Dawnflight (25 page)

“I don’t want to see anyone!” That was almost true. But the possibility that Arthur was waiting in her antechamber was laughably remote.

“But he’s a”—Gyan heard a giggle—“a messenger.”

Annoyed, she got up, stalked to the door, released the bolt, and yanked the door open. “I said—” She gasped. “Per!”

Sobs welled from the depths of her soul. Desperately, she tried to choke them down. The wound Arthur had wrought on her heart was the last thing she wanted to confess to her brother. But as raw and frayed as she felt, this was one fight she knew she was destined to lose.

NOT SINCE the death of a favorite hound puppy when she’d been about eight had Per seen his sister so distraught. “Gyan?” She only clung tighter to him and cried harder. Concerned, he glanced at Cynda, who was standing nearby with folded arms and a look on her face that seemed to say this was exactly the sort of behavior she’d expected—which was no help to him at all. “What do you know about this, Cynda?”

“If she wants to tell you, she will. It’s not my place, Per.” Her tone was unusually gentle, but before he could question her further, she turned to busy herself with some towels near the wash stand.

He wasn’t surprised by Cynda’s answer, but it had been worth a try. So he silently held Gyan, stroking her hair and back until her tears subsided. Then he reverted to the tactic he used whenever his sister needed cheering: he tugged her braid.

The look she gave him was a strange mixture of sorrow, gratitude, and affection. But despite the reddened eyes and tear-stained cheeks, her grin was genuine, and he was glad to see it. “Beast!”

She released her hold and stepped back, scrubbing her eyes. Cynda proffered a wet towel, followed by a dry one, both of which Gyan put to good use. Cynda collected the towels, favored him and his sister with one of her typical knowing glances, and left the room. Now Gyan looked much more like the sister he knew. Only—and this puzzled him because the idea seemed so bizarre—older, somehow.

But he knew better than to ask her directly. “Miss me already, dear sister?”

“Ha. Among other things.” Her eyes seemed to focus on something he was wearing. She drew close enough to tap his new Dragon Legion cloak-pin. “Why are you wearing that?”

“Ah, my rank badge.” In his best imitation of what he’d seen the Breatanach soldiers doing countless times over the past two days, he took a pace backward and thumped his chest. “Centurio Equo Peredur mac Hymar, Seventh Ala, Horse Cohort, reporting.” He couldn’t keep down the grin. “Gods, what a mouthful! I’m not even sure of what it all means yet.”

“That you’re in charge, I think.” Her laugh was too brief, and sadness dominated her gaze. “Your badge, it—” Determination chased away the sorrow, and she ventured a thin smile. “It becomes you, Per.”

Why would a simple cloak-pin elicit a reaction like that? It was nothing special, just a copper dragon inside a red enamel ring, with a sapphire chip set in the dragon’s eye…the dragon’s eye—the Pendragon! If that Ròmanach cù-puc had hurt her…

Casting about for more clues, his gaze fell upon her bandaged forearm. “The Pendragon did this to you.” He felt his anger mount. “Didn’t he?”

She gave him a startled look. He stabbed a finger toward the bandage, and she raised her arm as though to study it more closely. “Oh, this? Yes.” She sighed.

“I thought as much.” He’d heard about their match, of course—the men had been talking about little else all day—but not about her getting wounded. His battle fury ignited. “I have some business to attend to.” He spun toward the door.

She caught his hand to pull him back. “Per, please, no!” He faced her. Her eyes were wide with fear and…beseeching?

“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t kill him.”

Horror crossed her face, followed by exasperation and, finally, resignation. “I’ll give you two good reasons. First, this wound is nothing. A scratch.” She enunciated each word as though speaking to a simpleton, which was exactly how he was starting to feel. “The attending physician got too zealous with the bandage roll.” She cocked the injured arm and punched him in the shoulder, hard.

“Hey! That hurt!” He massaged the spot, but it continued to throb.

She grinned. “You deserve it, you big idiot.” Circling her arm about his waist, she laid her head against his chest. “But I appreciate you wanting to protect me. I really do.” She looked at him plaintively. “I wish you could come with me to Maun.”

“For protection?” Certainly not from the Pendragon; Arthur would be remaining at legion headquarters. He felt his eyes narrow as he regarded his sister. “From whom?”

“Myself.” She shook her head and pushed away from him, expelling a noisy sigh. “Never mind. I’ve said too much.” She wandered to the table, braced both arms against its surface, and bowed her head.

Her defeated posture wrenched his heart. He walked around to the front of the table, bent over, and lifted her chin so he could see her face. “You haven’t said nearly enough. At least, you owe me that second reason of yours.”

“The second reason”—she jerked her chin free and dropped her gaze to the tabletop—“is a lost cause.”

Gods! Briefly, he studied the rafters. She hadn’t been this reluctant to divulge information since the day she’d hidden his first helmet down a well, furious that Ogryvan had declared her to be too young, at age six, to start training. Only after their father had relented did she consent to reveal the helmet’s location. And then, Per recalled with a slim smile, her first lesson with her new practice sword occurred when Ogryvan had applied the flat of its wooden blade to her bottom. She didn’t sit for days afterward, but Per could never decide whether that had been from the pain of Ogryvan’s “lesson” or because she’d been too busy fighting mock battles with the sword to engage in more sedate activities.

Wrestling his mind back to the present, he tried to piece together the hints to divine her problem. But Arthur and “lost cause” didn’t make any sense. If she preferred Arthur to Urien, well, the remedy for that was simple enough. Per wasn’t entirely ready to accept the idea of his little sister taking any man into her bed, no matter how worthy. But Argyll’s line of succession had to remain secure, and that was Gyan’s most important duty.

