Two to Conquer Read Free

Ysabet demanded. “One day, I have no doubt, he will be general of all your father’s armies! You are not holding it against him that he is nedestro , are you? The poor lad did not choose to be born to one of his father’s fancy-women instead of to his lawful wife!”
    Carlina smiled faintly at the thought of anyone calling Bard “poor lad.”
    Her nurse pinched her cheek. She said, “Now, that is the right way to go to your handfasting, with a smile! Let me do up these laces properly.” She tugged at the lacings, then tucked in the ribbons. “Sit here, my pretty, while I do up your sandals. Look how dainty, your mother had them made to match the gown, blue leather with pearls! How pretty you are, Carlie, like a blue flower! Let me fasten the ribbons here in your hair. I do not think there is a prettier bride anywhere in nine kingdoms this night!
    And Bard handsome enough, surely, to be worthy of you, so fair where you are so dark…”
    “What a pity,” Carlina said dryly, “that he cannot marry you, Nurse, since you like him so much.”
    “Oh, come now, he wouldn’t want me, old and withered as I am,” said Ysabet, bridling. “A handsome young warrior like Bard must have a young and beautiful bride, and so your father has ordained it… I cannot imagine why the wedding is not on this night as well, and the bedding too!”
    “Because,” Carlina said, “I begged my mother, and she spoke for me to my father and my lord; and he consented that I should not be married until I had completed my fifteenth year. The wedding will be a year from tonight, at Midsummer Festival.”
    “How can you bear to wait so long? Evanda bless you, child, if I had a handsome young lover like Bard, I could not wait so long…” She saw Carlina flinch and spoke more gently. “Are you afraid of the marriage bed, child? No woman ever died of it, and I have no doubt you will find it pleasurable; but it will be less frightening to you at first, since your husband is playfellow and foster brother as well.”
    Carlina shook her head. “No, it is not that , Nurse, though, as I told you, I have no mind to marriage; I would rather spend my life in chastity and good works among the priestesses of Avarra.”
    “Heavens protect us!” The woman made a shocked gesture. “Your father would never allow it!”
    “I know that, Nurse. The Goddess knows, I besought him to spare me this marriage and let me go, but he reminded me that I was a princess and that it was my duty to marry, to bring strong powerful
    alliances to his throne. As my sister Amalie has already been sent to wed with King Lorill of Seathfell.
    Beyond the Kadarin, poor girl, alone in those northern mountains, and my sister Marilla married south to Dalereuth…”
    “Are you angry that they were wedded to princes and kings, and you, only, to your father’s brother’s bastard son?”
    Carlina shook her head. “No, no,” she said impatiently. “I know what is in father’s mind; he wishes to bind Bard to him with a strong tie, so that one day Bard will be his strongest champion and protector.
    There was no thought for me, or for Bard; it is only one of my father’s maneuvers to protect the throne and the kingdom!”
    “Well,” said the nurse, “most marriages are made for reasons less worthy than that.”
    “But it is not necessary,” Carlina said, impatiently. “Bard would be content with any woman, and my father could have found some woman of noble rank who would satisfy Bard’s ambition! Why should I be forced to spend my life with a man who does not care whether it is me, Carlina, or another, provided she is high-born enough to satisfy his ambition, and has a pretty face and a willing body! Avarra have mercy, do you think I do not know that every servant girl in the castle has shared his bed? They brag of it after!”
    “As for that,” said Ysabet, “he is no better and no worse than any of your brothers or foster brothers.
    You cannot blame a young man for