Rebels Asending

Chapter 6

y, go greet your mother. I’ll be a time making sure the casket is placed in proper state.”

The Guardsmen went off to their own quarters. Domenic gave each of the Edelweiss servants a small purse of silver. Then he made his way through the labyrinth of halls and corridors to his own chamber in the family suite. This part of the Castle had always seemed to him an accretion of centuries of architectural styles, all jumbled together. The stone stairs had been worn in the middle, polished by generations of feet. Here and there, a newer wall hanging or a panel of translucent blue stone brightened the passageway. At last, Domenic reached the familiar archway leading to the family quarters.

His father was right, he was wet through to his skin. The brief laran contact had drained him even further. Any moment now, he would start shivering. He did not want to face his mother without a bite to eat, a bath and shave, and a change of clothing. A drink might not be a bad idea, either. In this frame of mind, he hurried down the corridor, head down, slapping his sodden riding gloves against his thigh.

“Domenic!” Alanna Alar burst from an opened door and threw her arms around his neck. He smelled her faintly floral perfume, felt her silken cheek against his.

“Alanna! Don’t hug me! I’m drenched and filthy from the trail. You’ll ruin your gown!”

Alanna’ met Domenic’s gaze with a disconcerting directness. He had seen her but little in the last three years. Somehow, in the time they’d been apart, she had changed from a pretty child into a beauty, with hair like spun copper and startling green eyes beneath dark, sweetly arched brows. He noticed a hint of shadow between the curves of her breasts at the neckline of her gown, her slender waist, her skin like velvet.

“Never mind about the dress!” she said, pouting a little. “Aren’t you happy to see me? I’ve missed you so much!”

Something inside Domenic, some knot of tension, loosened. He and Alanna had been playfellows since they were young children, when she had come to live with his family. Her own mother had been too insecure and neurotic, not to mention utterly lacking in laran, to deal with a strong-willed, tempestuous daughter, so Marguerida had offered to foster the child. Domenic had taken the disconsolate girl under his wing, and he soon became closer to her than to his own siblings.

Domenic kissed Alanna’s cheek. “I’ve missed you, too. I sent word—you must have heard—Grandmother Javanne died.”

Alanna’s cheerful expression faltered. Javanne and Gabriel were her grandparents as well as his, for her mother was Mikhail’s younger sister.

“I ought to be sorry,” she said, lowering her gaze but not sounding at all sad, “but I hardly knew Grandmother Javanne. She certainly made Auntie Marguerida’s life miserable, and she wasn’t very nice to you. I couldn’t believe you went to stay with her when you didn’t have to.”

Domenic hesitated to remind her that Javanne’s irritability and suspiciousness was not her own fault but an effect of her illness. It was too complicated to explain, and he didn’t have the energy for a lengthy discussion. He remembered, too, how little grief Alanna had shown after the death of Regis Hastur, who had always been gentle and kind to her.

“It was the right thing to do,” he said, “and we made our peace in the end.”

Alanna slipped her hand into his. Her fingers felt smooth and soft. “Come on. We’ve only got a little while before Auntie Marguerida hears you’re back.”

As they walked toward his chamber, she told him about the latest street opera, a retelling of the adventures of Durraman’s infamously recalcitrant donkey. Domenic remembered the times they had hidden in various places in the castle, the secret games they had shared, acting out tales of bandits or Dry Towners. Once, when they were about ten, she’d dressed in his jacket and breeches and announced she was going to cut her hair and run away with the Free Amazons.

Regretfully, he pulled his hand free. “Our reunion will have to wait. I must make myself presentable for my parents.”

“So?” She turned back to him, eyebrows lifted like the slender wings of a rainbird in flight. For an instant, he felt as if he were drowning in the celadon light of her eyes.

“So,” he said, trying not to blush, “no young woman of good reputation should be alone with a man who is not her husband, especially in his own chamber. Especially if—in case you hadn’t noticed—I am in sore need of a bath and a shave.”

Rosy color seeped across Alanna’s cheeks and throat. Her eyelids, fringed with amazingly long lashes, half lowered, and her blush intensified. Domenic thought she was the most beautiful creature he had ever seen.

“Please,” he began, suddenly desperate to say something, “after I’m cleaned up, I must go to my mother.

I’d very much appreciate your company.”

“I will look for you afterward, but don’t ask me to go in. Auntie Marguerida is expecting you, not me.”

“Oh, Alanna, we are all family! You will not be intruding.”

“It’s not that…” Her eyes darkened, and she bit her lower lip. “I would not spoil your homecoming.”

“Alanna—cousin—what is the matter?”

She gave a little, careless laugh. Domenic heard the forced quality, as if she were trying to put on a brave face for him. “She does not—we do not…

she is always telling me… No, I will say no more. You are here, and everything will be better now, I promise.”

With a smile that sent a curious sensation through Domenic’s stomach, Alanna hurried away.

Domenic emerged from his chamber clean and smooth-cheeked, wearing a suit of butter-soft suede dyed in Hastur blue and trimmed with silver braid, and made his way to the small office that his mother kept in her own suite of rooms. A lively fire warmed the hearth and scented the air with the familiar, comforting fragrance of balsam. An uneven tapestry, his sister Yllana’s work, hung in a place of honor on the paneled walls, but otherwise the chamber with its cheerful carpet and lovingly tended furniture was exactly as he remembered it. Through the far door Domenic glimpsed his mother’s specially built clavier.