Lara (36 page)

“Aye,” he agreed. “Your High Council would like to annex some of these lands if they dared. The Outlands are rich in land and other resources they are greedy to possess. The provinces grow more and more crowded.”

“What do you do here?” she asked him.

“We live free,” he said, and then he amended it. “Some farm. Many tend to their herds. Our villages are like villages everywhere. The Fiacre have more villages than any other clan in the Outlands. I rule the Fiacre.”

“Will we reach your village today?” Lara asked him.

“Nay, not until tomorrow,” he said. “We were told strangers had entered our lands, and came out several days ago to find them. You are the only ones we have found so far,” he said.

“We cannot be those you seek,” Lara said. “We only entered the Outlands yesterday from the Desert Kingdom.”

“That cannot be,” he said. “The border between us and the Shadow Princes is at least three days away.”

“We came through a tunnel in the cliffs,” Lara said.

“What cliffs?” he asked, puzzled.

She laughed softly. “They have made some magic, I suspect,” she told him. “In the Desert where the great cliffs rise the Shadow Princes have their palaces. If you are a guest in these palaces you will discover a wonderful valley between the cliffs where the princes raise their horses. Yesterday Noss and I were led across that valley from Prince Kaliq’s palace. We entered a tunnel and traveled for several hours before we reached its end, which opened out onto your plain. After we had ridden for a time across your land I looked back, but the cliffs from which we had exited were gone.”

“Why have you come here?” Vartan wondered.

“I don’t know yet. I just know that given the choice of the Coastal Province or the Outlands, my instinct told me to come here,” Lara explained.

“Have you magic?” he asked her.

“Some,” she said lightly, “but nothing powerful of which I am aware. I can light a fire without flint and stone.” She gave him a small smile.

“A very useful magic for a traveler,” he told her, returning the smile.

“Have you magic?” she asked him.

“Some,” he said, not elucidating further, and then Vartan chuckled at her delicately raised eyebrow. “I shape-shift,” he said. “
Fiacre
is a word for eagle, and I take the form of my clan’s badge sometimes. Each leader of the Fiacre is given this gift. It is generally useful.”

“Indeed,” she said dryly, but did not reveal her own proclivities to him. Not yet. “Why did you simply not seek for these intruders as the eagle?” Lara asked him.

“I had no chance. Most do not know of the ability I possess. They would be afraid,” Vartan told her. “Shall we keep it our little secret, Lara, daughter of Swiftsword? You appear to be a girl who can keep secrets.”

Now it was Lara who laughed. “I can, and I do,” she agreed.

Noss pushed her mare closer to Lara’s stallion. “There is a man who keeps looking at me as if I am his next meal,” she murmured.

Vartan heard her, and looked quickly about him. “’Tis Liam, little girl, and I will tell him he is frightening you. He is a good fellow with a soft heart who would not harm a flea. But he is obviously taken with you.” The lord of the Fiacre chuckled and dropped back a few paces to speak with the red-haired man who gazed so intently at Noss. When he rejoined Lara and her companion he said, “Liam would like to know if you are married, young Noss? ’Tis not a question a man of the Fiacre asks casually.”

“Noss is only thirteen and a half,” Lara said quietly. “She is a virgin. She is too young for any man, and she must want the man who weds her one day.”

Vartan nodded. “I will explain all of this to Liam. But Noss,” he directed his question to her, “might you allow him to become a friend? He will not, I swear to you, harm a hair of your head.”

Noss looked to Lara questioningly. “Should I?”

“If you wish it I see no reason to deny yourself the company of a fine young man,” Lara replied. “But he must treat you with respect,” she warned.

“I will see he does,” Vartan replied, and then dropped back again to speak with the red-haired Liam, who listened, and then grinned happily.

Noss blushed when the young man looked to her again, lowering her head shyly as Liam moved his horse up next to Sakari.

