Fortune and Fate (Twelve Houses) (38 page)

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Authors: Sharon Shinn

BOOK: Fortune and Fate (Twelve Houses)
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“Sometimes,” she agreed, feeling oddly relieved.
 
 
“So you have more work to do, my Willa! I will see you tomorrow and you can tell me how much farther you’ve progressed.”
 
 
 
 
KARRYN
was back at the training yard in the morning, greeting all the guards by name. They fought that morning as if performing for the queen herself, no one holding back. There would be some spectacular bruises in the barracks tonight, Wen thought, but no one would begrudge the manner of earning them.
 
 
Davey sauntered over after the first hour of the workout. With his right wrist splinted, he had been forced to practice bladework with his left hand, and he’d done fairly well at it, too.
 
 
“Does the serramarra care to take a little practice?” he asked Karryn, showing her his injured arm. “You see I’m hurt. You could probably take me on with no trouble.”
 
 
“Davey,” Wen said in a warning voice.
 
 
He gave her a look of injured innocence through a floppy fall of dark hair. “I think it would be an excellent idea for serra Karryn to learn to defend herself.”
 
 
“Probably, but not from you,” Wen replied.
 
 
Karryn looked between them, intrigued but uncertain. “Why not?”
 
 
“Because even injured, he could give a good accounting of himself against most men, and he’d certainly overpower
you
,” Wen replied.
 
 
“I’ve never held a sword,” Karryn said.
 
 
Quick as a flash, Davey had pulled his practice blade and offered it to her. She took it gingerly, obviously unprepared for its weight, and let the tip fall to the grass. “That’s so heavy! How do you swing it around like that?”
 
 
Davey rolled back a sleeve to show off a pretty impressive array of muscles in his curled arm. “You build strength over the months and years,” he said.
 
 
“I’d never be able to fight somebody with a sword,” Karryn said.
 
 
Now Davey pulled a short blade from his belt, this one true metal. “Dagger, then,” he said, offering it hilt first. “Can’t use it except in close quarters, but you can certainly do some damage.”
 
 
Karryn returned the sword and took the knife, examining it with real interest. Davey’s was plain but exceedingly sharp; Wen resigned herself to the fact that Karryn would cut herself, which she did almost instantly. But the sight of her own blood seemed to make her more intrigued, not less. “I might be able to learn how to use this,” she said presently. “If someone showed me.”
 
 
“I’d be happy to,” Davey said.
 
 
Wen had a sudden intense, painful memory of a day spent at Ghosenhall. She and Janni were inside the palace, teaching the young princess how to hold a weapon. Both of them had relished the chance to get to know Amalie, who had always been so reclusive and shy. Not on that particular afternoon, though—Amalie had been friendly, determined to learn, and completely free of snobbery, and Janni and Wen had both found themselves delighted with their princess’s openness. Cammon had been there, too, and they had laughed away the afternoon, despite the gloom that hung over Ghosenhall in those days. The princess needed to learn to fight because everyone was convinced that war was coming. They’d known they wouldn’t have too many more carefree days.
 
 
“Willa?” Karryn asked, because clearly she had been silent too long. “Do you think it would be all right if he showed me how to handle a knife?”
 
 
“Of course it would,” Wen said briskly. “Or someone! You don’t have to take lessons from Davey if you think he’s too forward.” She gave him a heavy frown.
 
 
His expression was virtuous. “I will treat serra Karryn with the greatest respect!”
 
 
Karryn giggled. “I don’t mind if Davey shows me. If he gets fresh, I’ll just twist his hurt wrist.”
 
 
“Serra!” he protested.
 
 
Wen reflected that Karryn probably could take care of herself after all.
 
 
“You might want to wear something a little less fancy,” Wen said, indicating Karryn’s dress. It was a simple enough style, but made of material that looked extremely expensive, and the lace at the throat would probably cost Wen her salary for the month. “Something old and tattered, if such a thing hangs in your closet.”
 
 
Karryn glanced down as if to remind herself of her attire. “Hmm. Maybe tomorrow morning, then. I’ll find an old castoff to wear.”
 
 
She left soon afterward, and Wen took the first opportunity to crowd Davey against the fence. “If you touch her,” she said in a pleasant voice. “If you make her nervous. If I look over and see the first sign of worry on her face. I will break your other hand. I will break your jaw. I will cut out your eyeballs with your own knife.”
 
 
“Good,” he said. “I was afraid you’d expel me from the guard.”
 
 
She gave him a look of unspeakable disgust, and he laughed and poked her in the ribs. She was tempted to grab his arm, flip him to the ground, and batter his face just to underscore the seriousness of her threat. “You know I can kill you,” she said.
 
 
“And you should know that I wouldn’t give you any reason to,” he replied, some of his laughter fading.
 
 
“She’s just a girl.”
 
 
“She’s a pretty girl,” he said. “She ought to get a chance to enjoy that.”
 
 
Since Wen didn’t know how to answer him—because she didn’t know much about what it was like to be a pretty girl—she just gave him another darkling look and strode away. She took out some of her confusion and irritation in a hard bout against Eggles, but she was distracted. He bested her once when she made a careless mistake, and he almost caused her mock death until she beat him back with a sudden desperate frenzy. In the end, he was lying on the ground, winded and a little stunned, and she stood over him, breathing heavily and feeling like she had been pounded by rocks and hammers.
 
 
“I didn’t think
you
ever had an off day,” he observed from his position in the mud.
 
 
“Just want you to gain a little confidence with a near-win now and then,” she said. His expression was skeptical, but he didn’t bother to contradict her.
 
