
“Please tell me you can save it, Mistress.”
The seamstress eyed the hole as if assessing its size and jagged edges. Then she peered at Knight.
Cassia’s hound lifted his head from his favorite resting place, his lady’s feet, and sniffed. Whatever
he scented, and whatever his instincts beyond his nose told him, he parted his jaws in a dog smile,
showing the old woman a lolling tongue and a mouthful of teeth.
The seamstress’s mouth puckered as if she wished to spit upon the beast for ruining such a fine
garment. Or perhaps the reason for her disgust was not Knight’s lack of respect for her craft, but the
odor of his feet, which he had given a thorough licking just before she entered. As unique as the scent
of a horse, the musk of a liegehound inspired either love or hatred.
When the seamstress turned her gaze on Cassia again, the old woman’s lips creased into what
passed for a smile. She patted the pincushion she wore upon her sleeve, which sported an arsenal of
long bone needles. “I can repair anything, Lady. Of course, it will take time.”
“How long?” asked Cassia.
“I trust the wait will be no inconvenience while the court is wintering here in Namenti. This far
south, a lady has no need of the warmest lambskin in the kingdom, especially not here on the coast.”
Cassia took her lower lip between her teeth, then waited for an instant to convey a hint of
hesitation. She allowed a suggestion of apology to enter her tone. “I shall need it quickly. Naturally
your compensation shall match the speed with which you return the cloak to me.”
The old woman’s eyes narrowed, but her smile remained. “I’ve repaired everything from a
knight’s leathers between one battle and the next to a lady’s underlinens the very morning of her
wedding. Name the day you need the cloak, and I shall deliver.”
“I must have it in three days’ time.”
The lines around the seamstress’s smile deepened. “And so you shall.”
“Such service shall not go unnoticed by the king.”
Nothing escaped his notice. Would Cassia really get away with this act of resistance under his
very roof?
If she handed over the cloak now, her plan would be in motion, and it would succeed. There would
be no turning back.
For an instant, she sat frozen in her chair. Her awareness of the smooth hide under her palm faded.
She no longer felt the sweat on her skin or the shivers of tension in her limbs.
Numbness came over her. She saw the seamstress staring at the composed lady in the chair. Saw
the lady’s arms reach out and offer the cloak to the old woman.
Air reached Cassia’s legs. Sensation returned.
She had done it.
The seamstress gathered the garment to her with the tenderness of a mother, but as soon as she had
it in her arms, she hesitated. The flare of her nostrils was so slight it might go unnoticed, but Cassia
was watching for it.
The smell of the herbal treatment Cassia had worked into the hide didn’t carry far, but right under
one’s nose, the odor was unmistakable. She had made sure of that. Her stock of dried flora had
supplied her with half a dozen of the most potent plants well known to ward off rogue magic.
No one took such precautions under the king’s roof, where the royal mage saw to it all magic was
practiced with the favor of the gods and the approval of the Orders. However, no one would set foot
in the kingdom’s untamed eastern reaches without wearing the proper herbs to protect against the
malign spells of fugitive apostates.
The seamstress’s eyes watered, but the calculation in her gaze revealed she had drawn the
conclusions that Cassia had intended. The old woman bowed over the redolent cloak as if Cassia had
done her a great favor, then took her leave with a self-satisfied smile.
Cassia let a shaking hand fall to rest on Knight’s head and scratched behind his ears. “Good dog.”
Her voice came out small. She took a deeper breath, then another. “Good dog.” Better.
The door to the adjoining chamber swung open, and Cassia managed not to jump. Perita appeared,
one hand on the latch, toes firmly on the other side of the threshold. Behind the handmaiden, the
dressing room was in chaos, strewn with all that must be readied in secret for the long journey east.
“Shall I pack your scent oils next, Lady?” The girl sounded breathless, either because she dreaded
asking a question Cassia hated, or because she was trying not to breathe so close to Knight.
“If you must.” Cassia studied Perita’s face.
It didn’t take odorous herbs to reduce Perita to tears, only the traces of dog fur that clung to
everything Cassia wore. The girl’s eyes were already swollen and red from sorting through Cassia’s
things.
“For now, take some air,” Cassia instructed.
“Thank you, Lady.” Perita swiped at the moisture oozing from her eyes, then tucked an escaping
tendril of her hair back under her kerchief. She darted out the door of the hearth room, letting in a
draft from the corridor.
With any luck, she wouldn’t return for a while. She took every opportunity to sneak off with a
particular guard, who served none other than Lord Hadrian and was quickly rising in the ranks.
Cassia savored a rare moment with Knight as her only companion. “Mark my words, dearest.
Perita will be unpacking those oils again by sundown. That cloak will see to it we don’t get sent
away.”
