First published in the United States of America by HarperTeen in 2019

Published simultaneously in Great Britain by HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2019

Published in this ebook edition in 2019

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Text copyright © 2019 Rebecca Ross LLC

Map illustration by Virginia Allyn

Cover design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2019

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Source ISBN: 9780008246013

Ebook Edition © March 2019 ISBN: 9780008246020

Version: 2019-01-30

To my grandparents—

Mark and Carol Deaton & John and Barbara Wilson,

who continue to inspire me every day.

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Map of the Realms

Map of Maevana’s Territories

Cast of Characters

Allenach Family Tree

MacQuinn Family Tree

Morgane Family Tree

Kavanagh Family Tree

PART ONE—The Return

1. The Enemy’s Daughter—Brienna

2. A Trail of Blood—Cartier

3. To Take Up Grievances—Brienna

4. The Swift Are Born for the Longest Night—Cartier

5. Confessions by Candlelight—Brienna

6. The Lass with the Blue Cloak—Cartier

7. Bring Me the Golden Ribbon—Brienna

8. Where Are You, Aodhan?—Cartier

9. The Sharp Edge of Truth—Brienna

10. Orphan No More—Cartier

PART TWO—The Trial

11. Half-Moons—Brienna

12. Bitter Portions—Cartier

13. Late-Night Quandaries—Brienna

14. Once a Lannon, Always a Lannon—Cartier

15. Brothers and Sisters—Brienna

16. Let Their Heads Roll—Cartier

17. Dark Discoveries—Brienna

PART THREE—The Snare

18. Ride the Currents—Cartier

19. At the Mark of the Half-Moon—Brienna

20. A Bleeding Princess—Cartier

21. Lady of MacQuinn—Brienna

22. Rosalie—Cartier

23. The Beast—Brienna

PART FOUR—The Reprisal

24. Ultimatum—Cartier

25. To Thwart and to Hope—Brienna

26. Hidden Threads—Cartier

27. Blades and Stones—Brienna

28. The Southern Tower—Cartier

29. To Hold Fast—Brienna

30. Where Are You, Declan?—Cartier

PART FIVE—The Lady of Morgane

31. Revelations—Brienna

32. The Account—Cartier

33. The Dragon and the Falcon—Brienna

34. Between Darkness and Light—Cartier

35. The Queen Rises—Brienna

36. The Best of Your House—Cartier

37. To Meet the Light—Brienna

Acknowledgments

Keep Reading …

Books by Rebecca Ross

About the Publisher

Map of the Realms

Map of Maevana’s Territories

HOUSE of MACQUINN—The Steadfast

Brienna MacQuinn, mistress of knowledge, the lord’s adopted daughter

Davin MacQuinn, lord of MacQuinn (formerly Aldéric Jourdain)

Lucas MacQuinn, master of music, the lord’s son (formerly Luc Jourdain)

Neeve MacQuinn, weaver

Betha MacQuinn, head weaver

Dillon MacQuinn, groom

Liam O’Brian, thane

Thorn MacQuinn, castle chamberlain

Phillip and Eamon, men-at-arms

Isla MacQuinn, healer

HOUSE of MORGANE—The Swift

Aodhan Morgane, master of knowledge, lord of Morgane (formerly Cartier Évariste)

Seamus Morgane, thane

Aileen Morgane, wife of Seamus, castle chamberlain

Derry Morgane, stonemason

HOUSE of KAVANAGH—The Bright

Isolde Kavanagh, queen of Maevana (formerly Yseult Laurent)

Braden Kavanagh, father to the queen (formerly Hector Laurent)

HOUSE of LANNON—The Fierce

Gilroy Lannon, former king of Maevana

Oona Lannon, wife of Gilroy Lannon

Declan Lannon, son of Gilroy and Oona

Keela Lannon, Declan’s daughter

Ewan Lannon, Declan’s son

HOUSE of HALLORAN—The Upright

Treasa Halloran, lady of Halloran

Pierce Halloran, the lady’s youngest son

HOUSE of ALLENACH—The Shrewd

Sean Allenach, lord of Allenach, Brienna’s half brother

Daley Allenach, the lord’s manservant

HOUSE of BURKE—The Elder

Derrick Burke, lord of Burke

HOUSE of DERMOTT—The Loved

Grainne Dermott, lady of Dermott

Rowan Dermott, husband of Grainne Dermott

OTHERS MENTIONED

Merei Labelle, mistress of music

Oriana DuBois, mistress of art

Tristan Allenach

Tomas Hayden

Fergus Lannon

Patrick Lannon

Ashling Morgane

Líle Morgane

Sive MacQuinn

THE FOURTEEN HOUSES of MAEVANA

Allenach the Shrewd

Kavanagh the Bright

Burke the Elder

Lannon the Fierce

Carran the Courageous

MacBran the Merciful

Dermott the Loved

MacCarey the Just

Dunn the Wise

MacFinley the Pensive

Fitzsimmons the Gentle

MacQuinn the Steadfast

Halloran the Upright

Morgane the Swift

Lord MacQuinn’s Territory, Castle Fionn

Brienna

The castle was brimming with laughter and dinner preparations when Cartier and I entered the hall, blue passion cloaks on our backs, the night breeze tangled in our hair. I came to a stop in the heart of the grand room to admire the hanging tapestries, the high arch of the ceiling that melted into smoky shadows, the mullioned windows on the eastern wall. There was a fire roaring in a glazed hearth, and the women of the castle were setting the best pewter and silver on the trestle tables. They did not take note of me, for I was still a stranger to them, and I watched as a group of young girls decorated the table spines with a current of pine boughs and dark red flowers. A boy was rushing behind them to light a mountain range of candles, his eyes clearly taken with one of the auburn-haired girls.

For a moment, it would almost seem as if this castle and these people had never known the darkness and oppression of the Lannon family’s reign. And yet I wondered what wounds remained in their hearts, in their memories after surviving a tyrannical king for twenty-five years.

“Brienna.” Cartier came to a gentle stop at my side. He stood a safe distance away from me—a full arm’s length—although I could still feel the memory of his touch, I could still taste his lips on mine. We stood together quietly, and I knew he too was soaking in the clamor and rustic beauty of the hall. That he was still trying to adjust to what our lives were about to become now that we had returned home to the queen’s realm of Maevana.

I was the adopted daughter of Davin MacQuinn—a fallen lord who had been in hiding for the past twenty-five years—who had finally returned to light his hall and restore his people.

And Cartier, my former instructor, was the lord of the House of Morgane. The lord of the Swift—Aodhan Morgane.

I could hardly find the will to call him by such a name. It was one I would have never imagined him possessing throughout all the years I had known him in the southern kingdom of Valenia, when I had been his pupil and he had been my teacher, a master of knowledge.

I thought of how our lives had intertwined, from the very first moment I had met him when I was accepted into the prestigious Magnalia House, a Valenian school for the five passions of life. I had assumed that he was Valenian—he had taken on a Valenian name, was polished in etiquette and passion, and had lived nearly all of his life in the southern kingdom.

And yet he had been far more than that.

“What kept you?”

I startled, Jourdain taking me by surprise as he stepped into my view, his eyes sweeping me from head to toe, as if he expected me to have a scratch. Which almost struck me as humorous, because three days ago, we had ridden into battle with Isolde Kavanagh, Maevana’s rightful queen. I had donned armor, streaked blue woad across my face, braided my hair, and wielded a sword in Isolde’s name, not knowing if I was going to live through the revolution. But I had fought for her, as had Cartier and Jourdain, and with her to challenge Gilroy Lannon, a man who should never have been king of this land. Together, we had brought him and his family down in the span of a morning, a bloody yet victorious sunrise.

And now Jourdain was acting as if I had been darting through battle once more. All because I was late for dinner.

I had to remind myself to be understanding. I was not accustomed to fatherly fussing—I had lived my entire life not knowing who my blood father was. And, oh, how regretfully I knew now who I had descended from; I pushed his name from my mind, focusing instead on the man standing before me, the man who had adopted me as his own months ago, when the two of us joined our knowledge to plot a rebellion against King Lannon.

“Cartier and I had much to talk about. And don’t look at me like that, Father. We’re back in time,” I said, but my cheeks warmed under Jourdain’s attentive scrutiny. And when he shifted his eyes to Cartier, I think he knew. Cartier and I had not been merely “talking.”

I irresistibly thought back to that moment when I had stood with Cartier in his dilapidated castle on Morgane lands, when he had given me my passion cloak at last.

“Yes, well, I told you to be back before dark, Brienna,” Jourdain said, and then he softened his tone when he addressed Cartier. “Morgane. Nice of you to join us for a celebratory feast.”

“Thank you for extending the invitation, MacQuinn,” Cartier returned with a respectful bow of his head.

It was odd to hear such names spoken aloud, for they didn’t align as such within my mind. And while others would begin to address Cartier as Lord Aodhan Morgane, I would always think of him as Cartier.

Then there was Jourdain, my patron-turned-father. When I had met him two months ago, he had introduced himself as Aldéric Jourdain, his Valenian alias. But, like Cartier, he was far more than that. He was Lord Davin MacQuinn the Steadfast. And while others would begin to address him as such, I would call him “Father,” and would always think of him as Jourdain.

“Come, the two of you.” Jourdain led us up to the dais, where the lord’s family was to sit and sup at a long table.

Cartier winked at me when Jourdain’s back was angled to us, and I had to swallow a smile of pure joy.

“There you are!” Luc cried as he entered the hall through one of the side doors, his gaze finding me on the dais.

The young girls paused in their pine-and-flower arrangements to giggle and whisper as Luc passed them. His dark brown hair was in disarray, which was a daily occurance, and his eyes were bright with mirth.

He clomped up the dais stairs to sweep me into an embrace, acting as if we had been apart for months although I had seen him earlier that afternoon. He took me by the shoulders and turned me about, so he could see the silver threads stitched upon my passion cloak.

“Mistress Brienna,” he said. I turned back around and laughed, to finally hear the title linked to my name. “It’s a beautiful cloak.”

“Yes, well, I waited long enough for it, I should think,” I replied, helplessly glancing to Cartier.

“Which constellation is it?” Luc asked. “I fear I am rather horrible with astronomy.”

“It is Aviana.”

I was a mistress of knowledge now, something I had labored years at Magnalia House to achieve. And in that moment, standing in Jourdain’s hall in Maevana, surrounded by family and friends, wearing my passion cloak, with Isolde Kavanagh about to return to the northern throne … I could not have been more satisfied.

As we all sat down, I watched Jourdain, a golden chalice in his hands, his face carefully guarded as he surveyed his people entering the hall for dinner. I wondered what he was feeling, to finally come home after being gone for those twenty-five years of terror, to wade back into his role of lord to these people.

I knew the truth of his life, of his Maevan past as well as his Valenian one.

He had been born in this castle as a noble son of Maevana. He had inherited the lands and people of MacQuinn, striving to protect them as he was forced to serve the horrible King Gilroy Lannon. I knew Jourdain had witnessed terrible things in the king’s hall—he had seen hands and feet cut off of men who could not pay the full amount of their taxes, had seen old men lose an eye for looking at the king for too long, had heard women scream from distant chambers as they were beaten, had seen children scourged for making a sound when they should have been quiet. I watched it, Jourdain had once confessed to me, pale from the memory. I watched it, afraid to speak out.

Until he had finally decided to rebel, to take down Gilroy Lannon and put a rightful queen back upon the northern throne, to snuff out the darkness and the terror that had become the once-glorious Maevana.

Two other Maevan Houses had joined his secret revolution—the Kavanaghs, who had been the one magical House of Maevana and the origin of queens, and the Morganes. But Maevana was a land of fourteen Houses, as diverse as the land, each holding their own strengths and weaknesses. Yet only three dared to defy the king.

I think it was doubt that held most of the lords and ladies back, because two precious artifacts were missing: the Stone of Eventide, which gave the Kavanaghs their magical power, and the Queen’s Canon, which was the law that declared no king was to ever sit upon Maevana’s throne. Without the stone and the Canon, how was the rebellion ever going to completely overthrow Gilroy Lannon, who was deeply rooted on the throne?

But twenty-five years ago, MacQuinn, Kavanagh, and Morgane had united and stormed the royal castle, prepared to wage war. The success for the coup depended on taking Lannon by surprise, which was spoiled when my biological father, Lord Allenach, learned of the rebellion and ultimately betrayed them.

Gilroy Lannon was waiting for Jourdain and his followers.

He targeted and killed the women of each family, knowing it would take the heart out of the lords.

But what Gilroy Lannon did not anticipate was for three of the children to survive: Luc. Isolde. Aodhan. And because they did, the three defying lords fled with their children to the neighboring country of Valenia.

They took on Valenian names and professions; they discarded their mother tongue of Dairine for the Valenian language of Middle Chantal; they buried their swords and their northern sigils and their anger. And they hid, raising their children to be Valenian.

But what most did not know … Jourdain never stopped planning to return and dethrone Lannon. He and the other two fallen lords met once a year, never losing faith that they could rise again and be successful.

They had Isolde Kavanagh, who was destined to become queen.

They had the desire and the courage to revolt once again.

They had the wisdom of years on their side, as well as the painful lesson from the first failure.

And yet they were still missing two things that were vital: the Stone of Eventide and the Queen’s Canon.

That was when I joined them, for I had inherited memories from a distant ancestor who had buried the magical stone centuries ago. If I could recover the stone, magic would return to the Kavanaghs, and the other Maevan Houses might join our revolution at last.

And that was exactly what I had done.

All of this had happened mere days and weeks ago, and yet it felt like it had happened very long ago, like I was looking back upon all of it through fractured glass, even though I was still bruised and battered from battle and secrets and betrayals, from discovering the truth of my own Maevan heritage.

I sighed, let my reveries fall away as I continued to regard Jourdain sitting at the table.

His dark auburn hair was pulled back by a ribbon, which made him look Valenian, but a circlet crowned his head, a glimmer of light. He was dressed in simple black breeks and a leather jerkin with a golden falcon stitched over the breast, the proud sigil of his House. There was still a cut on his cheek from the battle, slowly healing. A testament of what we had just endured.

Jourdain glanced down into his chalice, and I finally saw it—the flicker of uncertainty, the doubt in himself, the haunting unworthiness—and I took a goblet of cider and drew out the chair close to his, to sit at his side.

I had grown up in the company of five other ardens at Magnalia House, five girls who had become like sisters to me. Yet these past few months surrounded by men had thoroughly taught me about their natures, or, more important, how fragile their hearts and egos were.

I remained quiet at first, and we watched his people bring forth steaming platters of food, setting them down on the tables. I began to notice it, though; quite a few of the MacQuinns talked in hushed tones, like they were still afraid to be overheard. Their clothes were clean but threadbare, their faces deeply grooved from years of hard labor, decades absent of smiles. Several of the boys were even sneaking slivers of ham from the platter, stuffing the food in their pockets, as if they were accustomed to being hungry.

