The Raven and the Rush

4. Silver-Haired Witch

Chapter 4

Silver-Haired Witch

Rhosyn was already running when her feet unfolded and hit the rough ground of the northerly road. Her raven wings disappeared, talons lengthening into legs as she hit her stride. She hadn’t changed out of her jeweled boots, and they were a poor choice for the snowy hamlet of Midwinter Rest, but she hadn’t expected her mother to give her such a gift. She’d asked for a day away, and her mother had given her weeks. She’d not squander a moment.

Her pace eased as she left the main road and passed through the mammoth iron gates announcing her arrival to Midwinter Hold. Here, the way was less tended; old snow had buckled against the sides of the long path leading to the imposing keep, but there was enough fresh snow to betray the inconsistent efforts to keep it cleared. The Frosts left Midwinter Hold only when they had to. Their provisions arrived monthly, enough to last until more arrived the following month. She knew this because Morwen had told her. It was only through Morwen she understood the world of men at all.

We’re too far north, Morwen often said, her meandering way of answering many of Rhosyn’s questions. Men of the kingdom had no business in the remote town, she said. Those who did had no business with them.

Rhosyn didn’t know what the Frosts’ business was, though it could only be something lucrative that supported their northern dominion, which competed with Wulfsgate Keep, the capital, in size and splendor. Their keep spanned as far as her gaze could travel, all stone and ramparts and windows that stretched so far she had to crane her neck up to examine the length. It was far too big for the handful of Frosts residing within the walls. Even The Rookery of Midnight Crest felt less assuming than the fortress the Frosts had built for themselves in the northern wastes of the kingdom.

Despite her questions, the answers didn’t matter to her. The Frosts were kind to her. Rhosyn used to fantasize about what it might be like to be their daughter, instead of the daughter of the High Priestess of Midnight Crest. To be tucked into her bed each night with love and awaken to laughter and warmth.

But she was not.

Rhosyn enjoyed a vigorous imagination, but always, always tempered by the acceptance that hiding from reality made it more difficult to face, not less.

A smile full of delight and promise spread across her face as she made her way to the iron doors of the place she secretly wished was home.

Arwenna Ravenwood sat upon the icy throne in the center of the Courtyard of Regents. The midnight goats were asleep at this late hour, as she should be if sleep hadn’t forsaken her. The curious little beasts formed a furry circle just beyond where the tips of her boots grazed the ice. When she was a girl, some of her fondest memories were of nestling into a plush pile of their silver coats as her mother perched on the throne, lost to the one place a High Priestess could be alone with their thoughts.

That had led to her first hard lesson. Thoughts were dangerous.

Words were worse. And anyway, she had none. Not anymore. No more than anyone had words for her, about what her failures had wrought. Least not the helpful kind.

She tapped the end of her heel against the ice. Imagined the impact birthing a splinter she could send through the middle, splitting their world in two, leaving her safe on her own side.

The low sound of Rendyr’s heavy, purposeful steps didn’t surprise her. He knew he wasn’t allowed in the courtyard. He had no care for the lines separating him from what was his to enjoy, and what rules forbade him from.

He emphasized his footfalls for her. Without fear, his power had nowhere to take hold.

“You aren’t allowed here,” she said because she had to. Rules didn’t matter to him, but they still mattered to her.

“I’m your husband. I’m allowed anywhere you are.”

“You are not that. Nor are you the High Priest,” Arwenna said, more cruelly than she intended. It wasn’t for fear of hurting him that made her recoil after she’d released the words.

“I should be,” Rendyr said. He closed in on her, casting a tall shadow over her chair. His black hair fell in waves over the leather that tightened across his muscular shoulders as he tensed. “I would be, if not for you.” He pulled the corner of his mouth into a grin. “I still will be, long after you’re frozen against the mountainside.”

Arwenna was frozen in another way. All the words she wanted to say burned against the back of her throat, warned away from finding life, as she herself neared closer to death. It hadn’t always been this way. Once, she and her brother had even been friends. Playmates. She didn’t know when the light had died inside Rendyr, or even why, only that it had. He was much more content in the darkness.

“You have only yourself to be angry with,” he went on when she didn’t rise to his hatred. “It was not for lack of effort on my part.”

“No,” she agreed, swallowing down the hard memories of those terrible nights.

“Rhosyn will be more agreeable,” he mused. “Or not. It’s really no matter to me how she feels about it.”

“Your confidence that the gods will choose you a second time, among all the other Ravenwood men who will cast their lot for Rhosyn at her Langenacht, would almost be amusing to me if I didn’t think you meant it.”

“The gods,” he repeated, as if she’d said something funny. “There’s no magic who decides which man will light the womb of the High Priestess. The magic is merely an illusion so that the High Priestess can be seen as having no choice in who becomes her daughter’s High Priest, when in fact she’s the only one who can choose. Mother chose me. Mother chose me for you. She’ll choose me for Rhosyn.”

