The Winner's Curse (The Winner's Trilogy, #1)(44)

*

Arin stoked the forge’s fire. Not for warmth but for color. He craved it in the cold months. He had been a sickly child, and this time of year reminded him most of his home, of feeling cooped up inside, not knowing that one day he would dream of those painted walls, the curtains in a sweep of indigo, the blue of his mother’s dress.

Cold without, color within. This was how it had been.

Arin watched the fire flare crimson. Then he went outside and surveyed the grounds, saw through leafless trees that no one was near. He could steal a few minutes.

When he stepped back inside the forge, he leaned against the anvil. With one hand he pulled a book from its hiding place behind the kindling box, and in the other he held a hammer so that, if in danger of being caught, he could more quickly pretend to have been working.

He began to read. It was a book he had seen in Kestrel’s possession, one on the history of the Valorian empire. He had taken it from the library after she had returned it, weeks ago.

What would she say, if she saw him reading a book about his enemy, in his enemy’s tongue? What would she do?

Arin knew this: her gaze would measure him, and he would sense a shift of perception within her. Her opinion of him would change as daylight changed, growing or losing shadow. Subtle. Almost indiscernible. She would see him differently, though he wouldn’t know in what way. He wouldn’t know what it meant. This had happened, again and again, since he had come here.

Sometimes he wished he had never come here.

Well. Kestrel couldn’t see him in the forge, or know what he read, because she couldn’t leave her rooms. She couldn’t even walk.

Arin shut the book, gripped it between rigid fingers. He nearly threw it into the fire.

I will have you torn limb from limb, the general had said.

That wasn’t why Arin stayed away from her. Not really.

He forced his thoughts from his head. He hid the book where it had been. He busied himself with quiet work, heating iron and charcoal in a crucible to produce steel.

It took some time before Arin realized he was humming a dark tune. For once, he didn’t stop himself. The pressure of song was too strong, the need for distraction too great. Then he found that the music caged behind his closed teeth was the melody Kestrel had played for him months ago. He felt the sensation of it, low and alive, on his mouth.

For a moment, he imagined it wasn’t the melody that touched his lips, but Kestrel.

The thought stopped his breath, and the music, too.





24


When no one was looking, Kestrel practiced walking around her suite. She often had to rest a hand against a wall, but she could make it to the windows.

She never saw what she wanted, which made her wonder whether this was mere chance or if Arin was avoiding her so completely that he took other paths across the grounds than those that passed through her view.

She couldn’t handle the stairs, which meant that a visit to the music room on the ground floor was impossible unless she consented to be carried, and she didn’t. Yet Kestrel caught her fingers playing phantom melodies on the furniture, on her thighs. The absence of music became an ache inside her. She wondered how Arin could bear not to sing, if he was indeed a singer.

Kestrel thought of the long flights of stairs, and forced her weak muscles to work.

She was standing in her visiting room, hands holding the carved back of a chair, when her father entered.

“There’s my girl,” he said. “On her feet already. You’ll be a military officer in no time with an attitude like that.”

Kestrel sat. She gave him a slight, ironic smile.

He returned it. “What I meant to say is that I’m glad you’re better, and that I’m sorry I can’t go to the Firstwinter ball.”

It was good that she was already sitting. “Why would you want to go to a ball?”

“I thought I would take you.”

She stared.

“It occurred to me that I have never danced with my daughter,” he said. “And it would have been a wise move.”

A wise move.

A show of force, then. A reminder of the respect due to the general’s family. Quietly, Kestrel said, “You’ve heard the rumors.”

He raised a hand, palm flat and facing her.

“Father—”

“Stop.”

“It’s not true. I—”

“We will not have this discussion.” His hand lifted to block his eyes, then fell. “Kestrel, I’m not here for that. I’m here to tell you that I’m leaving. The emperor is sending me east to fight the barbarians.”

It wasn’t the first time in Kestrel’s memory that her father had been sent to war, but the fear she felt was always the same, always keen. “For how long?”

“As long as it takes. I leave the morning of the ball with my regiment.”

“The entire regiment?”

He caught the tone in her voice. He sighed. “Yes.”

“That means there will be no soldiers in the city or its surroundings. If there’s a problem—”

“The city guard will be here. The emperor feels they can deal with any problem, at least until a force arrives from the capital.”

“Then the emperor is a fool. The captain of the city guard isn’t up to the task. You yourself said that the new captain is nothing but a bungler, someone who got the position because he’s the governor’s toady—”