And it was going to take time for the fear to fade, for the men and women and children of this land to heal and find restoration.

“Does this all feel like a dream to you, Father?” I eventually whispered to Jourdain, when I felt the weight of our silence.

“Hmm.” Jourdain’s favorite sound, which meant he was agreeing in half. “Some moments it does. Until I look for Sive and realize she is no longer here. Then it feels like reality.”

Sive, his wife.

I could not help but imagine what she had been like, a woman of valor, of bravery, riding into battle all those years ago, sacrificing her life.

“I wish I had known her,” I said, sadness filling my heart. I was familiar with such a feeling; I had lived with it for many years, this longing for a mother.

My own mother had been Valenian, having died when I was three. But my father had been Maevan. Sometimes, I felt broken between these two countries: the passion of the south, the sword of the north. I wanted to belong here with Jourdain, with the MacQuinn people, but when I thought of my paternal blood … when I remembered that Brendan Allenach, lord as he was traitor, was my blood father … I wondered how I could ever be accepted here, in this castle that he had terrorized.

“What does this feel like to you, Brienna?” Jourdain asked.

I thought for a moment, savoring the golden warmth of the firelight and the happiness that swelled in Jourdain’s people as they began to gather around the tables. I listened to the music Luc spun on his violin, melodious and sweet, rousing smiles from the men and women and children, and I leaned toward Jourdain, to rest my head upon his shoulder.

And so I gave him the answer that he needed to hear, not the one that I fully felt yet.

“It feels like coming home.”

I didn’t realize how ravenous I was until the food was set down, platters of roasted meats and herb-sprinkled vegetables, breads softened by butter, pickled fruits, and plates of sliced cheese with different-colored rinds. I piled more food than I could possibly handle onto my plate.

While Jourdain was preoccupied with speaking to the men and women who continually ascended the dais to formally greet him, Luc pulled his chair around so he could face Cartier and me.

“Yes?” I prompted when Luc continued to smile at us.

“I want to know the truth,” he said.

“About what, brother?”

Luc cocked his brow. “About how the two of you knew each other! And why you never said anything about it! During our planning meetings … how did you not know? As far as the rest of our rebel group went, we all believed you two were strangers.”

I kept my eyes on Luc, but I felt Cartier’s gaze shift to me.

“We never said anything because we did not know of the other’s involvement,” I said. “In the planning meetings, you called Cartier Theo D’Aramitz. I didn’t know who that was. And then you called me Amadine Jourdain, and Cartier didn’t know who that was.” I shrugged, but I could still feel the shock of the revelation, that heady moment when I had realized Cartier was Lord Morgane. “A simple misunderstanding caused by two aliases.”

A simple misunderstanding that could have destroyed our entire mission to restore the queen.

Since I had known where my ancestor had buried the Stone of Eventide, I had been sent to Maevana, to seek Lord Allenach’s hospitality while I covertly recovered the stone on his lands. In addition, Jourdain’s rebel group had planned for Lord Morgane to masquerade as a Valenian noble visiting Castle Damhan for the autumnal hunt. His true mission was to prepare the people for the queen’s return.

“And who told you about it?” I asked Luc.

“Merei,” my brother said, taking a quick sip of ale to hide how his voice softened when he spoke her name.

Merei, my best friend and roommate at Magnalia, who had passioned in music and had also known Cartier for what I had always believed him to be—a Valenian master of knowledge.

“Mm-hmm,” I said, relishing the fact that my brother was now the one to flush beneath my scrutiny.

“What? She offered the truth to me after the battle,” Luc stammered. “Merei said, ‘Did you know Lord Morgane taught Brienna at Magnalia? And we had no idea he was a Maevan lord?’”

“And so—” I started, but was cut short by Jourdain, who suddenly rose to his feet. At once, the hall fell quiet, every eye going to him as he held his chalice, gazing over his people for a few moments.

“I wanted to speak a few words, now that I have returned,” he began. “I cannot tell you how it feels to be home once more, to be reunited with you. For the past twenty-five years, I have thought of you upon rising, and upon lying down at night. I spoke your names in my mind when I could not sleep, remembering your faces and the sound of your voices, the talents of your hands, the joy of your friendship.” Jourdain paused, and I saw the tears in his eyes. “I have done wrong by you, to abandon you as I did that night of the first rising. I should have stayed my ground; I should have been here when Lannon arrived, seeking me …”

A painful lull overcame the hall. There was only the sound of our breaths coming and going, the crackle of the fire burning in the hearth, a child cooing in its mother’s arms. I felt my heart quicken, as I had not expected him to say this.

I glanced at Luc, whose face had gone pale. Our eyes met; our thoughts united as we both thought, What should we do? Should we say something?

I was one moment away from rising myself when I heard the steady footsteps of a man approaching the dais. It was Liam, one of Jourdain’s remaining thanes, who had escaped Maevana years ago to search for his fallen lord and who had eventually found Jourdain in hiding, joining our revolution.

We could not have fully revolted without Liam’s insight. I watched him now ascend the steps and set his hand on Jourdain’s shoulder.

“My lord MacQuinn,” the thane said. “Words cannot describe what we feel to see you return to this very hall. I speak for all of us when I say that we are overjoyed to be reunited with you. That we thought of you every morning upon rising, and every evening as we lay down to sleep. That we dreamt of this very moment. And we knew you would return for us one day.”

Jourdain stared at Liam, and I saw the emotion building in my father.

Liam continued. “I remember that dark night. Most of us here do. Coming around you in this very hall after the battle, bringing your lad into your arms.” He glanced to Luc, and the love in his eyes nearly stole my breath. “You fled because we asked and wanted you to, Lord MacQuinn. You fled to keep your son alive, because we could not bear to lose the both of you.”

Luc rose, walking around the table to stand on the other side of Liam. The thane set his right hand upon my brother’s shoulder.

“We welcome you both back, my lords,” Liam said. “And we are honored to serve you once more.”

The hall came alive as everyone stood, holding up their cups of ale and cider. Cartier and I stood as well, and I held my cider up to the light, waiting to drink to my father’s and brother’s health. “To Lord MacQuinn—” Thane Liam started, but Jourdain abruptly turned to me.

“My daughter,” he rasped, extending his hand for me.

I all but froze, surprised, and the hall fell silent as everyone looked at me.

“This is Brienna,” Jourdain said. “My adopted daughter. And I could not have returned home without her.”

I suddenly was flooded with the fear that the truth from Castle Damhan had spread—Lord Allenach has a daughter. Because I had certainly announced myself as Allenach’s long-lost daughter last week in his hall. And while I did not know the extent of the terror and brutality that had happened on this soil, to this people, I did know that Brendan Allenach had betrayed Jourdain, and had taken Jourdain’s people and lands twenty-five years ago.

I was their enemy’s daughter. When they looked at me, did they still see a shade of him? I am no longer an Allenach. I am a MacQuinn, I reminded myself.

I stepped to Jourdain’s side, let him take my hand and draw me even closer, beneath the warmth of his arm.

Thane Liam smiled at me, an apologetic gleam in his eyes, as if he was sorry to have overlooked my presence. But then he raised his cup and said, “To the MacQuinns.”

The toast bloomed throughout the hall, scattering the shadows, soaring as light up to the rafters.

I hesitated for only a moment before I lifted my cider and drank to it.

After the feast, I found myself being ushered by Jourdain with Cartier and Luc up the grand stairs to the room that had once been my father’s office. It was a wide chamber with walls carved deep with bookshelves, the stone floors overlaid with furs and rugs to mask our footsteps. An iron chandelier hung above a table set with a beautiful mosaic face, the beryl, topaz, and lapis lazuli squares depicting a falcon in flight. On one wall was a large map of Maevana; I took a moment to admire it before joining the men at the table.

“It’s time to plan the second step of our revolution,” Jourdain said, and I recognized the same spark that I had seen in him when we had plotted our return to Maevana in the dining room of his Valenian town house. How distant those days felt now, as if that had occurred in another life entirely.

On the surface, it would seem that the hardest leg of our revolution was over. But when I began to think upon all that sprawled before us, exhaustion began to creep up my back, weigh upon my shoulders.

There was plenty that could still go wrong.

“Let’s begin by writing down our concerns,” Jourdain suggested.

I reached for fresh parchment, a quill, and a stopper of ink, preparing to scribe.

“I’ll go first,” Luc volunteered. “The Lannons’ trial.”

I wrote The Lannons on the paper, shivering as I did so, as if the mere scratch of the quill’s nib could summon them here.

“Their trial is in eleven days,” Cartier said.

“So we have eleven days to decide their fate?” Luc asked.

“No,” Jourdain replied. “We will not decide it. Isolde has already made it known that the people of Maevana will judge them. Publicly.”

I wrote that down, remembering that historic event three days ago when Isolde had entered the throne room after battle, splattered with blood, the people standing behind her. She had removed the crown from Gilroy’s head, struck him multiple times, and then made him slither down to the floor, to lie prostrate before her. I would never forget that glorious moment, the way my heart had beat with the realization that a queen was about to return to the Maevan throne.

“We arrange a scaffold on the castle green, then, so all may attend,” Cartier said. “We bring forth the Lannons one at a time.”

“And we have our grievances read aloud,” Luc added. “Not just ours, but anyone who wishes to testify against the Lannons’ transgressions. We should send word to the other Houses, to bring their grievances to the trial.”

“If we do so,” Jourdain warned, “the entire Lannon family will most likely face death.”

“The entire Lannon family must be held accountable,” Cartier said. “That is how it has always been done in the north. The legends call it the ‘bitter portions’ of justice.”

I knew that he was right. He had taught me the history of Maevana. To my Valenian sensibilities, this merciless punishment felt dark and harsh, but I knew this had been done to prevent resentment growing in noble families, to hold those with power in check.

“Lest we forget,” Jourdain said, as if he had read my mind, “Lannon has all but annihilated the Kavanagh House. He has tortured innocent people for years. I do not like to assume that Lannon’s wife and his son, Declan, supported him in such endeavors—perhaps they were too afraid to speak out. But until we can properly interview them and those around them, I think it is the only way. The Lannon family as a whole must be punished.” He fell quiet, deep in thought. “Any public support we can gather for Isolde is vital and needs to happen quickly. While the throne is empty, we are vulnerable.”

“The other houses need to publicly swear fealty to her,” I said.

“Yes,” my father replied. “But even more so, we need to forge new alliances. Breaking an oath is far easier to do than breaking an alliance. Let’s sort through the alliances and rivalries we know of—it’ll give us an idea of where we need to begin.”

I wrote House Alliances first, creating a column to fill. With fourteen Houses to consider, I knew this could quickly become a tangled mess. Some of the older alliances were the sort of relationships that had originated when the tribes became Houses and received their blessings from the first queen, Liadan, centuries ago. And they were often alliances forged from marriage and from sharing borders and similar foes. But I also knew that Gilroy Lannon’s reign had most likely corrupted some of those alliances, so we could not wholly depend upon historical knowledge.

“Which Houses support Lannon?” I asked.

“Halloran,” Jourdain said after a moment.

“Carran,” Cartier added.

I wrote those names down, knowing there was one more, one final House that had fully supported the Lannons during the terror. And yet the men were not going to say it; it would have to come from my own mouth.

“Allenach,” I murmured, preparing to add it to the list.

“Wait, Brienna,” Cartier said gently. “Yes, Lord Allenach supported Lannon. However, your brother, Sean, has now inherited the House. And your brother joined us in the battle on the green.”

“My half brother, but yes. Sean Allenach threw his support behind Isolde, even if it was last-minute. Do you want me to persuade Sean to publicly support the Kavanaghs?” I questioned, wondering how I could even go about such a conversation.

“Yes,” Jourdain said. “Gaining Sean Allenach’s support is vital.”

I nodded, eventually writing Allenach off to the side.

We conversed through the remaining alliances that we knew of:

Dunn—Fitzsimmons (through marriage)

MacFinley—MacBran—MacCarey (covers the northern half of Maevana; alliance shared from a common ancestor)

Kavanagh—MacQuinn—Morgane

The Houses of Burke and Dermott were the only freestanding Houses.

“Burke declared his support when he fought with us on the green,” I said, remembering how he had brought his men- and women-at-arms just as we were faltering in battle, when I thought we might lose. Lord Burke had changed the tide of the fight, granting us that final burst of strength we needed to overcome Lannon and Allenach.

“I’ll speak privately with Lord and Lady Burke,” Jourdain said. “I don’t see why they wouldn’t swear allegiance to Isolde. I’ll also reach out to the other three Mac Houses.”

“And I’ll extend an invitation to the Dermotts,” Cartier offered. “Once I get my House in order.”

“And perhaps I can win over the Dunn-Fitzsimmons alliance with a little music, eh?” Luc said, waggling his eyebrows.

I smiled at him, to hide the fact that the Allenachs were left for me to deal with. I would think on it later, when I had a moment alone to sort through the array of emotions it provoked in me.

“Now, on to the rivalries,” I said. I knew two of them and took the liberty to write them down:

MacQuinn—Allenach (border dispute, still unresolved)

MacCarey—Fitzsimmons (over access to the bay)

“Who else?” I asked, my quill dripping stars of ink on the paper.

“Halloran and Burke have always been at odds,” Jourdain said. “They compete with their steel goods.”

I added them to the list. Surely, there had to be more rivalries. Maevana was known for its fierce and stubborn spirit.

I was staring at my list, but from the corner of my eye, Jourdain looked to Cartier, and Cartier shifted minutely in his chair.

“Morgane and Lannon,” he said, so quietly I almost didn’t hear him.

I raised my eyes to Cartier, but he was not looking at me. His gaze was transfixed on something distant, something that I could not see.

Morgane—Lannon, I wrote.

“I have another concern,” Luc said, breaking the awkward silence. “The Kavanaghs’ magic has returned now that the Stone of Eventide has been recovered. Is this something we need to be addressing now? Or perhaps later, after Isolde’s coronation?”

Magic.

I added it to the list, one little word that held so much possibility. It was evident after the battle that Isolde’s gift in magic was healing. I had set the stone about her neck, and she had been able to touch wounds and heal them. I wondered if she was somehow controlling her magic.

“I’m not,” she had confessed to me. “I wish I had an instructor, a guidebook …”

She had confided in me the day after the battle.

“If my magic goes astray … I want you to swear to me that you will take the Stone of Eventide away. I do not desire to wield magic for evil, but for the good of the people,” she had whispered, and my gaze had drifted to where the stone rested against her heart, alight with color. “And as of this moment, there is still so much about it I do not know. I do not know what I am capable of. You must promise me, Brienna, that you will hold me in check.”

“Your magic will not go astray, Lady,” I had whispered in return, but my heart began to ache at her admission.

This had been the very reason why the stone had gone missing one hundred and thirty-six years ago. Because my ancestor Tristan Allenach had not only resented the Kavanaghs for being the one House to bear magic, but he had also feared their power, particularly when they wielded it in war. Magic did go astray in battle, this much I knew, even though I didn’t fully understand it.

