She caught her uncle as he fell, cradling his head on her lap, her hand on his chest, feeling the beat of his heart slowing. “Never . . . killed anyone . . . before,” he said. “Glad it . . . turned out to be . . . him.” His hand fluttered to her cheek and she held it there. “Don’t . . . doubt the Father’s love . . . my wonderful niece. Promise me.”
“I won’t, Uncle. Not now, not ever.”
He smiled, his red eyes dimming. “Brahdor,” he whispered.
“Uncle?”
“The man the priest called lord . . . His name . . . Brahdor . . .” The bony hand went limp in her grasp. His eyes still stared up at her but she knew they saw nothing.
◆ ◆ ◆
Fief Lord Sentes Mustor was laid to rest in the family crypt within the manor walls. By Reva’s order only she and the coffin bearers were present. She had wanted Veliss at her side but the lady was too stricken by the day’s events to attend, stumbling back to the manor white-faced and locking herself in her room. Reva sent the bearers away and sat by the coffin until nightfall. It was a plain pine box, incongruous next to the ornately carved marble of her forebears, something she would have to fix in time. Outside the faint thump of engine-cast stones could be heard as they ate another breach into her wall. Antesh reported that it was only another two weeks away from completion.
She had hoped sitting here with the bones of her ancestors might provoke some vision or insight, a cunning stratagem to win the day when the final stone fell. But all she earned was a cold behind and a sense of loss so great it felt as if some invisible hand had scooped out her insides.
She rose and went to the coffin, touching her fingers to the unvarnished wood. “Good-bye, Uncle.”
Veliss opened the door at the seventh knock, red-eyed and pale. A ghost of a smile played on her lips before she turned back, leaving the door open. Reva closed it behind her, watching Veliss sit at her desk where a piece of parchment waited, half-covered in her fine script. “My formal letter of resignation,” she said, picking up the quill. “I think I’ll take you up on that horse, and the gold. When this is all over, naturally. I hear the Far West offers many opportunities . . .”
She fell silent as Reva came to place her hands on her shoulders, eyes raising to meet hers in the mirror as they lingered. “I thought it was a stain.”
Reva bent to press a kiss to her neck, exulting in the thrill of delight as she provoked a gasp. “It washed.” She took Veliss’s hands and drew her towards the bed. “Now it’s a gift.”
◆ ◆ ◆
Is it wrong? she wondered the following morning. To feel so good at a time such as this? She had been fighting to keep the smile from her face all through the council with her captains, scrupulously avoiding catching Veliss’s eye for fear of a betraying grin or blush. Her uncle dead, the Reader slain on the steps of his own cathedral and the city on the verge of destruction, but all she could think about was the wondrous night before.
“It’s just not enough,” Antesh was insisting to Arentes, his knuckles thumping onto the map on the library table. “We’ll hold them at the breaches for no more than a few hours, and all the time you can bet they’ll be making a fresh assault on the walls to draw off our strength.”
“What else can we do?” the old guard commander asked. “This city’s defence rests on its walls. There is no provision, no plan for anything else. My lady”—he turned to Reva—“it might help if we had some notion of how long the Dar—, Lord Al Sorna will take in getting his army here.”
Reva stopped the amused frown before it reached her brow. He believed me. Seeing the intent gaze of Lord Antesh she realised the old guardsman was not alone. They actually think the Father has sent me some holy vision. “Such . . . details were not revealed to me, my lord,” she replied. “We must plan on holding this city as long as possible.”
Antesh sighed, returning his gaze to the map. “Perhaps if we build towers here and here, just behind the new walls. Pack them with archers to loose down at them as they rush through . . .”
Reva surveyed the map as he went on, noting how circular it was, the empty space of the square in the centre like the bull’s-eye of an archer’s target, the surrounding streets ordered in a circular pattern radiating outwards. She reached for a charcoal stub and began to draw on the map. “We have been thinking on too small a scale,” she told the two lords, tracing a series of black circles through the streets, each one smaller than the last. “Not two inner walls, six. Each to be held for as long as possible. Archers on every rooftop. The streets are narrow so their numbers won’t matter so much. When one wall is breached, we fall back to the next.”
