“Elia?” he breathed. “She is in Aremoria. She will marry Morimaros.”
“We have counseled her not to, for it would weaken Innis Lear’s position. And Elia loves this island. She never before wished to leave it, and never would have, we think, had not our father driven her away in his addled state.” A wrinkle appeared about her nose, the only sign of Regan’s disgust. “Elia will return home, make no mistake, and when she does, she would be a good wife for the powerful Earl Errigal. A tempting offer to you both, because she loved you, once.”
Though some part of him was sure he was being manipulated, Ban could not help wanting all she offered. It was greater and more ambitious than anything he’d dreamed of, to be at Connley and Regan’s side when King Lear breathed his last, to welcome Elia home and then have her for his own. His wife. To share with her the way these two shared with each other, in heart and body and mind. Legitimately. To put down roots together here on Innis Lear—where with Regan and Connley—the island would thrive, the stars cease to command.
Drunk more on wishes than wine, Ban’s head spun. He tried to imagine himself as an earl, rather than a wizard; a man at the center, not a boy on the outside, or a spy set apart. But for Ban to be Errigal, Rory could never be pardoned. This lie that he was a patricide must remain.
Caught up in the heat of his hopes, Ban reminded himself that there were always casualties of war, as he knew far better than Rory. His brother had served only as idle commander, while Ban had been sent as cannon fodder. Before he’d saved himself, proven useful to another, better king. What sweet revenge it would be upon the hated Lear for Ban the Bastard to father precious Elia’s children. Morimaros be damned.
With his wine halfway to his mouth again, Ban froze in sudden horror.
Elia was not his to long for. Her children were not his to claim. What would she feel if she heard Ban’s thoughts? He had wanted her to choose him, wanted to be chosen by her. She was not a pup easily traded between kennels, as Ban had been. She was meant to be prized—not just as a daughter or sister or wife should have been, but on her own. As herself. Ban swallowed and lowered his goblet so it rested on his thigh. He thought of Elia’s face, the night of the Zenith Court. Who are you? And then, who was Ban? Two nobodies. What did he want?
What a magnificent mess swirling around him.
Morimaros wanted him here to gain Errigal’s iron for trade at the least, and prepare for an Aremore invasion if possible. Likely wanted Ban at his side, in case of a war, and even if Mars got Elia for his queen, he would expect his best spy to protect them both with his knowledge, if not his magic. Kay Oak wanted Ban to be a bridge between the sisters, and between their lords, until Elia could be brought home as queen, in accord with her father’s mad heart. But Kayo had no further plans for Ban, and Ban had no interest in following the Oak Earl’s path, forsaking his own life for the plans of Lear. Regan saw Ban’s magic, as Mars did, but she saw beyond its usefulness to her. She understood it. She believed in it, and loved the roots and forests as he did. And she and her lord wanted him to unseat his own despised father, to marry Elia, and serve Innis Lear through his own heart. As himself.
He did not know if Elia wanted him at all, for anything.
Ban glanced up at Regan, then expanded the look to her husband. “I will join you. But not to win Elia’s hand, or even to earn my father’s title, which will be at your service still. I will do it because it is right for Innis Lear.”
Even as he said it, the Fox was not sure if he meant to betray Mars, or only to embed himself deeper where he’d been planted.
Regan rose, her brown eyes glittering, and she came to him. She took his goblet and set it aside. As Connley watched, she pulled Ban to his feet and put her mouth against his. She tasted sweet and sharp, her lips like flower petals, her tongue darting. It felt more like an earth saint’s blessing than a woman’s kiss.
Then she drew away. “You are so noble, Ban the Fox. We are glad to have you on our side.”
Connley joined them. He kissed Ban’s cheeks, first one, then the other, and then his mouth. There was more heat than had been in his wife’s touch. “Hail, Errigal,” the duke murmured against Ban’s lips.
Ban could not help the shiver that tore down his spine.
“Finish your drink, Ban, and tell us what the Fox of Aremoria would do next,” Regan said.
The letter from Elia Lear to her sister remained inside Ban’s coat, discarded across the arm of a chair.
SIX YEARS AGO, INNIS LEAR
“YOU CAN’T HIDE from me, Ban Errigal!”
The princess sang out her call, smiling all the while as she picked her way across the mossy meadow. She avoided crushing any of the tiny white sparflowers, but kicked at every dandelion gone to seed. Her trusted boots remained by the creek where she’d been dipping her toes, waiting for her sister Regan to finish collecting caterpillar husks and wildflowers. The water had been cool, the silt soft underneath her feet, and Elia wished to throw off her light summer layers and revel like a river spirit.
But the hanging branches of a willow had brushed her shoulders and said, Ban is near.
Not having seen her friend in several months, Elia splashed to shore and asked the trees for direction.
This was the edge of the White Forest nearest the Summer Seat, on land her uncle the Oak Earl tended. Wind-stripped moors and hard grazing land, except for under the trees, where it became a bright place with quiet meadows full of young deer and hanging sunlight, creeks spilling from fresh springs, and very few spirits. It was easy for Elia to listen to a whisper here and there, to trace a straight path toward Ban. Her breath came light and full, as she tasted the height of summer on her tongue, happy for quite a long stretch, and happier still to know who it was she chased.
When she came to the line of slate and limestone rocks turned upside down, the worms and sleeping beetles exposed, Elia said his name aloud, twice—once in the people’s tongue and once in the language of trees. No answer came back to her. But she saw the imprint of a narrow boot, thin-soled and supple enough to show where the ball of his foot hit and the toe brushed after. She traced the curve of it, and went the way it pointed, humming to herself a song with nonsense words like her father’s Fool would sing, but changed them to flower-names and root words, in a long cheerful pattern that all the birds appreciated. A half-dozen bluebirds and sparrows hopped from their nests to flit along behind her.
The meadow of sparflowers and white-puffed dandelions glowed with traces of sunlight and floating seeds, yet all was still. Someone had told these grasses and trees to be quiet.
Elia smiled. She was just fourteen and none on the island were better than she at listening, for none but she both understood and rarely demanded a response. That was Ban’s role: he asked, he spoke, he commanded. His mother, the gorgeous witch Brona, meddled and manipulated, twisting vines and flowers to her will with teasing and fair exchange. Regan had just begun to pull at roots, to weave them into hopes and messages, pouring her blood into the barren space left behind.
So Elia listened now, from the center of the meadow, her little brown hands caressing the grasses gone to seed, and the tufted dandelion heads, the kiss-soft petals of delicate white flowers. Her hair moved and shifted as she cocked her head, a mass of free copper-brown-black curls. She wore a gown her sister had once owned, and so it was three intricate and expensive layers, but all of them some kind of yellow, and Elia was everything summer-warm in the world.