David Coe - Bonds of Vengeance

With every hour that passed, however, these flaws seemed to diminish, leaving Cresenne with a child she could describe only as beautiful. Overnight, her skin had lightened to a pale shade of pink, the swelling around her eyes had lessened. Her lips were perfectly shaped, as was her tiny nose. Her fingers and toes, wrinkled like the skin of some ancient Eandi, were smaller than Cresenne had ever imagined possible. Wisps of fine hair covered her head and the back of her neck, softer than Uulranni silk and as white as the new snow covering the highlands. Sitting in her bed, she felt helpless to do anything more than gaze upon her baby and weep, not for fear, or exhaustion, but for a joy unlike any she had known before.

Eventually, Bryntelle awoke again, her yellow eyes opening slowly. They were the color of fire, not quite as pale as Cresenne’s but not so bright as those of her father.

“Are you hungry again, little one?” Cresenne whispered, placing a finger on the child’s lips to see if she wanted to nurse. Immediately, Bryntelle took the finger in her mouth and began sucking on it. Cresenne laughed. “Very well.”

She sat up straighter, wincing at the dull ache in her back and hips. She pulled off her shift and raised Bryntelle to her breast. The babe began to suckle greedily.

“You’d think I hadn’t fed you all night.”

She heard a knock at the door and felt her body tense.

“Come in.”

She had expected Grinsa, but instead the herbmaster bustled in, crossing hurriedly to the shelf near her bed where he kept his herbs and stoppered vials of various extracts.

He glanced at her. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m sore. But other than that I feel all right, thank you.”

“Some pain is normal, particularly after a difficult labor. And the child?”

“I think she’s fine.”

“Good.” He stepped to the bed and looked at Bryntelle a moment. “She’s nursing quite well, and her color seems right for a Qirsi child.” He turned and started for the door. “I’d stay longer, but one of the guards was wounded in training this morning. I’ll try to return later.” He hesitated at the door, facing her again. “The gleaner is here to see you. Shall I send him in?”

She didn’t answer. As much as Cresenne wanted to refuse him, to avoid this encounter for as long as possible, she knew that she couldn’t, not after what Grinsa had done for her the night before. “Yes,” she said at last, the word coming out as a sigh. “Thank you.”

He nodded and let himself out of the room, leaving the door ajar. A moment later Grinsa walked in.

Cresenne, though very much aware of his presence the night before, hadn’t really looked at him until now. She hadn’t remembered his face being so thin, and though he had always been an imposing man, he appeared taller and broader in the shoulders than he had in Curgh. She silently cursed the racing of her pulse.

His bright eyes fell on her as soon as he entered the room, but he quickly averted his gaze, his face coloring, as if embarrassed to see her nursing the baby.

She should have found a way to use this against him, but instead she felt herself growing discomfited as well. With her free arm, she draped her shift over her shoulders and breast so that only Bryntelle’s face could be seen.

Grinsa paced the room briefly, like a restless dog, finally stopping before the hearth.

“How do you feel?”

She shrugged, glancing down at Bryntelle. The baby’s eyes were beginning to droop again. “Not too bad.”

“And Bryntelle?”

She smiled in spite of herself. It was the first time someone else had used her-their-daughter’s name.

“She’s hungry all the time.”

“Isn’t she supposed to be?”

“I think so, yes.”

He nodded, resuming his pacing.

“I believe she looks a little bit like you.”

“Don’t!” he said, halting near the door and glaring at her.

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t talk to me like we’re husband and wife! Don’t pretend that this child changes who you are and what you’ve done!”

“What do you know about who I am, Grinsa?”

“I know you’re a traitor.”

“A traitor to whom? The kingdom of Eibithar? I was born in Braedon and raised in Wethyrn. How can I betray a kingdom that’s not my own?” She forced a thin smile. “From where I sit, you’re the one who’s guilty of treason. You’ve forsaken your people for the Eandi courts. You, of all people.”

He narrowed his eyes. “What does that mean?”

“I think you know. We live in a land where you risk your life simply by admitting the extent of your powers, yet you willingly serve those who would be your executioners.”

She thought he would deny it. Until this moment none in the movement, not even the Weaver himself, knew for certain that Grinsa was a Weaver as well. They suspected, of course, and Cresenne had been fairly confident of it for some time. But only now, watching him wrestle with the implications of what she had said, did she know beyond doubt.

“Do you really want Bryntelle to grow up in a world where her father fears for his life every day?” she went on. “And what if she inherits more from you than just her name and the shape of her face? What if she carries your power in her blood? Do you want her to live in fear as well?”

The Weaver had said much the same thing to her several turns before, walking in her dreams as he often did. At the time it had been mere speculation, one possibility among many. Yet still, it frightened her, as if the Weaver had already claimed her child for his movement. Yet here she was echoing his words to Grinsa, the one man in the Forelands whose claim to Bryntelle rivaled her own. As she searched Aneira for the gleaner, carrying his child, dreading her next dream of the Weaver, Cresenne had wondered if she could turn Grinsa to her cause and thus trade one Weaver for another. She had thought to control him then, so that rather than serving a Weaver she feared, she might wield this man as a weapon. Gazing at him now, though, seeing how he regarded her, with loathing in his yellow eyes, she wondered if that had been folly.

“Of course I don’t want her to grow up as I did,” he said, “bearing the burden of that secret and that fear.”

“Then why do you fight us?”

“Because I’ve seen what your Weaver can do.”

She felt the blood drain from her cheeks. “What?”

“Yes, I know about him. I know that he’s capable of great cruelty, that he wields his power as a weapon, not just against the Eandi but against Qirsi as well.”

“How is this possible?” she asked. “Has he seen you? Does he know where you are?”

“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were concerned for my safety.”

“I am.”

He let out a bitter laugh, though not before Cresenne saw something else flash in his eyes. “Of course you are. That’s why you sent that assassin for me.”

Actually, I’ve sent two . She hadn’t intended to give Grinsa’s name to the second man, Cadel, the partner of the one Grinsa killed. But Cadel asked upon learning that Jedrek was dead, and to have denied him the name would have raised his suspicions. “That was before. . ”

“Before what? The baby? I’ve already told you, this child changes nothing.”

She met his glare as long as she could, seeing once again all the hurt and hatred in his eyes, and knowing this time what lay at the root of it all. He had loved her so deeply. Twisted as it was now, that love still resided within him, waiting to be rekindled. Waiting to be used again. Yes, she loved him, too, though he would never believe that. But she loved Bryntelle more. Her love for this child was already the most powerful force in her life, more so even than her fear of the Weaver. No doubt he would sense this the next time he walked in her dreams. Only Grinsa could protect her now, if he could be convinced to do so. Folly or not, she had little choice but to try.