LITMIR.BIZ

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getting a feel for the sword he held. He started to increase the pace, adjusting his footwork, moving from one guard to another with his blows: ox, to wraith, to long, and back again.

      Somewhere in the flurry of it, he stopped thinking about the individual moves, the strokes and the parries and the binds flowing together into one whole where steel rang on steel and his blade flickered out to cut and thrust. He worked until he was sweating, the post moving at speeds now that could bruise or injure if he misjudged things even once.

      Finally, he stepped back, saluting the post as he had seen swordsmen salute an opponent, before checking the blade he held for damage. There were no nicks on it or cracks. That was good.

      “Your technique is good,” a voice said, and Devin spun, finding himself facing a man of perhaps thirty, dressed in breeches and a shirt that had been tied tighter to his body to avoid cloth tangling with a passing blade. He had long dark hair, tied back in braids that would not come undone in a fight, and aquiline features leading up to eyes of piecing gray. He walked with a slight limp, as if from an old injury. “But you should keep your weight off your heels as you turn; it makes it hard for you to adjust until you complete the movement.”

      “You… you’re Swordmaster Wendros,” Devin said. The House had many sword masters, but Wendros was the one nobles paid most to learn from, some waiting years to do it.

      “Am I?” He took a moment to stare at his reflection in a suit of plate armor. “Why, so I am. Hmm, I’d listen to what I said then, if I were you. They tell me I know all there is to know about a sword, as if that’s much.

      “Now listen to another piece of advice,” Swordmaster Wendros added. “Give it up.”

      “What?” Devin said, shocked.

      “Give up your attempt to become a swordsman,” he said. “Soldiers just need to know how to stand in a line. There is more to being a warrior.” He leaned in close. “Much more.”

      Devin didn’t know what to say. He knew he was alluding to something greater, something beyond his wisdom; yet he had no idea what it could be.

      Devin wanted to say something, but he couldn’t think of the words.

      And just like that, Wendros turned and marched off into the sunrise.

      Devin found himself thinking about the dream he’d had. He couldn’t help feeling as if they were connected.

      He couldn’t help feeling as if today was the day that would change everything.

      CHAPTER THREE

      Princess Lenore could barely believe the beauty of the castle as servants transformed it in preparation for her wedding. It went from a thing of gray stone to something sheathed in blue silk and elegant tapestries, chains of woven promises and dangling trinkets. Around her, a dozen maidservants busied themselves with elements of dresses and decorations, buzzing around her like a swarm of worker bees.

      They did it for her, and Lenore was truly grateful for that, even if she knew that as a princess she should expect it. Lenore had always found it amazing that others were prepared to do so much for her, simply because of who she was. She appreciated beauty almost more than anything else, and here they were, doing so much with silk and lace to make the castle wondrous…

      “You look perfect,” her mother said. Queen Aethe was giving commands at the heart of all of it, looking resplendent as she did so in dark velvet and shining jewels.

      “Do you think so?” Lenore asked.

      Her mother led her to stand in front of the great mirror that her maids had arranged. In it, Lenore could see the similarities between them, from the near black hair to the tall, slender frame. Except for Greave, all her other siblings had taken after their father but Lenore was definitely her mother’s daughter.

      Thanks to her maids’ efforts, she shone in silks and diamonds, her hair braided with blue thread, her dress embroidered with silver. Her mother made the smallest of adjustments, then kissed her cheek.

      “You look perfect, exactly as a princess should.”

      From her mother, that was about the greatest compliment that she could have. She’d always told Lenore that as the eldest sister, her duty was to be the princess that the realm needed, to look it and to act it in every moment. Lenore did her best, hoping it would be enough. It never felt like it, but still Lenore tried to live up to everything she ought to be.

      Of course, that also allowed her little sisters to be… other things. Lenore wished that Nerra and Erin were there too. Oh, Erin would complain about being fitted for a dress, and Nerra would probably have to stop partway through because she felt unwell, but Lenore couldn’t think of anyone she wanted there more.

      Well, there was one person.

      “When will he be here?” Lenore asked her mother.

      “They say that Duke Viris’s retinue arrived in the city this morning,” her mother said. “His son should be with it.”

      “It did?” Instantly, Lenore ran over to the window and the balcony there, leaning out over it as if being that fraction closer to the city would let her see her betrothed as he arrived. She looked out over the bridge-linked islands that made up Royalsport, but from this height it wasn’t possible to make out individuals, only the concentric rings of the water between the islands, and the buildings that stood between. She could see the guard barracks that spilled out men when it was low tide to manage traffic across the rivers, the Houses—of Weapons and Sighs, Knowledge and Merchants—each standing at the heart of their district. There were the houses of the poorer folk on the islands toward the edges of the city, and the great homes of the wealthy closer to, some even on their own small islands. The castle towered over all of it, of course, but that didn’t mean that Lenore could spot the man to whom she was going to be married.

      “He’ll be here,” her mother promised. “Your father has arranged a hunt on the morrow, as part of the celebrations, and the duke will not risk missing it.”

      “His son will come for Father’s hunt, but not to see me?” Lenore asked. For a moment, she felt as nervous as a girl, not a woman of eighteen full summers. It was only too easy to imagine him not wanting her, not loving her, in a marriage arranged like this.

      “He will see you, and he will love you,” her mother promised. “How could anyone not?”

      “I don’t know, Mother… he hasn’t even met me,” Lenore said, feeling the nerves that threatened to overwhelm her.

      “He will soon, and…” Her mother paused as a knock came at the door to the chamber. “Come in.”

      Another maidservant entered, this one less richly dressed than then others; a servant for the castle, rather than directly for the princess.

      “Your majesty, your highness,” she began, with a curtsey. “I’ve been sent to tell you that Duke Viris’s son Finnal has arrived, and is waiting in the greater antechamber, if you have time to meet him before the feasting.”

      Ah, the feasting. Her father had declared a week of it and more, filled with entertainments, open to all.

      “If I have time?” Lenore said, and then remembered how things were done at court. She was a princess, after all. “Of course. Please tell Finnal that I will be down directly.”

      She turned to her mother. “Can Father afford to be so generous with the feasting?” she asked. “I’m not… I don’t deserve a whole week and more of it, and it must be eating into both our coin and our food stocks.”

      “Your father wants to be generous,” Lenore’s mother said. “He says that the hunt tomorrow would bring enough quarry to make up for it.” She laughed. “My husband thinks himself the grand hunter still.”

      “And it’s a good chance to organize things while people are busy feasting,” Lenore guessed.

      “That too,” her mother said. “Well, if there’s to be a feast, we should make sure that you look fit for it, Lenore.”

      She fussed around

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