I had seen bits and pieces of this filtered through the memories I had inherited from Tristan.

The last memory had been of a magical battle gone terribly wrong. The way the sky had nearly split in two, the dreadful trembling in the earth, the unnatural way weapons had turned on their handlers. It had been terrifying, and I partly understood why Tristan had decided to assassinate the queen and take the stone from her.

And yet … I could not envision Isolde becoming a queen whose magic went corrupt, a queen who could not control her gifts and power.

“Brienna?”

I glanced up at Jourdain, unaware of how long I had been sitting at the table, reminiscing. All three men were gazing at me, waiting.

“Do you have any thoughts about Isolde’s magic?” my father asked.

I considered sharing that conversation with the queen, but I decided that I would hold her fears privately.

“Isolde’s magic favors healing,” I said. “I don’t think we need to be afraid of it. History has shown us that the Kavanaghs’ magic only went astray in battle.”

“Yet how vast is the Kavanagh House now?” my brother asked. “How many Kavanaghs are left, and will they all be of the same mind-set as Isolde and her father?”

“Gilroy Lannon was bent upon destroying them, more than any other House,” Jourdain said. “He killed a ‘Kavanagh a day’ at the beginning of his reign, accusing them of false crimes, making a sport of it.” He paused, grieved. “I would not be surprised if only a small remnant of the Kavanaghs remained.”

The four of us fell silent, and I watched the candlelight trickle over the falcon mosaic, catching the glimmer of the stones.

“Do you think Lannon kept record of their names?” Cartier asked. “They should be read as grievances at the trial. The realm needs to know how many lives he has stolen.”

“I do not know,” Jourdain responded. “There were always scribes in the throne room, but who knows if Lannon allowed them to record truth.”

More silence, as if we could no longer find words to speak. I stared at my list, knowing we had not truly created any solid plans this night, and yet it seemed as if we had at least opened a door.

“I say we meet privately with Isolde when we return to Lyonesse for the trial,” my father finally said, breaking the quiet. “We can speak to her more about the magic, and how she would prefer her grievances to be read.”

“I agree,” Cartier said.

Luc and I nodded our consent.

“I think that is all for tonight,” Jourdain said, rising. Cartier, Luc, and I mirrored him, until the four of us stood in a circle, our faces cast half in firelight, half in shadows. “I shall send a letter to Isolde, to let her know our thoughts for the trial so she can begin gathering grievances in Lyonesse. I’ll also send missives to the other Houses, to prepare their grievances. The only thing I ask of the three of you now is to remain aware, vigilant. We have planned a rebellion before; we should know what to look for, should supporters of Lannon dare to impede our plans to crown Isolde.”

“Do you think we will face opposition?” Luc asked with an anxious fidget of his hands.

“Yes.”

My heart plummeted at Jourdain’s response; I had believed that every Maevan would be thrilled to see the Lannons overturned. But the truth was, there were most likely groups of people who would scheme to disrupt our progress. People with darkened hearts who had loved and served Gilroy Lannon.

“We are one step from returning the queen to the throne,” my father continued. “Our greatest opposition will no doubt come in the next few weeks.”

“I believe so as well,” Cartier said, his hand drifting close to mine. We did not touch, but I felt his warmth. “Isolde’s coronation is going to be one of the greatest days this land has ever seen. But wearing the crown is not going to protect her.”

Jourdain looked to me, and I knew he was imagining me in her place, not as a queen, but as a woman with a target upon her.

Crowning Isolde Kavanagh as the rightful queen was not the end of our rising. It was merely the beginning.

Lord Morgane’s Territory, Castle Brígh

Cartier

There was a time in my life when I believed I would never return to Maevana. I did not remember the castle I had been born in; I did not remember the lay of the land that had been in my family for generations; I did not remember the people who had sworn fealty to me as my mother held me to her heart. What I did remember was a kingdom of passion and grace and beauty, a kingdom that I later learned was not mine although I yearned for it to be, a kingdom that had held and guarded me for twenty-five years.

Valenia was mine by choice.

But Maevana … she was mine by birthright.

I had grown up believing myself to be Theo D’Aramitz; I had later defiantly become Cartier Évariste, and both were names to hide beneath, a shield for a man who did not know where he was supposed to live or who he was supposed to be.

I thought of such things as I departed Jourdain’s castle well past midnight.

“You should stay the night, Morgane,” Jourdain had said to me, after our planning meeting had come to an end. He followed me down the stairs, concerned. “Why ride out so late?”

What he meant to say was, Why ride back to sleep alone in a crumbling castle?

And I did not have the courage to tell him that I needed to be on my own lands that night; I needed to sleep where my father and my mother and my sister had once dreamt. I needed to walk the castle I had inherited, dilapidated or not, before my people began to return.

I stopped in the foyer, reaching for my passion cloak, my travel satchel, my sword. Brienna was there, waiting on the threshold, the doors open to the night. I think she knew what I needed, because she looked to Jourdain and murmured, “It’ll be all right, Father.”

And Jourdain, thankfully, left it at that, clapping me on the arm in a wordless farewell.

It had already been a strange night, I thought, moving to where Brienna waited. I had not expected to hear Jourdain speak his regrets, to witness the first step of healing for the MacQuinns. I felt like an imposter; I felt burdened each time I anticipated my own homecoming and reunion.

But then Brienna smiled up at me, the night breeze playing with her hair.

How did you and I reach this point? I wanted to ask, but held the words captive in my mouth as she caressed my face.

“I shall see you soon,” I whispered, not daring to kiss her here, in her father’s house, where Jourdain was most likely observing us.

She only nodded, her hand falling away from me.

I departed, fetching my horse from the stables, the sky crowded with stars.

My lands lay to the west of Jourdain’s, our castles only several miles apart, which equated to roughly an hour’s ride. On the way to Castle Fionn that evening, Brienna and I had found a deer trail connecting the two territories, and we had chosen to take that instead of the road, winding through a forest and over a rill, eventually meandering into the fields.

It was the longer route, beset by thorns and branches, but I chose again to take it that night.

I rode the trail as if I had done so countless times, following moonlight and wind and darkness.

I had already been to my lands once, earlier that day.

I had come alone and taken my time walking through the corridors and the rooms, uprooting weeds and streaking through dust and cutting down gossamer, hoping I could remember something fair about this castle. I had been one year old when my father had fled with me, but I hoped that a fragment of my family, a seed of my memory, had lingered in this place, proving that I deserved to be here, even after twenty-five years of solitude. And when I could remember nothing—I was a stranger within these walls—I had conceded to sit on the dirty floor of my parents’ chamber, eaten by grief until I had heard Brienna arrive.

Despite all of that, the castle still took me by surprise.

Once, Castle Brígh had been a beautiful estate. My father had described it to me in perfect detail years ago, when he had finally told me the truth of who I was. But what he had depicted to me did not correspond with how it looked now.

I eased my horse to a trot as we approached, my eyes smarting from the cold as I struggled to see it in full by moonlight.

It was a crumbling sprawl of gray stones; the foothills of the mountains rose steadily behind it, draping shadows on the uppermost floors and turrets. A few slopes of the roof gaped with holes, but the walls were thankfully intact. Most of the windows were shattered, and vines had nearly overtaken the front of the exterior. The courtyard was thick with weeds and saplings. I had never seen a place more forlorn in my life.

I dismounted, standing in waist-high grass, continuing to stare at the castle, feeling as if the castle was leering back at me.

What was I to do with such a broken place? How was I to rebuild it?

I untacked my horse, leaving him hobbled beneath an oak, and began the trek to the courtyard, stopping in the wild heart of it. I stood on vines and thorns and weeds and broken cobbles. All of it mine, the bad as well as the good.

I found that I was not the least bit sleepy although I was bone weary and it had to be drawing nigh to two in the morning. I began to do the first thing that came to mind: pull up the weeds. I worked compulsively until I warmed myself, sweating against autumn’s frost, eventually getting on my hands and knees.

That was when I saw it.

My fingers yanked up a tangle of goldenrod, exposing a long cobble with a carving in the stone. I brushed away the lingering roots until I could clearly see the words, gleaming in the starlight.

Declan.

I shifted back to my heels, but my gaze was hooked to that name.

Gilroy Lannon’s son. The prince.

He had been here that night, then. The night of the first failed rising, when my mother was slain in battle, when my sister was murdered.

He had been here.

And he had carved his name into the stones of my home, the foundation of my family, as if by doing so, he would always have dominion over me.

I crawled away with a shudder and sat down in a heap, the sword sheathed at my side clattering alongside me, my hands covered in dirt.

Declan Lannon was in chains, held prisoner in the royal dungeons, and he would face trial in eleven days. He would get what he deserved.

Yet there was no comfort in it. My mother and my sister were still dead. My castle was in ruins. My people scattered. Even my father was gone; he had never had the chance to return to his homeland, dying years ago in Valenia.

I was utterly alone.

A sudden sound broke my chain of thoughts. A tumbling of stones from within the castle. My eyes went to the broken windows at once, searching.

Quietly, I rose, drawing my sword. I waded through the weeds to the front doors, which hung broken on their hinges. It rose the hair on my arms to push those oaken doors open further, my fingers tracing their carvings. I peered into the shadows of the foyer. The stones of the floor were cracked and filthy, but by the moonlight that poured in through the shattered windows, I saw the imprint of small, bare feet in the dirt.

The footprints wound into the great hall. I had to strain my eyes in the dim light to follow them back to the kitchen, weaving my way around the abandoned trestle tables, the cold hearth, the walls stripped bare of their heraldic banners and tapestries. Of course, the footprints went to the buttery, to every cupboard in an obvious search for food. Here there were empty casks of ale that still sighed with malt, old herbs hanging in dried batches from the rafters, a family of goblets encrusted with dust-coated jewels, a few broken bottles of wine that left glittering constellations of glass on the floor. A smudge of blood, as if those bare feet had accidentally stepped on a piece of glass.

I knelt, touching the blood. It was fresh.

The trail of blood took me out the back door of the kitchens, into a narrow corridor that emptied into the rear foyer, where the servants’ staircase wound in a tight spiral to the second floor. I stepped through a hoard of cobwebs, stifling a shudder when I finally reached the second-floor landing.

Moonlight poured in patches through this hallway, illuminating piles of leaves that had blown in from the broken windows. I continued following the blood, my boots crunching the leaves and finding every loose stone in the floor. I was too exhausted to be stealthy. The owner of the footprints undoubtedly knew I was coming.

They led me right to my parents’ chamber. The very place I had stood with Brienna hours ago, when I had given her her passion cloak.

I sighed, finding the door handles. Nudging them open, I peered into the dim light of the chamber. I could still see where Brienna and I had wiped the dust from the floors, to admire the colorful tiles. This room had felt dead until she had stepped within it, as if she belonged here more than I did.

I entered and was promptly assaulted with a handful of pebbles.

I whirled, glaring across the chamber to see a flash of pale limbs and a mop of unkempt hair disappear behind a sagging wardrobe.

“I am not going to hurt you,” I called out. “Come. I saw your foot is bleeding. I can help you.”

I took a few steps closer but then paused, waiting for the stranger to reappear. When they didn’t, I sighed and took another step.

“I am Cartier Évariste.” And I winced, to realize my Valenian alias had come out so naturally.

Still no response.

I edged closer, nearly to the shadow behind the wardrobe …

“Who are you? Hello?”

I finally reached the back of the furniture. And I was greeted by more pebbles. The grit went into my eyes, but not before my hand took hold of a skinny arm. There was resistance, an angry grunt, and I hurried to wipe the dust from my eyes to behold a scrawny boy, no more than ten years old, with a splash of freckles on his cheeks and red hair dangling in his eyes.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, trying to subdue my irritation.

The boy spat in my face.

I had to find the last dregs of my patience to wipe the spittle away. I then looked at the boy again.

“Are you alone? Where are your parents?”

The boy prepared to spit again, but I pulled him from the back of the wardrobe, guiding the lad to sit on the saggy bed. His clothes were in tatters, his feet bare, one still bleeding. He couldn’t hide the agony on his face when he walked on it.

“Did you hurt yourself today?” I asked, kneeling to gently lift his foot.

The child hissed but eventually let me examine his wound. The glass was still in his foot, weeping a steady trickle of blood.

“Your foot needs stitches,” I said. I released his ankle and continued to kneel before him, looking into a pair of worried eyes. “Hmm. I think your mother or father will be missing you. Why don’t you tell me where they are? I can take you to them.”

The boy glanced away, crossing his lanky arms.

It was as I suspected. An orphan, squatting in the ruins of Brígh.

“Well, lucky for you, I know how to stitch wounds.” I stood and slipped my travel satchel from my shoulder. I found my flint and sparked some of the old candles to life in the chamber, then withdrew a woolen blanket and my medical pouch, which I never traveled without. “Why don’t you lie down here and let me tend to that foot?”

The boy was stubborn, but the pain must have worn him down. He settled back on the wool blanket, his eyes going wide when he saw my metal forceps.

I found my small vial of stunning herbs and dumped the remainder into my flask of water.

“Here. Take a drink. It’ll help with the pain.”

The boy carefully accepted the mixture, sniffing it as if I had sprinkled in poison. Finally, he relented and drank, and I waited patiently for the herbs to begin to work their numbing effect.

“Do you have a name?” I asked, propping up the wounded foot.

He was silent for a beat, and then whispered, “Tomas.”

“That’s a good, strong name.” I began to carefully extract the glass. Tomas winced, but I continued to talk, to distract him from the pain. “When I was a lad, I always wanted to be named after my father. But instead of Kane, I was named Aodhan. An old family name, I suppose.”

“I thought you said your name was … C-Cartier.” Tomas struggled to pronounce the Valenian name, and I finally pulled out the last of the glass.

“So I did. I have two names.”

“Why would a man”—Tomas winced again as I began to clean the wound—“need two names?”

“Sometimes it is necessary, to stay alive,” I replied, and this answer seemed to appease him, for the boy was quiet as I began to stitch him back together.

When I finished, I gently bound Tomas’s foot and found him an apple in my satchel. While he ate, I walked about the chamber, looking for any other scrap of blanket that I might sleep with, for the night’s chilled air was flowing into the room through the broken windows.

I passed my parents’ bookshelves, which still held a vast number of leather-bound volumes. I paused, remembering my father’s love of books. Most of them were moldy now, their covers stiff and rippled from the elements. But one slender book caught my interest. It was drab in comparison to the others, whose covers were exquisitely illuminated, and there was a page sticking out at the top. I had learned that the most unassuming of books typically held the greatest of knowledge, so I slipped it beneath my jerkin before Tomas could see me.

No other blanket could be scrounged up, so I eventually conceded to sit against the wall by one of the candles.

Tomas rolled around in the wool blanket, until he looked more like a caterpillar than a boy, and then sleepily blinked at me.

“Are you going to sleep against the wall?”

