Author: Leah Cypess

“We haven’t had as much time to work on it,” he growled.

“Then I suppose I’ll be on my guard in twenty years.” She hesitated, though probably not long enough for him to notice. She was shaken, and wanted to make her escape. But she also wanted to know what the memory meant, when it had happened, and why she had cared more about the arrows whistling past her than about the one that had pierced her side. “In the meantime,” she finished, “I won’t hold this against you. Know that the Shifter never disdains any assistance in protecting her prince.”

No matter how insignificant, her tone proclaimed, and she watched the tiny clenching of nearly-invisible muscles beneath the smooth fat of his cheeks. It was a moment before he could speak, and then he couldn’t manage it without spitting.

“Don’t be so secure in your power, Shifter. You think Rokan trusts you—a creature without a heart, without a soul? I told him exactly what you are when he came to me for help, with his delusion that a bracelet might protect him from one such as you. I warned him what he was inviting into his castle.”

“Really?” Isabel said, adopting a curious tone. “Did he take your advice?”

Albin drew himself to his full height—which was still only a few inches taller than Isabel. “He heard what I said, and he won’t forget. When you eventually turn on him, he’ll remember. He’ll know that I was the only one who tried to protect him from you.”

“How kind of you to take matters into your own hands.” She moved suddenly, first kneeling to swoop up the knife, then coming to a stop only inches from the sorcerer. She was faster than any human, and Albin had no time to summon up a spell. He stumbled back several steps, and she smiled demurely as she held the knife out to him, hilt first. “Don’t worry. I won’t tell Rokan about this charming demonstration of your power.”

Not yet, she amended silently as the high sorcerer turned on his heel and walked down the long hall. After all, why make Albin into Rokan’s enemy? Let him be hers. She, clearly, could handle him.

What made her heart pound against her ribs, so that she lay awake for a long time staring at the green canopy stretched above her bed, was the possibility of a similar attack against Rokan. Her own safety could wait until his was assured. Her own safety, in fact—she realized with neither surprise nor resentment—was of no concern at all.

Isabel spent half the next day exploring the castle; she was determined to be so familiar with it that she could walk through it blindfolded and know where every step and turn would take her. The castle was a maze of passageways and rooms and inner courtyards tiled with flagstone, halls blending into one another on most of the ground floors, upper floors crammed with narrow corridors and closed doors. She soon discovered that she had an instinctive sense for where she was, no matter how confusing the twists and turns she had taken to get there; something within her responded to a pull from the ground itself, disregarding the structures built upon it. It was a helpful sense to have.

That afternoon Rokan went to the practice ground to work on his swordplay—part of his daily routine, Isabel was pleased to learn. Today the ritual had been transformed into a semi-festive event, with all the members of the guard and a few of the nobles coming out to watch their soon-to-be king. Isabel went, too, so she could judge his skill for herself.

The practice ground was little more than a large open square between the stables and the kitchens. She was the first spectator to arrive; the only people in the square were those members of the guard who had been consigned to setting up benches to accommodate the viewers, and Rokan, who was running through some standard exercises in the center of the square. He wore loose breeches and a black silk tunic embroidered with silver threads—not, Isabel suspected, his usual practice clothes.

As she took a seat on one of the already set-up benches, he sheathed his wooden sword and walked over, plopping down next to her and leaning back on his elbows. “Are you planning to participate? Because if half of what’s said about the Shifter’s skill is true, your identity wouldn’t stay secret for long.”

“I’m just here to watch,” Isabel said a bit coolly. The prospect of her prince being under attack—even fake attack—made her tense and edgy, not in the mood for human banter. “Is that permitted?”

“Of course. Daria’s going to be here, too.” Rokan’s face softened when he said her name, and he glanced around the square with eager eyes. “She’ll arrive any minute now. You should sit with her and talk to her. After all, she may also be under your protection someday.”

The prospect of spending the next hour with a demure noblewoman did nothing to alleviate Isabel’s edginess. “My time would be better spent sitting with those who might pose a threat to you.”

Rokan shrugged. “The guard is loyal. They wouldn’t threaten me, even if they don’t particularly respect me. I wouldn’t worry.”

“You wouldn’t.” Isabel noted the tightness around his mouth. He didn’t want her talking to the guard. Why not? “But even if they are loyal, it will be useful to know my allies.”

Rokan bit the side of his lip, still looking out at the square. “You need allies?”

“Did you think I would spend all my time acting as your personal bodyguard?” He blinked, and she knew that was what he had thought. But based on the skills she was constantly discovering she had, that couldn’t be the case. “It’s more subtle than that. I prefer to prevent attacks before they’re launched, to dissolve conspiracies before they’re formed. To help you keep Samorna in order so that there’s no cause for discontent against you. I need to know everything about your allies and enemies to do that effectively.”

Rokan stood, drew his wooden sword, and swung it in a slow arc above his head before moving swiftly through a series of practice slashes and parries. Isabel admired the efficient economy of his movements, though he would have appeared more graceful if his shoulders hadn’t been set so stiffly. “Daria will be one of your allies.”

