The Swans' War 1 - The One Kingdom (8 page)

ELISE LOVED ONLY ONE PERSON IN THE WORLD WITHOUT RESERVATION and hated two others with at least equal passion. This disparity between the number loved and the number hated did not go unnoticed by her—but she was, after all, a Wills, and the Wills family, it was often said, had a certain genius for hatred. One of the two she hated was about to arrive, and Elise paced across her sitting room, unable to sit still. For a moment she paused to stare out a window and down to the green earth below. Tying the bedsheets together was out of the question. Not only was it too far to the ground, but, despite the reassurances of any number of tales, Elise had no faith in the sheets holding together under the weight. Of course, she could just have a groom ready a horse and ride across the bridge, but by nightfall they would be looking for her, and by noon—or supper time at the latest—she would have been found. And all that would have been accomplished would be to convince her uncle that she was too young to make her own decisions—not that he needed to be convinced. Running away, no matter how appealing, did not seem to be an option—not for her, at least.” I guess I'll have to attend the Westbrook Tournament, after all," she said rather sadly. It was the one event of the year that she most dreaded, for it seemed to be a time that family honor absolutely required sacrifice, and though her cousins appeared more than willing to bow to this necessity, she was not so amenable. Of course, they had only to risk their limbs and, less likely, their lives. She, on the other hand, was being asked to sacrifice a great deal more. At least that was how she saw it.

"Your Highness?"

It was one of the conceits of the family that the heir presumptive was still addressed as though he or she were royalty. Elise turned to find her maid in the doorway.

"Your uncle is on the stair."

Elise had several uncles, in fact, but the only one who did not need to be identified by name was Menwyn. He was her uncle," even though he was not the eldest of his brothers. That honor belonged to her father.

"I don't suppose you could tell him I'm ill?"The maid did not respond either to refuse or agree, but only looked deeply uncomfortable. It was one thing for Elise to lie to Menwyn, but a servant would be taking a great risk.

"Please show him in," Elise said with resignation, to the great relief of her maid.

Elise took up an embroidery hoop that she had not actually looked at in months, and bent over it in false concentration. Suddenly disgusted by this farce, she flung the hoop aside and went back to staring out the window. He might as well know the truth: she was not industrious as a young, unmarried woman should be, but instead read poetry and played her lute and stared out the window—and, yes, daydreamed.

"Enjoying the scenery, Your Highness?""According to my understanding only the members of a royal family are so addressed, Uncle." She could see his pained smile without turning around.

"Before the first restoration, our ancestors were always addressed as the royalty they were. It is a tradition I believe in upholding.""And if there is no restoration?""There will be," he said.” I have no doubts. It was true in the past, and will be true again." She turned away from the window, unable to continue being so rude, even to Menwyn—she was simply too well brought up. Her uncle smiled at her, that repulsive smile—as though she were a willful child, exasperating at times, but in spite of it he loved her. But he did not love her. In fact, she suspected he felt much the same toward her as she did toward him: a festering, malignant hatred. Whenever he stood before her, exhibiting, as he always did, this utterly false concern, images began to appear, unbidden, in her mind. She would see herself bludgeoning Menwyris narrow little face, breaking his teeth and blackening his eyes. It always unsettled her—ladies were never to countenance such thoughts—but she could not help it. Elise tried to compose her face to not betray her thoughts. How surprised he looked when she broke his mouth with her mace. And then, when he raised his hands, she drove them into his face as well, and he fell back, cringing.” Your father asked me to speak with you." Elise felt her jaw tighten at the lie. Her father was her ally and hated Menwyn as much as she.... Though perhaps that was not quite true: her father's feelings toward his ambitious younger brother were far more complicated. But her father had retreated, now, into music and the books that were read to him. Into the dark and still night that was his entire world. Her father had been born blind and had been pushed aside in the succession by Menwyn, who was strong and hale and who could see perfectly well—too well, in some ways, for he had an eye for the weaknesses of others. Menwyn was a man who could lead an army into battle; and to the Wills family, that was of great importance, despite the fact that there had been no battles now for many years.” The Westbrook Tournament is but a few weeks away," he began smoothly, his speech obviously rehearsed.” I have supported your wishes in the past, and understood then that you were not yet ready, but this year I can hardly go against the family again. You are a Wills, Your Highness: we must consider your future and ours A suitable match must be found.""With a suitable number of men-at-arms and a suitable fortune," she said, not meaning to taunt, or at least not meaning it to sound so.

