Xara Zynthar's Arc

Chapter 14 of 16

Xara heard the horses in the yard before dawn. She stayed on the bench until the sound thinned into distance. The prince had gone with the captain to the docks himself. He had asked her to find him after the council meeting, whatever came of it. The council was done. The ships were sailing. She had no gift left to carry to him and no news he did not already own. Verity was still in the corridor, leaning against the stone with her arms folded inside her sleeves. "He is back within the hour," Verity said. "You should not be sitting here when he comes." "I have nothing to bring him." "Then bring nothing." "He watched me trade my home for a nod through glass. If I go to him now he will look at me the way people look at the sick." Verity was quiet. Then she said, "You are deciding what he feels before he feels it. That is a thief's work." Xara looked up. "Go to him," Verity said. "Or stay here and lose him to a story you wrote in a hallway." Xara stood. She pulled her sleeve tight over the sigil and walked. She found him in the small room off the library, still in his riding coat. The orb sat on the table between them, dark. He had set the empty place where the vial had been beside it, as if keeping the shape. He looked up when she came in. He did not stand. "The captain has it," he said. "He knows your mother's name. He will speak it first." "Thank you." She did not move from the door. He watched her not move. "You thought you would come to me with something in your hands," he said. "Yes." "I did not ask for anything in your hands." She crossed the room. She sat down opposite him. The mark on her arm itched under the cloth. She put her good hand on the table, palm up, and left it there. He took it. "I cannot go home," she said. "The pact takes me at the border. The ships go without me. If my mother reaches the harbor in time, the children live. If she does not, they don't. I will not know for weeks. I will not know for months." "No," he said. "You won't." "I did not want to bring you that." "You brought me yourself. That is what I asked for." She felt the shape of the empty space beside the orb and did not look at it. She kept her hand in his. "Stay," he said. "For how long." "For as long as you have." She said yes. The word was small and it held. Outside, the sky was beginning to grey. Somewhere past the harbor, a ship was already moving.