Solace Shattered (22 page)

The hairdresser and ladies-in-waiting drew back from Jesquin. She sashayed before the full-length dressing mirror and grew even prettier as she glowed with pleasure and anticipation. “Can’t we begin now?” The peach-colored silk swished as she fluffed the skirt. “I’ve been sixteen for an age already.”

They filed into the hallway where the Household Guards and their trumpeters waited. A redcoat summoned the king, Prince Lerouge and a score of relatives from another room to line up for the procession down the grand staircase.

The hallway buzzed. Waiting for instructions, Arvana stayed pressed to the wall by the dressing room.

Chane, wearing his Acadian reds, waded through the press of people to Arvana. He leaned against the doorframe and glanced to the empty dressing room. “Come, this may be our last chance to speak. I’ll not have a moment’s peace the rest of the evening.”

Inside, he faced her. “When I come home from battle, if your superior gives you leave, may I present you with the proof of my deed? I promise to return the Blue Eye. While I do this for my people and my own deliverance,” he held his hand to his chest where the relic must be, “it began with you and must end there, too.”

Arvana thumbed her ring. She wouldn’t be able to accept the Blue Eye in any capacity he imagined. Refusing to acknowledge his enormous courage, however, would be ungrateful and insensible of the honor he proposed. “If you wish, I’ll find a way to welcome you back to Acadia. I hope it’s soon. For whatever they are worth, you have my prayers.”

The answer and the hopeful smile that accompanied it seemed to gratify him. He turned and plucked a flower from the vase the hairdresser left. Holding the white bloom to his nose, he inhaled deeply. “Ah, ginger lily. It smells sweet, innocent. I’ve never thought you a flower, but come to think of it, the willow blooms.” His hand crossed the space between them and tucked the flower’s stem into her headband. He eyed it critically and reached again to reinsert the bloom. “There.” His fingers closed around the edge of her veil and drew down its length as his brown eyes smoldered once again with their old warmth. In a single, swift motion, he grasped her arm and gave it a gentle squeeze while brushing a kiss across her cheek. He whispered, “Until then,” and taking her elbow, walked her back to the hallway where he left her in a daze over what had happened so quickly and quietly.

Somehow, Arvana ended up where she should be—next to Miss Gallivere with the other ladies-in-waiting. Behind them was Chane, with Lady Martise on his arm, then the king and Jesquin at the very end.

Two guards threw open the door at the top of the wide staircase. Heralding the procession, the trumpeters went first and sounded pure, high notes. From the floor of the hall, the musicians answered with a lovely, sweeping march.

I won’t look for him
. The room below glowed amber with candlelight and gold gilding. Hundreds of expectant faces upturned to the stairway. Flowers were everywhere—cascading down the balustrade, over the doorways. Every hothouse in Acadia must have been growing them. Their scent overpowered even the Acadian’s heady perfumes.
He never wears perfume
.
Oh, Ari.
The procession wound through the crowd to a platform arched by a trellis woven with vines and yet more flowers. As they neared, children threw handfuls of petals into the air, a fragrant, fluttering snow.

Though she’d sworn she wouldn’t look for him, as she came to the platform, there he was in the front row, so unmistakable. His wore his cape thrown back over his shoulders to show a beautiful new coat edged in gold. Chane was good to his word. Nan was general. How happy he must be. But not to see her. He seemed to be watching everyone and everything except her. Yes, that was best. She fixed her gaze on her shoes, on the steps to the platform, on finding her place with the ladies-in-waiting, on the princess’s happiness.

To Arvana’s relief, the king began to speak. Having to watch him at least gave her someplace to look. Unassailable by both age and position, he droned uninterrupted for half an hour. Over the noisy jumble of her thoughts, Arvana only heard half of what he said: he recollected Jesquin’s mother, flattered himself indirectly by praising the girl’s excellent nature in spite of lacking a mother’s attention, lamenting her growing up, lamented his own advancing years, hoped for her happiness, and lectured on the duties of adulthood. Then, his eyes grew moist, and he nodded into the crowd. “A young man has my permission to speak.”

Prince Fassal, followed by Nan, ascended the stairs. Thank the Maker, Nan was standing on the other side of Fassal and so was mostly hidden from her.

Taking the princess’s hand, Fassal kissed it. “I give you joy on your Coming of Age.” He turned to Nan and came away with a ring. Its diamonds flashed around a huge pale citrine. Those close enough to see gasped at its size and significance. “I hope it’s not the last gift you’ll receive from me.”

Jesquin’s hand flew from his to cover her mouth. Her whole body trembled and tears streamed her cheeks. Though she’d expected the proposal, the expectation hadn’t prepared the princess for the emotion of it, Arvana knew, feeling herself in much the same, yet opposite, predicament.

Fassal drew her left hand from her lips and held the ring poised at her fingertip. “Will you wear it?”

“Forever.”

He slid the ring upon her finger.

Arvana
knew
she should be happy for Jesquin and Prince Fassal. They deserved her happiness. She smiled for them.

Prince Fassal lifted Jesquin off her feet in a sweeping embrace. The crowd broke into roaring and applause.

There, still holding the open, empty ring box in his palm, was Nan.

Watching her.

Hera Solace’s smile turned brittle and her eyes went glossy and inward looking, as if focusing on pained images only she could see. It brought to Degarius’s mind the all too familiar look of a widow to whom he was returning the remembrances from a dead soldier’s pack. It dawned on him that
he
somehow was the cause of the sorrow on her kind, gentle face. His weeks of absence, of seeming indifference, hadn’t been a trial only for him. Damn it, why had he looked at her?
Because it is impossible not to
. A noose of guilt tightened around his conscience. Fassal was right. He had dismissed her feelings, even if they were only of abiding friendship, to absolve his own. He had to explain.

