The Dinosaur Knights (12 page)

“Well, you'll forgive me my informal dress, Highness. Or you'll not. Either way, welcome to our camp. And who's this ravishing creature here?”

Melodía had to glance around to follow his gaze—straight to Pilar. Who seemed to be blushing. Something Melodía had never seen her lifelong companion do before, in memory.

“This is my
friend
, Pilar. And as for informality, Master Rob, you didn't have much advance notice of our visit. And anyway, I'm happy to be a plain Gardener now, since I'm not even sure I'm legally a princess anymore.”

Rob approached, unself-conscious, water dripping from his hairy calves. “Ah, yes. We've heard about your arrest in La Merced, and your daring escape. There's quite the price on your head, I understand, so.”

She must have looked alarmed at that. He laughed.

“We'll all be Imperial outlaws here soon enough, mark my words,” he said. “You need have no fear of being turned in for the reward, I'm thinking.”

He came right up, and past her, to take Pilar's hand in his and press it to his bearded lips.

“Enchanted to meet you, señorita,” he said. Then to Melodía: “You too, of course.”

She smiled thinly. Inside she was trying to still the reflexive surge of panic the man's casual talk of outlawry had roused in her, to momentarily blanket the always seethe of rage.

Bogardus assured me they could tie the Empire up in courts for years, if Daddy tries to make them give me back
, she made herself recall.
My father may not uphold all the traditions that have helped our Torre remain sole holders of the Imperial throne for centuries, but he won't want to make the family look worse than it does already by throwing an armed snit about me
.

Surely, Bogardus knows more about the Empire's law and noble sensibilities than this rough creature?

She had thought about mentioning the report of a Grey Angel Emergence in Providence that so fortuitously reached La Merced as Falk succeeded Duval as her father's chief bodyguard. That could provoke a hysterical response not just at court but in the streets of La Merced—and lead to the Empire taking action against the Garden for reasons having nothing to do with her.

She had thought better of it.
We're guests here
, she reminded herself again,
by sufferance of Bogardus and the Council. It just seems rude to bring that matter up
.

And the Garden itself, the community and the literal garden it nurtured at the villa, were so calm and beautiful as to render the notion of some mythical monster's presence … as absurd as it was.

“Where's Karyl?” Bogardus asked. His deep, smooth voice was like oil poured on the fears Rob's insouciance had raised.

With visible reluctance Rob let go of Pilar's hand. The gitana had gotten over her bout of shyness—or dropped the façade, Melodía guessed—and was smiling openly at the dinosaur master now. He was, candidly, a bit coarse for Melodía's tastes. But she had to admit there was charm to his hada grin and the mischief-light dancing in his eyes.

“Himself will be on the other side of these great beasts,” Rob said, “admiring them in the guise of inspecting them. Where else would he be?”

Bogardus smiled at Melodía. “Shall we?”

Ignoring Bogardus's proffered hand Melodía splashed through the stream—upstream of the large dinosaurs, of course. Though she and Pilar had bathed and donned fresh clothing after being welcomed to the villa, she wore the same boots, still scuffed and stained from worse than mountain-shed water and a little bottom mud. She noticed with amusement that the ever-capable Pilar wasn't at all backward about accepting the assistance of Rob's crooked elbow.

On the far bank a slight man in a nondescript dark skirt not too different from Rob's stood talking with three other people. Her eyes slid right past him, before stopping with a bit of a shock and snapping back to him.
The snake most dangerous
.… she recalled.

This
is the devil in human form whom my father ordered Jaume to throw away his own honor, and that of the Empire, in order to bring down?
She could hardly believe it.
Why, he's shorter than I am!

On second glance there was no mistaking him, from Jaume's account, reports from the Princes' War, and yes, the songs that celebrated both his long and epic rise and meteoric fall. The long, dark, grey-threaded hair, worn in a sort of horsetail from the crown that hung over unbound hair at the back of his head. His bearded face, so gaunt it reminded Melodía of a Life-to-Come sectary who took their eccentric self-denial doctrines too much to heart. His ribs, a washboard to fit the most extreme ascetic.

But the ropy muscles that twined his limbs and torso definitely did
not
belong to any cloistered monk. Nor did his air of total physical assurance—his movements graceful yet slightly abrupt, like a lizard moving on a cool day.

Without so much as a glance at the newcomers he continued talking to his companions. One was a sturdy, good-looking young blond man with an arm in a sling. The other two were even smaller than Karyl himself. Judging by the olive skins, the long blue-black hair both man and woman wore in braids, and the quilted jackets they wore, they must be Parsos or Turcos from the Grand Turanian Empire of High Ovda. Probably they had come with the three-horns; the huge hornfaces didn't live in Nuevaropa, but abounded on the grassy semiarid plateau east beyond the Shield range. Which roughly exhausted Melodía's stock of knowledge about the beasts, other than that they were truly fearful to meet in battle. Which the merest glimpse of them was enough to show.

“Voyvod Karyl,” she said, walking toward him, “I'm Melodía.”

He turned a rumpled brow to her. “Who?”

She stopped. Her stomach went tense and cold. She drew a deep breath.
Down
, she told her anger.
I am a guest here. And this man serves my hosts
.

“Melodía Delgao,” Bogardus said, joining her.

“Emperor Felipe's daughter,” said Violette.

Karyl grunted. “Apologies, your Highness,” he said.

“Oh, that's not necessary. For one thing, I'm an outlaw. I may not even be a princess anymore, technically.”

“Of course you are,” he said blandly. “Felipe can't attainder you without giving up his own lands and titles—including the Fangèd Throne. Welcome to Providence.”