Arentes looked at her plan for a good while before commenting, “It’ll mean tearing down a quarter of the city.”
“The city can be remade, its people can’t.” She looked at Antesh. “My lord?”
The Lord of Archers gave a slow nod. “It seems the Father’s blessing is not misplaced. But it’ll take a mighty effort to have it all done by the time the breach is complete.”
“Then let’s be about it. Besides I think the people will welcome any distraction from the sound of those bloody stones.”
◆ ◆ ◆
Veliss organised work gangs based on neighbourhood allegiance, putting a skilled builder in charge of each one. They worked in seven-hour shifts, no-one was hungry now as rationing had been abandoned in the face of more pressing need. They worked through the night pulling down houses that had stood for centuries, their bricks moulded into the new barricades which had quickly been dubbed the Blessed Lady’s Rings. The taller houses were turned into miniature fortresses with wooden platforms added to the rooftops to accommodate additional archers, each one well-stocked with arrows and weapons. A series of walkways was also constructed across the rooftops, allowing reinforcements to be rushed from one point to another.
Reva spent the time rehearsing the House and City Guard in their response to the coming Volarian assault. “Is this really necessary now?” Veliss asked, watching the soldiers running from the wall for the tenth time as Reva counted down the seconds.
“Every one we kill on the wall or in the breaches is one we don’t have to kill in the streets,” Reva replied. She strode over to where the House Guard sergeant stood wheezing with his men. “Better than last time, but still too slow. Do it again.”
“You’re lucky they love you,” Veliss observed as the guardsmen trooped back to the stairs.
“I’m discovering the Father’s Blessing can do wonders, real or imagined.”
Veliss nodded, pursing her lips. “I, ah, thought I’d take another look at the stocks in the cellar. Should take an hour, perhaps longer.”
She gave a precisely formal bow and strode away, Reva hoping the guardsmen would ascribe the flush on her cheeks to the recent exertions. This was how it had been since that first glorious night, hurried but delightful fumblings in dark corners, the sense of stealing private pleasures adding a wicked charm to every encounter.
“Working hard?”
She turned to find Arken walking towards her with a stiff gait, his face tense with suppressed pain. “Go back to bed,” Reva instructed him flatly.
“Another minute of the healing house and I’ll go mad,” he replied. “Brother Harin is a good man, but his stories never end. This is his fifth war, you know? He’ll tell you all about the others in great detail, if you let him.”
She saw the determination in his gaze and let it drop. “Lord Antesh requires help in the eastern quarter,” she said. “There’s an old wine-shop with unusually deep foundations.”
He nodded, hesitating. “We’re never going to the Reaches, are we? Even if we win this.”
Looking at his broad, honest face she saw the boy he had been replaced by the good and brave man he now was. It hurt, because she knew he couldn’t stay with her now. She might want a brother but he already had a sister. “I’ve decided on Lady Governess of Cumbrael,” she said. “As my formal title. As you said, Fief Lady didn’t sound right.”
“Lady Governess,” he repeated with a grin. “Suits you.” He gave an overly florid bow, wincing and rubbing his back as he straightened then walked off towards the eastern quarter.
◆ ◆ ◆
She was with Veliss when the stones stopped falling, lying entwined on a pile of furs in a shadowed corner of the manor cellar, sweat-covered and panting. “I love your hands,” Veliss said, entwining their fingers together, nuzzling at her neck.
“They’re rough, callused and the nails are horrible,” Reva replied. “Though my feet are worse.”
“You’re mad.” Veliss raised herself up to kiss her, lips lingering, tongue probing. “There isn’t an inch of you that isn’t gorgeous.”
Reva giggled as her lips moved lower, her hands bunching in Veliss’s rich, strawberry-flavoured hair . . .
“Wait!” she said as it came to her.
“What?” Veliss raised her head, pouting in annoyance.
“They’ve stopped.” After so long the absence of the stones on the wall was like an endless shout of silence. Reva disentangled herself and reached for her clothes.