“Yes.”

“Do you need the blanket?”

“No.”

Tomas yawned, scratched his nose. “Are you the lord of this castle?”

I was surprised by how I wanted to lie. My voice sounded odd as I replied, “Yes. I am.”

“Are you going to punish me, for hiding here?”

I did not know how to respond to that, my mind hung upon the fact that the boy thought I would punish him for doing all that he could to survive.

“I know I was wrong to throw pebbles in your face, milord,” Tomas rambled on, his brow wrinkled in fear. “But please … please don’t hurt me too badly. I can work for you. I promise I can. I can be your runner, or your cup bearer, or your groom, if you like.”

I didn’t want him to serve me. I wanted answers from him. I wanted to demand, Who are you? Who are your parents? Where do you come from? And yet I had no right to ask such of him. These were answers that would be won by trust and friendship.

“I’m sure I can find a task for you. And as long as you are on my lands, I will protect you, Tomas.”

Tomas murmured a sigh of gratitude and closed his eyes. Not a minute passed before he was snoring.

I waited a few moments before withdrawing the book from my jerkin. I gently leafed through the pages, tickled that I had randomly chosen a book of poetry. I wondered if this had been my mother’s, if she had held this book and read by the window years ago, when a page fluttered loose from the leafs. It was folded, but there was a shadow of handwriting within it.

I took the parchment, let it unfold in my palm, delicate as wings.

January 12, 1541

Kane,

I know we both thought this would be for the best, but my family cannot be trusted. While you were gone, Oona came to visit us. I think she has grown suspicious of me, of what I have been teaching Declan in his lessons. And then I saw Declan yanking Ashling around by her hair in the courtyard. You should have seen his face as she cried, as if he enjoyed the sound of her pain. I am afraid of what I see in him; I think that I have failed him in some way, and he no longer listens to me. How ardently I wish it were different! And perhaps it would be, if he could live with us instead of being with his parents in Lyonesse. Oona, of course, was not even surprised by his behavior. She watched her son yank our daughter around, refusing to stop him, and said, “He’s only a lad of eleven. He’ll grow out of such things, I assure you.”

I can no longer go through with this—I will not use our daughter as a pawn—and I know you would be in agreement with me. I plan to ride to Lyonesse and break Ashling’s betrothal to Declan at dawn, for it is I who must do this, and not you. I’ll take Seamus with me.

Yours,

Líle

I had to read it twice before I felt the bite of the words. Kane, my father. Líle, my mother. And Ashling, my sister, betrothed to Declan Lannon. She had only been five then, as this letter was written mere months from the day she was killed. What had my parents been thinking?

I knew the Lannons and the Morganes were rivals.

But I never imagined my parents had been at the origin of it.

My family cannot be trusted, my mother had written.

My family.

I held the letter to the candlelight.

What had she been teaching Declan? What had she seen in him?

My father had never revealed that my mother had come from the Lannon House. I had never learned her lineage. She was beautiful, he had said. She was lovely; she was good; her laughter had filled the rooms with light. The Morgane people had loved her. He had loved her.

I refolded her letter, hiding it in my pocket, but her words lingered, echoed through me.

My mother had been a Lannon. And I could not stop the thought from rising …

I am half Lannon.

Lord MacQuinn’s Territory, Castle Fionn

Brienna

I woke to the sound of banging below in the hall. I lurched out of bed, momentarily dazed. I didn’t know where I was—Magnalia? Jourdain’s town house? It was the windows, of all things, that reminded me; they were mullioned and narrow, and beyond them was the fog Maevana was notorious for.

I fumbled for the clothes I had worn yesterday and brushed my hair with my fingers on the way down the stairs, servants noticeably quieting as they passed me, their eyes wide as they took me in. I must look wretched, I thought, until I heard their whispers follow me.

“Brendan Allenach’s daughter.”

Those words sunk into my heart like a blade.

Brendan Allenach would have killed me on the battlefield had Jourdain not stopped him. I could still hear Allenach’s voice—I will take back the life I gave her—as if he was walking in my footsteps, haunting me.

I hurried along, following the noise, realizing the clamor was inspired by Luc’s music. My brother was standing on a table playing his violin, rousing hearty claps and cup banging from the MacQuinns.

I watched for a moment before sitting alone at the empty lord’s table to eat a bowl of porridge. I could see the love and admiration in the MacQuinns’ faces as they looked upon Luc, cheering him onward even as he knocked over a pint of ale. My brother’s music spread over them like a healing balm.

Beyond the revelry, on the other side of the hall, I noticed Jourdain standing with his chamberlain, a grouchy old man named Thorn, no doubt discussing the plans for the upcoming day. And I began to think about what my own plans should be now, in this strange time of in-betweens—in between resuming normal life and the trial, in between an empty throne and Isolde’s coronation, and perhaps more than anything, my place in between arden and mistress. I had been a student for the past seven years; now it was time for me to decide what to do with my passion.

I felt a wave of homesickness for Valenia.

I thought about the possibility of a passion House in Maevana. There were none here that I knew of, as impassionment was a Valenian sentiment. Most Maevans were familiar with the idea; however, I worried their attitudes toward it fell as cynical or skeptical, and I honestly could not fault them for it. Fathers and mothers had been more concerned about keeping their daughters and sons alive and protected. No one had time to spend years of their life studying music, or art, or even the depth of knowledge.

But all of that would soon change beneath a queen like Isolde. She had a vast appreciation of the study. I knew she desired to reform and enlighten Maevana, to see her people flourish.

And I had my own desires to sow here, one in particular being to start a House of Knowledge and maybe, hopefully, convince my best friend Merei to join me, uniting her passion of music with mine. I could see us filling these castle chambers with music and books, just as we had done at Magnalia as ardens.

I pushed my porridge bowl aside and rose from the table, walking back to my room, still struck with homesickness.

I had chosen an eastern chamber in the castle, and the morning light was just beginning to break through the fog, warming my windows with rosy hues. I walked to my desk, staring down at my writing utensils, which Jourdain had ensured I had an ample supply of.

Write to me whenever you miss me, Merei had said to me days ago, just before she departed Maevana to return to Valenia, to rejoin her patron and her musical consort.

Then I shall write to you every hour of every day, I had replied, and yes, I had been a touch dramatic to make her laugh, because we both had tears in our eyes.

I decided to take Merei’s advice.

I sat at my desk and began to write to her. I was halfway through the letter when Jourdain knocked on my door.

“Who are you writing to?” he asked after I had invited him in.

“Merei. Did you need something?”

“Yes. Walk with me?” And he offered me his arm.

I set my quill down and let him guide me downstairs and out into the courtyard. Castle Fionn was built of white stone in the heart of a meadow, with the mountains looming to the north. The morning light glistened on the castle walls as if they were built of bone, nearly iridescent in the melting frost, and I took a moment to look over my shoulder to admire it before Jourdain led me along one of the meadow paths.

My wolfhound, Nessie, found us not long after that, trotting ahead with her tongue lolling to the side. The fog was finally receding, and I could see the men working in an adjacent field; the wind carried snatches of their hums and the whisk of their sickles as the grain fell.

“I trust my people have been welcoming to you,” Jourdain said after a while, as if he had been waiting until we were liberated from the castle before he voiced such a thing.

I smiled and said, “Of course, Father.” I remembered the whispers that had chased me to the hall, about whose daughter I truly was. And yet I could not bear to tell Jourdain.

“Good,” he replied. We walked farther in silence, until we reached a river beneath the trees. This seemed to be our talking ground. The day before, he had found me here among the moss and currents, revealing that he had secretly married his wife in this lush place, long ago.

“Have you had any more memory shifts, Brienna?” he asked.

I should have expected this question, yet I still felt surprised by it.

“No, I have not,” I responded, looking to the river. I thought about the six memories I had inherited from Tristan Allenach.

The first had been brought on by an old book of Cartier’s, which happened to have belonged to Tristan over a century ago. I had read the same passage as Tristan had, which had created a bond between us that not even time could break.

I had been so bewildered by the experience, I had not fully understood what was happening to me, and as a result, I told no one about it.

But it had happened again when Merei had played a Maevan-inspired song, the ancient sounds of her music vaguely linking me to Tristan as he had been searching for a place to hide the stone.

His six memories had come to me so randomly, it had taken me a while to finally theorize how and why this was happening to me. Ancestral memory was not too rare of a phenomenon; Cartier himself had once told me about it, this idea that all of us hold memories from our ancestors but only a select few of us actually experience them manifesting. So once I had acknowledged that I was one of those few people to have the manifestations, I began to understand them better.

There had to be a bond made between me and Tristan through one of the senses. I had to see or feel, hear or taste or smell something he had once experienced.

The bond was the doorway between us. The how of it all.

As far as the why … I came to surmise that all the memories he had passed down to me were centered on the Stone of Eventide, or else I would have most likely inherited more memories from him. Tristan had been the one to steal the stone, to hide it, to begin the decline of the Maevan queens, to be the author of magic’s dormancy. And so I was the one destined to find and reclaim the stone, to give it back to the Kavanaghs, to let magic flourish again.

“Do you think you will inherit any more memories from him?” Jourdain asked.

“No,” I replied after a moment, looking up from the water to meet his concerned gaze. “All of his memories pertained to the Stone of Eventide. Which has been found and given back to the queen.”

But Jourdain did not appear convinced, and to be honest, neither was I.

“Well, let us hope that the memories have come to an end,” Jourdain said, clearing his throat. His hand went to his pocket, which I thought was a nervous habit for him until he withdrew a sheathed dirk. “I want you to wear this again,” he said, holding the blade out to me.

I recognized it. This was the same small dagger he had given me before I crossed the channel to set our revolution into action.

“You think it necessary?” I asked, accepting it, my thumb touching the buckle that would hold it fast to my thigh.

He sighed. “It would ease my mind if you wore it, Brienna.”

I watched him frown—he suddenly appeared so much older in this light. There were more threads of gray in his russet hair and deeper lines in his brow, and suddenly I was the one to feel worried about losing him when I had just gained him as a father.

“Of course, Father,” I said, tucking the dirk away into my pocket.

I thought that was all he needed to say to me, and we would begin to walk back to the castle. But Jourdain continued to stand before me, the sunlight dappling his shoulders, and I sensed the words were caught in his throat.

I braced myself. “Is there something else?”

“Yes. The grievances.” He paused and took a breath. “I was informed this morning that a large portion of the MacQuinns, mainly those younger than twenty-five, are illiterate.”

“Illiterate?” I echoed, stunned.

Jourdain was quiet, but his eyes remained on mine. And then I realized the cause of it.

“Oh. Brendan Allenach forbid them education?”

He nodded. “It would be of great help to me if you could begin to gather grievances for the trial. I worry that we will run out of time to appropriately collect and sort them. I have asked Luc to approach the men, and I thought perhaps you could scribe for the women. I understand if it is too much to ask of you, and I—”

“It is not too much to ask,” I gently interrupted him, sensing his apprehension.

“I made an announcement at breakfast this morning, for my people to begin to think about if they had any grievances, if they wanted them to be made known at the trial. I believe some will remain quiet, but I know others will wish to have them recorded.”

I reached out to take his hand. “Whatever I can do to help you, Father.”

He raised our hands to kiss the backs of my knuckles, and I was touched by the simple act of affection, something that we had not quite reached yet as father and daughter.

“Thank you,” he rasped, tucking my fingers in the crook of his elbow.

We walked side by side back along the path, the castle coming into view. I was comfortable with the silence between us—neither of us were known as avid conversationalists—but Jourdain suddenly pointed to a large building on the eastern edge of the demesne, and I squinted against the sun to see it.

“That’s the loom house,” he explained, glancing down at me. “Most of the MacQuinn women will be there. That is where I would have you start.”

I did as he asked, only returning to the castle to gather my writing tools. My mind was swarming as I walked the path and approached the loom house; the greatest of my thoughts was hung upon the fact that all of the young MacQuinn people were illiterate, and how devastating that was. Here I had hopes and dreams of beginning a House of Knowledge among them, but in truth, I would need to change my tactic. I would need to offer reading and writing lessons before I even attempted to educate on passion.

I stopped in the grass before the loom house. It was a long, rectangular structure built of stone, with a shingled roof and beautiful filigreed windows. The back side offered a sharp view of the valley below, where boys were herding sheep. The front door was cracked open, but it did not feel very inviting to me.

I took a deep breath and roused my courage and stepped into an antechamber. The floors were caked with mud and lined with boots, the walls crowded with hanging scarves and tattered cloaks.

I could hear the women talking farther inside. I followed the threads of their voices down a narrow corridor, nearly reaching the room in which they were working when I heard my name.

“Her name is Brienna, not Brianna,” one of the women was saying. I stopped short at the sound, just before the threshold. “I believe she is part Valenian. Her mother’s side.”

“That explains it, then,” said another woman in a rougher tone.

That explains what? I thought, my mouth going dry.

“She’s very pretty,” a dulcet voice stated.

“Sweet Neeve. You think everyone is pretty.”

“But it’s truth! I wish I had a cloak like hers.”

“That’s a passion cloak, love. You would have to go to Valenia and purchase one.”

“You don’t purchase them. You earn them.”

My face flushed from eavesdropping, but I could hardly move.

“Well, at least she doesn’t look like him,” the rough-hewn voice spoke again, spitting the words out. “I don’t think I could bear to look at her if she did.”

“I still cannot believe Lord MacQuinn would adopt Allenach’s daughter! His enemy! What was he thinking?”

“She fooled him. That’s the only explanation.”

There was a crash, as if something had accidentally overturned, followed by an exasperated curse. I heard footsteps draw close, and I rushed back down the corridor, leather satchel banging against my leg, through the muddy antechamber, and out the door.

I didn’t cry, although my eyes smarted as I hurried back to the castle.

What had I thought? That Jourdain’s people would like me at once? That I would fit into the weavings of a place that had suffered while I had flourished on the other side of the channel?

As I stepped into the castle courtyard, I began to wonder if it would be better for me to return to Valenia.

I began to believe that perhaps I truly didn’t belong here.

Lord Morgane’s Territory, Castle Brígh

Cartier

I woke with a start, a crick in my neck, my hands aching from the cold. I was slumped against the wall, and morning light was pooling on the floor, illuminating the dust on my boots. A few yards away was my wool blanket, wrinkled and empty. I blinked, gradually gaining my bearings.

I was in my parents’ bedchamber. And it was freezing.

Rushing my hands over my face, I heard the distant pounding on the front doors. The echo of life moved through the castle like a heart remembering its pattern.

I stumbled to my feet, wondering if Tomas had snuck away in the night, rethinking his offer to stay here. Halfway down the broken stairwell, I heard the lad’s voice.

“Are you here to see Lord Aodhan?”

I halted. There, in the crook of the front doors, was Tomas balanced on one foot, speaking to a man standing on the threshold. The light was too bright for me to wholly discern the visitor, but I couldn’t breathe in that moment.