Spirits. She did not have the patience for this. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

Rokan executed a complex series of feints, ending with an underhanded thrust, before he turned to her and rested the point of the wooden sword on the ground. “And she could use a friend.”

“The other women don’t like her much, do they?” Isabel leaned forward and put her elbows on her knees, trying to sound sympathetic. “They have good excuses. She’s a northerner, and the southerners wish you had chosen one of them. And she’s illegitimate, which insults all the highborn northern women you might have chosen instead.”

Rokan’s eyebrows lifted. “You figured that out in less than a day? Members of the court must be chattier than they used to be.”

Isabel didn’t know how chatty they used to be, but she shrugged and said, “Not really. I can learn a lot from people even when they’re not talking.”

He nodded, admiration clear on his face, and pride welled up in her. She was only half-bluffing; she had been able to learn more than she would have believed possible from her few hours at court, relying on techniques and instincts she couldn’t remember acquiring. She still hadn’t managed to unearth the source of the threat to Rokan, but she wasn’t about to mention that to him.

“That’s not all there is to it, though.” Rokan rolled his head from side to side and lifted the sword again. “They didn’t like her even before I began to show interest. She’s different. She’s not hard-edged and ruthless and manipulative like the rest of them.”

Hard-edged and ruthless and manipulative. All words that applied very well to the Shifter, though Rokan didn’t seem to disdain them in her. Well, one sought different qualities in a bodyguard than in a wife.

But Isabel couldn’t help saying, “It can be helpful for a queen to be all those things.”

“I’m not thinking about that.” Rokan transferred his sword to his left hand, then back to his right. “I didn’t set out to fall in love with her. Not at first. I just…I felt sorry for her. And the other women were so outraged when I started paying attention to her. And she was the only woman in the court who wasn’t out to snare me so she could be queen.”

Either that, or she was better at it than all the rest of them. Isabel sat up straight. “Does it matter? Last I heard, kings don’t marry for love.”

“I’m going to,” Rokan said.

“Even if Daria—”

“I decided this long before I met Daria.” Rokan thrust his jaw forward. “My parents didn’t love each other. My children’s parents will.”

“How does Clarisse feel about that?”

Rokan rolled his eyes. “I think you can guess.”

Isabel said, with a completely straight face, “I would have to draw upon all the Shifter’s wisdom to do so.”

Rokan chuckled. She smirked back at him, but wasn’t sure what to do after that. She was vastly relieved when his dark eyes turned serious. “About Clarisse. I know she’s been…unwelcoming to you. But she’s on your side.”

Her relief vanished as quickly as it had come. “Is she.”

“I’m the first to admit that she can be a little difficult—”

“Really?” Isabel murmured. “The first?”

His smile came and went, very briefly, and not until it was gone did she realize she had been trying to elicit it on purpose. “All right, maybe the second or third. But it’s not entirely her fault. Our father didn’t treat her very well.” He sat down on the bench next to her, tilting his head so he could see her better, squinting against the sunlight. “No matter what she says, though, she loves me. And I her. Even if we don’t like each other very much sometimes. You can trust her.”

Before Isabel could think of how to respond, a large group of guards and noblemen entered the practice grounds. Among them was Albin, accompanied by his apprentice, a dark-haired young man wearing a short red cloak. The high sorcerer scowled at them, and Isabel lifted her chin and stared back. The apprentice, unlike his master, gaped at her with wide eyes.

Rokan got to his feet. He hefted his sword, bowed to her with a wry grin, and walked out into the square.

Today’s practice consisted of a series of matches between Rokan and the guards. After several tense minutes, Isabel realized that not only were none of Rokan’s opponents going to threaten him with serious harm, they were all going to great lengths to make sure he won. She could tell by the suppressed mirth in Rokan’s eyes that he knew it, too.

Once she was sure enough of his safety to relax, Isabel turned her attention to Daria. The object of Rokan’s affections was medium height and slender, with soft brown hair and softer brown eyes, and she spent the entire practice session watching Rokan with breathless attention. She wasn’t the type of girl men were usually smitten with—you had to watch her for a while before you noticed how pretty she was—but that, Isabel supposed, was Rokan’s business. There was an air of straightforward sweetness to her, a sincerity devoid of intensity, that might hold great appeal to someone raised in a swirl of courtly intrigue.

“He’s completely smitten,” said a voice on Isabel’s right, and she turned sharply to stare at the speaker: a foppish young nobleman with an elaborate lace collar that he obviously, and mistakenly, thought made him look dignified. By his lilting accent, he was from the south. “If you were hoping to make a try for our prince yourself, I’m afraid you’re out of luck.”

Isabel stopped herself just in time from giving him her deadliest glare. Instead, she pouted. “I’ve heard people say the match is ill-advised.”

“Oh, it is; no doubt about that. If the king were alive, it wouldn’t be happening.” The nobleman bit his lip and lowered his voice, a pattern Isabel had noticed before. Everyone seemed reluctant to talk about Rokan’s father. The few times Isabel had brought him up, people had slipped away from her and found someone else to talk to, even when that required a break in the smooth finesse so prized among courtiers. “Samorna needs southern trade more than it needs northern armies. The prince should be seeking his wife among the southern noblewomen.”