Night of Lust

Pelagia let out a low growl and leaned on Caderyn for support. Her freckled face scrunched up with effort as she limped at his side, using a cane to shuffle through the estate's vineyards.

She'd awoken the night before and it had taken considerable effort to convince her to stay in bed. Only after another night's rest had Melisent assented to letting the wounded knight walk around the grounds for a bit of fresh air.

"Easy, easy," Caderyn said, tightening his grip around her waist as their path took them onto rougher ground.

He glanced over his shoulder; Melisent and Gwion were close by to assist if Pelagia fell or tore her bandages, but they remained far enough back to give them some privacy. Even though he had one lover leaning against him, Caderyn could not help but smile back at Melisent. His body tingled with the memories of their wild coupling in the shrine. Though they'd yet to explore each other further since then, his soul yearned for the chance.

Regret pulsed through him as Pelagia let out another soft grunt of effort.

"Gods damn it," she said through clenched teeth. "Give me a moment."

Caderyn helped her down to the ground so she could rest, then she plucked at the bandage.

"Leave it be, Pelagia. Melisent says the healing ointments won't work if you tear it off. Then you'll have weeks of recovery instead of days."

Her freckled face twitched into a scowl but she let her hand fall away.

"I should be out there with Nolmvar and the others, hunting that bastard Everard down," she said.

"Believe me, I long for the hunt as well."

Caderyn had been mere moments from riding off into the night after Everard. Only Melisent's wise counsel had convinced him otherwise. Such a reckless action would have been too dangerous and would have potentially left Melisent vulnerable. Though they were still guests of Duke Leopold, Caderyn did not trust the man in the slightest. He or his Asparran masters could very easily snatch Melisent away to use her birthright for their own ends.

With a long sigh, Pelagia leaned back and glared up at the sky.

"Almost wish I could just slumber again and sleep through the whole recovery."

"I am sure Melisent could brew up some potions to help with that."

The redhead glanced down the row of grapes at Melisent, who still lingered in the distance, making friendly conversation with Gwion.

"I still don't trust her," Pelagia said. "Even if she did save my life."

"I verified her story," said Caderyn, not begrudging Pelagia for her suspicions. "Duke Leopold and Lady Rigarda both recognized her."

"The truth of her parentage doesn't mean she can be trusted."

Sighing, Caderyn glanced once again over at Melisent, who had crouched down to pluck a few weeds from the ground.

"Saints' blood," Pelagia cursed, then let out a soft chuckle. "You fucked her, didn't you?"

Caderyn scowled off into the distance but said nothing. Shame rippled through him, for he still harbored regrets that he'd sought such pleasures while Pelagia was recovering and his men were off hunting down Everard.

"I'm sorry. I was so lost and adrift with the news of Everard and your wounds and I-"

"I'm not your damned wife, Caderyn," Pelagia said with another snort, followed by a playful strike to his shoulder. "But I still think you're a fool. Even if she is telling the whole truth and does genuinely want to help, you shouldn't get attached. Your parents may not be as merciful to her as you have been."

"No," he said with a fierce shake of his head. "They wouldn't condemn her. They'll understand."

"Do you truly think your father could forgive the woman whose actions nearly killed your mother? Even if she was acting under duress, that is quite the complication."

"My parents have worked with their enemies before. After my father reclaimed Ravenmark, he had to ally with barons who had supported the usurper. And after they defeated Kovgaard's invasion, they made friends among the northlanders. They'll see the wisdom of mercy here as well."

Pelagia sighed, her dark eyes once more glaring at Melisent. After a few moments her gaze softened.

"I suppose I

should

be jealous. She's a pretty one."

The smile on her face lasted but a moment.

"But please be careful, Caderyn. After everything you've survived, I'd hate for it to be your heart that finally kills you."

Caderyn understood her fears and had no further desire to argue, so simply smiled, then helped Pelagia to her feet. Together they continued their slow, careful walk through the vineyard before doubling back. Melisent finally caught up to them as they neared the estate.

Despite Pelagia's misgivings, the redhead did not shirk back as Melisent leaned forward to check her pulse, then placed the back of her hand to Pelagia's forehead.

