Dakrias Brown’s ghosts had not read Lord Eldred Faintly’s book. No, indeed. They had gone and done something new and unexpected.

Dakrias’ eyes rolled to the back of his head, his candle extinguishing as he hit the floor in a dead faint.

Journal of Hadriax el Fex

The face of the young woman I saw in the mirror lake so long ago haunts my dreams. Why did she appear to me? Was she a messenger from God? If so, I did not hear her message; I do not know what it portends. All I know is that she appeared out of the etherea as though to look upon me, and that she wore a winged horse brooch, just as Lil Ambriodhe and her riders do.

KARIGAN RIDING

“No,”Karigansaid.

“No?” Drent’s eyes creased as he stared her down. He loomed over her, gigantic and bristling.

“No.” Her outward calm did not reflect the anger roiling inside her. Her emotions were far too raw to tolerate Drent and his abuse anymore.

“On the beam,” he growled. “Now.”

Drent had raised the beam, and greased it, to test her “sure-footedness.” All she saw was a new opportunity for him to batter her senseless with his practice sword, and to create a spectacle for onlookers. Well, she’d give him a spectacle, all right.

“I’m done here,” Karigan said.

“Insubordination.” Drent smiled in anticipation. “You know what—”

“I won’t be cowed by your threats.”

A heavy silence blanketed the practice field. Even the crows seemed to settle on treetops to watch.

Drent raised his practice sword to strike her. She ducked beneath it and rotated her own in a graceful arc, and smashed his knuckles. He dropped his sword with a howl of pain, a howl that brought her a gratifying amount of satisfaction. Had any of his other students ever heard him utter such a sound?

He watched her wordlessly, clutching at his hand.

“I learned that move from an arms master named Ren dle, a good man who never beat me to teach me a lesson.”

She pivoted and slammed the flat of her practice sword against the beam. The wooden blade broke and she dropped the hilt to the ground. Wiping her hands, again perversely satisfied, she strode away from Drent, the onlookers, and the practice field, never looking back.

They could, and probably would, lock her up for both insubordination and the purposeful injury she inflicted upon a superior, but it no longer mattered. Compared to her losses, it was insignificant.

By the time she reached the stable, she was shaking from all the anger she’d held inside. She went to Condor and started currying him with hard, circular strokes. He leaned into them with a grunt of pleasure, as the tension seeped out of her arms and shoulders.

She would go for a ride. A ride would calm her, help bring some balance to her frayed nerves. She remembered her promise to Bluebird, and decided she’d take him along for some exercise.

When she rode Condor out onto the castle grounds, Bluebird followed on a lead rope. The gelding pricked his ears forward, and there was a new spring in his gait. He looked about himself as if seeing his surroundings for the first time. His spark of interest in life gladdened Karigan, and it brought her closer to healing.

She rode to the west castle grounds, which were wide and open, an ideal place for exercising horses, and as about as far away from Drent as she could get and remain on castle grounds. A couple other soldiers sat astride their horses, sharing a conversation at the north end, otherwise the area was all hers.

The walk there had warmed up both horses, and she squeezed Condor into a trot. After making a couple of very large circles, she let him run, Bluebird nosing alongside them. All cares melted away from her, and she knew only the wind against her face and the rhythm of hoofbeats.

He watched her riding down below, how her hair streamed behind her like a wild horse’s mane. He could not see her face clearly, but he imagined her lips turned up in a smile, those dimples of hers dinting her cheeks, and the sun shining in her eyes. She rode fluidly as though one with her horse, as if it were the most natural thing in the world for her.

Gone was her usual shortcoat, the sun blazing on her white shirt. She was unfettered and free, a wild spirit he could not capture, tame, or confine, but one he wished would come to him, as a deer is tempted by a handful of oats. Would she shy away and run?

Wild spirit that she was, she was not invulnerable, and he yearned to comfort and protect her, but she would only run, he knew.

No, she could not be captured, but he was. Inextricably.

“My lord?”

Zachary Hillander bowed his head before turning away from the window to face Lord Richmont Spane and the nobles of Coutre Province. Laid out on the table before him was a heavily inked document.

“My lord,” Spane said, “I believe Lord Coutre’s terms are exceedingly generous. The dowry alone represents considerable wealth.”

Everyone wanted something from the high king of Sacoridia, whether it was a pardon, status by association, or his agreement to a marriage proposal so a daughter might become a queen, bringing a clan much prestige and power. Few wanted him for himself. Laren had always been his close friend and confidant, but the relationship was overshadowed by her sense of duty. His position seemed to put some sort of taint on all his relationships.

“You do realize you have much to gain,” Spane said, with a look in his eye that reminded Zachary of a rodent. “Or, much to lose. As you know, Lord Centre’s influence over the eastern clan lords is critical to your power. For instance, there is the D’Ivary matter to consider ...”