 
While they packed up the equipment after the morning’s training session, Wen maneuvered a little to end up in the tack room along with Orson and Moss, the two guards she trusted the most. She laid out the situation—the serramarra interested in defense, the flirtatious young guard offering to be her tutor.
 
 
“Should I keep him away from her? She seemed pleased at the notion of learning from him, but—”
 
 
“Davey won’t cross the line,” Moss said, sounding certain. “Do you ever watch him with Ginny? He teases her and tells her she’s pretty, but he never makes her uncomfortable.”
 
 
“Ginny
is
pretty,” Orson said in an admiring voice. “That hair alone! No wonder no one’s ever late for dinner at the barracks.”
 
 
Wen gave him a hard and level look. “If you touch her, I will cut your parts off,” she said.
 
 
He burst out laughing and even Moss smiled. “I don’t know how you ever find time to sleep,” Orson said at last, “since you have to spend so much time taking care of everybody in the world.”
 
 
“Not everybody, but Karryn, yes, it’s my job, and Ginny certainly,” Wen said grimly. “I’m the one who brought Ginny here and if something happens to her—”
 
 
Moss stopped her with a hand on her arm. With her other hand, she was brushing her pale hair away from her wide face. “Willa. He’s just trying to get a reaction from you. If any of the men tried to seduce Ginny, Orson would kick them all the way through Forten City to the sea itself. He wouldn’t let anyone hurt a young girl—and he’s certainly not interested in one himself.”
 
 
“Prefer me a mature woman,” Orson said with a drawl. “One who knows a bit about pleasing a man.”
 
 
Moss gave him a quick look accompanied by a faint flush and Wen thought,
What have I missed here?
Moss and Orson? They seemed an unlikely couple, she so odd and reserved, hardly any more feminine than Wen herself, and Orson so masculine and tough. Yet Wen had seen stranger pairings whenever women joined the ranks of soldiers. Throw men and women together in any situation, she supposed, and some kind of attraction would result.
 
 
“Well, we’re not discussing Ginny anyway,” Wen said shortly, since she didn’t want to appear curious. “We’re talking about Karryn. If you think Davey can be trusted to coach her, I don’t see any reason she shouldn’t learn a few moves. I doubt Karryn will ever be able to do much to defend herself—but she’s surprised me before. And it never hurts to be able to unsettle an attacker with a weapon he didn’t think you had.”
 
 
“I’ll watch him,” Orson said. “He’s even more afraid of me than he is of you. He won’t get out of line.”
 
 
“She’ll be back tomorrow morning,” Wen said. “Ready to fight.”
 
 
 
 
INDEED,
Karryn was at the training yard the next day, garbed in a shapeless gray dress that she had to have borrowed from her abigail, since it had obviously never hung in her own closet. She was also wearing thick boots to protect herself from the mud, and she’d tied back her thick hair in a style that was unflattering but eminently practical. Wen was impressed. Karryn was here to do business.
 
 
She was accompanied by her guardian, which Wen noted in utter amazement. He had strolled down from the house with Karryn, and now he leaned against the fence, examining the yard with his usual curiosity. For a moment, he looked strange to her, and she wondered why. He wore the same loose-fitting jacket and unfashionable trousers that he always did; he had not trimmed his hair or his beard. It finally occurred to her that she had rarely seen him outdoors, in direct sunlight. This was an unfamiliar setting for him and she wondered if his behavior would change now that he was in it.
 
 
Almost immediately, something distracted his attention from the yard. “Gods, what a remarkable smell,” he said, swinging his head to sniff the air. “Every year, I forget what a treat we are in for.”
 
 
Indeed, the entire yard was heavily scented because, overnight, the hedge that surrounded Fortune had burst into ecstatic bloom. The gaudy white blossoms were so thickly clustered on the branches that it was difficult to see any green at all; standing beside the hedge was a little like leaning against a deeply perfumed cloud. Wen didn’t wonder that Jasper was distracted. She herself had been drawing in deep lungfuls of air ever since she stepped outside.
 
 
“I’ve never smelled anything like it anywhere else,” Wen said.
 
 
“And you won’t,” Jasper replied. “The story goes that Rintour Fortunalt—the man who built Fortune—imported seeds from some country whose name has been lost to memory. He planted them around his estate and coaxed the hedge to grow, but no one has ever been able to successfully transplant a cutting to any other patch of soil in Gillengaria.”
 
 
“Is that true?” Karryn asked, looking pleased.
 
 
He smiled at her. “I don’t know. But
I’ve
never encountered these blossoms anywhere except Fortune.”
 
 
“No time to look at pretty flowers,” Wen said briskly, because Orson and Davey had jogged up. “Is everyone ready?”
 
 
Karryn ducked between the railings of the fence to stand inside the yard. But she hovered close to Jasper, as if afraid of wandering too far into unknown territory. Still, her voice was firm when she said, “
I
am.”
 
 
“Good. Let’s get started.”
 
 
They spent the morning showing Karryn various holds and moves that would frustrate an attacker and give her an advantage, however slight. Whenever Karryn didn’t understand their instructions, Wen and Orson would demonstrate, and then Karryn and Davey would mimic their actions. Wen noticed that Davey didn’t allow his injured arm to hamper him much, and she also noticed that he was very careful about where he placed his hands on Karryn’s body. That might have been because Jasper, Orson, and Wen were all two paces away, watching intently. Or it might have been because he really would offer the serramarra no insult, even if he were alone with her. Just like Moss said.

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