"Good," Melisent said with a nod. "You should rest for the remainder of the day, then take a longer walk tomorrow. I'll apply another dose of the healing ointment tomorrow evening which should seal up the wound completely. With luck and sufficient rest, you should be able to ride within two or three days."

"Then in two or three days we should set out," Pelagia said, after mumbling her thanks to the former nun. "The sooner we get back to Fellhaven, the better."

"Agreed," Gwion said. "But we'll need to be more careful going through Jadewall this time. No brawls in taverns, no public disputes. Just a quick, discreet ride."

"We'll need to take pains to disguise you," Caderyn said to Melisent. "When we met, I couldn't help but notice an uncanny resemblance, and those more familiar with Thandor could guess your identity."

That faint resemblance, of course, had done nothing to dampen his lusts.

"Particularly pious women in Tsannor sometimes wear veils or shawls," Melisent said. "Simple enough for me to disguise myself as a Tsannori healer or a servant."

He hoped that would suffice. Thankfully their route back up through Jadewall would avoid the larger keeps and cities. If they rode quickly and stuck to camping in the wilderness or only stayed in smaller villages, they could escape notice and be back at Fellhaven within a few weeks.

"Let's get you back to bed, then," said Melisent with a warm smile at Pelagia, seemingly unaware of the redhead's suspicions.

**

Once they'd tucked Pelagia back into bed, Caderyn joined Melisent and Tessandra for a meal in the courtyard. The place was a pleasant little oasis, filled with flower-covered trellises, bubbling fountains, and statues of leaping animals.

"I cannot thank you enough for looking after Pelagia," Tessandra said to Melisent with a warm but weary smile.

Dark circles clung to the skin beneath her eyes and her silky blonde hair was a wild mess.

"Though I am no longer formally bound to the convent, I did still take vows to keep death at bay. We welcome death once it has arrived, but we fight against that inevitability all we can." Melisent smiled. "But I'd have helped her even were it not for those vows."

Deep down, Caderyn knew such medical treatment also benefited Melisent. It created a debt and allayed suspicions, yet that did not dim his gratitude in the slightest. Smiling, he reached under the table and patted her knee, then went back to his tea.

Tessandra let out a soft chuckle once she'd finished with her grapes.

"You are many things, my lord, but subtle is not one of them."

"Whatever do you mean?" he asked, a faint twinkle in his eyes.

The bard chuckled again and glanced to Melisent.

"I confess that I share Sir Caderyn's confusion," Melisent said with an almost sickeningly sweet little smile. "Whatever do you mean, Tessandra?"

The bard's peal of laughter startled a few songbirds atop a nearby trellis. The laugh continued, perhaps for a bit longer than it should have, then she finally cleared her throat and took a sip of tea.

"Gods, it feels good to laugh again. Seeing Pelagia up and about has raised my spirits, but hearing such ridiculous lies from you two raised them even more."

After another chuckle she shook her head, then wagged a finger at Caderyn.

"But you are still incorrigible."

Melisent's sweet smile faded and her fingers tapped nervously against the table.

"This...will not cause any complications, will it? I would not wish to create any undue difficulties on our journey back. Caderyn did tell me that he was not the jealous type and-"

"I am not either, my lady," said Tessandra with another soft laugh. "In this world, one must seek pleasure and joy wherever one can, and not let bitterness or jealousy get in the way."

The bard raised an eyebrow at Melisent.

"And this does not create any complications for

you

does it? Just because

we're

quite open with our lusts and affections doesn't mean you must be."

A small smile spread across Melisent's face.

"It is not entirely new to me. In the convent, where there were no men, unusual relationships would form between the nuns. We'd find joy in one another's arms when we could, but we had to take care not to let the attachments distract from our duties. I suppose this...this is but another form of that."

Caderyn couldn't help but dwell on how Leopold had mentioned the prospect of marriage a few nights before. After all, it would be a prudent political move for him to marry Melisent so his family could use her claims against Jadewall. If they moved carefully, they could put Melisent on the throne and turn her father's realm into a vassal, thus ending the old rivalry for good.

And yet there were other options, too. His parents might not want their heir to marry an illegitimate noblewoman and might instead want to marry her off to Berent or one of their loyal barons. Though he did not consider himself a jealous man,

that

notion did make his skin crawl.

