Reign of Shadows - Deborah Chester [34]
The last thing he wanted was to be told he resembled Beva in anything. Caelan shifted angrily and crawled out of the tent.
She followed anxiously. “Caelan, what’s wrong? What did I say?”
“Nothing.”
Her eyes widened. “You have quarreled with Father. Don’t, Caelan. You mustn’t.”
His mouth twisted into a bitter little smile. “Too late. I already have.”
She flung her arms around his waist. “Please don’t sound like that. I don’t want you to fight with him.” Tears streaked her face. “I don’t want you to leave. Please!”
“I won’t leave you, sweetness,” he said, hugging her. But even as he said the words, he felt horrible for lying to her. His throat closed up into a knot. “In my heart I will never leave you.”
She lifted her huge, tear-drenched eyes to his. “I don’t want you to go”
“I haven’t left yet—”
“Caelan!”
He sighed, trying to find an explanation, and couldn’t. “You’d better get in bed.”
She frowned and stamped her foot. “Don’t treat me like a baby! You’re keeping things from me. I don’t like it.”
He scooped her up and tucked her into her bed, smoothing the feather-filled coverlet.
She kicked at it. “I can make you stay. I can, if I wish it hard enough.”
“Go to sleep.”
“You and Father have to—”
“All Father and I want to do right now is eat our supper,” he said, trying to soothe her. “If you don’t go to sleep, we can’t go look for emeralds tomorrow.”
She was still frowning, but her eyes were growing heavy. “Tomorrow I’ll learn your secrets,” she said sleepily. “I’ll make you promise to stay.”
He kissed her forehead and turned the lamp down low, leaving only a glow burning beneath the wall disk of the goddess Merit, protector of small children. At the door he hesitated, filled with regrets, but then he closed the door soundlessly and left before her will could force him to give in.
Chapter Seven
SUPPER WAS EATEN in silence, he and his father spooning Anya’s rich stew hungrily by the ruddy light of the kitchen fire. The kitchen served as the common room. Central to the whole house, its large hearth never went cold, and there was plenty of space beyond the long trestle table of worn, well-scrubbed pine for the other members of the household to gather.
Surva, Anya’s elderly mother, worked her loom in one corner. The rhythmic clack of the shuttle was a lulling sound in the general quiet. Old Farns carved wood, the shavings curling over his big, gnarled hands. Gunder frowned over lists, grinding herbs to refill the medical supplies. Raul, the groom, had dragged in a saddle to oil it, and the aromatic scent of the leather mingled with the smell of stew and hot bread. Anya hovered with her big wooden spoon, ready to ladle out additional helpings of food, while the young scullion Tisa scrubbed copper pots with river sand and made them shine.
On the surface it looked like a content domestic scene, but although Caelan was dying to ask dozens of questions and catch up on all that had happened at the hold during his absence, he dared not break the silence. Beva did not permit chatter at mealtimes, saying it impeded digestion.
When at last Beva pushed his bowl away and shook his head at Anya’s apple pie and browly cakes, Gunder was ready to show him the herbal lists for his approval.
Caelan went on eating although it was rude to continue when his father had left the table.
“Good,” Anya whispered, slipping him a third piece of pie. “You’re too thin. You eat all you want.”
He grinned at her and munched away. Beva frowned at him, but Caelan pretended not to notice.
Finally Beva went out. Everyone seemed to relax. Caelan shoved his plate away with a feeling of satisfaction and joined Farns.
With a smile, the old watchman went on with his carving. “It is good to have all our family home and safe,” he said.
Caelan longed to pour all his troubles into the old man’s sympathetic ears, but he couldn’t here in front of everyone. “I need to talk to you,” he said softly.
Old Farns nodded wisely. “Talk. There is time while the master and Gunder are making rounds in the infirmary.”
“Not here. Alone.”
Farns