“He’s sleeping. You’ll have to come back later,” Tomas stated and began to close the doors, which would not have done much good with how they hung from the hinges.

“I’m here, Tomas,” I said, my voice almost unrecognizable. I descended the remainder of the stairs, taking care on the shattered stones.

Tomas begrudgingly relented, swinging the doors wider so that they banged against the wall.

An older man stood in the sun, his white hair knotted in a braid, his face deeply lined, and his clothes ragged. As soon as he met my gaze, astonishment shone in his eyes.

“Seamus Morgane,” I said. I knew who he was. He had once held me as a child; he had once knelt before me as he swore his fealty to me. My father had told me of him countless times, this man who had been his most trusted of thanes.

“My lord Aodhan.” He knelt before me, among the weeds.

“No, no.” I took Seamus’s hands, guiding him back to his feet. I embraced him, forgoing formality. I felt the tears rack his body as he clung to me.

“Welcome home, Seamus,” I said with a smile.

Seamus composed himself and leaned back, his fingers on my arms as he stared up at me, somewhat agape, like he still could not believe I was standing before him. “I cannot … I cannot believe it,” he rasped, tightening his hold on me.

“Would you like to come in? I fear I do not have any food or drink, or I would offer you some refreshments.”

Before Seamus could respond, there was a cry from the courtyard. I glanced up to see a slim woman, also older, with curly silver hair that rested on her shoulders like a cloud, standing by a wagon overflowing with supplies. She had a corner of her patchwork apron pressed to her mouth, as if she was also trying to wrestle back a sob at the sight of me.

“My lord,” Seamus said, shuffling to stand beside me, to hold his hand out to the woman. “This is my wife, Aileen.”

“Gods above, look at you! How you’ve grown!” Aileen burst, dabbing her eyes with her apron. She extended her hands to me, and I crossed the distance, to embrace her. She hardly reached my shoulder in height, and yet she took hold of my arms and gave me a gentle shake, and I could only laugh.

Aileen nudged me back, to peer up at my face, memorizing it.

“Ah, yes,” she said, sniffing. “You have Kane’s build. But look, Seamus! He has Líle’s coloring, Líle’s eyes!”

“Yes, love. He is their son,” Seamus responded, and Aileen swatted him.

“Aye, I know. And he’s the most handsome lad I’ve ever seen.”

I felt my face warm, embarrassed by all the fuss. I was grateful to be saved by Seamus, who directed the conversation to more practical matters. “Are we the first to arrive, my lord?”

I nodded, the crick in my neck protesting. “Yes. I’ve sent out a call to my people, to return as soon as they are able. But I fear the castle is much worse than I anticipated. I have no food. No blankets. No water. I have nothing to give.”

“We didn’t expect that you would,” Aileen said, indicating the wagon. “This is a gift from Lord Burke. We were made to serve him during the dark years. Thankfully, he was good to us, to your people.”

I walked to the wagon, to hide the tangle of my emotions. There were bundles of blankets and yarn, fresh sets of clothing, cast iron to cook in, casks of ale and cider, wheels of cheese, bushels of apples, dried shanks of meat. There was also a collection of buckets to draw water from the well, and paper and ink for letters.

“I owe Lord Burke a great debt, then,” I said.

“No, my lord,” Seamus spoke, laying a hand on my shoulder. “This is the beginning of Lord Burke’s payment, for remaining silent when he should have spoken.”

I stared at Seamus, not knowing what to say.

“Come! Let’s carry the goods inside and we can begin to tidy the place,” Aileen declared, seeming to sense the sorrow of my thoughts.

The three of us began to carry the casks and baskets into the kitchens, and that was when I realized Tomas had disappeared again. I almost called for him when there came another knock on the front doors.

“Lord Aodhan!” A dark-haired young man with a freckled face, whose arms were nearly the size of my waist, greeted me with a broad smile. “I am Derry, your stonemason.”

And that was how the morning continued to progress.

As the light strengthened, more of my people returned, bearing whatever gifts they could bring. Two more of my thanes and their wives arrived, followed by the millers, the chandlers, the weavers, the healers, the gardeners, the brewmen, the cooks, the masons, the coopers, the yeomen … They returned to me laughing and weeping. Some I had never seen before; others I instantly recognized as the men- and women-at-arms who had rallied to fight with me days ago on the castle green. Only now they brought their families, their children, their grandparents, their livestock. And my mind swelled with their names, and my arms became sore from carrying so many bundles of provisions to the storerooms.

By late afternoon, the women had busied themselves with cleaning and straightening the hall, and the men had begun to clear the weeds and vines from the courtyard, to sweep out the broken glass and splintered furniture from the rooms.

I was carrying out the remains of a chair when I saw Derry standing with his back to me in the courtyard, staring down at the stone bearing Declan’s name. Before I could think of something to say, the mason took an iron wedge and viciously uprooted the stone. Holding it facedown, so that the name would not show, he whistled for one of the lads, setting it into his hands.

“Run this to the quagmire, just on the other side of those woods,” Derry said. “Don’t turn it over, you hear? Give it to the bog just like that, facedown.”

The boy nodded and bolted away with a frown, awkwardly holding the stone in his hands.

I forced myself to keep walking before Derry took note of my presence, carrying the splintered chair to the fire pit. And yet I felt a darkness creeping over me, even as I stood in the broad daylight of the meadows.

I paused before the pit, the castle at my back and a mountain of old broken furniture before me, waiting for a flame. But there was a whisper in the wind, cold and sharp from the mountains. And the dark words rose up like a hiss in the rasping of the grass, like a curse in the groaning of the oaks.

Where are you, Aodhan?

I shut my eyes, focused on what was truth, what was real … the rhythm of my pulse, the solidness of earth beneath me, the distant sound of my people’s voices.

The voice came again, young yet cruel, accompanied by the stench of something burning, the overwhelming smell of refuse.

Where are you, Aodhan?

“Lord Aodhan?”

I opened my eyes and turned, relieved to see Seamus bearing pieces of a stool. I helped him toss the remains into the pit and then together we silently walked back to the courtyard, where Derry had already patched the Declan hole with a new, nameless stone.

“Aileen has been looking for you,” Seamus finally said, guiding me back into the foyer.

I noticed how quiet and empty it was, and followed the thane into the hall.

Everyone had already gathered, waiting for me to arrive.

I took one step into the hall and stopped upright, surprised by its transformation.

There was a fire burning in the hearth, and the trestle tables were arranged and set with mismatched pewter and wooden trenchers. Corogan wildflowers had been harvested from the meadows, woven together to make a blue garland for the tables. Candles cast light over the platters of food—most of it was bread and cheese and pickled vegetables, but someone had found the time to roast a couple of lambs—and the floors beneath me gleamed like a burnished coin. But what truly caught my eye was the banner that now hung over the mantel.

The Morgane sigil. It was blue as a midsummer sky, with a gray horse stitched over the center.

I stood among my people in the hall, staring at the symbol I had been born to wear, the symbol my mother and sister had been slain beneath, the symbol I had bled to reawaken.

“The swift are born for the longest night,” Seamus began, his voice resounding in the hall. These words were sacred, the motto of our House, and I watched as he turned to me, set a silver chalice of ale into my hands. “For they shall be the first to meet the light.”

I held the chalice, held on to those words, for I felt as if I was falling down some long tunnel, and I did not know when I was to meet the bottom.

“To the swift!” Derry shouted, raising his cup.

“To Lord Morgane,” Aileen added, standing on one of the benches so she could see me over the crowd.

They held their cups to me, and I held mine to theirs.

For appearances’ sake, I appeared calm and joyful, drinking to the health of this hall. But within, I was trembling from the weight of it.

I heard the whisper again, rising from the shadows in the corner. I heard it over the cheers and clamor as dinner began, as I was led to the dais.

Where are you, Aodhan?

Who are you? I inwardly growled back to it, my mind tensing as I sat in my chair.

It faded, as if it had never been. I wondered if I was hearing things, if I was beginning to lose my wits with exhaustion.

But then Aileen set the finest mutton chop on my plate, and I watched the red juices begin to pearl on the plate. And I knew.

Those words had once been spoken in this castle, twenty-five years ago. They had come from the person who had ripped this castle apart, trying to find my sister, trying to find me.

Declan Lannon.

Lord MacQuinn’s Territory, Castle Fionn

Brienna

The last thing I expected was for one of the weavers to come knocking at my door that evening.

I had managed to take down a few grievances among the women-at-arms, those who I had fought alongside during the battle. But after overhearing the conversation at the loom house, I did not approach any others. I spent the remainder of the day trying to appear useful, trying not to compare my scant list of grievances with the great tome that Luc had accumulated.

I was more than ready to retire for bed after dinner.

I sat before the fire with woolen stockings pulled up to my knees and two letters perched on my lap. One letter was from Merei, but the other was from my half brother, Sean, who I was supposed to persuade to alliance with Isolde Kavanagh. Both letters had arrived that afternoon, surprising me; Merei’s because she must have written it the day after she departed Maevana, and Sean’s because it was entirely unexpected. The question of the Allenachs’ allegiance was a constant simmer in the back of my mind, but I had not yet determined a way to address it. So why was Sean writing me, of his own accord?

October 9, 1566

Brienna,

I am sorry to be writing you so soon after the battle, because I know that you are still trying to adjust to your new home and family. But I wanted to thank you—for remaining with me when I was injured, for sitting with me despite what others might have thought of you. Your bravery to defy our father has inspired me in many measures, the first being to do my best to redeem the House of Allenach. I believe there are good people here, but I am overwhelmed with how to begin purging the corruption and cruelty that has been encouraged for decades. I do not think I can do this on my own, and I wondered if you would be willing to at least write to me for now, to pass some ideas and thoughts on how I should begin to right the wrongs committed by this House …

There was a hesitant rap on my door. Startled, I quickly folded my brother’s letter and hid it within one of my books.

So the Allenachs, as far as my brother was concerned, would not be too difficult to persuade.

I pushed the relief aside as I opened the door, perplexed to see a young girl.

“Mistress Brienna?” she whispered, and I recognized her voice. It was sweet and musical, the voice that had remarked I was pretty when I eavesdropped on the weavers’ hall.

“Yes?”

“May I come in?” She cast a glance down the corridor, as if she was worried she would be discovered here.

I took a step back, wordlessly inviting her inside. I shut the door behind her, and the two of us returned to sit before the fire, awkward and adjacent to each other.

She was wringing her pale hands, her mouth quirked to the side as she stared at the fire, as I tried not to stare at her. She was thin and angular with wispy blond hair, and her face was scarred by the pox—tiny white flecks dotted her cheeks like snow.

Just as I was drawing breath to speak, she brought her eyes to mine and said, “I must apologize for what you overhead today. I saw you through the window leaving in a hurry. And I felt horrible that you had come to us and we were speaking of you in such a way.”

“I must be the one to apologize,” I said. “I should have announced myself. It was wrong for me to linger at the door without your knowledge.”

But the girl shook her head. “No, Mistress. That does not excuse our words.”

But you were the only one to speak well of me, and yet you are the one to come and ask for forgiveness, I thought.

“May I ask why you came to see us today?” she inquired.

I hesitated before saying, “Yes, of course. Lord MacQuinn has asked me to help gather grievances of the people. To take to the Lannon trial next week.”

“Oh.” She sounded surprised. Her hand fluttered up to her hair, and she absently wrapped the ends around her finger, a slight frown on her face. “I am sixteen, so Allenach was the only lord I ever knew. But the other women … they remember what it was like before Lord MacQuinn fled. Most of their grievances are held against Lord Allenach, not the Lannons.”

I looked to the fire, a poor attempt to hide how much this conversation rattled me.

“But you are not Allenach’s daughter,” she said, and I had no choice but to meet her gaze. “You are Davin MacQuinn’s daughter. I have only thought of you as such.”

“I am glad to hear that,” I said. “I know that it is difficult for others here to regard me that way.”

Again, I was overcome with the cowardly urge to flee, to leave this place, to cross the channel and sink into Valenia, where no one knew whose daughter I was. Forget about establishing a House of Knowledge here; I could easily do such in Valenia.

“My name is Neeve,” she said after a moment, extending a beacon of friendship to me.

It nearly brought tears to my eyes. “It is a pleasure to meet you, Neeve.”

“I do not have a grievance for you to write down,” Neeve said. “But there is something else. I wanted to see if you could write down a few of my memories from the dark years, so one day I can pass them down to my daughter. I want her to know the history of this land, what it was like before the queen returned.”

I smiled. “I would be more than happy to do that for you, Neeve.” I rose to gather my supplies, dragging my writing table before the fire. “What would you like me to record?”

“I suppose I should start at the beginning. My name is Neeve MacQuinn. I was born to Lara the weaver and Ian the cooper in the spring of 1550, the year of storms and darkness …”

I began to transcribe, word for word, pressing her memories into ink on the page. I soaked in her stories, for I longed to understand what life had been like during “the dark years,” as the people here referred to the time of Jourdain’s absence. And I found that I was grieved as well as relieved, for while Neeve was forbidden some things, she was protected from others. Not once had Lord Allenach physically harmed her, or allowed his men to do so. In fact, he never once looked at her or spoke to her. It was the older women and men who were given the harsher punishments, to make them bend and cower and submit, to make them forget MacQuinn.

“I suppose I should stop for now,” she said after a while. “I’m sure that is more than enough for you to have written down.”

My hand was cramped and my neck was beginning to tighten from stooping over the desk. I realized she had talked beyond an hour, and we had accumulated twenty pages of her life. I set down my quill and bent my fingers back and dared to say, “Neeve? Would you like to learn how to read and write?”

She blinked, astonished. “Oh, I don’t think I would have the time, Mistress.”

“We can make time.”

She smiled, as if I had lit a flame within her. “Yes, yes, I would like that very much! Only …” Her delight faded. “Could we keep the lessons secret? At least for now?”

I couldn’t deny that I was saddened by her query, knowing that she would not want others learning of our time together. But I thought again on ways I could prove myself to the MacQuinns—I needed to be patient with them, to let them come into their trust of me in their own time—and I smiled, stacking the pages together, handing them to her. “Why don’t we begin tomorrow night? After dinner? And yes, we can keep it a secret.”

Neeve nodded. Her eyes widened as she took the pages, as she gazed down at my handwriting, tracing it with her fingertip.

And as I regarded her, I helplessly thought back to what I had overheard that morning. I believe she is part Valenian, one of the weavers had said of me. They were seeing me as either southern or as an Allenach. I worried this would always set me apart from the MacQuinns no matter how much I might attempt to prove myself to them.

“Neeve,” I said, an idea coming to mind. “Perhaps you can teach me something in return.”

She glanced up, shocked. “Oh?”

“I want to know more about the MacQuinns, about your beliefs, your folklore, and your traditions.”

I want to become one of you, I almost begged. Teach me how.

