Royce sensed Sherwood was one of those quirky spigots that started by chugging and spitting out blasts of useless, dirty water. But after you pumped it a few times, it vomited the good stuff. He decided to continue to coax, to see what came out. “So what color is her hair?”
“Brown.”
“Looks black to me.”
“It’s what I call soft black, but it’s really a very dark brown. You can see it when she stands in front of a window on a sunny day. The light gives her a golden halo as it passes through the individual strands. Her eyes aren’t really brown, either. There’s a hint of gold and even a little green in them.”
“I’m not interested in painting her.”
“But that’s how I know her. That’s how I understand her. She doesn’t have black hair and brown eyes like everyone else, because she isn’t like everyone else. She isn’t like anyone else. You can hear it in her voice. She drags her vowels, puts emphasis on the wrong syllables, as if she’s from another country. But I’ve been to all of them, and I’ve never heard the like. Just looking at her you can see the differences. She’s only twenty-two, but she has an old soul. Her not-young soul is visible through those not-brown eyes. She betrays it in the way she moves, the way she acts. Each step, each shift is poised and filled with total confidence. She’s fearless in the command of her body. This confidence bleeds out in her voice and the directions she gives her staff. Firm, strong, but kind and compassionate, she has wisdom far beyond her apparent years. And courage!” Sherwood chuckled at the absurdity, as if Royce had just accused Lady Dulgath of being a coward.
“I once saw her stop a fight between two soldiers. One had a busted, bleeding nose, and he had just drawn his sword. The other man’s face was red with rage, and he howled in anger. Everyone else—big men, some of them armed—backed away. She marched right up and slapped one and then the other. Just slapped them. I couldn’t believe it. I don’t think anyone could. She did the same sort of thing with an unruly horse.”
“She slapped it?”
Sherwood chuckled again; the man was in a decidedly better mood than when they’d first met. “No, but…well, the animal was rearing and kicking, and Nysa—I mean, Lady Dulgath—showed no hesitation. She laid a hand on the animal’s neck. The horse relaxed—calmed right down.” Sherwood continued to stare at the easel, then blinked and laughed again. A self-conscious smile pulled at his lips.
Royce remained quiet, waiting to see if Sherwood would continue. Just as he thought the artist was finished, he spoke again.
“She’s sad,” Sherwood said at last. “Lonely, I think.”
“Her father just died.”
“It’s not that. I arrived before he died. She was melancholy then, too. She actually took her father’s death well, very stoically. Still, there’s a regret that hovers around her. That’s the thing I notice the most about her. She wears it like…like you wear that cloak—hides behind it. That’s what makes her so hard to see.”
Sherwood went on to speak of Nysa Dulgath with an awe that only infatuation—deep and fresh—produced. Sherwood was likely on the verge of declaring that the lady inhaled with more acumen than mere mortals, and yet…
Heat and cold don’t bother you nearly as much as they do your friend, but ice, snow, and boats—oh, ships!
If she had added dogs and dwarves to the list of things he avoided, Royce would’ve concluded she knew him. And the comment about water…Royce could swim, he’d had to on a few occasions, but he avoided lakes, rivers, and the ocean. He hated having no solid ground to stand on. Boats and docks were somehow worse. They messed with his balance and made him sick. He’d never told anyone. Weaknesses were things only the stupid advertised. Nysa Dulgath knew his just by looking at him.
Royce spotted the cloth-covered painting behind the table. “Is that her portrait?”
“Yes.”
“Can I see it?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“It’s not done.”
Royce considered looking anyway, but he’d seen plenty of portraits hanging in the halls of the wealthy, usually pudgy men and pasty women. He simply wasn’t that interested. He’d learned what he came to find out. Sherwood wasn’t a threat to Lady Dulgath—he was in love with her. Royce had suspected as much from the moment the painter threw a fortune in blue pigment at him in her defense. Now he was certain. With their deal concluded, Royce was content to leave the artist alone with his easel mystery. Still, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he should have looked.
Climbing the ivy was even easier the second time.
Lady Dulgath was in her bedroom. He’d seen the light come on before he started his climb and made no effort to conceal his approach. Even so, the odds of anyone seeing or hearing him were slim. Practice and experience had made his stealth habitual. Cats—even when not hunting—were damn hard to hear.
She wasn’t in bed.
Lifting his head above the sill, Royce saw Nysa Dulgath sitting at the little desk, her back to him. She was wearing a different gown. This one was white and off the shoulder, drawing attention to the smooth dark-olive skin, and—he didn’t care what Sherwood said—she had black hair.
He studied her.
The first time he’d met Lady Dulgath—he hadn’t really noticed the woman herself. Instead, he’d seen the accumulated assumptions he’d built while riding to Maranon. This time he watched more honestly and found a beautiful woman. Slender, tall, relaxed in her body—Sherwood was right about the poise and confidence. She was just sitting at her desk, but she sat straight, ankles crossed. The movement of her hands and arms as she used a quill was—
“Are you here to kill me this time?” she asked without turning.
Royce slipped through the window and perched on the sill, his feet dangling inside the room but not touching the coiled rug that covered half the floor. “No. Why would you say that?”
Lady Dulgath set her quill down and turned halfway in her seat, throwing one arm over the back of the chair. Long hair covered the side of her face, obscuring one eye and blanketing one shoulder. The candle behind her gave it a pleasant shine. “Because no one hires an assassin merely to plan a murder. Was it Bishop Parnell or Lord Fawkes who hired you to kill me?”
She knows!
“Actually, they did hire me, but merely to provide them with a plan.”
“Which they will execute?”
Royce shrugged. “Probably.”
The degree to which Royce had misjudged this noble woman was earthshattering. He’d made bad guesses before, but he almost always overestimated his enemies. This time he’d pegged his target as a careless, negligent, oblivious child; he’d mistaken a fox for a hen.
“Since you obviously know people are plotting your death, why haven’t you bothered to take precautions?”
“Mister Melborn, is it? Ruling a kingdom doesn’t equal unfettered power. Take for example the Church of Nyphron—the chief sponsor of my elimination. I have no power to remove any of them. They don’t work for me. Only the king can order such a ban, and he won’t. This leaves me with an assassin on my windowsill—something that ought to be only a metaphor.”
“And yet you don’t seem the least bit frightened.”
She rolled her shoulders, shrugging off the hair. “You just said you weren’t here to kill me.”
“And you believe the word of a killer?”
“Maybe I’m just not afraid of dying.”
“Everyone is afraid of death.”
“Says the deliveryman. And yet you make a business of it.”
“I used to make a business of it,” Royce clarified, then wondered why he bothered. She didn’t care, and neither should he. “And people are not afraid of death happening, just of it happening to them.”
“So you aren’t a killer anymore?”
“Not an assassin.”
“Ah.” She nodded. “Now you merely advise others.”
“This is an unusual job.”