Guy Kay - A Song for Arbonne

She was coming sleepily back up the hallway clad only in the night-robe the countess had given her when she saw someone waiting in the shadows outside her door. She stopped, instinctively afraid, a hand fumbling to more properly close her robe.

"Forgive me," said the duke of Talair, moving forward into light. "I did not mean to frighten you."

Rosala took a shaky breath. "I am easily frightened of late. I never used to be."

"You are in a strange place," En Bertran murmured gravely, "and have a new responsibility. It is not unnatural, I think."

"Will you enter?" she asked. "I think I have wine left from earlier this evening. I can send a servant for more."

"No need," he said, "but thank you, yes, I will come in. There are tidings you should hear."

It was late at night. Something thumped within Rosala: her heart, pounding as if on a drum. "What has happened?" she asked quickly.

He made no immediate reply, opening her door instead and ushering her in. He waited until she had taken one of the chairs by the fire and he sat down on the low bench opposite. In the firelight his eyes were remarkably blue, and the scar on his cheek showed white.

"Is it Blaise?" she asked. She had been told about this morning, several times already, by many people. The duchess of Carenzu had brought her a white flower and explained the meaning of it. The flower was in a vase by the window now. She had sat looking at it for a long time after Ariane had left, thinking of what Blaise had done, and had surprised herself by beginning to cry.

"He is fine," said Bertran de Talair, reassuringly. He fingered his ear. "I'm afraid he is going to rather resemble me, in one regard at least, when the bandages come off, but other than that he is not seriously harmed." He hesitated. "I don't know how much it means to you, at this point, but I can say that he honored his name and his country's this morning."

"So I have been told. It does mean something to me, obviously, given what he declared before the challenge began. They will not wait long before coming after him."

The duke of Talair shifted a little in his seat then and left a small silence.

"I see," Rosala said, clasping her hands tightly in her lap. "They have come already."

"They have, but not for him. They will not learn about him for some days yet. They destroyed a village named Aubry tonight, killing everyone, and then they burned the priestesses of the temple there.

Rosala closed her eyes. Her hands began to tremble. "That was for me, then," she said. Her own voice unsettled her; it was dry and thin as a stream in a season of drought. It seemed to be coming from someone else, a long way off. "It was because of me."

"I'm afraid so."

"How many people?"

"We aren't certain yet. Perhaps fifty."

"Who was there? From Gorhaut, I mean." Her eyes were still closed. She brought, her arms up to wrap them around herself. She felt cold, suddenly.

His voice was gentle, but he was not shielding her from any of this. She understood that there was a large measure of respect for her in his not doing so. "The king himself, we are told." He hesitated. "Your husband and your brother as well."

Rosala opened her eyes. "They would have had no choice. I don't think either of them would willingly have done this."

Bertran de Talair shrugged. "I would not know. They were there." He looked closely at her a moment and then rose to tend to the fire. It had burned low, but there was fresh wood and kindling beside it, and he knelt, busying himself with them. She watched him, the neat, precise movements. He had not turned out to be what she'd expected from his verses, or from the tales told of his dealings with women in many countries.

"How do we know of this?" she asked at length.

He said, without turning, "A coran from Garsenc who was here for the tournament. He watched Blaise this morning and was riding north to tell the king what had happened."

"Why did he change his mind?"

Bertran looked briefly over his shoulder and shook his head. "That I do not know. I'll have to ask Blaise later." He turned back to the fire, shifting the wood. First one side caught, and then a moment later the other did. With a grunt of satisfaction he rose. "He swore fealty to Blaise tonight, as his liege lord and true king. He named Ademar as a traitor."

"Iersen Bridge, then," said Rosala quietly. "That is why he did it. He was probably a man from the north. There will be many who feel that way about the treaty."

"How many?" asked the duke of Talair. She realized that he meant the question seriously, that he was treating her as someone whose views on this would matter.

"That is hard to judge," she said. The fire had caught now, warming her. "Not enough, I don't think. Most of the men of rank who might matter are afraid of the king, and the common folk are even more afraid of the brethren of Corannos—who are ruled by my father-in-law."

He was silent. Looking into the fire Rosala saw a future there shaped of flame. Fifty people had died tonight for her. She closed her eyes again, but the imprint of the fire was still against her eyelids. The shock was beginning to pass.

"Oh, my son," she said. "Oh, Cadar." And then, "I will have to take him back. I cannot let them do this to people here. It is because he is a boy, you see. They will not let us be."

It seemed that she was crying again, the tears spilling to slide down her face before the fire. She heard the sound of a chair scraping the floor, and then a rustling, and then competent, capable hands had taken her and laid her head against a strong shoulder. His arm went around her.

"Neither of you is going back," said Bertran de Talair, his voice roughened. "The countess herself stood up for your child before Corannos and Rian and so did I. I swore an oath to you the night Cadar was born. I did not do so carelessly. I will swear it again: neither of you is going back to them while I live."

Something hard and tight in Rosala seemed to loosen, or she let go of her hold upon it, and she allowed herself to weep without shame in the arms of the duke of Talair. She wept for Cadar, for herself, for the dead and burned of that night, for all the dying and burning yet to come. His clasp was firm holding her, his voice low, murmuring words of comfort and heart's ease. No one had held her like this, Rosala thought, since her father had died. She wept for that, as well.

She could not know it, but Bertran de Talair's thoughts just then were almost a mirror of her own: he was thinking that he could not remember the last time he had held a woman in this way, offering shelter and strength and not simply the passion of a moment. And then, a moment later, he realized that this was untrue: that he could remember the last time, quite well actually, if he allowed the memory in through his barriers.

The last woman he had held this way, his own heart beating as if for hers, had later died in Miraval giving birth to his child, twenty-three years ago.

Blaise stopped outside the partially open door of Rosala's room. He had been coming to tell her of the news that had reached them that night, feeling the dread of all such message-bearers, but not wanting her to learn it badly, from a stranger. Ranald had been at Aubry, Thaune had said, and Fulk de Savaric, her brother. About to knock, he heard two voices, and realized a moment later that he had been anticipated in his errand. He felt an unexpected mixture of emotions. Relief, mostly, in the end.

Uncertain whether to enter or leave, he heard Rosala abruptly speak in a stricken voice of taking the child back to Gorhaut. Grieving for her, understanding exactly what she meant, and humbled again by what it seemed she was, he heard Bertran de Talair, unexpectedly gruff, repeating an oath he'd evidently sworn to her before. Blaise heard Rosala begin to weep then, and through the angle of the door, in the light of the fire's glow, he saw the duke move to the arm of her chair to hold her while she cried.