The Cedna (Tales of Blood & Light Book 2) (30 page)

P
apa
!”
Sterling glided across the room into her father’s embrace.

After a surprised silence, Jaasir rose and offered a haughty inclination of his head. “Lord Ricknagel.”

The differences between the two men struck me. Jaasir Amar was so young. Ricknagel’s face was scored by experience, as unyielding as stone. Could these two ever understand each other? What did Jaasir Amar know of grief or war?

“Lord Amar,” Ricknagel said, still holding Sterling by the shoulders. The entire tenor of the room had changed with his arrival, growing serious.

“You have been away?” Jaasir asked.

“A small errand,” Ricknagel said.

“We are sorry for your losses.”

“Thank you for your sympathy.”

Ricknagel could not make the first move here, not until the Jaasir offered a sign, some signal of interest. What Xander would ask could be construed as treason.

To fill up the silence, both Jaasir and Ricknagel took their time settling back into seats, as if they were women wearing complicated skirts.

Laith spoke. “I have been in Murana these past sennights.”

Ricknagel turned towards the mage, eyebrows raised. “And?”

“Amongst other tasks, I was tracking a rogue magitrix.”

“Against my orders,” snapped Jaasir, but beneath his breath.

“A rogue magitrix?” Ricknagel echoed. “You can’t mean the one who attacked at Costas Galatien’s Brokering?”

“As a favor to Costas,” Laith added.

Xander’s eyes narrowed. “You are close with the prince?”

“Close enough to know he would never have hurt your daughter,” Laith said brazenly. “If you believe these rumors that he played some role in her death, you are gravely mistaken, Lord Ricknagel.”

Xander crossed his arms over his chest, his gaze flicking between Jaasir and Laith. Did Xander truly believe Costas Galatien had ordered Stesichore killed? This theory missed the mark in my view. Costas Galatien might have been a typically overindulged man of the Ten Houses, but he had not struck me as a murderer. The agent of Stesichore’s death
had
to be Ennis Angusina. But who had set her upon the deed? And why? A sudden cold sweat erupted on my back. I had permitted the magitrix into Ricknagel’s home without any explanation of her background. If I had told him Ennis was a magitrix who had been accused of infamous crimes, he’d never have trusted her. What had I wrought with my silence?

“I have no proof her death was anything but an illness,” said Ricknagel grimly. “Only suspicions and rumors.” His face made my heart ache. His grief had broken him beyond anyone’s fixing.

“Then you will make no protest against the Galatiens?” Jaasir’s voice cut the thick tension in the room.

“Protest?” Ricknagel looked exhausted. Yet I’d summoned the Amarians to create this moment. I sat forward in anticipation. “I must do something,” he said. “What would you do if your daughter had been treated this way? Scorned, abused, and possibly murdered. I cannot sit by and do
nothing.
”

Laith said gently, “I have known Costas Galatien since he was a boy. He isn’t the type to murder—or abuse—a woman.”

Ricknagel’s face only hardened further. “What a man will to do in private may surprise even you, Laith Amar.”

Laith acknowledged his words with a nod. “Even so, we are here to urge you to think before you act. Lethemia needs unity among the Ten Houses right now. We play right into the Eastern Empire’s hands if you allow these rumors to sow discord. The Vhimsantese want a civil war to weaken us.”

Xander stood and said stiffly, “I did not realize you were so thoroughly in Costas Galatien’s pocket. I ask you, what is
King Mydon
doing to prevent a war with the Vhimsantese? He gives me no support. If he truly wanted to avert war, he’d act. He’d give me mages to build a barrier at the border, or he’d negotiate with our eastern neighbors to make a treaty that clarifies everyone’s position.”

“Costas does not agree with his father in these matters,” Jaasir said into the taut silence. “Costas would mobilize the Galatien mages to protect the eastern border. We have asked him to reason with his father—”

“Mydon is ruled by emotions.” Xander snorted. “And his son is a spoiled dilettante.”

“You misjudge him,” Laith said. “Costas has a head for strategy, and he is well aware of the eastern situation—”

“Off with you, Starry.” Ricknagel pushed Sterling, who had stood frozen beside him throughout the conversation, towards the parlor door. “It’s late, and these are heavy matters not for your ears.”

I had no choice but to follow Sterling out, leaving Xander closeted with the Amarians. I did not believe he would gain an alliance from them, but perhaps they might convince him of the folly of treating with the Vhimsantese against Mydon Galatien’s orders.

I
woke
the following day with all kinds of doubts in my mind. Why wouldn’t Xander explain what he was up to with the governor in Vorisipor? And who had orchestrated Stesichore’s death? Could it truly have been Costas Galatien as Sterling and her father believed? I didn’t know the man, but I had seen the way he looked at the other girl at the Brokering. That was not the love of a murderer; it had been too pure. A person moved to murder loves differently. Her loves are colored by her hates, as I knew too well.

I could only agree with Laith Amar. If Stesichore had been killed, we should look elsewhere for her murderer. If Lord Ricknagel meant to go to war with the Galatiens over his daughter’s death, he was acting on bad information.

I rose and dressed quickly, hoping to find Ricknagel and have a few words with him. I needed to let him know my concerns about Ennis Angusina, sooner, rather than later. I wandered the ground floor of the mansion, but the only person I found was the Ricknagels’ butler.

“Have you seen Lord Ricknagel?” I asked.

“He has gone, Miss Serafina.”

“Gone?”

“Before dawn, shortly after the Amarians departed.”

My gut dropped. Where was he off to now? He’d only just returned! I feared that the Amarians—not to mention Xander—leaving so abruptly could only mean their discussion of an alliance had gone deeply awry.

