Heir to the Shadows (The Black Jewels #2)(56)
Author: Anne Bishop

Her eyes changed. "See her if you like," his daughter replied. "But don’t invade her privacy."

"There’s no wine." Tersa opened and closed cupboards, looking more and more confused. "The woman didn’t buy the wine. She always buys a bottle of wine on fourth-day so it will be here for you. She didn’t buy the wine, and tomorrow I was going to draw a picture of my garden and show it to you, but third-day’s gone and I don’t know where I put it."

Saetan sat at the pine kitchen table, his body saturated with sorrow until it felt too heavy to move. He’d joked about being predictable. He hadn’t realized that his predictability was one of Tersa’s touchstones, a means by which she separated the days. Jaenelle had known and had let him come to learn the lesson for himself.

With his hands braced on the table, he pushed himself up from the chair. Every movement was an effort, but he reached Tersa, who was still opening cupboards and muttering, seated her at the table, put a kettle on the stove, and, after a little exploring in the cupboards, made them both a cup of chamomile tea.

As he put the cup in front of her, he brushed the tangled black hair away from her face. He couldn’t remember a time when Tersa’s hair didn’t look as if she’d washed it and let it dry in the wind, as if her fingers were the only comb it had ever known. He suspected it wasn’t madness but intensity that made her indifferent. And he wondered if that wasn’t one of the reasons, when he’d finally agreed to that contract with the Hayllian Hourglass to sire a child, that he’d chosen Tersa, who wa’s already broken, already teetering on the edge of madness. He’d spent over an hour brushing her hair that first night. He’d brushed her hair every night of the week he’d bedded her, enjoying the feel of it between his fingers, the gentle pull of the brush.

Now, sitting across from her, his hands around the mug, he said, "I came early, Tersa. You didn’t lose third-day. This is second-day."

Tersa frowned. "Second-day? You don’t come on second-day."

"I wanted to talk to you. I didn’t want to wait until fourth-day. I’ll come back on fourth-day to see your drawing."

Some of the confusion left her gold eyes. She sipped her tea.

The pine table was empty except for a small azure vase holding three red roses.

Tersa gently touched the petals. "The boy picked these for me."

"Which boy is that?" Saetan said quietly.

"Mikal. Sylvia’s boy. He comes to visit. Did she tell you?"

"I thought you might mean Daemon."

Tersa snorted. "Daemon’s not a boy now. Besides, he’s far away." Her eyes became clouded, farseeing. "And the island has no flowers."

"But you call Mikal Daemon."

Tersa shrugged. "Sometimes it’s nice to pretend that I’m telling him stories. Jaenelle says it’s all right to pretend."

A cold finger whispered down his spine. "You’ve told Jaenelle about Daemon?"

"Of course not," Tersa said irritably. "She’s not ready to know about him. All the threads are not yet in place."

"What threads—"

"The lover is the father’s mirror. The brother stands between. The mirror spins, spins, spins. Blood. So much blood. He clings to the island of maybe. The bridge will have to rise from the sea. The threads are not yet in place."

"Tersa, where is Daemon?"

Tersa blinked, drew a shuddering breath. She stared at him, frowning. "The boy’s name is Mikal."

He wanted to shout at her,Where’s my son? Why hasn’t he gone to the Keep or come through one of the Gates? What’s he waiting for? Useless to shout at her. She couldn’t translate what she’d seen any better than she had. One thing he did understand. All the threads were not yet in place. Until they were, all he could do was wait.

"What are the sticks for, Tersa?"

"Sticks?" Tersa looked at the basket of sticks in the corner of the kitchen. "They have no purpose." She shrugged. "Kindling?"

She withdrew from him, exhausted by the effort of keep-nig the stones of reality and madness from grinding her soul.

"Is there anything I can do for you?" he asked, preparing to leave.

Tersa hesitated. "It would anger you."

Right now, he didn’t feel capable of that strong an emotion. "It won’t anger me. I promise."

"Would you . . . Would you hold me for a minute?"

It rocked him. He, who had always craved physical affection, had never thought to offer her an embrace.

He closed his arms around her. She wrapped her arms around his back and rested her head on his shoulder.

"I don’t miss the rutting, but it feels good to be held by a man."

Saetan gently kissed her tangled hair. "Why didn’t you mention it before? I didn’t know you wanted to be held."

"Now you do."

2 / Kaeleer

The Dark Council whispered.

At first it was only a thoughtful look, a troubled frown. The High Lord had done many things in his long life—look what he’d done to the Council itself in order to become the girl’s guardian—but it was hard to believe he was capable ofthat. He had always insisted that the strength of a Territory, the strength of the Realm, depended on the strength of its witches, especially its Queens. To think he would do such things with a vulnerable girl, a dark young Queen . . .

Oh, yes, they had inquired about the girl before now, but the High Lord had always responded tersely. The girl was ill. She could have no visitors. She was being privately tutored.

Where had the girl been during the past two years? What had she been subjected to? Was Jorval sure?

No, Lord Jorval insisted, he was not sure. It was only a spurious rumor made by a dismissed servant. There was no reason to suspect it wasn’t just as the High Lord had said. The girl probablywas ill, an invalid of some kind, perhaps too emotionally or physically fragile for the stimulation of visitors.

The High Lord had made no mention of the girl being ill until the Council requested to see her the first time.

Jorval stroked his dark beard with a thin hand and shook his head. There was no evidence. Only the word of a man who couldn’t be found.

Murmurs, speculations, whisssspers.

3 / The Twisted Kingdom

He clung to the sharp grass on the crumbling island ofmaybe and watched the sticks float toward him. They were evenly spaced like the boards of a rope bridge strung across the endless sea. But the footing would be precarious at best, and there were no ropes to hang on to. If he tried to use them, he would sink beneath the vast sea of blood.

He was going to sink anyway. The island continued to crumble. Eventually there wouldn’t be enough left to hold him.