The Banished of Muirwood (Covenant of Muirwood, #1)(3)

It was one of her father’s knights who breached the threshold. Carew. His face was damp with sweat, his eyes haunted with emotion, and Maia knew just from looking at him that the babe was dead. Her stomach shriveled at the thought, and she felt the ache press against her heart. She wanted a sibling, even if it meant losing her chance of becoming Comoros’s queen one day. She had always enjoyed the company of other children, but though she never lacked for playmates, every other child in the kingdom was inferior to her in rank and station. She knew the other children had all been trained to agree with her. To let her win at their games, to fawn over her ideas and her desires.

She hated that.

To her mind, it was nothing more than luck that had made her a princess. She considered everyone her equal unless they proved themselves not to be. Maia was competitive by nature, she wanted to win on her own merits, not because someone else let her. As a result, she did not have many friends her own age. Most, like the chancellor, were much older and wiser.

“The babe . . . is stillborn,” Carew said between gasps. He hung his head and shook it. “A boy. You must come down and console my master. He is beyond himself with grief.”

“I will come presently,” Walraven said gravely. Maia watched him as he peered out of the window again, steeling himself for the encounter to come. His jaw muscles clenched, and his hands fidgeted, but he took a calming breath and then turned toward the knight. “Come with me, Maia.”

She was shocked and pleased that he would invite her on such an errand. She clambered off the window seat and felt dagger slashes of pain shoot down her legs. Rubbing her calves, she began hobbling down the steps after the chancellor.

Maia’s heart was on fire with conflicting emotions. Her little brother was dead. Or perhaps he had never truly been alive, though she remembered pressing her palm against her mother’s abdomen and feeling his gentle kicks. The memory seared her heart, threatening to destroy her composure. Her mother’s previous miscarriages had happened long ago, when she had been too young to feel them keenly. This burden was much harder to bear without breaking, but she had to be strong for her parents. Yet there was a slender, guilty part of her that was almost . . . excited. For the last year, the chancellor had been preparing her to be her father’s heir, but his training had been more discreet lately given her mother’s pregnancy. Would she be given the chance to rule on her own right and not as a result of whom she married? The idea of becoming queen one day was sweet on her tongue, sweet as crispels, and it conflicted with the bitterness of the moment. She wondered if she was truly a wicked child for having such thoughts.

When they reached the main corridor, they marched vigorously. Moans and wails were already starting to echo throughout the castle as news spread. Her parents’ grief would be shared by everyone. Maia clutched her stomach as an awful, constricting feeling clutched at her chest. She kept close to the chancellor’s heels and together they mounted the steps to another turret. Leerings began to illuminate the way as they climbed, bathing the steps in cool, smokeless light. Around and around they climbed, and soon Maia could hear voices. The handsome knight shook his head and refused to go any farther. He crumpled into tears. Still Maia did not weep. She merely followed the chancellor as he walked around the man.

When they reached the landing at the top of the turret, Maia could hear her father’s voice. That he was suffering was obvious—his voice was husky and ferocious.

“Why did I even marry you?”

Her eyes went wide with shock as she took in the meaning of the words. She had never heard him say such a thing, and was stunned silent.

The chancellor paused at the threshold, his eyes narrowing with anger. His face became a mask of calm, his lanky body stiffening with resolve as he held out an arm to prevent her from entering the room.

Maia could hear her mother’s sobs. “Forgive me, Husband. Forgive me. It . . . I . . . please . . . forgive . . . me. My child! My son!” There was a torrent of tears, gulping and swallowing and hissing breaths.

“To see you in such pain!” her father moaned. “It would have been better if we had never . . .” His voice trailed off and he coughed violently. “How could the Medium fail us . . . again? My thoughts were fixed. So were yours. It begins . . . with a thought, that is what they say. And all the vigils that were held to strengthen our connection to the Medium . . . the whole city was holding vigil!” His voice rose like thunder. “How could it fail us like this? What, in Idumea’s name, does it expect from us?”

“No . . . no . . . it is not . . . no . . . the Medium . . . it is not . . . the Medium’s . . . fault, Husband.” Her mother was babbling.

Maia shrunk, experiencing a dread that she had never felt before. Her parents had always made her feel comforted and safe. Hearing them so distraught, so wild, frightened her.

“I thought,” her father said venomously, “that if we obeyed the will of the Medium, our line would be secured. This is the fourth stillborn! It must be a sign that our marriage is cursed.”

“No!” came the pleading voice. “We both felt it, Brannon. We felt the Medium consecrate our marriage. This is a test. To see . . . if we will be faithful.”

Her father let out a hiss of anger. “Another test? And what then? Another? What if we were wrong? What if we should never have married? We are being punished by a mistake from the past.”