She frowned. This wasn't going at all the way she anticipated.

She had intended—well, she wasn't entirely sure. Something involving apology for what her lover had done to him—at her father's behest, and dutifully, but a terrible injustice. She wanted to assure him Jaume himself knew what the wrong had been, and felt contrition.

And here he was dismissing her like a foolish child. The way her father had rebuffed her efforts to take some active role at Corte Imperial.

“Count Jaume—” she began. Saying the name cost her pain, and caused the anger to flame up inside her. At herself and her beloved.

But Karyl himself stiffened at the name. “I mean,” she said, “we're betrothed—practically—and, well—”

I'm making a fucking fool of myself
, she realized.
I'm trying to apologize, here! Why won't this man
listen
?

But Karyl's face had closed like an iron gate. “We prepare for war here, Princess,” he said curtly. “You will excuse me.”

He turned his back on her.

She was left standing rigid, eyes stinging, hands wrapped into fists so tight the backs of them ached.
I abased myself to make things right with him and he, he spurned me! He treats me as less than filth. The way Falk did—

The rage made her want to vomit.

Then Bogardus touched her lightly on the arm. “Come on, Melodía,” he said gently. “You and Pilar must be exhausted by your travels. Let's get you back to the villa.”

She made herself swallow her bile, and her fury, and force a smile at him.

“Yes, of course, Eldest Brother. We need to rest.”

Chapter 9

Hada
, the Fae
—Also
demonio
, demon. An individual is called a
Faerie
. A race of wicked supernatural creatures, who defy the Creators' will, and seek to tempt humanity into ruin. Fighting together, humankind, the Grey Angels, and the Creators Themselves defeated their attempt to conquer all Paradise during the dreadful Demon War. Notorious for their pranks, which can be cruel, and their fondness for driving bargains with mortal men and women. Which they keep, but seldom as expected.

—A PRIMER TO PARADISE FOR THE IMPROVEMENT OF YOUNG MINDS

Not long past sunset Rob walked the Imperial High Road toward Providence town. It was a beautiful evening. Overhead the clouds had already broken apart to reveal a sky shading from indigo toward black the farther it got from the eastern horizon, where the clouds were lit with fading glows in peach and lilac. The stars shone forth in glory. Late-summer insects trilled competition to the frogs in the ditch and along the riverbank nearby. The air was soft as a maiden's kiss, and smelled of evening blossoms and distant suppers.

Rob Korrigan swaggered along in his bandy-legged way, his bootsoles crunching the tufa pebbles of the roadway, humming a song to himself. It was a ballad he was composing, a satire on the conduct of the town lords in the Battle of Blueflowers Fields. He did not expect to perform it at the Garden villa anytime soon.

He carried his axe across his shoulders. Its head was uncased. Though the land hereabouts wasn't as mad-fecund as that lower down, there were few areas outside Nuevaropa's higher mountains that were hard to get a living from. And Providence prospered at least as much through trade as farming.

But banditry had never, it seemed, been a great problem in Providence—at least, not until its highborn neighbors began to supply it in abundance. The major trade caravans, like those run by the house of Gaétan's father, Évrard, offered fat prey, true enough—and safeguarded with packs of well-compensated bravos. Indeed the merchant clans grew bravos of their own, as Gaétan himself attested.

So the targets rich enough to draw attention from large, well-organized gangs tended to be too formidable to be worth the game. And the lesser traders, tinkers, and farmers simply weren't worth the taking, when living was so relatively easy.

That had changed, though, with the refugees swarming to Providence town, especially in the wake of Salvateur's fire-and-sword sweep. But not that much. Providencers were openhanded folk, if prone to argue the merits of poets and painters ferociously at the drop of a critical remark.

The woods-runners now gave vast respect to Karyl, and scarcely less to Rob, whose mounted scouts had helped them chase the hated Rangers back into Crève Coeur. They proved willing to let go of their traditional distaste and distrust for the Seated Folk enough to help the dispossessed. At least those who showed goodwill. Those who didn't vanished; and Rob for one, wasted scarce thought on them, and less pity.

So Rob expected no trouble of this fine evening. But he hadn't survived the life Fate had led him through by taking his own safety for granted. So often did he run the craziest risks that, when chance allowed, he took extra care.

When the shadowy figure emerged from the weeds at the causeway's side he raised the axe-haft from his shoulder.

“Master Korrigan,” a female voice said. “You have an unmistakable silhouette.”

“Pilar?” he said, frowning into the gloom. “Why are you lurking in the weeds, then, lass?”

He saw her smile gleam white in starlight literally before the rest of her began to resolve as if materializing from the gloom. “For the same reason you carry your axe with naked head.”

He laughed. “Sensible girl.”

“What brings you out on the highway by night?” she asked. Her accent was strongly spiced with Spañola—and something else whose familiarity spooked him.

No,
he told himself,
leave off. That cannot be. It's starting at phantoms you are, me lad.

“I'm, ahh—on my way to the Gardeners' villa,” he said. “They set a better table than our mess, I fear. Even if there's, um, no meat to be had.”

“Is that so?” Her tone and the glitter of starlight in green eyes challenged him. “Well, I was coming to see you, Master Korrigan.”

“Rob,” he said. “Just Rob. Er—you were?”

“Come now,” she said with a laugh. “I'm not drawn to bashful men. Nor does bashfulness seem to come naturally to the likes of you, Just Rob.”

“Don't call me that either, for I'm not just at all,” he said.

But it was mere flippantry, reflexive as catching an apple tossed at his face. He wondered himself at his bashfulness. It wasn't his style, for a fact.