I already harbored head knowledge of the MacQuinn House, courtesy of Cartier and his teachings at Magnalia House. I knew their history, the sort that could be found in an old, dusty tome. They were given the blessing of Steadfast, their sigil was that of a falcon, their colors were lavender and gold, and their people were respected as the most skilled of weavers in all the realm. But what I lacked was knowledge of the heart, the social mores of MacQuinns. What were their courtships like? Their weddings? Their funerals? What sort of food did they serve at birthdays? Did they harbor superstitions? What was their etiquette?

“I don’t know if I am the best one to teach you such things,” Neeve said, but I could see how pleased she was that I had asked her.

“Why don’t you tell me about one of your favorite MacQuinn traditions?” I offered.

Neeve was quiet for a moment, and then a smile emerged on her lips.

“Did you know that if we decide to marry someone beyond the MacQuinn House, we have to choose them with a ribbon?”

I was instantly intrigued. “A ribbon?”

“Or, perhaps I should say that the ribbon chooses for us,” Neeve said. “It is a test, so we may determine who is worthy beyond our House.”

I settled back in my chair, waiting for more.

“The tradition began a long time ago,” Neeve started. “I do not know if you are familiar with our tapestries or not …”

“I’ve heard that the MacQuinns are known to be the best weavers in Maevana.”

“Aye. So much so that we began to hide a golden ribbon in the tapestry wefts as we wove. A skilled weaver can make the ribbon melt into the design, so that it is very difficult to find.”

“Every MacQuinn tapestry holds a hidden ribbon, then?” I asked, still very confused as to how this corresponded to choosing a mate.

Neeve’s smile widened. “Yes. And this is how the tradition began. The first lord of MacQuinn had only one daughter, one that he loved so greatly he did not believe any man—MacQuinn or beyond—would ever be worthy of her. So he had the weavers hide a ribbon within a tapestry they were making, knowing that it would take the most determined, dedicated of men to find it. When the lord’s daughter came of age, man after man arrived to the hall, desperate to win her favor. But Lord MacQuinn called forth the tapestry and his daughter challenged the men to bring her the golden ribbon hidden in the wefts. And man after man could not find it. By the time the twentieth man arrived, Lord MacQuinn believed the lad would only last an hour. But the man stood in the hall for one hour searching, and then one hour turned into two, until evening stretched into dawn. By the first light of the sun, the man had pulled the ribbon from the tapestry. He was a Burke, of all people, and yet Lord MacQuinn said he was more than worthy should his daughter choose to marry him.”

“And did the daughter choose him?” I asked.

“Of course she did. And that is why to this day we MacQuinns think twice before challenging the Burkes to a competition, because they’re a stubborn old lot.”

I laughed; the sound provoked Neeve to join me, until we sat before the fire wiping our eyes. I couldn’t remember the last time I had felt so lighthearted.

“I think I like that tradition,” I eventually said.

“Yes. And you should use it yourself, if you decide to take a mate outside of the MacQuinns,” Neeve stated. “Unless, that is, the handsome Lord of Morgane is already your secret beau.”

My smile widened, and I felt my cheeks warm. She must have noticed it last night, when Cartier had sat beside me at dinner. Neeve raised her brows at me, waiting.

“Lord Morgane is an old friend of mine,” I found myself saying. “He was my instructor in Valenia.”

“For the passion?” Neeve asked. “What does that mean, exactly?”

I began to explain it to her, inwardly struck with the worry that she would find the passion study frivolous. But Neeve seemed hungry to hear of it, as I had been to hear of her traditions. I would have kept talking deep into the night had we not heard voices in the hall. The sound seemed to jar her, reminding her that she was here in my chamber secretly, that she had been here for well over an hour.

“I should probably go,” Neeve said, hugging the stack of paper to her heart. “Before my absence is noted.”

We stood together, nearly the same height.

“Thank you, Mistress, for writing this for me,” she whispered.

“You’re welcome, Neeve. I shall see you tomorrow night, then?”

She nodded and quietly slipped out into the corridor as if she were nothing more than a shadow.

My body was exhausted, and yet my mind was brimming with what had just happened tonight, with all that Neeve had said to me. I knew if I lay down, sleep would evade me. So I tossed another log on the fire and sat before the hearth, my writing table still before me spread with paper and quill and ink. I found Merei’s letter and tore it open gently, the wax seal of a musical note catching beneath my nail.

Dearest Bri,

Yes, I know you’ll be surprised by this letter coming to you so soon. But didn’t someone vow they would “write me every hour of every day”? (Because I’m still waiting on that mountain of letters you promised me!)

I’m currently sitting at a lopsided table at an old leaky tavern in the city of Isotta, right by the harbor, and it smells of fish and wine and a man’s terrible cologne. If you hold your nose to this parchment, you can probably smell it—it’s that strong. There’s also a one-eyed tabby cat that keeps glaring at me, trying to lick the grease from my dinner. Despite all of this chaos, I have a moment before I’m supposed to meet up with my consort, and I wanted to write you.

I just disembarked from my ship, and it’s hard to believe I just left you behind in Maevana as a lord’s daughter, that I just saw you yesterday, that the revolution you and Cartier drew me into has done everything you dreamt it would. Ah, Bri! If only we’d known what was to come that night at the summer solstice four months ago, when we were both so worried we would fail our passion! And how long ago that time feels now. I confess, I wish you and I could go back to Magnalia, just for a day.

Old memories aside, I do have a little snippet of news that I think you will find interesting. You know how taverns attract the salt of the earth? Well, I overheard quite a few of them talking about Maevana’s revolution, about Queen Isolde returning to the throne and the Lannons being in chains awaiting trial. (It took everything within me to remain quiet and sip my wine.) Quite a few people here think it is marvelous that a queen has taken back the northern crown, but there are a few who are nervous. I think they worry unrest might spread to Valenia, that some here will dare to contemplate a coup against King Phillipe. Valenians are very curious and will be watching the north in the upcoming weeks, eager to hear how things are resolved with the Lannons. I’ve heard talk center on everything from beheadings to torture to making all of the Lannons walk over flames so that they slowly burn to death. Let me know the truth of what actually happens, and I will have to keep you abreast with such gossip and developments here in the south, but it only makes me miss you more.

I need to wrap this up, and you know I am going to ask these three vital questions (so you had better answer them all!):

First, what does your cloak look like?

Second, how good of a kisser is Cartier?

Third, when can you come visit Valenia?

Write me soon!

Love,

Merei

PS: Oh! I almost forgot. The sheet of music in this letter is for your brother. He asked me to send it to him. Please do pass it on to him, with my regards!—M

I read the letter a second time, my spirits lifting. I reached for my half-written letter I had begun that morning, and then decided to start it over. I asked Merei about her consort, where they were traveling to next, what sort of people and parties had she played her music for. I answered her three “vital” questions with as much grace as I could—my cloak is beautiful, stitched with the constellation of Aviana; I should hopefully visit Valenia sometime in the next few months when things settle here (prepare for me to bunk with you wherever you are); Cartier is a terribly good kisser—and then I told her about the grievances: that I was still struggling to fit in here, that I thought about her and Valenia nearly more than I could bear. Before I could hem my worries, I wrote them down, as smoothly as if I were speaking them to her, as if she were sitting in this room with me.

And yet I already knew what she would say to me:

You are a daughter of Maevana. You are made of ancient songs and stars and steel.

I stopped writing, staring at the words until they blurred in my weary sight. And yet I could almost hear the echo of Merei’s music, as if she were only playing down the hall, as if I were still at Magnalia with her. I closed my eyes, homesick yet again, but then I listened to the hiss of the fire, to the sounds of laughter drifting down the corridor, the howl of the wind beyond my window, and I thought, This is my home. This is my family. And one day, I will belong here; one day, I will feel like a daughter of MacQuinn.

Lord Morgane’s Territory, Castle Brígh

Cartier

I’ve invited Lady and Lord Dermott to stay with us next week,” I said to Aileen one morning, the Lannons’ trial steadily growing closer by the day.

“Lady and Lord Dermott?” Aileen repeated, her voice a touch too shrill for my liking. “Here?”

We both glanced around to the broken windows and empty rooms.

I had written to the Dermotts, inviting them to lodge at Castle Brígh on their journey down to the trial. And I thought that I had given myself enough time to finish restoring the castle for proper visitors, as well as to get my plans in place for wooing the Dermotts into a public alliance with the queen. But by the look on Aileen’s face … I realized I had bitten off more than I could swallow.

“I apologize,” I said in a rush. “I realize we are not best suited for visitors at the moment.” But this alliance must be done quickly, I wanted to add but nipped it before the words could emerge, as Aileen arched her brow at me.

“Does this mean you are positioning me as the castle chamberlain?” she inquired, a faint smile in her eyes.

“Aye, Aileen.”

“Then don’t worry, Lord Aodhan,” she said, touching my arm. “We shall get this castle ready in seven days.”

Later that afternoon, I found myself standing in the office with Thane Seamus, both of us trying to decide how we would repair the hole in the roof, when Tomas came hopping into the room, his injured foot cocked back.

“Milord,” the boy said, tugging at my sleeve. “There’s a—”

“Lad, do not tug on the lord’s sleeve,” Seamus gently scolded, and Tomas’s face flushed as he jumped back to put some proper distance between us.

“It’s all right,” I said, glancing down at Tomas. The boy had made himself scarce the past two days, as if he had been overwhelmed by all the people now gathered in the castle. “Let me finish this, and then you and I can talk.”

Tomas nodded and hopped from the room. I watched him go, noticing how his shoulders were stooped.

“My lord Aodhan, you need to instruct young ones like him to respect you,” Seamus said with a sigh. “Or else he will constantly be out of line.”

“Yes, well, as far as I know, he is an orphan,” I said. “And I want him to feel at home with us.”

Seamus said nothing. And I wondered if I was wrong to think such—I knew nothing of raising children—but I did not have time to stand and ponder it. I returned to talking about roof repairs, sorting Tomas to the back of my mind.

Half an hour later, Seamus left to begin overseeing repairs to the alehouse, about a fifteen-minute ride but still on the property, after Aileen had admonished that “we cannot have Lady and Lord Dermott here without proper ale.” I could not fault her for ranking drink above proper beds and glass windows, and I departed the office in search of Tomas. The boy seemed to disappear at will, slipping into shadows and finding the best hiding places.

I went to the hall first, where some of the women were working at trestle tables around a pot of tea, sewing curtains and quilts for the guest chambers. Their laughter hushed at the sight of me, their gazes softening as they watched me approach.

“Good afternoon. Have you seen Tomas?” I asked. “He’s about yea high, with red hair.”

“Yes, we saw him, Lord Aodhan,” one of the women said, her fingers working a needle through the fabric all the while. “He’s with the lass with the blue cloak.”

Brienna.

I startled; it was like my heart was on a string, yanking through me at the mere thought of her.

“Thank you,” I said and rushed from the hall, the women’s whispers chasing my heels as I emerged into the courtyard. From there I hurried to the stables, but there was no trace of Brienna. One of the grooms informed me that she had just been there with Tomas, speaking of honey cakes, and so I returned to the castle through the kitchens, where a tray of honey cakes was cooling on the windowsill, two of them noticeably missing …

I walked back toward the office, my tread quiet on the stone floors; I could hear Brienna’s voice drift into the corridor as she talked to Tomas.

“So I began to dig, just beneath the tree.”

“With your bare hands?” Tomas eagerly asked.

“No, silly boy. With a spade. I had stowed it away in my pocket, and—”

“Your pocket? Dresses have pockets?”

“Of course they do. Don’t you think women need a place to hide a thing or two?”

“I suppose so. What happened next?” Tomas insisted.

“I dug until I found the locket.”

I gently pushed the door open, almost hesitant to interrupt this moment. The door creaked, as everything in this castle did, alerting them of my arrival, and I stood on the threshold, gazing down at them.

There was no furniture in the office. Brienna and Tomas were seated on the floor in a ring of sunlight, legs outstretched as they leaned back on their hands.

Brienna quieted as she met my gaze.

“I tried to tell you, milord!” Tomas hurried to say, as if he was worried he would be in trouble. “Mistress Brienna arrived, but you sent me away before I could.”

“Yes, and I apologize, Tomas,” I said, moving to join their circle on the floor. “Next time, I will listen.”

“Are you ill, milord?” The boy frowned as he studied me. “You look like you have a fever.”

I conceded to chuckle, and wiped my brow again. “No, I am not ill. I merely chased the two of you around the property.”

“I brought her back here to you, milord.”

“Mm-hmm. I should have waited here, then.” My eyes helplessly shifted to Brienna. Her hair spilled over her shoulders and her face was flushed from the ride, her eyes bright. Her cloak was knotted at her collar; the dark blue spread around her, basking in the light.

“I was just telling Tomas the story about how I found the stone,” she said, amused.

“What happened next?” Tomas insisted, directing his attention back to her.

“Well, the Stone of Eventide was within the locket,” Brienna continued. “And I had to hide it in my … ah, in my dress.”

“In your pocket, you mean?” Tomas suggested, propping his chin in his palm.

“Yes. Something like that.” She glanced back to me with a wry smile.

“What does the stone look like?” he asked.

“Like a large moonstone.”

“I’ve seen a few moonstones,” the boy remarked. “What else?”

“The Eventide changes colors. I believe it reads the moods of the one who bears it.”

“But only the Kavanaghs can wear it without the locket, right?”

“Yes,” Brienna said. “It would burn people like you and me.”

Tomas finally became quiet, mulling over what we had told him. My gaze traced Brienna again, and I softly suggested, “Tomas? Why don’t you go see if Cook needs another hand in the kitchen?”

Tomas groaned. “But I want to hear the rest of Mistress Brienna’s story.”

“There will be another day for stories. Go along now.”

Tomas huffed to his feet, hobbling his way out.

“You should get him a little crutch before he tears those stitches you gave him,” Brienna said. “I had to carry him on my back.”

“You what?”

“Don’t look so surprised, Cartier. The boy’s nothing but skin and bones.”

The silence stretched between us. I felt pricked by guilt.

“I don’t know who he belongs to,” I finally said. “I discovered him the other night. I think he had been squatting here.”

“Maybe one day he will tell you where he comes from,” she responded.

I sighed, leaning back on my hands, regarding her once more. There was an echo of a bang, followed by Cook’s distant shouting. I could hear Tomas defiantly shouting back, and I groaned.

“I don’t know what I’m doing, Brienna.” I closed my eyes, that weight coming over me again. Weight of the land, weight of the people, weight of the Dermott alliance, weight of the impending trial. Months ago, I would have never imagined myself in such a state.

Brienna moved closer to me; I listened to the whisper of her dress, felt her block the sun as she sat before me, her hands on my knees. I opened my eyes to see the light crowning her, and for a moment it was simply her and me and no one else in the world.

“There is no guidebook for this,” she said. “But your people have gathered about you, Cartier. They are wonderful and they are dedicated. They don’t expect you to have all the answers, or to settle into your role by tonight. It will take some time.”