Knight gazed up at her from under his shaggy brows.
“You never liked Lord Adrogan, did you? Even before he tried to buy my hand with that cloak.
How unfortunate for him that he had to leave court in haste, after we made sure someone told him
what his concubine and his brother were up to back home.”
Knight yawned, giving her a view of his impressive maw.
“You are a marvelous co-conspirator, Sir Knight. Thank you for your assistance with the cloak.”
He rested his head on her feet again.
“The seamstress will tell her son what she learned from my cloak, so he can trade the news to his
lord to win favor. The king isn’t the only one with a bastard, you see. The seamstress secretly gave up
a boy child years ago, and she still concerns herself with his fate. Now he is a grown man trying to
distinguish himself in service to Free Lord Ferus.”
A growl rumbled in Knight’s chest.
“I know, love. Lord Ferus is all too interested in news of me. He’s even more persistent a suitor
than Lord Adrogan. No telling what rewards he’ll give the seamstress’s son for this information. He
will know exactly which keep he should ride to, for all the king’s holdings that far east are only home
to soldiers, except one, which might be made fit for a lady.”
Knight huffed a deep dog sigh.
“True, whether it is ‘fit’ for anyone is arguable, but we’ve done all right with much worse, haven’t
we? No matter in any case, for we shall not be there.”
The afternoon waned, and there came the moan of the door, followed by Perita’s footsteps. Then
her voice, “I’ll return to the packing now, Lady.”
“Very well.” Cassia spared a glance for her handmaiden.
The girl’s eyes were dry, her nose less red, but now the rest of her had gone pale. No rendezvous
with her lover had detained her, then. It had been a summons from the king. The only information her
report to him would yield today was that Cassia had called upon the seamstress to rescue a suitor’s
expensive gift.
If Cassia was fortunate.
After the sun had set, she still sweated and listened for any sound of a messenger’s approach. She
quit the confines of the chair and shut herself and her agitation in her bedchamber.
With only Knight to observe her lapse of control, she paced at the end of her bed, east then west,
east then west. He padded faithfully beside her, although he barely had space to turn around in the
small room. These chambers where the king kept her were an afterthought.
She buried a hand in Knight’s ruff. The familiar feeling of his shaggy fur under her fingers kept her
panic from vanquishing her.
Her heart pounded. Then at last she heard a pounding from without. A fist on the door of the hearth
room.
That would be her summons from the king.
The floor seemed to disappear from under feet, as if she floated to the bedchamber door. She
couldn’t feel the handle. She observed some other, distant Cassia open the door.
The next thing she knew, she was in her chair by the empty fire pit, sitting with her back straight
and her feet tucked under Knight.
Her handmaiden admitted the messenger. The young man bowed, and a drop of sweat splashed
from his forehead onto the threadbare hearth rug.
He was a smart boy, if he already understood that even a simple task from the king was cause for
fear. “Your father the king commands your presence in his hall.”
Cassia nodded, and the boy fled. He had not expected a longer response. There was only one
response to the king, and the messenger would deliver it regardless of any words Cassia did or did
not say.
“Shall I accompany you, Lady?” Perita clutched her hands in front of her, her knuckles white.
“No. Knight and I shall go.”
“As you wish, Lady.”
Cassia stepped out into the corridor. A chill crept between her shoulder blades where her gown
was damp with sweat. Somewhere in the shadow and light ahead of her, the messenger’s footfalls
echoed. It was not long before she couldn’t hear them anymore.
As she made her own way toward the royal hall, she listened for any sign she was not the only one
abroad at this hour. One never knew which members of the court were in their beds and which were
not. There could be eyes or ears anywhere, and any of them could report to the king.
But all she encountered was the odor of drying piss one of the lords had left in a corner. She traded
places with Knight so she could smell his paws instead.
The king’s door came into sight ahead. It seemed to draw nearer at an unnatural speed. Two guards
flanked the entrance, as still and hard-faced as statues. When Cassia approached, one sprang to life
and opened the door. Golden candlelight spilled into the corridor, glinting on the swords at their
belts.
The guards’ bulk made the doorway narrow. Knight pressed closer to her, his body taut as they
walked between the men. Hound and guards eyed one another.
Cassia blinked in the bright hall. The iron chandeliers seemed too close. The guards at their posts
along the walls appeared too tall, and the room felt crowded, although they few were the only ones
who attended the royal presence tonight.
At the head of the hall, the king sat alone in a haze of candlelight.
Cassia broke out in another sweat from her scalp to the bottom of her feet. She fixed her gaze on
the polished floor tiles and put one foot in front of the other.
