Champion of the Rose - Kobo Ebook (45 page)

"The baby?" she asked then, and waited a very long
moment before his sigh, pure relief, gave her an answer. She cried then: release, guilt.

"The Rose was shielding it," he said, to her
surprise. "Not this instinct, but
the Rose itself, still carrying out its basic function. Shielding it and you, preserving the Rathen
heir and Champion."

"Ah." She
tried to feel some gratitude, but there was only relief. Then she turned her head toward him, started
to lift a hand to her own face, and stopped. It seemed an insignificant thing, compared to the life of her
child. She thought about it, then added,
almost apologetically: "I don't seem to be able to see."

-
oOo
-

Enthroned in the King's bed, all bandages and
exhaustion. Healing was a tricky thing,
even for the best of mages, and the burns on Soren's hand would require many
days of work. She wouldn't lose use of
her fingers. Her eyes were beyond
repair.

It had taken Strake a long time to accept it. When his own and Aristide's divinations had
failed to give hope, he'd even gone so far as to summon the Tzel Aviar. But although magic was good at hurrying
healing, and doing straightforward things like binding bones and warding
against infection, living bodies resisted enchantment which replaced or made as
new. She was blind.

Strake and Aristide had stayed a long time away after
escorting the Tzel Aviar out. Soren
drifted on the edge of dozing, feeling she should stay awake, feeling it was
all unreal and that she'd died after all and was only dreaming she still
lived. Any moment now, surely, the Moon
would welcome her back.

A step at the door told her it wasn't true. Strake, though the Rose was no longer there
to underline the guess with perfect awareness. She felt the bed shift with his weight as he sat beside her, and then
the echo of another step as someone else crossed from the door.

"Champion–" Aristide began.

"Not Champion
any more
." She said it with open pleasure, and heard
Strake swallow.

Aristide responded with that light, polite, almost chiding tone
which had once made her writhe: "There was a Champion before there was a
Rose. And is one after."

"Blind Champion?" She thought that funny, made a little hiccupping noise.

"Yes." All
hint of mockery had gone. "Without
the Rose, Darest is now exposed to the full force of the
malison
. Strake will bear the brunt of that, and you
will be a vital shield against its effects. There are many ways to serve: don't underestimate this one."

She supposed he meant she'd take the edge off Strake's
temper, keep him human, or sane. Save
him from Lady Arista's fate, from becoming a grieving, brooding king, a
whirlwind eating out its own heart. A
most important factor for Aristide, bound to serve. But something else was more interesting.

"You called him Strake." She said it in an awed, dizzy kind of way, and
had the signal pleasure of hearing Aristide
Couerveur
laugh.

"So I did. Remiss of me."

Soren wondered if it was possible to shield Aristide as
well. Two kings in Darest, and the
uncrowned just as important, but before she could say anything he went on.

"We cannot repair your eyes, Champion. But we have been to view the structure of
spell which allowed the Rose to see, and I believe we can adapt it to our
purposes."

"Palace-sight?" She sounded appalled, and shook her head to underline that. To suffer that overwhelming press again –
she'd rather the alternative.

"It wouldn't have the same range," Strake said
quickly. "The bounds of a room, no
more. And you'd be able to go out of the
palace. You'd not be able to see into
the distance, though, and we'll have to keep renewing the thing, but – Soren
–" He gripped her uninjured hand
painfully.

"We will attempt a casting tomorrow morning,"
Aristide said, with an amused edge to his voice. "Until then, Champion. Majesty."

He went out. Soren
wondered if he was smiling, and knew that she'd be glad to see again. She especially wanted to see the look in her
Rathen's
eyes, right this moment.

"This isn't your fault, Strake," she said softly.

"Does that make it any better?" He leaned over her, pressed his cheek against
hers and inhaled as if he, too, couldn't quite believe the Moon hadn't taken
her, and had to have some proof beyond – sight. "You screamed, Soren. I've
never heard anything worse."

"Well it hurt." That seemed so obvious. "But
I'd do it again."

"You should never have had to do it in the first
place."

"Maybe not. Who
can know what Darest would have been if
Domina
Rathen
had never created the Rose? Perhaps the
Kingdom would have died young, or would have been taken back by The Deeping
these past couple of centuries. Or
perhaps Aristide would be King, and doing very well indeed. I do know I couldn't go on as a puppet, and I'm
so happy to have my mind my own I can barely stop myself screaming. And that there's one thing that hasn't
changed, even without the Rose."

"What?"

"You're still my Rathen."

He was silent, and Soren found her inability to see his
expression suddenly overwhelming. Could
she somehow be wrong? Had they not come
far enough?

Then a touch on her uninjured hand, and his fingers curled
through hers.

"I'm Strake," he said, and that was all the
reassurance she needed. Not her Rathen,
but her friend. Without the shadow of
the Rose, it was a way forward both of them could accept.

--
ooOoo
—

Thank you for reading

"Champion of the Rose"

For information about

other books by

Andrea K
Höst

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