Blood ran from his ears as she laid her mace alongside his head.

Menwyn shook his head, looking for all the world like a man injured by what had been said.” Child, you will never know what injustice you do me, how much concern I have for your well-being and your happiness. I have risked insulting some of the most powerful families in Ayr because I respected your desire to remain a girl a few years more. But you are twenty years old now. Past time when one should accept the duties and responsibilities of one's position. You are a Wills, not the daughter of some tradesman. None of us have married on a whim, yet most of us have found contentment in our unions."She could not bear it when he spoke the truth, or at least partial truth—as close as Menwyn likely ever came. Not everyone had found happiness in their "unions" and some endured something more akin to lengthy illness, but many had found contentment.

"But I will not choose your husband, as Your Highness well knows. That decision will be made by your father. I am only here as messenger. I can tell you that the flower of the nobility will be at the Westbrook Tournament: all the other great families and all their sons. Elise," he said, suddenly dropping the sham of royal address, "childhood has run its course."This last line chilled her more than anything he had said, not because she wished to remain a child—she did not—but because everything Menwyn would require of her would be justified thus. Because she was no longer a child, because she must shoulder her responsibilities, put aside her own desires for the good of the family. She must join in this terrible illusion that they were still royalty, deprived of their rightful place. An illusion to which all things must be sacrificed.

She knew well that everything Menwyn said was deception or an outright lie, not that it would be of any use to protest. Menwyn did not much care to be reminded of his exact words from other conversations. He simply denied them. Elise sometimes thought the man so deluded that he actually believed whatever his current version of the truth happened to be.

Over the last three years it had been Uncle Menwyn pressing to have her wed—and despite his protestations, she suspected he had already chosen her groom to be, the son of a powerful man with ambitions of his own. A duke who wanted his grandson to rule even greater estates than they now possessed, perhaps even a kingdom—who could say? He would not be the first to believe that adding some Wills blood to his family's would provide the justification he needed to invade a neighbor; for, after all, Ayr in all of its entirety had once been their dominion.

Menwyn was staring at her, his brows knitted. He was a master at reading the reactions of others, at tailoring his words to the moment. She tried to make her face blank and unreadable.

"I think you shall see, Elise, that this year the young men are fairer than ever. All the ladies say so. Among them we shall find you a prince."She almost laughed out loud at this. There did seem to be an urmsviafty promising group of brutal young men in this generation. Utterly ready to fight the Renné as though the ghosts of the past rode onto the field. That was how it seemed to her. Each family was at war with the other's ancestors, those who had perpetrated the "great injustice" upon the other. The fact that it was not the present Renné or Wills made no difference. There was the perennial, unerasable injustice of the past and it must be engaged in mortal combat at all costs. If war was not, at present, possible, then the tournament would make a reasonable substitute.

Why the people of Ayr would ever want to be ruled by families so stupid she could not understand. But then, that was exactly the point: they did not want to be ruled by them. It was only a myth of the two families, who could no more give up the injustices of the past—their precious injustices— than they could surrender the dream of restoration in the future. The ultimate victory over their rivals—restoration. Better even than the utter annihilation of the other. Just let them ascend the throne again, with the other family there to witness. It would make centuries of warfare and uncounted dead seem a small price—it would be worth that ten times over.

"I simply cannot shield you from your responsibilities any longer," Menwyn said solicitously.” The family will not hear of it."A protracted silence ensued, which did not seem to discomfit her uncle at all. He continued to look upon her with feigned affection.

"Have you finished?" she asked evenly. Offending Menwyn was one of the few pleasures she had, considering that in the end he would no doubt have his own way. It was the only form of rebellion possible.

His face barely changed.” I bid Your Highness good day."As soon as the door closed, she yanked a pillow off the divan and screamed into it as loudly as she dared, then flung it across the room.

She went to the window again and looked out over the river valley. The sight calmed her a little. It was so beautiful in the late afternoon light—the stands of trees casting their shadows over the irregular fields, the innumerable shadings of emerging green. It had rained earlier—just a shower—and the world looked freshly scrubbed and pure, the blue sky with its rags of clouds fluttering in the breeze.

