Kushiel's Scion - Jacqueline Carey [67]
All knowledge is worth having.
At home, it was another matter.
The Lady Nicola called upon us within days of our Court reception, and I found out what gift she had brought me. Like my long-promised gift to Alais, hers took living form.
It was one of the spotted horses of Aragon; like the Salmon, whom I had admired at the fair the day I learned of my mother's disappearance, over a year ago. Phèdre, it seemed, had seen fit to mention it in a letter. But I had known nothing of it.
I walked into the front courtyard, and my mouth went dry.
He was two years old, broken to the saddle, but still a little green with it. Unlike the Salmon, he was mostly white, generously speckled with reddish spots, the color of old blood. Secured on a lead-line in the narrow courtyard of the townhouse, he glared, rolling eyes that showed the whites, stamping striped hooves, making the courtyard ring. His strong neck arched, particolored mane breaking like a wave over his spotted hide. As I drew near, he wrinkled his lips, showing teeth like ivory plates.
"Do you like him?" Nicola L'Envers y Aragon leaned out of the open carriage door, laughing. "Phèdre said you would."
I loved him.
I hated her.
"Name of Elua!" Gilot breathed fervently. He had been moping ever since we had left Montrève; now he grabbed my shoulders and shook them in an excess of excitement. "Ah, Imri, look at him, will you!"
"His name is Hierax," Nicola said, descending lightly from the carriage. "Though Ramiro says the Tsingani who bred him called him the Bastard."
I knew Phèdre and Joscelin were watching. I walked forward. I wished someone else had given me this horse; I wished I had found him by myself. I grabbed his coarse mane in both fists, bowing my head and leaning against him, feeling the hard, bony plate of his forehead against mine.
"Hello, Bastard," I whispered.
He whuffed hard through dilated nostrils, our breath mingling.
Mindful of courtesy's demands, I made myself release him and turned, bowing deeply to Nicola. "My thanks, my lady, to you and the House of Aragon. He is a splendid gift."
She smiled. "You're quite welcome."
After that, of course, nothing would do but that Nicola was invited inside. Phèdre called for cordial, and I served it myself. We sat on couches in the salon and made polite conversation. It was a double agony, for all I wanted to do was acquaint myself with my magnificent new horse, and what I least wanted to do was be pleasant to the Lady Nicola.
It was unfair, I know. She had done nothing to merit my dislike, and I had cause to be grateful to her. But I hated knowing what I knew, and I hated the way Phèdre's eyes sparkled in her presence. They bantered, light and teasing and fond, but there was an undercurrent of tension between them. I could feel it on my skin, the way one feels lightning's charge in the air before the flash.
How Joscelin could bear it, I do not know; and yet he seemed untroubled. Perhaps, I thought glumly, it was my own heritage that made me sensitive to it. Although they are mostly Naamah's line, there is old Kusheline blood in House L'Envers. But no; although Joscelin harbored no dark desires—indeed, in the eyes of the realm, he harbored unnaturally few desires—he was no fool, and he knew Phèdre too well. For whatever reason, he willingly tolerated Nicola L'Envers y Aragon.
I knew what she had done. It was not just the aid she had given in Amílcar. Long before, she had entrusted Phèdre with the password of House L'Envers, the phrase that its members are compelled to honor. And Phèdre used it, too—twice. She used it to compel Barquiel L'Envers to hold the City against Percy de Somerville's army, and she used it to compel his daughter in Khebbel-im-Akkad. Valère L'Envers, who is wed to the Khalif's son, petitioned her husband for aid in retrieving me from Drujan because of it.
He didn't grant it, though. Even the Khalif's son feared the bone-priests of Drujan, having lost two armies to them. All he did was give Phèdre and Joscelin a guide to Daršanga. And when they brought me out of that living