Vartan rejoined Lara, and the two rode ahead a ways. “How old are you?” he demanded of her, “and are you a virgin, too?”

“I am sixteen, and I have experienced the giving and taking of pleasures,” she told him. “How old are you, and are you experienced?” she countered.

“I have lived twenty-eight years, and I am considered experienced by those with whom I share a bed,” he replied, and his blue eyes met her gaze.

“You should know I am half faerie,” Lara told him. “If your people fear magic, then they fear my mother’s people. You would not be wise to involve yourself with a woman like me. I have, I am told, a destiny to live out, my lord Vartan.”

“Perhaps I am that destiny,” he suggested.

Lara laughed. “An interesting excuse for attempted seduction,” she remarked.

He grinned engagingly at her. “I think I am falling in love with you, Lara, daughter of Swiftsword,” he told her.

“You are a fraud, my lord Vartan, for we have only just met,” Lara reminded him.

“Have you never heard of love at first sight?” he asked her.

“I do not believe in love, my lord,” Lara answered him. “You do not have to cajole me with sweet words, my lord Vartan. If I remain among the Fiacre long enough, and we become friends, then I will gladly share my body with you,” Lara promised him. “But be warned that even half faerie women do not give children to those they do not love.”

“Now,” he said, “I am even more curious to learn your story, Lara, daughter of Swiftsword,” he told her.

“Tonight,” she promised. “We will speak together as the Triad blazes overhead.”

They rode the day long, stopping only briefly to water their horses. Lara dug into her pouch, and pulled out a piece of faerie bread to share with Noss, who was all rosy with blushes from her ride with the Fiacre Liam.

“You are too young to be seduced,” Lara warned Noss. “Do not let his sweet words or stolen kisses overcome your innate common sense.”

“He is very polite,” Noss half whispered.

“Then he is indeed a dangerous man,” Lara cautioned. “Remember that unlike me you can conceive a child in your belly, Noss. Do you desire to be a mother at your young age? Think carefully before you let him insinuate himself between your legs. I should have to leave you behind, and we do not know these people. They are considered savages by those in the City.”

“They do not seem very savage to me,” Noss noted.

“Nay, and I do not believe they are. They simply wish to live their lives in a different manner than those who call themselves Hetarians,” Lara said.

“I like this freedom that they have,” Noss said softly.

“So do I,” Lara agreed, “but I want to know more about the Outlanders, and sheltering with Lord Vartan for a short while is a good way to learn about them.”

They reached the encampment, a small circle of tents. In the center of the circle a fire was prepared, and ready to light. When Vartan looked to Lara she shook her head in the negative. There was no reason to reveal her skills to others right now. She dismounted, noting that her buttocks felt sorer today than they had yesterday.

“How I would love a hot bath,” she said to no one in particular.

“Tomorrow in my house we will bathe together,” Vartan said, coming up next to her. “Come, and I will show you and Noss to my tent. You will sleep there tonight while I sleep outside keeping watch.”

“You need not keep watch,” Lara told him. “I will set Verica, my staff, at the entrance of your tent and he will watch over us.”

“The sword has magic. The staff has magic,” Vartan noted. “What else about you is magic, Lara, daughter of Swiftsword?”

“The horses talk,” she told him, her green eyes dancing with mirth. “None of this is my doing, my lord Vartan, I swear it. These things were given to me by Prince Kaliq and his people to help keep me safe,” Lara finished, almost laughing.

Vartan of the Fiacre did laugh at these admissions. He had not lied when he told her he was falling in love with her. He knew it in his heart from the moment he had laid eyes on her, but he also knew this was a strong woman. But could the lord of the Fiacre follow in the wake of a half faerie woman, even if he loved her? He did not know the answer to these questions. Yet.

They remained the night at the encampment. They did not eat faerie bread, but rather feasted on broiled rabbits the Fiacre clansmen had caught along the way. There was real bread, and cheese, and even wine. And after the others had all gone to bed, Lara and Vartan sat by the fire beneath the Triad and the four silvery moons of Hetar as she told him her tale. He was fascinated, repelled and angered by her recitation.