Perhaps his pride made him think that only he could truly protect her. If she were married to someone else, she'd be reduced to a mere pawn, a weapon, rather than a wife to be cherished and possibly loved.

Those were distant notions, however. Far more pressing were the matters of Pelagia's recovery and Everard's capture.

The door to the courtyard opened and Leopold limped over to the table, beaming brightly.

"Wonderful news, Sir Caderyn," he said. "Lady Rigarda has sent word that they may have tracked Everard to one of the abandoned Imperial border keeps. Your man Nolmvar found tracks in that direction which match the numbers of men who helped him escape, and local shepherds reported seeing armed men at that old keep. Even as we speak, they may be taking the wretched rogue into custody."

Tessandra and Melisent both sighed with relief, though Caderyn frowned at the prospect of his friends assaulting the keep and risking their lives without him. No doubt that was how his parents felt about him riding off on his pilgrimage to track down his mother's would-be assassin. The sentiment was one he'd have to manage if he was to assume the duties of a duke...and an Emperor.

Delegating the business of death, after all, was one of the primary tasks of a ruler.

"And on that matter, there is something I wish to discuss with you, Sir Caderyn. In private, if you please."

"I trust Tessandra and Melisent with my life," Caderyn said firmly. "And thus I trust them with my secrets."

"Lovely and trustworthy as they are, I would much prefer this to be a private conversation."

The two women excused themselves and the duke slid into Melisent's chair, then popped the last grape into his mouth.

"Everard's inevitable capture provides my realm with closure...but also opportunity," Leopold said. "There were suspicions that he might have had outside assistance, but we found no evidence of that within his keep. None of the supporters we've captured thus far have hinted at any such aid."

His thin fingers drummed on the tabletop.

"And yet the possibility exists that we might find such evidence, or that his most loyal followers will confess to outside support once they're captured. Once the knives of my torturers assail his foul flesh, Everard himself might make such a confession."

Caderyn had an inkling of where Leopold was going, but kept silent and finished off his tea. Another game, another move of a piece across the board, another scheme...

Gods, if only his mother or brother were there to help him play that particular game.

"With how ambitious Thandor is, do you think it's possible Jadewall was involved?" Caderyn asked, opening the door so that Leopold could stride right through it.

"Given the rumors we've heard of his Imperial ambitions, perhaps he sought to encourage dissent to weaken us, or perhaps to create a wedge between me and my Asparran partners. Doing so could have destabilized my duchy and given him an opportunity to seize greater influence."

The usage of the term 'partners' was almost laughable, as Tsannor was in reality little more than a vassal. But Caderyn maintained decorum, continuing to play the delicate game as best he could.

"It would be quite a boon to my cause if we learned Thandor was sponsoring revolts in neighboring duchies. Such knowledge would confirm that he is a murderous, ambitious meddler," said Caderyn.

And it might also ease some of Leopold's shame for allowing the revolt to happen at all. It was one thing for Everard to have rebelled on his own, but altogether another if it was the result of a rich, ambitious duke's schemes. Such support could help to explain the poorly-managed siege and the baron's escape.

Both men could thus benefit from such a revelation.

Leopold then removed an envelope from his belt and set it upon the table.

"This is a formal writ, signed by myself and Lady Rigarda, affirming and attesting to our knowledge of Lady Melisent's parentage. While this will not suffice as a formal claim of inheritance, it can be but one weapon among many." He then slipped it back into his belt. "And this writ can be yours, along with confirmation of a confession of Thandor's involvement in the revolt, if you but make a few...rearrangements."

The offer was a tempting one, but it was time for Leopold to move another piece across the board.

"I should think fair restitution would be the meager enlargement of my own duchy," Leopold said. "Once your family completes its punishment and pacification of Jadewall, all I ask is that you transfer one of Jadewall's baronies to me. Specifically, the lands of Baroness Gisla."

Caderyn recalled riding through those lands on the pilgrimage. They'd been relatively prosperous for a border barony, and he remembered several locals mentioning work in the mines of the rocky hills.

Baroness Gisla's lands had no doubt filled Thandor's coffers for years, yielding gold and silver with which to purchase arms and mercenary contracts. If war broke out, steel purchased by that gold would be arrayed against Caderyn's own people. And now Leopold wanted it for himself.