When the king’s fine leather shoes came into view, she halted. With Knight’s toes no longer
clicking on the stone, the room seemed very quiet.
She lowered herself to her knees. Her belly rose into her throat. Her mind filled with the
horrifying vision of her emptying her stomach on his shoes. What would he do to her for that
transgression?
She held very still. When his voice echoed through the hall, not so much as her finger flinched.
“You will not go east three days from now.”
She kept swallowing until she was sure it was safe to open her mouth. “As you wish, Your
Majesty.”
At the edge of her vision, his fingers tightened on the arm of his chair. “It seems nowhere is distant
and forgotten enough to keep you out of Lord Ferus’s reach. He departed this afternoon to inspect one
of his frontier outposts that happens to lie within a day’s ride of my easternmost household.”
Cassia gave the king the response he now desired, her silent attention. She could feel the weight of
his gaze. The floor ground into her knees.
His tone did not change. He was not a man who need speak with any great emotion. His will or
displeasure was always self-evident. “This is the third time I have attempted to relocate you
discreetly. This is the third time Ferus has suddenly learned his presence is necessary at one of his
holdings in the vicinity. I will discover who is informing him of your movements and silence that
tongue.”
Cassia swallowed again, but her guilty tongue was dry.
How many more attempts would it take before the king decided the only safe place for her was
where she actually wanted to go?
“Until I discover who is responsible for this,” he said, “it appears I must keep you within my sight.
Contrary to my plans, you will remain here at Namenti with the court, then accompany us when we
depart for Solorum.”
She was headed for the capital. Her plan had worked. She had challenged him...and won.
Although she knelt before the king, something inside her rose up and stood tall. The feeling
shocked through her, new and wild and much too dangerous.
The displeasure in his tone punished her. “You will remain at the capital on my sufferance. You
may reside at Solorum, but you will conduct yourself as befits a bastard I have been generous enough
to acknowledge. You will keep out of sight, except when I require your presence.”
“As you wish, Your Majesty.”
He leaned closer, looming over her. “It is time I kept a closer eye on you. Any man with ambitions
would find my royal blood in your veins useful, regardless of your mother’s shame. Occasionally it is
necessary to remind all concerned your blood is mine to use as I see fit, and mine alone.”
Her grand scheme had succeeded, and here was the stunning result. She was on her knees before
the king. She had just sentenced herself to a whole season of moments like this. If she lived that long.
Outmaneuvering him was so much more dangerous than submitting to his will.
She pulled a quiet breath into the vice of her lungs. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
“It is a very unfortunate inconvenience that I must keep you at the capital,” he warned. “This means
you will be there when the Hesperine embassy arrives from Orthros.”
The Hesperines. The king spoke their name, but it sounded like an invocation of magic beyond his
power to control.
Yes. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
“Too much is at stake at the Equinox Summit for me to suffer distractions such as you. In your
ignorance, you can have no notion of the significance of the events transpiring in the kingdom.”
She understood better than anyone.
The immortals would descend from the north and appear in human lands. This was the first time in
nearly four hundred years that Orthros had sent official representatives to Tenebra. It might be another
four hundred before Hesperines and mortals convened for the Equinox Summit again.
A moment like this would never come again. She must carry out her plan now.
The Hesperines were her reason for everything.
“Do not disobey me, Cassia. Especially while the Hesperines are there.”
The king’s weathered hand lifted in an abrupt gesture of dismissal. His rings caught the candlelight
and scattered it in Cassia’s eyes. Blinking to clear her vision, she rose to her feet and backed away.
She managed to get back to her rooms without stopping in the corridor to heave. By the time she
slipped into her chambers, the flashes of heat and chill had left her damp with sweat and blessedly
cool, and the sickening tension in her belly had eased.
There was no sign of Perita. The girl would surely be spending the longest night of the year with
her guardsman.
Cassia sank down in her chair and considered what she had just accomplished.
She would not be swallowed by the eastern forests, while in the northern mountains, two lights
faced each other on either side of the border between Tenebra and Orthros.
Tenebra’s Summit Beacon burned at the fortress on Mount Frigora to summon the Hesperines to the
negotiations. A transient fire atop a pile of old stones, making demands of the immortals.
Orthros’s beacon had ascended into the sky in reply, a promise of the Hesperines’ arrival. Cassia
had never seen it with her own eyes, but everyone said it was a spell light as large and bright as a
star.
She would not pass the Equinox Summit in a distant tower, while the Hesperines were at the royal
palace. She would be waiting for them at court.
She had thrown herself in the most dangerous position imaginable. Nothing could be worse than an
entire season in the king’s sights. Except a lifetime of knowing she had missed her chance.
She had just seized her only opportunity to get close to a Hesperine.