I did not know what to say, but her words reassured me. I took her hands in mine—our palms aligned; our fingers linked. I noticed the ink stains on her right hand.

“You’ve been busy writing, I see.”

She smiled wanly. “Yes. Jourdain asked me to begin gathering grievances.”

That took me somewhat by surprise. It felt too soon to be gathering up that darkness; we had just arrived back home, becoming reacquainted with what our lives were supposed to be. But then I reminded myself that the trial was in a matter of days. Of course, I should be gathering up my people’s grievances, as well. I should begin penning my own. Which meant I needed to fully confront what had happened in detail that night. Because while I knew some truth, I did not know the whole of it. I did not know who had given the killing blow to my sister, or the full extent of violence that was done to the Morgane people.

And then there was my mother’s letter, which I continued to carry around in my pocket, uncertain what to make of it. I had Lannon blood in my veins; did I need to acknowledge this truth or conceal it?

I broke from those thoughts to see Brienna was watching me.

“Have you written many grievances down?” I asked.

“Luc has collected quite a tome.”

“And why haven’t you?”

She glanced away from me, and a dark suspicion began to cloud my mind.

“Brienna … tell me.”

“What is there to tell, Cartier?” And she gave me a false smile, one that did not reach her eyes.

“You were never a good dramatic,” I reminded her.

“It is truly nothing.” She tried to slip her hands from mine, but I tightened my hold on her.

If she would not speak it, then I would. “Jourdain’s people have not been welcoming to you.”

I knew it was the truth, because there was a flicker of pain in her gaze before she covered it up with irritation.

“What have they said to you, Brienna?” I pressed on, my anger rising at the thought. “Have they been unkind?”

“No. It’s what I should have expected,” she countered, as if defending them, as if it was her fault, that she could control who she had descended from.

“Does Jourdain know?”

“No. And I would ask you not to tell him, Cartier.”

“Don’t you think your father should know his people are slighting you? That his people are slighting his daughter?”

“They aren’t slighting me. And if they were, I would not want Jourdain to know.” She freed her hands from mine and rose, turning to face the window. “He has enough on his mind as it is. And I would think you would understand that.”

I did understand it. And yet more than anything, I wanted Brienna to feel like she belonged here. It was nearly the shadow of all my other thoughts—for her to be accepted, for her to find happiness. I wanted her to claim her home in Maevana, this wild land that she and I had once spoken of in lessons. Half of her heritage was in this soil, and I did not care which territory it had risen from.

I stood, wiping the dust from my breeks. I approached her slowly, coming to stand just behind her, just as I could feel her warmth. We were quiet, our gazes to the land beyond the broken glass, the meadows and the woods and the hillocks that rose into mountains.

“They see me as Allenach’s. Not as MacQuinn’s,” she said quietly. “They believe I fooled their lord into adopting me.”

And it broke me to hear her acknowledge it. I could have said countless things to her in return, the foremost being that I never saw her as an Allenach, that I had only seen her for who she was—a daughter of Maevana and a beloved friend to the queen. But I held the words down.

She finally turned to face me, her gaze lifting to mine.

“They only need a little more time,” she whispered. “Time for my blood father’s memory to fade, for me to prove myself to them.”

She was right. We all needed time—time to settle, time to heal, time to discover who we were supposed to become.

And all I could say was her name, spoken as if in prayer.

“Brienna.”

My hand rose; my fingers traced the edge of her jaw. I wanted to memorize her, to explore her lines and her bends. And yet my fingers stopped at her chin, to tilt her face up, to watch the sunlight dance across her cheeks.

Her breath caught, and I leaned down to draw it from her. I kissed her softly once, twice, until she opened her mouth beneath mine and I discovered that she was just as hungry as I was. I suddenly found my hands in her hair, my fingers tangled in the silk of it, lost in the desire to fully surrender to her.

“Cartier.” She tried to speak my name; I drank the sound from her lips. I felt her hands move up my back and take fistfuls of my shirt, tugging. She was warning me, because I could now hear the footsteps scuffing loudly, just beyond the office door.

I struggled to break away from her, my breath shallow as I somehow recovered enough to whisper, “You taste like a stolen honey cake, Brienna MacQuinn.”

She smiled, laughter in her eyes. “Does nothing evade the lord of the Swift?”

“Not when it comes to you.” I dared to kiss her again, before whoever it was reached the office, but something sharp pressed into my leg. Surprised, I leaned back and traced my hand down to her skirts, to her thigh. There was the hard shape of a dirk beneath the fabric, and I met her gaze, speechless yet deeply pleased she was wearing a concealed blade.

“Yes, well,” she all but stammered, her cheeks flushing. “We women can’t hide everything in our pockets, now, can we?”

Lord MacQuinn’s Territory, Castle Fionn

Brienna

I planned to skip dinner in the hall that night, to prepare for Neeve’s first reading lessons. I was carrying a tray of soup and bread to my chambers, reflecting on how nice the afternoon had been visiting Cartier and his people, when Jourdain loomed before me out of the shadows.

“Saints, Father!” I almost spilled dinner down the front of my dress. “You should know better than to sneak up on me!”

“Where are you going?” he asked, frowning at my tray of food.

“My room,” I drawled. “Where else?”

Jourdain took the tray from my hands and passed it to a servant who just so happened to walk by at that moment.

“I was going to eat that.”

Jourdain, though, did not seem to hear my exasperation. He waited until the servant disappeared around the bend, and then he took my hand and pulled me along to my bedchamber, shutting the door behind us.

“There’s a problem,” he finally said, his voice hoarse.

“What sort of problem, Father?” I tried to read the lines in his brow, to prepare myself for anything.

“Tell me all that you know of the House of Halloran, Brienna.”

I stood frozen before him. “The Hallorans?” I cleared my throat, still caught off guard by Jourdain’s request and trying to remember everything Cartier had taught me. “Queen Liadan gave them the blessing of the Upright. They are known for their orchards and their steel goods—they craft the finest swords in Maevana. Their colors are yellow and navy; their sigil is of an ibex standing in a ring of juniper. Their territory is known as the hinge of Maevana, as it is the only one to touch seven neighboring territories. They historically had a strong alliance with the Dunns and the Fitzsimmonses, which was broken when the Lannons took the throne. Since then, they have pledged their allegiance to the House wielding all the power.” I paused, feeling the constraint again of my head knowledge. “I can recite their noble lineage if that is what you are seeking. Even the bastard daughters and sons.”

“So the name Pierce Halloran should mean something to you,” Jourdain said.

“Yes. Pierce Halloran is the youngest of Lady Halloran’s three sons. Why?”

“Because he is here,” my father all but growled.

I could not hide my surprise. “Pierce Halloran is here, at Fionn? How come?”

But I had a suspicion as to why. The Lannons were our prisoners. The Hallorans’ alliance with them had begun to crumble …

“He wants to get a look at you.”

“He wants to look at me?”

“He wants to present himself as a suitor to you,” Jourdain amended, as it would have been phrased in Valenia.

This revelation shocked me at first. But then the shock dissipated as I began to strategize.

“My, he must think he is very clever,” I stated, which thankfully loosened the tension that had been building in Jourdain.

“So you see what I see in this?” my father said, his shoulders sagging a bit.

“Of course.” I crossed my arms, glancing to the fire. “The Hallorans have been in bed with the Lannons for over a hundred years. And that bed has just been overturned. By us.” I felt Jourdain watching me, hanging on to my words. “The Hallorans are scrambling right now, as they should. They are seeking an alliance with the strongest House.”

“Aye, aye,” Jourdain said, nodding. “And we must tread very carefully, Brienna.”

“Yes, I agree.”

I took a moment to sort through my thoughts, to weave a plan together, walking about my room, absently touching the braids in my hair. I had decided to start plaiting my hair, as many of the MacQuinn women did. Warrior braids, as I liked to think of them.

When I came to stand before Jourdain once more, I saw a slight smile on his face.

“By the gods,” he said, shaking his head at me. “I never thought I would be so happy to see that scheming gleam in your eyes.”

I grinned and playfully laid my hand over my heart. “Ah, Father. You wound me. Why wouldn’t you be happy to hear of my plans?”

“Because they give me gray hairs, Brienna,” he responded with a chuckle.

“Then perhaps you should sit for this.”

He obeyed, taking the chair Neeve had graced the night before, and I sat beside him in my favorite armchair, our boots stretched out to the fire.

“All right, Father. Here are my thoughts. The Hallorans are seeking to form an alliance with us through marriage to me. I cannot say that I fault them for their effort. I’m certain they were tools of the Lannons during the past twenty-five years. And the political landscape of Maevana is dramatically shifting. The Hallorans need to rebrand themselves, to win the favor of the queen in some way. Marriage is one of the easiest yet strongest ways to forge a new alliance, hence why Pierce has shown up on our threshold.”

“Brienna … please do not tell me that you are considering this,” Jourdain said, covering his eyes for a moment.

“Of course not!”

He dropped his hand and let out a relieved huff. “Good. Because I do not know what to think about this! More than anything, I would like to spit on the gifts Pierce brought us, to send him off with a kick to the breeks. But both of us know that we cannot afford to be so rash, Brienna.”

“No, we cannot,” I agreed. “The Hallorans want to ally with us. Should we let them?”

We were both quiet, contemplating all the possibilities.

I broke the silence first. “We were just discussing alliances, rivalries. The four of us sat down and parsed out Houses to win over for Isolde. We are still trying to decide what to do with the Lannon people, but what about the Carran House, the Halloran House?” I shrugged, betraying my uncertainty. “It nearly makes me ill to think about letting them join our fold. They thrived the past twenty-five years while so many of your people suffered. But if we refuse them … what sort of ramifications come with that?”

“There is no way to be certain,” my father responded. “All I can say now is, I do not want the Hallorans in our alliance. I do not trust them.”

“You think they would deceive us?”

Jourdain met my gaze. “I know that they would.”

I tapped my fingers along my knees, anxious. “So we cannot outright deny them. But I still need to give Pierce Halloran an answer.”

Jourdain went very still, staring at me. “All I ask—if you would heed me as your father—is that you would not play games with him. Do not do anything that would put yourself at risk, daughter.”

“I would not assume to play Pierce in a romantic way. But as I just said, I need to answer him.”

“Can you not simply tell him you are with Aodhan Morgane?” Jourdain spouted.

“Cartier needs to appear as a lord with no weakness.” It almost sounded harsh, but the words hovered in the air between my father and me as truth; the people we loved were always a weakness. “And the fact that Cartier, essentially, has nothing—no living family, no spouse, no children—sets him higher than us in this game of politics.”

I watched Jourdain as his eyes glazed for a moment. I worried that he was thinking of himself, of his wife, Sive, of how he had lost her.

“I simply want for you to be happy, Brienna,” he eventually whispered, and his confession nearly wrung my heart.

I reached forward to take his hands in mine. “And I thank you for that, Father. After the trial—after Isolde is crowned and we have a better understanding of how everything is going to settle—Cartier and I will make it known.”

Jourdain nodded, looking down at our linked hands. “So, daughter. How will you answer Pierce Halloran tonight?”

“How I will begin to answer every man beyond this House who wishes to earn my favor as a suitor.”

Jourdain went still, soaking in my words, slowly understanding. His eyes lifted, meeting mine, and I saw the surprise within him.

“Oh? And how is that?” But he already knew.

A smile warmed my voice. “I will ask Pierce Halloran to bring me the golden ribbon from a tapestry.”

Every MacQuinn showed up for dinner that night in the hall.

There was hardly an empty space at the tables, and the great room soon grew stifling from the fire in the hearth, from the inspirations of so many curious people, from the fact that I was sitting beside Pierce Halloran at the lord’s table.

He was exactly as I expected: handsome in a sharp, unforgiving way, with eyes that flickered with deceptive languidness. And he liked to set that ruthless gaze on me, I soon found. He traced the braids in my hair, the neckline of my dress, the curves of my body. He was weighing my physical attractiveness, as if that were all to me.

You are a fool, I thought halfway through the meal as I took a steady sip of my ale, his eyes resting on me again. He was too preoccupied to entertain the thought that I might be plotting something detrimental to him.

I smiled into my goblet, just for a moment.

“And what is humoring you, Brienna MacQuinn?” Pierce asked, noticing.

I set down my ale and looked at him. “Oh, I just remembered that the tailor is sewing a new dress for me on the morrow, one with white fur on the trim. I am excited to see its design, of course.”

From his place two chairs down, Luc snorted and then hastily tried to cover it up by pounding on his chest, like he was choking. Pierce glanced at my brother, brow arched. Luc finally quieted, waving in apology, and Pierce set his focus on me again, wolfishly grinning.

“I should like to see you in white fur.”

To which a second coughing fit began, this time from Jourdain, who was on my other side. Poor Father, I thought, his knuckles white as he gripped his fork.

Jourdain spared me a swift glace, and I saw the spark of warning in his eyes. I was playing Pierce too well, then.

I reached for the plate of bread. Pierce reached for it as well, our fingers bumping.

“Shall I cut you another slice?” he asked with feigned politeness, his eyes, unsurprisingly, on my décolletage.

But my eyes were on something else entirely. His sleeve had ridden slightly up his wrist, and there was a dark tattoo on his pale skin, just over the faint blue shadows of his veins. It looked like a D with the center filled in. An odd thing to permanently etch on one’s skin.

“Yes, thank you,” I said, forcing my gaze to shift before he saw that I noticed his strange mark.

Pierce set a slice of rye bread on my plate, and I knew it was almost time, that I had let this dinner drag on long enough.

“May I ask why you have come to visit us, Pierce Halloran?”

Pierce took a long sip of ale; I saw the gleam of perspiration on his brow, and I tried not to revel in the fact that he was barely concealing his worry and nerves.

“I brought you a gift,” he said, setting his goblet down. His hand swept to the other side of the table, where two broad swords sat on the oak, resting in gilded sheaths. They were, perhaps, two of the most beautiful swords I had ever beheld, and it had taken all of my restraint not to touch them, not to unsheathe one of the blades. “I also brought one for your father.”

Jourdain made no reply. He was doing a rather poor job of hiding his annoyance with Pierce.

“And why have you brought us such magnanimous gifts?” I inquired, my heart beginning to beat faster. I saw from the corner of my eye that Neeve was rising from the table, a few other weavers following her. They were preparing to bring the tapestry into the hall as we had planned.

Can you find me a tapestry whose golden ribbon can never be found? I had asked Neeve after scheming with Jourdain.

Neeve had looked surprised. Yes, of course I can. You need the tapestry so soon, then?

As soon as dinner tonight.

“I hope to win your favor, Brienna,” Pierce answered, finally looking me in the eye.

I merely stared at him; that minute dragged on for what felt like a year, and I tried not to squirm with discomfort.

He broke the stare first, because there was a commotion sprouting on the other side of the hall.

I didn’t have to look; I knew the weavers were bringing in the tapestry, that the men were aiding them in hanging it up so that both sides could be seen.