The swell of dread in her belly surged outward. She’d always wondered if this was true; if there was any magic at all involved in the Langenacht, or if it was simply a ceremonial reason for the available Ravenwood men to bed the future High Priestess. But if it was true, then it would mean Naryssa had knowingly sent Arwenna to the two years of t*****e that followed her Langenacht. If a mother could choose for her daughter, then what did this choice say about her own mother? About her?

“She will not make the same mistake twice,” Arwenna said. She forced herself to stand. He didn’t move back to give her room, and she nearly lost her balance. When she tried to duck around him, he threw his arms out. Like a child, she thought, but that was wrong, all wrong. He’d never been a child.

Arwenna summoned her courage and looked him in the eyes.

“You may be right about me,” she said. “I am weak. I’ve never been strong. Perhaps it’s this weakness that has prevented a child from finding its way to me. But you’re wrong about Rhosyn. She will not fall so easily under your wanton cruelty. Nor will she abide it.”

Rendyr laughed. His hot breath tickled her ear, sending a chill through her. “I once thought the same about you. You used to want it, Arwenna. You used to want everything about it.”

“Everyone wants something until they have it.” Arwenna pressed on his arm and pivoted away. “Your lesson on this awaits you still.”

Morwen Frost held her for so long, Rhosyn’s face flushed with dizziness.

“I didn’t expect to ever see you again!” she cried. “Not after...” She rolled her lower lip inward. “The Guardians must be fond of me once again.”

“Once again? Had you angered them?”

Morwen laughed. “I expected as much when they took you away from me.” Her joy faded. “You’re not going to tell me you’re just here for the day? Break my heart?”

Rhosyn had been coming to Midwinter Hold for years, but the last time she had spent with Morwen was over a year ago, when Stewardess Frost lost the child she’d been carrying. Rhosyn, under the instruction of Arwenna, tended her difficult lying in, and then her broken heart and body, in the aftermath. Once the stewardess’ illness was spent, so was Rhosyn’s reason for being there. That was the agreement that had held her family’s world together for so long. They came when called upon. They returned to their own world when done.

“You’re here for Mother again?” Morwen pressed when Rhosyn didn’t recover from her reverie quick enough to answer.

Rhosyn nodded. The urge to cry was powerful, and she couldn’t decide if the source was joy or agony. “Is it like last time?”

Morwen sighed. “Worse. The physician walks around like she’s already met the Guardians. Father didn’t want to ask again, but...”

“Why wouldn’t he want to ask? You need our aid, we come. In return, you keep the foothills safe for us.”

“Ah, now’s not the time for such talk,” Morwen said, brightening again. “You’re here, and that’s what matters.” She landed a kiss at the corner of Rhosyn’s mouth. “How is Arwenna? Hopefully by now a mother?”

Rhosyn shook her head.

Morwen’s mouth parted in a soundless gasp. “Even a sign?”

“None.”

“They won’t really do it. Will they?”

“I didn’t use to think they would. But now that the two years are almost here, they all act less hopeful and more resigned to what’s coming. It’s as if they’ve convinced themselves her inability to bring a child is akin to treason. Shutting their love off for her. They treat her like a ghost, already dead.”

“What can we do?”

“Nothing,” Rhosyn answered, hiding her fury. “There’s nothing anyone can do.”

“But that’s preposterous, Rhosyn!” Morwen went to the fire, removing the now steaming water. “They cannot just murder their own daughter! And what if it’s Rendyr’s failure and not hers? No punishment for his deficiencies?”

Rhosyn had supposed the same thing, and she loved Morwen for thinking this, too. In her world, the women commanded the glory, but they also bore the totality of the shame. “Rendyr will never be held to account for any of his crimes. Expecting anything else is a path to heartache.”

“When did this bitterness spread over you? It’s new.” Morwen handed her a mug of tea. She climbed upon the wooden table, bowing her face over the steaming liquid.

“Ah, so I’ve not done a fair enough job hiding it this time. Is that what you’re saying?”

“Has so much changed in a year?”

“I’m about to lose my only sister, and instead of mourning her, I’ll be forced to take her place. Sadness, shadowed by agony. And there’s nothing, nothing, I can do about any of it.” Rhosyn set her tea aside and joined Morwen on the table. “You remember what I told you last time? About Rendyr?”

“Still?”

“Still.”

“Oh, Rhosyn.”

Rhosyn shook her head. “Put your pity away. It only makes me feel worse. He doesn’t dare touch me, not yet. But he haunts my dreams now. I’m his, he says, like I’m a prize, and not his sister.”

“I’ll never understand the Ravenwood ways,” Morwen said. “But I’m not a Ravenwood.”

“I am a Ravenwood, and I’ll never understand.” Rhosyn linked her hands over her lap. “But my strength must come from enduring the impossible, not pretending it won’t ever happen. Right? I know what’s coming. I can’t hide from it. But I can be ready.”

Morwen reached a hand over Rhosyn’s joined ones. “You could run away. Wait, don’t say it. I know what you think. That they’d find you. But they won’t fly beyond the Northerlands. It’s too dangerous. They’re not protected beyond our borders.”

“When Arwenna is gone, I’m all they’ll have. The last daughter. Without me, the line breaks. I can’t even fathom the chaos that would cause.” Rhosyn laughed despite her angst. “For me, they’d risk it. Not for any love, mind you, but to avoid that very chaos.”

