She didn’t use the word love. My aunt Cloris called it a “confluence of destinies.” I thought it was a beautiful word when she said it, confluence, and I was certain it had to mean something beautiful and sweet, like a powdered pastry. She said the king of Morrighan was thirty-four and had still not found a proper match when a noble First Daughter of a kingdom under siege had caught a Lord’s eye on a diplomatic trip to Gastineux.
Confluence—a coming together by chance, like meandering brooks that join up in a distant unseen gorge. Together they become something greater, but it isn’t delicate or sweet. Like a raging river, a confluence can lead to something impossible to predict or control. My aunt Cloris deserved more credit for her astuteness than I had given her. Yet sometimes the coming together, the confluence of destinies, seemed not to be by chance at all.
Today the Komizar had matters that needed his attention in the Tomack quarter, but he’d learned from Calantha that Rafe’s family had bred horses that supplied the Dalbreck army. He asked Eben and Governor Yanos to take Rafe to the eastern paddock and stables just outside the city to assess some of his studs and mares.
I had insisted on exercising some of my newly earned freedoms, even if it came with the escort of two well-armed guards, and I went to the Capswam quarter to seek out Yvet’s bapa. I gave him half the winnings from my card game with Malich and asked three things of him—that he seek out a healer for Yvet to make sure her hand didn’t blacken with infection, to use the remaining coins to buy the cheese she had so dearly paid for already, and to never shame her for the heinous deeds of another. He tried to refuse the money, but I made him take it. And then he cried, and I thought my heart would wrench from my chest.
The guards, two young men who were no more than twenty, witnessed the exchange, and after we left I warned them not to tell Malich where his winnings had gone.
“We’re Meurasi,” one of them said. “Yvet is our cousin.” And though they extended me no promises, I knew they wouldn’t tell.
It was midday, and I had just entered the stable yard from the south Sanctum gate, and Rafe from the western gate. My heart lifted as it always did when I saw him, for a brief moment forgetting about the danger he faced and the lies I had to guard. I only saw the scruff of his unshaven face, his hair tied back, the confidence of his posture in the saddle, the same sureness as when he had walked into the tavern the first time. There was an engaging power about him, and I wondered how no one else saw it. He wasn’t a conniving lackey to a prince. He was the prince. Maybe we all see what we want to see. I had fallen in love with the idea of a farmer, and it hadn’t taken much nudging for me to believe it was so.
He was eating an apple, and its red skin shone bright against the drab stable yard. I had seen the treasured fruit arrive this morning with a Previzi caravan and watched Calantha throw him two of the sweet prizes. I hadn’t had any fruit since I left the vagabond camp. The closest thing to it here was the root vegetables—carrots and turnips—sometimes served with the Sanctum chickens or wild game. I knew an apple was another reserved luxury delivered to the Council quarters, and I wondered at Calantha’s generosity with Rafe.
He swayed easily in his saddle as he approached, biting off another chunk of apple, and our paths met in the middle of the yard. We exchanged a quick glance and dismounted, waiting for teams of horses that were being hitched to wagons to move out of the way. Even though we had an idle moment together and the guards surrounding us were loud with jesting, telling the Previzi drivers to hurry up about their work, there were still too many within earshot. I couldn’t take a chance trying to explain last night and how my refusing the Komizar might hasten Rafe’s death sentence. He was left to wonder what I was up to. He knew I despised the Komizar. He chewed his apple, his eyes inspecting my dress and the long trails of bones that rattled at my side. I could see every syllable in his eyes: She’s becoming more Vendan every day.
“If my friend Jeb were here,” he said, “he’d commend your accessories, Princess. His tastes run on the savage side.”
“As do the Komizar’s,” a guard interjected, a reminder that they were always listening.
I studied Rafe. I wasn’t sure if it was a compliment or an insult. His tone was odd, but then something else caught his attention.
I followed his gaze. A confluence of destinies.
Not now. Not here. I knew it couldn’t go well.
It was Kaden. He was riding toward us with the governor he had sought at his side and what looked like a disheveled squad of men with him.
Rafe began choking, apple flying from his mouth. His eyes watered.
“Chew, Emissary,” I said, “before swallowing.”
He coughed a few more times, but his eyes remained fixed on the approaching squad.
I saw the visible relief on Kaden’s face when he spotted me. He swung down from his horse, and the men with him did the same. Kaden ignored Rafe as if he weren’t there, in fact as if no one were there. “You’re well?” he asked, not noticing the sudden hush of the soldiers around us. The Assassin was back—the Assassin who had not yet heard the news. The governor stepped up, clearing his throat.
Kaden grudgingly nodded toward him. “This is the new governor of Arleston and his”—he paused, as if searching for the right word—“soldiers.”
I understood why it gave him pause. “Soldiers” was a generous term. They were not an impressive lot. No uniforms, their clothes ragged, the poorest of the poor. But the governor was a frightening brute of a man, tall and lean with a broad chest and a vicious scar that striped his face from cheekbone to chin. He had a scowling line between his brows to match.
“And you are?” he said. The sudden forced smile twisting his lips was more wretched than his scowl.
“It’s not important,” Kaden said. “Let’s go—”
“Princess Arabella,” I answered. “First Daughter of Morrighan, and this is Rafe, the emissary of Prince Jaxon of Dalbreck.”
The governor’s smile disappeared. “Enemy swine in the Sanctum?” he said in disbelief.
He glared at Rafe and spit, hitting Rafe’s boots. Rafe started forward, but I stepped between them.
“For someone so new to this position, you have an exceptionally reckless tongue, Governor,” I said. “Be careful, or you may lose it.”
He sputtered with astonishment and looked at Kaden. “You allow your prisoners to speak to you this way?”
“She’s not a prisoner anymore,” one of the nearby soldiers chided.
And that’s when Rafe told Kaden about my new role at the Sanctum.