I found Sterling in her father’s study, hunched over a flat sheet of parchment.

“Serafina,” she said, looking up as I strode into the room. Her pale blue eyes were lined with lavender shadows.

“Where has your father gone?”

“To Talata,” she said dully, pushing the paper across the desk in my direction. “He left us a long letter.”

I blinked down at the paper covered with ink scrawls. I had never explained to Sterling that I could not read. Fortunately, she went on, “He plans to make an alliance with House Talata.”

“House Talata?” I echoed. I knew little about them, though their province was large, strategically located just north of the Galatien lands.

“They also harbor grievances against Mydon Galatien,” she said. “They are likely allies for us among the Ten Houses.”

“The Amarians said Costas didn’t kill Stesichore.”

“Papa did not agree,” she said. “Who else could it have been, really? Costas had the motive and the position. He must have used that vile magitrix, Sienna. Surely Costas was the one who assigned her as Stesi’s handmaiden. It wouldn’t have been King Mydon.”

“That magitrix could have been working for anyone, even the Vhimsantese!”

Sterling tapped the paper on the desk. “Papa says the Talatas have proof that Costas planned the assassination. Oh gods, I didn’t believe her. My own sister, Sera. I didn’t believe her when she fled him, fearing for her life.” Her bottom lip trembled.

I shook my head. “No, Sterling. Sienna, she wasn’t who she said she was.”

“Of course she wasn’t! She was a dirty Galatien spy!” Sterling shoved the parchment at me and scrubbed the tears from her face. “Read it,” she said. “Then you’ll see. Read it and then burn it as Papa instructs.”

My pride rebelled as I held the paper between thumb and forefinger. I turned and tossed the letter into the hearth where the morning fire already burned. “It sounds a treacherous letter that no eyes but ours should see,” I said. “Better to burn it now. You can tell me what it says.”

Sterling watched the paper curl and burn, an uncertain expression on her face. “Papa plans a rebellion. His troops shall march tomorrow towards Galantia, and he will fight the Galatiens for the throne of Lethemia. They have taken House Ricknagel for granted one too many times.”

It seemed too bold, too drastic a step to take on scant evidence. I gripped the edge of the desk. “He means to overthrow the Galatiens? But this is exactly what the Vhimsantese want, a civil war here in Lethemia.”

“You should have read the letter,” Sterling said, frowning. “Papa has agreements with Vorisipor; that’s what he’s been working on for so long with the governor there. A ‘delicate diplomacy,’ he called it. They have signed a treaty with Papa. They will not attack.”

I lifted my brows. “Treaties can be broken.”

Sterling’s face was pale but resolute. “Papa will win this. I wish you had not burned the letter without reading it. He had specific instructions for you.”

“For me?”

She had taken out the green Ophira stone again, and she lifted it from its box on the desk, rubbing it against her cheek.

I scowled at the rock, which threw sparks of magic everywhere, though only I could sense them. “What are you doing with that stone?”

“Papa sent for Siomar,” Sterling said. “I’m to give it to her, because she lost her Moonstone Ophira. Honestly, Sera. You should have read the letter—”

“It’s too late now. What did it say?”

“Papa wrote a paragraph addressed to you. It said, ‘Now is the time for you to repay all the kindnesses his family has shown you.’”

Kindnesses? Did he consider me indebted to him? I put both palms flat on the desk.

She continued, “He has a ship readied for you to sail to Murana. He—he wrote that you are to—to ‘use your powers to destroy the Galatien fleet’ there, and then that you are to continue west, destroying every ship belonging to our enemy Houses.” Sterling’s voice quavered.

I couldn’t believe my ears. He wanted me to fight in his war? He was giving me a ship? Equal parts thrilled and angry, I stared at her. “A ship?” I could sail it to Queenstown. I could finally find Onatos!

“You’re to leave immediately. Galen will bring you to the harbor.” Her voice sounded small and desperate.

Suddenly free to go wherever I wanted, I felt like a mythical firebird rising from its own ashes to fly again.
Onatos.
My heart slammed against the cage of my ribs. All the many thoughts that had been plaguing me—my doubts about Costas Galatien’s culpability, my suspicions about Ennis and the Vhimsantese, my fears that Xander was launching this rebellion on a lie—fled my mind. My own ship. True freedom. The magic of the water itched in my fingers already.

After my years in Vorisipor, I had thought all my emotions forever dampened, muted by the drugs they had given me to endure the attentions of the governor. But this surge of hope enlivened me in a way I had not felt—ever. With a ship I could sail to Queenstown, back to Onatos. All the way back to love.

“My lady.” Galen entered the office, bowing to Sterling. “Are you ready to depart, Miss Serafina?”

I blinked at him, lost in my own dreams. “Certainly,” I said. He gestured for me to follow.

I cast one look back at poor Sterling, her mottled face betraying fear and sorrow. “Goodbye then, Sera,” she whispered.

I did not reply.

T
he ship Ricknagel
had outfitted for me was called
Firebrand
, a sharp-hulled, two-masted clipper, slender and fast. The crew was minimal, and I worried that Ricknagel had overestimated both my powers and my experience at sea.

Even so, I could not remain angry with him after my tour of
Firebrand
. I loved her. I’d never had anything all my own and this ship, from her name to her cutting hull, belonged to me.

“You’re to sail now for Murana. I arranged for most of your clothing to be packed and sent along. You’ll find a trunk in your cabin,” Galen said as we stood on the ship’s deck. “Siomar Ricknagel is to sail with you. She should arrive any moment now.”

I spun to face the young guard. “Siomar Ricknagel? Why?” I didn’t want Xander’s hysterical sister on
my
ship.

Galen gave me a long look. “Lord Ricknagel’s orders.”