“He can’t hurt you here,” Morwen whispered, eyes heavy. “For however long that lasts.”

“How far along is your mother?”

“She has months yet to go, but they fear she won’t make it that far. That her confinement will end soon, for good or ill.”

Rhosyn hopped off the table. She pulled herself erect and wrapped her silver hair in a ribbon. “Then we mustn’t waste even a moment.”

The door to Ethelyn Frost’s chambers was cracked. A thin sliver of darkness marked the center of the brightly lit hall.

Rhosyn kept her eyes on the stone floor. Her reticence did her no favors. The whispers traveled her way just the same. Not even the Frosts’ hospitality could slake the curiosity of the grooms and chambermaids.

She slipped inside Stewardess Frost’s apartments and moved to close the door.

“Open. Leave it open.”

Rhosyn left the door as she’d found it. She rolled her hands around her upper arms with a shiver. “It’s far too cool in here, Stewardess. You’ll catch a chill. Can I at least light some candles? A lantern?”

“I like it this way.” In the darkness, Ethelyn’s face was distorted. “I know this voice. The tantalizing intoxication of the silver-haired witch. Rhosynora Ravenwood. Like a dream.”

“Stewardess?”

“I thought they’d send one of your brothers. I passed these wishes to Oswin, but Guardians know he only remembers the most pleasing parts of what I tell him. Perhaps it was his idea to bring you back. He does adore you.”

“They were going to send Augustyn,” Rhosyn answered. She moved to each window, drawing the heavy curtains. The stewardess may not want the light, but she wouldn’t miss the cold. “I offered to go in his place.”

“Offered,” Ethelyn repeated. Her hands hovered in what seemed midair, but then Rhosyn saw the blanket move. The stewardess’ hands formed over the bulge in the cover. “Of course you did.”

“May I approach?”

“You may.”

Rhosyn stepped closer, and now the thin moonlight provided a hint of illumination. The shadows darkened the stewardess’ crescents beneath her eyes, but enhanced the radiant flush in her cheeks. She was both dying and more alive than she’d ever been. Rhosyn had the power to help her take either path.

Rhosyn wrapped her fingers over the hard swell of the blanket. Stewardess Frost shifted under her touch, as if anticipating pain. Rhosyn’s eyes closed, and she listened.

“Your child is well. You are not,” Rhosyn said. She lowered herself to the chair at Ethelyn’s side. “I can help you. I will help you. It is my only desire to ease both you and the child through what remains of your confinement, and to see you both back to your health after.”

“I know you will. You were such a comfort to me the last time when...” Ethelyn’s words finished in her sad eyes alone. “But now I must ask you to help me in another way.”

“Another way? How?”

“Morwen.” Ethelyn pointed to the wine at her bedside. Rhosyn handed it to her, waiting for the stewardess to quell her thirst. “Morwen,” she said, stronger this time.

“What about her?”

“She’s to be married soon. And to a good man at that. A Haddenfoot. She’ll leave for Dunwoode in the south, as soon as the weather turns in our favor. At last, she’ll be free of this wretched cold that so vexes her.”

“How lovely,” Rhosyn said with a feigned smile. “Every young woman’s dream.”

“One would assume so, Rhosynora. Would they not?”

“What does this have to do with me?”

“You know,” the stewardess answered, “what this has to do with you.”

She could continue boasting her ignorance, but that would be exhausting. “It’s not me who’ll be giving you trouble with this. I have my own marriage to make, one way or another, and sooner than I’d like. I wish Morwen only happiness.”

“She hadn’t stopped talking about you,” the stewardess said. “No, not entirely. But she’d slowed to once a day, and we thought that meant it was time. Any sooner, she would’ve fought us. Any later, she’d be talked about. An over-ripened maid.”

Rhosyn cinched a fistful of bedsheet in her hand. “I won’t stand blocking the door between Morwen’s wants and needs.”

“Good. Good that we understand one another.”

“I love Morwen. My love for her is more familial than it is what you assume it to be. Like a sister.”

“That sisterly love is what would drive her to forsake a good life that awaits her, to save yours, when we both know it would be the task of a well-meaning fool,” Ethelyn answered. “It is enough for me that you understand and will not come in the way of what she needs.”

“I came not only for her, Stewardess.” Rhosyn’s toes curled in her slippers. Her heart traveled down to join them. “Sometimes I just find it easier to breathe on land.”

Rhosyn felt a hand close over hers. She looked down.

“We all have our burdens, raven. It’s not about finding a means to be free of them. It’s about how well we can adapt to living in a cage.”

When Rhosyn slipped into her bed that night, for once, sleep came swiftly.

But it was short-lived. Replaced all too quickly by the familiar, commanding voice of Rendyr.

Did you think there was anywhere you could go, Rhosynora, that I could not find you? Anywhere I would not go?

Are you here, then? Did you follow me?

Am I not a part of you?

Rhosyn bolted forward in the bed. She heaved a sob into both hands, covered in the sweat of her darkest fears, which were never far away.