Sword Catcher (Sword Catcher, #1)

On the threshold stood Oren Kandel, looking as if he were attending his own funeral. With him were two Castelguards, in red livery, both squinting against the bright sun. And between them was Prince Conor Aurelian, all in black velvet, wearing a gold coronet.

Lin’s mouth opened in shock, but no sound came out. She had only just seen the Prince last night, but he had been in his own world, his own element, among the people of the Hill. She thought of his cloak of white-and-gold brocade, and the metallic ink around his eyes. He was more quietly dressed now, it was true, but that still meant many flashing rings, gold paint on his nails—and that crown. For him to be here in the Sault, looking up at her calmly from her own front steps, was for reality to have folded itself in half. She could make no sense of it.

“Oren?” she whispered, almost regretfully; it was a dark day indeed when she had to ask Oren Kandel to explain what she was looking at with her own eyes.

“The Prince of Castellane is here to see you,” mumbled Oren.

This, Lin thought, was the least helpful thing he could have said. From behind her, she heard a squeak. Of course; Mariam was watching from the doorway of her room.

In fact, it was not just Mariam. Lin’s neighbors had begun to pour out into the street, and were staring in the direction of her house. Mez and Rahel, hand in hand, were gaping from their doorstep, and Kuna Malke, her baby girl balanced on her hip, was on tiptoe on her porch in order to see better.

For the first time, Lin locked eyes with the Prince. His were the shade of clouds, unreadable. She said, “If you seek my grandfather, Counselor Bensimon, he is not here, my lord.”

Before Prince Conor could answer, there was a patter of quick steps. Mariam appeared at Lin’s side, her cheeks bright red. “Monseigneur,” she exclaimed. “I am Mariam Duhary, and it would be the honor of my life to sew a cloak for you—”

“You’re the one who made Lin’s dress last night?” Prince Conor spoke for the first time. Something in Lin’s chest jumped when he said her name like that: Lin, not Domna Caster. It was familiar; too much so. She saw Oren notice it, too, and scowl. “Kel told me. Lin’s friend with the needle.”

Mariam glowed. “Lin spoke of me to him?”

“Of course she did. You’re very skilled.” There was real warmth in his tone, and though Lin knew it had been trained into him, it remained affecting. “I would like to speak to Lin for a moment alone. It is a matter of state.”

He managed to say it as if he were asking Mariam’s permission. She glowed brighter, and nodded. “Of course, of course,” she said, bolting down the stairs of Lin’s house and nearly knocking into Oren at the bottom.

“We will keep watch, Monseigneur,” said Benaset. He, too, descended the steps, where the guards had set about shooing off Oren. Oren seemed to have decided that the better part of valor was to pretend that he had always planned to escort Mariam back to the Women’s House. Fortunately for him, Mariam was in too good a humor to wave him off.

Rahel and Mez were both waving energetically at Lin, but she had no chance to wave back, had she been so inclined. The moment Benaset was gone, the Prince had closed the door of Lin’s house behind him, plunging the room into dimness. Lin wondered if she ought to go and pull the curtains closed over the windows, but no—that would simply set tongues to wagging even further, and it wasn’t as if one could easily see in without coming straight up to her house and pressing one’s face against the glass.

“That man who guided us to your house,” the Prince remarked, his gaze sweeping lazily over her living room, “has he a dog?”

“Oren?” Lin wanted to wrap her arms around herself. She felt oddly exposed, as if the Prince could see all of her: It was close enough, in a way. Here were her remaining books, her crumpled dress over the back of a chair, her breakfast plate still on the table. Open to his gaze, like a corpse on an anatomy table. “A dog? No, why?”

“I was wondering if it had died recently. He seems the most depressing person I have ever met.”

Lin was not sure if she should sit down or stand up. She settled for leaning against the wall. She was abnormally conscious of her bare feet, of the plainness of her dress, of her unbraided hair. Loose, the copper curls fell to the middle of her back. “That’s Oren. He’s just like that, always has been. What are you doing here, Monseigneur?”

“Don’t call me that,” he said, rather sharply, and she inhaled a breath; was this going to be like last night? Was he going to be strange, half furious, unpredictable? “I would prefer that you call me Conor. As your grandfather does.”

She stared at him. “I can’t do that. I’m not a royal or a noble, it would be too”—intimate—“too familiar. What if someone overheard?”

“Familiar,” he said, his lips quirking at the word. “I came, Domna Caster, because I understand that last night I may have alarmed you by kissing you. I don’t remember it well”—he waved a hand, as if shaking off a cobweb—“but I assure you there was no meaning or malice in it. I kiss a great many people.”

Lin blushed. She had not mentioned that part of the evening to Mariam; in fact, she had not mentioned a great deal of what had happened—not Luisa crying, nor her own dance, nor her angry words, nor Prince Conor’s fury when he had followed her from the room. And certainly not what had happened then. “I truly hope,” she said, “that you did not really waste your royal morning coming here to tell me something I already knew.”

Something in his eyes flashed. It was not anger, though she might have expected that. He had been angry the night before. It was something more like a passionate puzzlement, as if he were trying to solve an equation and coming up short.

“All right,” he said. “You are correct enough. I did not come here merely to apologize for kissing you.”

She looked at him directly. That always seemed to make a difference, she thought—when she could catch his gaze with her own, when she could make him look at her and see her. She did not think many people sought his gaze. The studied gaze of a royal might uncover any sort of secret; it might unsettle, might remind a member of the Charter Families that, though they were nearly as powerful as Gods, they were not.

Their gazes met, held. In the dimness of the room, his eyes seemed the brightest thing before her, save for his crown, a ring of fire. She said, “Then why are you here, Prince Conor?”

He drew something out of his jacket. A square something, that looked like a ragged brown package. “You called me a selfish bastard last night,” he said, “but would a selfish bastard gift you this?”

He held the object out to her. She realized it was a book, its leather cover tattered and worn. As she took it from him, her hand shaking slightly, she recognized the title, half faded from the spine: The Works of Qasmuna.