Lord of Falcon Ridge Read Free Page A

emissaries, you talk like limpets, don’t you, so low and quiet, your words slickerthan wet skin. You come here from your kings or from your dukes and you want something. A fat minister from King Charles’s court in Paris was here just last month. He was oily and kept looking at me as if my robe was lying at my feet. He made me want to bathe. None of you say anything, but you say it nicely and hope the other person is stupid. Well, I’m not stupid. At least you’re not oily and I feel like I still have my robe on. Now, why were you spying on us? What do you want?”
    â€œThat was quite a lot you just said.” He smiled at her, and still waited for her to flinch, to step back from him, but she didn’t. He continued, more than curious now because she hadn’t flinched, hadn’t looked at him and recoiled. “Actually I was merely learning my way about. I heard voices and came into this beautiful garden. I’m rather glad you didn’t succeed in pulling out that other woman’s hair. It’s far too beautiful to be left in knots on the ground.”
    â€œIt is her pride, that hair of hers.” She sighed. “Her hair is strong, curse her. I did try, I yanked as hard as I could but it did no good. It’s the first time I’ve managed to get so close, and I failed. The gods know what she’ll do to me now. She always manages something that hurts.”
    He took a step closer. He could see the red hand print on her left cheek. He reached out his hand, then realized what he was doing, and withdrew it. “Are you all right?”
    â€œOh, yes. She’s struck me so many times that now I hardly even notice. This time was different though, but still, we fight whenever we’re within the same chamber.”
    â€œHow was it different?”
    She was thoughtful for a long moment. Finally she said, her brows knit, “There was deep hatred this time, not just annoyance or irritation. I’m full-grown now and she can’t bear that, although I don’t understand why.”
    â€œWho is she?”
    â€œMy father’s second wife.”
    â€œAh, the stepmother. There are many tales about their vanity and evil. A skald I know well tells of a stepmother who turned her stepdaughter into a pumpkin and left her ina field to rot. Luckily for the pumpkin, a child came along, kicked it, and when it moaned with pain, the child touched it just right and the stepdaughter reappeared. The child ran away.”
    â€œThat didn’t sound like a diplomat. Perhaps you are human after all.”
    â€œPerhaps one day you will hear the full tale. Now, about your stepmother.”
    â€œYes, that’s what she is, and my father loves her, despite her vanity, her temper, her meanness. She’s given him four sons, you see.”
    â€œI see.”
    â€œYou needn’t repeat any of this,” she said, her eyes narrowing in warning.
    â€œWhy should I? Surely it isn’t all that interesting. Who would I tell who would be amused or hold me in higher esteem?”
    She snorted, actually snorted, and he was, for just an instant, enchanted. “There you go again, not saying anything, just asking a stupid question that doesn’t carry as much weight as a bee’s wings. I don’t think I’d be a good diplomat.”
    â€œNo, probably not,” he said in that same mild voice. “You haven’t answered my question. Why should I tell anyone about you trying to pull out your stepmother’s hair?”
    That jaw of hers was stubborn as a stoat’s but nicely rounded, quite soft looking, really. “Oh, very well. You’ll find out anyway, the way you sneak around and speak so softly like you’re licking honey. She’s Queen Sira, the king’s wife. He used to call her Naphta, after my mother, but she hated it so he let her have her own name back again. That was after the birth of her first son.”
    â€œIt all