Suddenly a bird flitted past her, and then back again, so dose she could almost reach out and touch it. It fluttered before her, the sunlight falling on its dark wings—blue-black in this light. It seemed so bold she almost thought it was a tamed bird, escaped from some cage, and held out her hand to it. Without hesitation, it darted at her ring with its opened bill, causing her to pull her hand back.

"Well, you cheeky thing. You would steal my ring, wouldn't you? Go on, you thief. Shoo!" She waved her arms, and somewhat reluctantly the bird was off. In only a second it was beyond the walls, then over the island and crossing the lake to the fields beyond. She could not take her eyes from its determined flight. Another moment and it was lost from view entirely.

If only she could fly like that: out the window and gone before anyone could even saddle a horse. She would have a branch for a bed and the sky for her country. She would be free of this foolish family that could never be rid of its past. Free to choose whom she would. Free.

What would the world look like to someone who did not even know her parents' names? It must seem a glorious place. No obligations but to oneself. No obligations.

ELISE HEARD HER FATHER BEFORE SHE SAW HIM. THERE WERE NO candles in his rooms, and dusk was stealing the light away like a cat stealing the breath from a baby.

He was playing upon the harp, not his virtuoso instrument, but still one upon which he was more than competent Elise paused at the door, listening. It was not a piece she knew, but it seemed to suit the sounds and mood of the evening entirely. The last whisper of falling wind, the lowing of cattle as they made their slow trek back to the barns, a curtain moving in the open window, a nightingale's liquid song. The music became part of all of these sounds, dancing in among them in exquisite counterpoint.

She pushed the door open a fraction more, and the music died away, reverberating for an instant longer in her mind than on the air.” Elise?""How can you know it's me?" she asked, shaking her head. His perceptiveness always astonished her.

"Everyone else knocks, my dear. Even Menwyn." She laughed.” And I thought it was some ... some secret sense.""Well, there is your perfume," he said, holding out his hand. She crossed the room and put her hand in his. He kissed it and held it to his cheek, closing his eyes tightly as he always did.

She often thought her father would have been a striking man if he did not have that emptiness of expression of the blind. His long face and serious countenance gave him an appearance of sadness, though she knew he was not an unhappy man, merely a thoughtful one.

He was the opposite of her in appearance—dark to her fair. Though she, too, had a somewhat long face, which she tried to hide by the way she wore her hair.

He took her hand away from his face, though did not release it. She loved the warmth and gentleness of his fingers— the hands of an artist.

"And what brings you down here to visit your aging father?""You are hardly aging, and do I need a reason other than the pleasure of your company?" She hooked a chair near with her foot—a terribly unladylike act, but she was sure her father would not recognize it as such.” You may visit me anytime you choose, as you well know, whether it is merely for the pleasure of my company, as you put it, or because you need to unburden yourself, but sometimes I sense it is the latter...." She squeezed his hand, wondering where to begin.” Menwyn .. ." he said softly. It was not a question. She nodded.” Shall I assume you are nodding agreement?" This made her smile.” Yes." "He is our particular bane, isn't he?" her father said conspiratorially.” He is pressing you to accept a suitor?" "He keeps saying that it is you who will make the decision ..." she blurted out. Her father sat back in his chair.” Yes, he would say that." "But, Father, Menwyn would have me marry... anyone if his father had enough men-at-arms and was belligerent in nature." She rose from her chair, taking three quick steps in the gathering gloom, but then stopped.” I don't want my marriage to support this senseless feud," she said in a harsh whisper, as though one did not speak such words within these walls. For a moment her father did not answer.” No," he said in a normal tone.” I don't want that either. We shall have to set ourselves to resist Menwyn, though he will rally all the others against us. You know the truth, Elise: he has isolated me almost entirely. We can count on no one but ourselves." He turned his head toward her as he said this, as though she were visible to him. She came and put a hand on his shoulder, bending to kiss his cheek. He was ever her supporter. He reached out and ran his fingers over the strings of the harp, the sound of falling water, and smiled.” You should know, Elise," he said, suddenly serious, "that all of us make appropriate marriages. That does not mean you must marry someone you detest, but even so, you must find a fitting match.""Yes," she said softly.” You loved Mother, didn't you?" "More than words can express, almost more than music can.""But you hardly knew her when you married. . . ?" She knew the answer to these questions, but it had become a litany of reassurance.