Suddenly, everyone was moving past him. Fassal, the princess, the king, and Lady Martise. In Miss Gallivere’s wake, Hera Solace swept past.

Degarius descended from the step. An Acadian admiral, his hand thrust out, came from the crowd. Degarius realized he still, like a fool, had the open box in his hand. He snapped the box shut, shoved it in his pocket, and accepted the admiral’s congratulations on his generalship.

Music started. Fassal and the princess were opening the dances.

The congratulations turned into a blustery commentary on Orlandian pirates.

Another dance began and ended.

Maybe yesterday Degarius would have welcomed the admiral’s diversion, but not now. “You’ll excuse me Admiral. I’m engaged for a dance and —”

The admiral chortled. “Then go to it.”

He wasn’t engaged for a dance. Where was she? Weaving thought the crowd, past the vast spread of food and the punch table, he searched for gray-clothed shoulders among the bare ones. Finally, he saw her from the back.

“Hera.”

She turned.

His chest lurched into his throat. Something in his resolve faltered. He’d endeavored not to think of what tonight would be, had drank half a bottle of wine beforehand because Fassal wouldn’t forgive him for the altartish. He didn’t know what to say. All he knew is that he wanted her to understand. But understand what?

“Your coat. You are made general,” she said.

“My father sent it.”

“He’s a good man. Please remember me to him. When did this happen?” She motioned to the new medal.

“Only last night.”

“I give you joy. I know what it means to you.” Brow creased, she gave a sweeping look at the room. “This is wondrous, isn’t it? I hardly remember turning sixteen. I couldn’t have imagined anything like this. The flowers. The dresses.” She returned to looking to his chest. Not to it, but through it. Her voice seemed distant, as if she wasn’t speaking to him, just into the space between them. He wanted to take her in his arms, pull her so hard against him that she’d feel what he didn’t know how to say. “I made a raisin cake for my sixteenth birthday,” he heard her say, but was thinking of how lovely she was, how pretty the flower was against the soft blushing skin of her temple that he yearned to touch. “My father gave me music manuscript paper,” she went on. “I remember not wanting to use it because it was so precious. I wonder what happened to it. What did you do when you turned sixteen?”

“You look...different.”

She modestly glanced to her dress. “Lady Martise insisted.”

“What kind of flower is that? I’ve not seen it up north.”

“Pardon?”

“That one.” He reached toward her veil but wouldn’t touch it.

Her hand, rising to the flower, brushed his. Her face flushed, and she stepped back. “We should say good-bye.”

“Wait. I wanted to apologize. I haven’t been to the archive lately. I’ve been busy.”

“
Busy
. I won’t keep you, then.” Her chin began to pucker. “Excuse me. I depart early tomorrow and have already overstayed.”

Damn, damn, damn. Why had he said that? He thrust a hand toward the dancers. “You can’t go. It’s not over. The dancing’s just begun.”

“It was over weeks ago,” she murmured and turned to leave.

“For the Maker’s sake, Ari. Let me explain.”

Oh, she looks quite unhappy
, Miss Gallivere thought with pleasure at seeing Hera Solace with Captain Degarius. She deserved to be unhappier still, that scheming woman who cloaked herself in piety to catch the very same two men Miss Gallivere sought. Captain Degarius wasn’t such a loss. But at Summercrest, the woman dashed her hopes for Prince Lerouge, and she still blinded the poor fool. Miss Gallivere smirked. She’d seen him pull Hera Solace into the dressing room. He’d put that flower in her headdress. What a pity he hadn’t seen her with the captain, seen her for what she was. At this moment, the prince was too deep into Orlandian politics with Sebastion to notice. Well, the blind must see the light. She grasped the prince’s arm and whispered to him.

The prince craned his neck in the direction she pointed.

T
he full moon swam in Arvana’s watery, wide-open eyes. A mere blink would roll tears over her cheeks, and dear Maker, she wouldn’t cry before Nan, though his every new coldly rational word about duty mercilessly added another drop to her precariously full eyelids.

“I wished to complete my study on winter campaigns,” he was saying as they walked the shortcut to Lady Martise’s through the wooded park behind the Great Hall, “but I had to prepare for the match with Lerouge.”

“I know. You told me the evening I played for Teodor.”

“You, of all people, must understand what was at stake.”

“Yes, I of all people.” Through her restrained tears, the moon turned liquid and dripped into the trees.

“And after it was over, I had many affairs to complete before returning to Sarapost.”

Something pierced the arch of Arvana’s foot. She stopped, removed her slipper, shook out a slivery twig from the mulched path, and then put back on the shoe. Nan, talking of the responsibilities of the generalship he’d only received last night, kept walking. Taking opportunity of his oblivion, she blinked hard and ran her sleeve over her eyes before calling, “Please stop,” as much to end his speech as to ask him to wait.

Her eyes now dry, she saw clearly how he turned, and waiting for her to catch up, crossed his arms imperiously over his chest. He was General Degarius. Not Nan. “Would you have me neglect my duty?” he asked.

She drew herself straight as she came to meet him. She wasn’t one of his soldiers who must cower at the gold on his coat. “You may say whatever you wish to defend your honor, but not at the expense of mine. I’ve never asked you to come to the archive. You came, or didn’t come, as you pleased.”