Rebecca Ross - The Queen’s Resistance

Ewan Lannon, Declan’s son

HOUSE of HALLORAN— The Upright

Treasa Halloran, lady of Halloran

Pierce Halloran, the lady’s youngest son

HOUSE of ALLENACH— The Shrewd

Sean Allenach, lord of Allenach, Brienna’s half brother

Daley Allenach, the lord’s manservant

HOUSE of BURKE— The Elder

Derrick Burke, lord of Burke

HOUSE of DERMOTT— The Loved

Grainne Dermott, lady of Dermott

Rowan Dermott, husband of Grainne Dermott

OTHERS MENTIONED

Merei Labelle, mistress of music

Oriana DuBois, mistress of art

Tristan Allenach

Tomas Hayden

Fergus Lannon

Patrick Lannon

Ashling Morgane

Líle Morgane

Sive MacQuinn

THE FOURTEEN HOUSES of MAEVANA

Allenach the Shrewd

Kavanagh the Bright

Burke the Elder

Lannon the Fierce

Carran the Courageous

MacBran the Merciful

Dermott the Loved

MacCarey the Just

Dunn the Wise

MacFinley the Pensive

Fitzsimmons the Gentle

MacQuinn the Steadfast

Halloran the Upright

Morgane the Swift

Lord MacQuinn’s Territory, Castle Fionn

Brienna

The castle was brimming with laughter and dinner preparations when Cartier and I entered the hall, blue passion cloaks on our backs, the night breeze tangled in our hair. I came to a stop in the heart of the grand room to admire the hanging tapestries, the high arch of the ceiling that melted into smoky shadows, the mullioned windows on the eastern wall. There was a fire roaring in a glazed hearth, and the women of the castle were setting the best pewter and silver on the trestle tables. They did not take note of me, for I was still a stranger to them, and I watched as a group of young girls decorated the table spines with a current of pine boughs and dark red flowers. A boy was rushing behind them to light a mountain range of candles, his eyes clearly taken with one of the auburn-haired girls.

For a moment, it would almost seem as if this castle and these people had never known the darkness and oppression of the Lannon family’s reign. And yet I wondered what wounds remained in their hearts, in their memories after surviving a tyrannical king for twenty-five years.

“Brienna.” Cartier came to a gentle stop at my side. He stood a safe distance away from me—a full arm’s length—although I could still feel the memory of his touch, I could still taste his lips on mine. We stood together quietly, and I knew he too was soaking in the clamor and rustic beauty of the hall. That he was still trying to adjust to what our lives were about to become now that we had returned home to the queen’s realm of Maevana.

I was the adopted daughter of Davin MacQuinn—a fallen lord who had been in hiding for the past twenty-five years—who had finally returned to light his hall and restore his people.

And Cartier, my former instructor, was the lord of the House of Morgane. The lord of the Swift—Aodhan Morgane.

I could hardly find the will to call him by such a name. It was one I would have never imagined him possessing throughout all the years I had known him in the southern kingdom of Valenia, when I had been his pupil and he had been my teacher, a master of knowledge.

I thought of how our lives had intertwined, from the very first moment I had met him when I was accepted into the prestigious Magnalia House, a Valenian school for the five passions of life. I had assumed that he was Valenian—he had taken on a Valenian name, was polished in etiquette and passion, and had lived nearly all of his life in the southern kingdom.

And yet he had been far more than that.

“What kept you?”

I startled, Jourdain taking me by surprise as he stepped into my view, his eyes sweeping me from head to toe, as if he expected me to have a scratch. Which almost struck me as humorous, because three days ago, we had ridden into battle with Isolde Kavanagh, Maevana’s rightful queen. I had donned armor, streaked blue woad across my face, braided my hair, and wielded a sword in Isolde’s name, not knowing if I was going to live through the revolution. But I had fought for her, as had Cartier and Jourdain, and with her to challenge Gilroy Lannon, a man who should never have been king of this land. Together, we had brought him and his family down in the span of a morning, a bloody yet victorious sunrise.

And now Jourdain was acting as if I had been darting through battle once more. All because I was late for dinner.

I had to remind myself to be understanding. I was not accustomed to fatherly fussing—I had lived my entire life not knowing who my blood father was. And, oh, how regretfully I knew now who I had descended from; I pushed his name from my mind, focusing instead on the man standing before me, the man who had adopted me as his own months ago, when the two of us joined our knowledge to plot a rebellion against King Lannon.

“Cartier and I had much to talk about. And don’t look at me like that, Father. We’re back in time,” I said, but my cheeks warmed under Jourdain’s attentive scrutiny. And when he shifted his eyes to Cartier, I think he knew. Cartier and I had not been merely “talking.”

I irresistibly thought back to that moment when I had stood with Cartier in his dilapidated castle on Morgane lands, when he had given me my passion cloak at last.

“Yes, well, I told you to be back before dark, Brienna,” Jourdain said, and then he softened his tone when he addressed Cartier. “Morgane. Nice of you to join us for a celebratory feast.”

“Thank you for extending the invitation, MacQuinn,” Cartier returned with a respectful bow of his head.

It was odd to hear such names spoken aloud, for they didn’t align as such within my mind. And while others would begin to address Cartier as Lord Aodhan Morgane, I would always think of him as Cartier.

Then there was Jourdain, my patron-turned-father. When I had met him two months ago, he had introduced himself as Aldéric Jourdain, his Valenian alias. But, like Cartier, he was far more than that. He was Lord Davin MacQuinn the Steadfast. And while others would begin to address him as such, I would call him “Father,” and would always think of him as Jourdain.

“Come, the two of you.” Jourdain led us up to the dais, where the lord’s family was to sit and sup at a long table.

Cartier winked at me when Jourdain’s back was angled to us, and I had to swallow a smile of pure joy.

“There you are!” Luc cried as he entered the hall through one of the side doors, his gaze finding me on the dais.

The young girls paused in their pine-and-flower arrangements to giggle and whisper as Luc passed them. His dark brown hair was in disarray, which was a daily occurance, and his eyes were bright with mirth.

He clomped up the dais stairs to sweep me into an embrace, acting as if we had been apart for months although I had seen him earlier that afternoon. He took me by the shoulders and turned me about, so he could see the silver threads stitched upon my passion cloak.

“ Mistress Brienna,” he said. I turned back around and laughed, to finally hear the title linked to my name. “It’s a beautiful cloak.”