Quietly, he ventured a guess: “You love the Pendragon, don’t you?” She nodded but did not look up. Why, then, would she consider Arthur to be a lost cause, unless…“He has refused to become your consort.” Per smashed his fist to the tabletop and straightened. That got her attention. Wounding his sister in the heat of combat was one thing; wounding her heart was quite another. “Now I
am
going to kill him!”

The fiery intensity of her glare rooted him to the spot. “You do that, Peredur mac Hymar, and I’ll have your head so fast, I guarantee you will never know what happened.” And by all the gods, he believed her. The glare dimmed as she moved from behind the table to face him. “Arthur didn’t refuse me. I haven’t—” She took in a breath and let it out slowly. “I can’t choose him. Ever.” Her upraised hand prevented him from voicing the question forming on his lips. “Please don’t ask me to explain. It’s too complicated.”

Per caught her hand. “What can I do to help you?”

Not unexpectedly, she shook her head. “You are helping me, Per, more than you might realize. Your support, your love, your concern—” A hint of the old Gyan returned in the mischievous grin, and she gave his hand a squeeze. “Even your thick-witted overprotectiveness.” As their laughter faded, she adopted a pensive look.

“You’ve thought of something?” She could have asked him to die for her, and he’d do it a hundred times if the gods would consent.

Hands on hips, she regarded him levelly. “Serve Arthur the Pendragon of Breatein to the very best of your ability, you and all of Argyll with you.”

An odd request, but…“It shall be done as you command, Chieftainess.” He bent double in a bow, careful not to grin until he was sure his face was hidden from her view.

“Beast!” She clapped her hands to his shoulders and pushed him straight so quickly, he couldn’t suppress the grin in time. “I meant what I said. Treaty or no treaty, he deserves at least that much from…us.”

“I know.” Thinking about Arthur in a more rational fashion forced to mind Per’s mission. He snapped his fingers. She gave him a questioning look. “Just call me six kinds of fool, dear sister. I was supposed to deliver you a message.” He wasn’t at all sure how she would react to his next statement: “From the Pendragon.”

Chapter 15

C
ROSSING HER ARMS, she regarded her brother and mentally girded herself for the worst.

“You needn’t look so worried,” he said. “It’s just a dinner invitation.”

“Just a dinner invitation. Ha.” She’d plunged unwittingly into her emotional quagmire the night before by accepting “just a dinner invitation.” But her innate curiosity conquered her gut reaction to deliver an outright refusal. “Do you know any details?”

“Aye. It’s a sendoff for the officers traveling to Maun.” Urien would be invited too. Wonderful, she thought as Per gestured at her with his upturned hand. “And, of course, yourself.”

Of course. Vividly, the image of Arthur’s barely leashed fury as he left the training field coursed through her mind. Had she alienated him so badly that he was willing to go to all the trouble of hosting a farewell dinner just to prove that the sight of her and Urien together no longer bothered him? She dearly hoped that wasn’t the case, but no better explanation presented itself.

Again, she opened her mouth to refuse the invitation, but curiosity took control: “Where?”

“The garrison commander’s quarters. What’s that Ròmanaiche word of theirs? The pra-pray—”

“The praetorium.” Of course. “I’m somewhat familiar with the place.” In response to the question in his eyes, she said, “Please don’t ask, Per.” But when she saw his hurt, she relented a little. “All right, maybe later.” If she could find a time when they both had an hour or four to spare, which didn’t seem likely before the following morning, when her ship was to depart. “When is this dinner to take place?”

He twisted to glance out the window and gave a rueful laugh. She followed the line of his gaze. The vibrant red-gold of the sky—the color of Arthur’s hair, she noticed dismally—announced the sun’s retreat. “Now. I’m sorry, Gyan. We started talking, and I forgot, and I—I’m sorry.” Gone was all trace of his usual teasing mirth.

“Don’t be. It’s my fault. Have you eaten yet?”

“No. But I’m not—”

“But nothing. You’re coming with me.”

If her tunic and leggings didn’t constitute the expected attire for this event, so be it. Never mind that there wasn’t time to change; she couldn’t be sure what Arthur was planning to accomplish with this dinner ploy, so above all she wanted to feel comfortable, including having one true ally at her side. She gathered her clan mantle from the chair, flung it across her shoulders, and deftly fastened the dove brooch in place.

“As your protection?” Per’s impish grin returned in full force.

“Beast!” She playfully slapped the spot on his shoulder that she had punched earlier and was rewarded by his exaggerated wince. “As my escort.” Since there was no time to find Cynda, she smoothed her hair as best she could. Unlike the day before, though, she wasn’t concerned with trying to impress anyone.

“Just do me one favor, dear brother.” As he held the door open for her, he raised an eyebrow. “Let me be the diplomat.”

“Gladly, dear sister.” Echoing in the corridor, his hearty laugh was a joy to hear. “Gladly!”

In the courtyard of the praetorium, Gyan and Per were approached by the same guardsmen who had escorted her the night before. Although the men’s salutes were no less sharp, their demeanors seemed cooler. Probably, she mused, because they didn’t like anyone who could dump their war-chieftain on his backside. A chill crawled up her spine with the recollection of Urien’s words: “Least of all a woman.” Did they all feel that way, including Arthur?

“Are you all right, Gyan?” The concern in Per’s hushed tone was clear.

Nodding once with an air of finality, she quickened her stride.

Although she never would have believed it possible, releasing her sorrow into her brother’s arms had done wonders toward reasserting her grip on reality. Proof came when she discovered she could regard the soldiers’ dragon cloak-pins with only the slightest twinge: just as well. If reality decreed Arthur the Pendragon to be forever lost to her, there was no sense in mooning about him for the rest of her life.