“How could your father…?” he began, but she hushed him.

“A man must be worthy to be a Crusader Knight,” she said. “I was my father’s only asset.”

“His assets should have been his battle skills, his honesty and his loyalty,” Vartan said.

“It is not the way of Hetar. A man’s appearance is all-important, my lord,” Lara replied. “If he could not look the part, what good his skills and ethics?”

Vartan shrugged. “Indeed” was all he could think of to reply. He listened again, scorning the foolish futility of the Forest Lords at paying thirty thousand pieces of gold for Lara in the belief she could remove the curse placed upon them by Maeve. “And then they came to Shunnar to reclaim you with a false document? What kind of a magistrate would give them such a parchment?”

“One whom they paid well,” Lara replied. “Commerce is the way of Hetar. If a man does not line his pockets when he can, he will die poor.”

Vartan shook his head. “Wealth is better, I will agree, but a man’s wealth should be gained honestly, not through schemes and trickery.”

“A man thought too honest will be considered a fool,” she replied. And yet his words were giving her pause for thought. Were there other ways than those she had been taught? She suspected she would learn them in her journeying.

Lara finally found her bed, curling up next to Noss, who was sleeping soundly. But her sleep was a restless one, and the dawn came swiftly. She found herself dozing in her saddle as they rode along the next day. When they stopped to water the horses, Dasras scolded her softly in his deep voice.

“What is the matter with you, mistress?”

“I did not sleep well last night,” she told him.

“And you were late to bed as well,” Dasras murmured. “Is it the Fiacre lord who disturbs your rest?”

“Why would Vartan disturb my rest?” Lara muttered. “You had better drink while you can. We’ll be going again very quickly.” She didn’t want to discuss Vartan.

Dasras lowered his head, and drank.

It was almost sunset when they reached the village of Camdene.

“Is there an inn or resting place for travelers?” Lara asked Vartan.

He looked slightly scandalized by her words. “You are my guest, Lara, daughter of Swiftsword,” he said. “My mother keeps my house. She would be very angry with me if I allowed you and Noss to rest your heads elsewhere.”

“You have no wife, no mate?” Lara inquired bluntly.

“I am responsible for my people, and the Fiacre are a large clan. Seven villages belong to us, as well as much land. I have no time for a wife. My younger brother, Adon, took a wife several months ago. Her name is Elin. My mother is Bera.”

To Lara’s surprise the village looked very prosperous. It very much resembled the villages in the Midlands, but it was better kept, to Lara’s eye. Each cottage sat upon a neat square of land with a garden both before it, and behind. The street of shops they traversed showed windows filled with goods. These people did not appear to be savages at all. The men with them dropped away, each going to his own home. At the far end of the village on a gentle green rise sat a large stone house toward which they rode. The house was long, and built to fit into the surrounding landscape. It would have been difficult to distinguish from a distance, it nestled so closely into the land.

They had but reached the house when the front door opened, and a woman stepped forth. “Vartan! What did you find?”

He slid from his horse, and embraced the woman. “Two little girls all alone on the plain, Mother. I brought them home.”

Bera looked Lara and Noss over with a sharp and critical eye. “They do not appear particularly helpless to me, my son,” she said. “Who are they, and from where do they come?” She was a big woman like her son with the same light blue eyes.

“That is not the welcome I would expect for Lara, daughter of Swiftsword, and her companion, Noss, Mother,” Vartan gently chided his parent.

“She is faerie,” Bera said suspiciously.

“Aye, mistress, my mother was indeed faerie,” Lara quickly spoke. “But she did not raise me. I was raised by my father, who was a mercenary, and my grandmother, Ina. While I have some small magic about me, I mean no harm to any. If you would not shelter Noss and me, I will understand, and seek your inn.”