“And what is this?” Pierce asked, a sly smile at the corners of his mouth. “A gift for me, Brienna?”

I rose, not realizing that I was trembling until I walked around to the other side of the table, to stand between Pierce and the tapestry on the dais. I swallowed, my mouth suddenly going dry, and the hall grew oppressively quiet. I could feel the weight of all the gazes gathering upon me. The tapestry Neeve had chosen for me was exquisite: a maiden in the thrall of a garden, a sword resting over her knees as she sat among the flowers, her face tilted upward to the sky. She was haloed in light as if the gods were blessing her. Neeve could not have chosen a more suitable depiction.

“Lord Pierce,” I began. “First, let me thank you for troubling yourself by coming all the way to Castle Fionn, so soon after battle. You obviously had us on your mind this week.”

Pierce was still smiling, but his eyes narrowed on me. “I will make no more pretenses. I have come to seek your hand, Brienna MacQuinn, to win your favor as my wife. Do you accept my gift of the sword?”

He had certainly brought the best of his House, I thought, resisting the urge to admire the swords. And yet how dull his character was in comparison to the steel.

“I will assume that you do not know one of the traditions of our House,” I continued.

“What tradition?” Pierce ground out.

“That marrying beyond the MacQuinn House requires a challenge.”

He laughed, to cover up his uneasiness. “Very well. I shall play along with your games.”

He was making me out to be a child. I hardened myself to his insult, glancing over my shoulder to admire the tapestry.

“Within every MacQuinn tapestry lies a golden ribbon that the weaver has hidden among the wefts.” I paused to meet Pierce’s cold stare. “Bring me the golden ribbon that hides within this tapestry, and I will accept your sword and give you my favor.”

He stood at once, rattling the dishes on the table. By the swagger in his stride, he thought this would be very simple, that he would be able to study the intricate design and find the hidden ribbon.

I cast a glance to my father, to my brother. Jourdain looked like he was carved from stone, his ruddy face caught in a scowl, his hand curled in a fist beside his plate. Luc merely rolled his eyes as Pierce passed, pouring himself another cup of ale and settling in his chair as if preparing for great entertainment.

Pierce stood before the tapestry, his fingers at once going to the halo around the maiden’s face and hair, the most obvious place to hide something golden. But his five minutes of study turned into ten, and ten into thirty. Pierce Halloran lasted forty-five minutes before giving up, tossing his hands up in frustration.

“No man could find such a ribbon,” he scoffed.

“Then I am sorry, but I cannot accept your sword,” I said.

He gaped up at me; the shock morphed into a sneer when there was a sudden gust of applause. Half of the hall—half of the MacQuinns—were cheering, standing for me.

“Very well, then,” Pierce said, his voice surprisingly calm. He strode back up the dais, gathering the two swords he had brought. But then he walked over to me, to stand with his face terribly close to mine. I could smell the garlic on his breath; I could see the bloodshot veins in his eyes as he whispered, “You will regret this, Brienna MacQuinn.”

I wanted to respond, to whisper a threat back to him. But he turned so quickly he gave me no time, hastily departing the hall, his accompanying guard rising from their tables to follow him.

The excitement broke, and the MacQuinns who had cheered for me sat back down, resuming their dinner. I felt Neeve’s gaze; I looked to her, to see that she was grinning in delight. I tried to smile in return, but there was an older woman at her side who was regarding me with such disgust that I felt my relief melt, leaving me cold and worried.

“Well done,” Jourdain whispered.

I turned to see my father standing in my shadow; he took my elbow, as if he sensed I was about to drop.

“I greatly offended him,” I whispered back, the words scratching up my throat. “I did not realize he would be so angry.”

“What did he say to you, just before he left?” Jourdain asked.

“Nothing important,” I lied. I didn’t wish to repeat Pierce’s threat.

“Well, do not let him upset you,” my father said, guiding me back to my chair. “He’s nothing more than a pup with milk teeth who just had his bone taken away. We are the ones in power here.”

I prayed Jourdain was right. Because I did not know if I had just stomped on the serpent’s head or its tail.

Lord Morgane’s Territory, Castle Brígh

Cartier

It was time for me to write my grievances of the Lannons, and yet I did not know where to begin.

After dinner, I retreated to my chambers and sat at my mother’s desk—one of the few pieces of furniture I had insisted remain during the castle purge—and stared at a blank sheet of parchment, a quill in my hand, a vial of ink open and waiting.

It was freezing in my room; the windows were still broken, as I had chosen to replace the other, more prominent windows first. Even though Derry had boarded up the casements for now, I could hear the wind’s endless howl. I could feel the bitterness in the tiled floors, the darkness that seemed to have me by the ankles.

I am half Lannon. How am I to bear these grievances?

“Lord Aodhan.”

I turned in my chair, surprised to see Aileen holding a tea tray. I had not even heard her knocking or sensed her entrance.

“I thought you could use something warm,” she said, stepping forward to set the tray close by. “It feels like the winter king is overstepping the autumn prince tonight.”

“Thank you, Aileen.” I watched as she poured me a cup, and that was when I realized she had not just brought one mug but two.

She set my tea beside the blank page, and then poured herself a cup, drawing up a stool to sit. “I won’t pretend that I’m ignorant as to what you’re trying to compile, my lord.”

I gave her a sad smile. “Then you should know why I’m struggling.”

She was quiet as she regarded me, anguish lining her brow. “Aye. You were only a baby that night, Aodhan. How could you remember?”

“Since I’ve returned here, there seem to be a few things coming back to me.”

“Oh?”

“I remember smelling something burning. I remember hearing someone call out to me, searching for me.” I stared at the wall, at the mortar lines between stones. “Where are you, Aodhan?”

Aileen was silent.

When I glanced back to her, I saw the tears in her eyes. Yet she was not going to weep. She was smarting with anger, reliving that horrible night.

“Aileen …,” I whispered. “I need you to tell me the Morgane grievances. Tell me what happened the night that everything changed.” I took up my quill, rolling the feather in my fingers. “I need to know how my sister died.”

“Did your father never tell you, lad?”

Mention of my father brought up another wound. He had been dead for nearly eight years now, and yet I still felt his absence, like there was a hole in my body.

“He told me that my mother was killed by Gilroy Lannon,” I began, my voice wavering. “He told me that the king cut off her hand in battle and then dragged her into the throne room. My father was still on the castle green and could not reach her before the king brought out her head on a pike. And yet … my father could never tell me how Ashling died. Perhaps he did not know the details. Perhaps he did, and it would have killed him to speak of it.”

Aileen was silent for a moment as I dipped my quill in the ink, waiting.

“All of our warriors were gone that night,” she said, her voice hoarse. “They were with your father and mother, fighting on the castle green. Seamus was even with your parents. I remained behind at Brígh, to care for you and your sister.”

I did not write. Not yet. I sat and stared at the page, afraid to look at her as I listened, as I envisioned her memory.

“We did not have much warning,” she continued. “For all I knew, the coup was a success, and your parents and the Morgane warriors would ride home in victory. I was sitting in this very room by the fire; I was holding you in my arms, and you were asleep. That’s when I heard the clatter in the courtyard. Lois, one of your mother’s women-at-arms, had ridden home. She was alone, battered and bleeding to death, as if it had taken all of her strength to make it back, to warn me. I met her in the foyer, just as she collapsed. Hide the children, she whispered to me. Hide them now. She died on the floor, leaving me in a cold panic. We must have failed; my lord and lady must have fallen, and the Lannons would now come for you and Ashling.

“Since I had you in my arms, I thought to hide you first. I would have to hide you and your sister separately, in case one of you were discovered, the other would not be. And so I called for one of the other servants to fetch Ashling from her bed. And then I stood there, Lois’s blood pooling on the floor, and I looked down at your sleeping face and wondered … where could I hide you? What place could I lay you, where the Lannons would never look?”

She paused. My heart was pounding; I had still not written a word, but the ink was dripping onto the page.

“That’s when Sorcha met me,” Aileen murmured. “Sorcha was a healer. She must have heard Lois’s words, for she brought a bundle of herbs and a candle. ‘Let him breathe this,’ she said, catching the herbs aflame. ‘This will keep him asleep for now.’ So we drugged you and I took you to the one place I could think of. The stables, to the muck pile. That is where I laid you; I covered you in filth and I hid you there, knowing they would not seek you in such a place.”

The odor … the smell of refuse … I understood now. I rushed my hand over my face, wanting to silence her, dreading to hear the rest of it.

“By the time I hurried back to the courtyard, the Lannons had arrived,” Aileen said. “They must have come to us first, before the MacQuinns and the Kavanaghs. There was Gilroy, mounted on his horse with the crown on his despicable head, and all of his men around him, blood on their faces, torches in their hands, steel at their back. And then there was Declan, beside his father. He was just a lad, only eleven years old, and he had been to Castle Brígh countless times before. He had been betrothed to your sister. And so I thought surely, surely there would be mercy.

“But Gilroy looked to Declan and said, ‘Find them.’ And all I could do was stand there on the cobbles, watching as Declan slid off his horse and entered the castle with a group of men, to search for you, for your sister. I stood there, the king’s eyes on me. I could not move; all I could do was pray that Ashling had been hidden as well as you. And then the screams and shouts began to rise. But still … I could not move.”

I could scarcely hear her, her voice was trembling so hard. She set down her tea and I set down my quill, and I moved to kneel before her, to take her hands in mine.

“You do not have to tell me,” I whispered, the words like thorns in my throat.

Her cheeks were wet with tears, and Aileen gently touched my hair—I nearly wept at the gentleness of it, to know such hands had hidden me, had kept me alive.

“Declan found your sister,” she murmured, closing her eyes, her fingers still resting in my hair. “I watched as he dragged her out into the courtyard. She was sobbing, terrified. I could not stop myself. I lunged for her, to take her from Declan. One of the Lannons must have struck me. The next thing I knew I was on the ground, dazed, blood on my face. I saw that Gilroy had dismounted, and all of the Morganes had been called out into the courtyard. It was dark, yet I remember all of their faces as we stood, silent and terrified, waiting.

“‘Where is Kane?’ the king shouted. And that was when I realized … your mother had been killed at the rising, but your father had survived. And Gilroy didn’t know where he was.

“It gave me hope, just a tiny thread, that we might survive this night. Until the king began to ask about you. ‘I already have Kane’s daughter,’ Gilroy taunted. ‘Now bring me his son, and I will be merciful.’ None of us for a moment believed him, this king of darkness. ‘Where are you hiding his son?’ He insisted. No one but I knew where you were. And I would never tell him; he could tear me to pieces, and yet I would never tell him where I had hidden you. So he drew forth your sister, held her before us, and said that he would break each of her bones until one of us revealed where we had hidden you, where Kane was hiding.”

She opened her eyes, and now I had to close mine. My strength faded into dust; I leaned forward, to conceal my face, as if I were a boy, as if I could hide again.

“Watching them torture your sister was the most difficult moment of my life,” she whispered. “I hated myself, that I had failed her, that I had not hidden her in time. The king made Declan begin it. I screamed at him. I screamed that Declan did not have to do it. He was just a lad, I kept thinking. How can a lad be so cruel? And yet he did exactly what his father ordered. Declan Lannon took up a mallet and broke your sister’s bones, one by one, until she died.”

I could no longer fight it. I wept the tears that must have been hiding in me the entirety of my life. That my sister had died so I might live. If only it had been me, I thought. If only I had been the one to be found, and she had been the one to survive.

“Aodhan.”

Aileen called me up from the darkness. I raised my head; I opened my eyes and looked at her.

“You were my one hope,” she said, wiping the tears from my face. “You were the only reason why I lived day after day these past years, that my despair did not kill me. Because I knew you would return. Your father had to sneak back to the castle after the Lannons left that night; I have never seen a man more shattered in my life until I set you in your father’s arms and made him swear to me that he would escape with you. I did not care where Kane went or what he did; I said, this child slipped through the Lannons’ fingers, and he will be the one to return and crush their reign.”

I shook my head to deny that it was me, but Aileen took my face in her hands to hold me steady. There were no more tears in her eyes. No, there was now fire, a burning hatred, and I felt it catch in my own heart.

“I will record all of our grievances for you to take to the trial,” she said. “After they are read, I want you to look Declan Lannon in the eye and curse him and his House. I want you to be the beginning of his end, to be your mother’s and your sister’s vengeance.”

I spoke no vow to this. Was not my mother a Lannon? Did I still have distant family among them? I lacked the courage to ask Aileen, to address Líle’s letter that I had found. But my compliance, the eagerness to do as she bid, must have been in my eyes.

I was still kneeling on the floor when I heard it again in the howling of the wind.

Where are you, Aodhan?

This time, I answered the darkness.

I am here, Declan. And I am coming for you.

Lord MacQuinn’s Territory, Castle Fionn

Brienna

The next morning, I packed up my writing tools and returned to the loom house.

This time, I emerged on the threshold and knocked on the lintel to announce my presence, my eyes sweeping the vast weaving hall and the women who were already hard at work.

“Good morning,” I greeted as cheerfully as I could manage.

After last night, the weavers would undoubtedly talk about me. And I had decided not to hide from such conversations, but to meet them directly.

There were perhaps sixty women in all, working on various tasks. Some were at the looms, coaxing the wefts into tapestries. Others were stationed at a table, drawing the cartoon that would be replicated into tapestry threads. Others were still spinning wool. This is where Neeve was, sitting at a wheel in a stream of morning light that cast her hair into a shade of gold. I noticed that her eyes brightened at the sight of me, and I could tell by the smile tugging on her mouth that she wanted to invite me into the weaving hall. But she didn’t move, because at her side was that older woman again, the one who had glared at me last night after Pierce had departed.

“May we help you?” the woman questioned in a careful, yet not very hospitable, voice. She had a large gray streak in her hair and a frown on her angular face. The only movement she made was to place her chapped hand on Neeve’s shoulder, as if to keep her in place.

I drew in a deep breath, my hand fiddling with the strap to my leather satchel. “My father has asked me to help gather the MacQuinn grievances, to take to the Lannon trial.”

No one spoke, and I began to realize that the woman at Neeve’s side was the head weaver, that I could not gain entrance to this place without her blessing.

“Why should we give up our grievances to you?” the woman asked.

For a moment, I was speechless.

“Be gentle to the lass, Betha,” another weaver, whose white hair was braided in a crown, spoke from the other side of the hall. “You would be wise to remember that she is Lord MacQuinn’s daughter.”

“And how did all of that come about, hmm?” Betha asked me. “Did Lord MacQuinn know whose daughter you truly were when he adopted you?”

I stood silent, my heart striking my breast like a fist. I could feel the heat rise in my face; I wanted to give nothing but honesty to the MacQuinn people. And yet to answer Betha’s question would make it seem that I had fooled Jourdain. Because he had not known I was Brendan Allenach’s daughter when he adopted me, but neither had I known. Yet I knew saying such would only sound hollow to these women.