To what end? Simply to enrich himself? Or did he have grander dreams...perhaps dreams of using that wealth to one day destroy Asparra's domineering 'partnership?'

"I must remind you, my lord, that I am but the heir," Caderyn said. "I have thus been granted no formal authority with which to negotiate agreements."

"Then convey my offer to your parents. If they uphold their end of the bargain, so shall I."

Caderyn stared down at his empty teacup. After the slaughter unleashed by Everard's foolish revolt, he cared little if the bastard was tortured and forced into a false confession. Caderyn had killed many men for the sake of his family, so accepting a lie was not exactly the darkest of sins on his conscience.

Again and again he'd pondered the costs of power and the price he'd have to pay to continue on this path. Seizing the Imperial throne would require even greater sacrifices than this.

What was one small lie and a barony if it helped purchase Thandor's defeat?

"I shall do all I can to convince my parents of the value of this arrangement, my lord," Caderyn said with a warm, forced smile.

"Excellent. Not only are you a damned fine warrior, you also have a damned keen mind for politics."

After a proud little slap of his hand upon the table, Leopold rose and limped off.

Once Caderyn was alone within the courtyard, he heard echoes of imagined screams between the chirps of songbirds. Screams of Everard and his men, screams of the doomed peasants who had fallen in the assault on the fortress...and the screams of Thandor.

Heart pounding, Caderyn rose shakily to his feet.

"One path of many," he murmured under his breath, knowing that there could have been other means of securing Leopold's cooperation...or other paths that could have turned the man into his enemy.

**

Later that evening, he wandered at Melisent's side near a creek that ran through the estate's grounds. Eager to find more materials that would help brew a potion to quicken Pelagia's recovery, she'd asked him to help find the ingredients.

As the setting sun cast long shadows over the muddy creek, Melisent prowled the banks, occasionally reaching down to snatch at the mud, cursing with each attempt.

"What are you trying to find?"

"There's a type of water-spider with a very weak venom that is amazing at assisting with sealing wounds," she said. "They only hunt at night so they're damnably hard to catch. But if I can snatch even a few of them..."

Melisent's hand darted down, only for her to grumble and curse with frustration as the little critter scampered beneath the dark water.

"It's strange how similar this is to the practices of the Kovgaardian witches and shamans," Caderyn said. "Ketrik, a shaman who assists my family at court, is always out in the countryside snatching up bugs, worms, and strange herbs."

"I don't think it's strange at all. The Kovgaardians live in the same world as the rest of us, after all. Surely they've stumbled onto the same solutions as us...or perhaps all of our knowledge descends from the same roots."

"What do you mean?" he asked, his eyes darting about in search for those little spiders.

"Go back far enough, and all men are kin. The old myths say that our ancestors came to this continent from far across the Sea of Talons, so it's not hard to imagine that the people of the south and Kovgaard are both descended from those same waves of migration. Some settled in the harsher north and developed in their own way, and others settled in the south, forming the kingdoms and then the Empire. It stands to reason that some knowledge might have persisted throughout both cultures."

"Now that you mention it," he murmured. "Some of the symbols used by your old convent did look similar to runes I saw in Kovgaard."

"Really?" she asked, looking up from the mud. "Interesting. Though hardly relevant now, I suppose. The history of a common language won't help me catch one of those damned little-"

She let out a yip of glee and lurched down, her fingers disappearing beneath the mud. Beaming with triumph, she lifted a little wriggling blue spider, then slipped it into a vial. After setting it into a basket for safekeeping, she continued her hunt.

"It seems that Tessandra and I have come to a bit of an accord," Melisent said after a few more minutes of wandering. "While you were scheming with Duke Leopold, she helped me prepare other bandages and we spent the rest of the afternoon gossiping and chatting."

Melisent smiled over her shoulder at him.

"I can certainly see why you were so charmed by her."

"I'm glad," Caderyn said, unable to resist imagining the blonde and the brunette entangled in lust, with Melisent's darker curves pressed against Tessandra's pale, slender form.

He cleared his throat.

"Not that I'm expecting her to leap into bed with us...but I am glad you can get along."

"I am not necessarily opposed to the idea," she said, swaying her hips almost invitingly. "But...would that not complicate things between you and Pelagia? It's obvious that she doesn't like me."