All three stared blankly back.
Renard felt his fury flash its teeth. His nostrils flared. “Where are Taillefer’s vials?”
After several angry heartbeats so loud Renard was sure even their aged ears could hear the drumbeat outside his own body, Menon unlocked his jaw and raised his cowardly eyes to his king. “It is my understanding from the soldiers who were aboard at the time that Ardenia seized the vials and all other contents of Taillefer’s workshop.”
Renard’s fists bulged, white and static at his sides. “Ardenia seized them? And we let it happen?”
“Yes, my king, it would appear so.” Menon held up two placating palms, soft and cold. “Leadership was not made aware of the missing items until we had long been moving toward Pyrenee.”
“Well then. We must get them back.”
“The Ardenian party will not likely return for—”
“Then have the message waiting for Amarande. Send a bird, a rider, a cannonball straight through the front gate of the Itspi. Amarande will release those vialsaheadof the conclave or we will send a regiment to retrieve them ourselves.”
CHAPTER 33
ITwas near dawn when the warmth of a palm covered Ferdinand’s mouth.
He startled awake not even realizing he’d finally fallen asleep, his eyes snapping open to the lovely smile of Osana by candlelight. “Hush now, you big ox—you thrash any more, and the candle will go out.”
Ferdinand pushed himself to sitting, and immediately cupped her pointed chin. “I’d light it and ten more to see your face clearly. I’ve missed it. And you.”
He captured her mouth with his, mindful of the candle and her injury, still marked by a sling. Osana’s good arm wrapped about his neck, pulling their kiss deeper, making it as much hers as his. Her skin was cool, the overnight winds leaving their mark as she made her way from the Basilican camp to his tent—the small, single-person kind afforded the Ardenian soldiers. It was what he requested and what he truly preferred. It didn’t leave much room for maneuvering with an extra person, which, in this instance, was not a problem at all. He’d be as close to her as she’d let him be. Now and always.
After a long moment, Osana pulled away, her fingers smoothing a lock of hair from his brow.
“The sun will be up soon—I can’t stay long. But I’ve brought you something.”
Osana set the candle aside, and then the body of a sword was thrust into his waiting palms. Though it was sheathed, Ferdinand immediately recognized it. “This is the sword Amarande gave you.”
“It is, but I want you to have it.”
This weapon had been one he recovered for her in the hours after they’d won back the Itspi from Geneva and staved off war with Taillefer’s crucial defeat of his mother. She’d surrendered it at the gate upon entry to the castle with Urtzi, and he knew she loved it for what it meant between her and Amarande. “No, you need a sword, and she gifted it to you for your service.”
“She did, but as you’ll recall my father has designs on holding me hostage in the steel capital of the Sand and Sky. The Aragonesti is practically swimming in metal—I’ll have no trouble obtaining another weapon. But this,thisis special and let me tell you why.”
Despite a lack of leverage because of the careful binding of her sling, Osana slipped the sword a hand’s breadth out of its sheath. Then, she brought the candle close. “See that inscription?”
“Egia?” Ferdinand read aloud. “I don’t know much Old Torrentian. What does it mean?”
Osana’s eyes truly glittered in the flickering candlelight. “Truth.”
Ferdinand’s breath caught, and Osana again set the candle beside them and cradled his face in her small hand. “This was your father’s sword, the twin to the one Amarande carries. Do you know what that one’s called?”
He didn’t.
“Maite—‘love.’”
A stillness settled over them. Ferdinand’s mind was suddenly heavy with all he didn’t know about Sendoa, or the man he was. In the past few weeks, Ferdinand had gathered the clues he could—stories and letters and scribbles on a map—hoping to know his father better, and yet perhaps the swords the man wielded said more about who he was than anything else.
Truth and love—what the Warrior King carried with him into battle to protect Ardenia, and indeed to protect the entire continent.
Osana’s beautiful face tilted in the candlelight. “Do you now see why this was meant to be yours? Amarande’s belief in true love led her to begin the quest we’re on. Your belief in the truth has defined everything you’ve done since you found out what had been hidden from you for so long. I believe you and Amarande are strongest together, and that you were meant to hold this sword, not me.”
The weight of this gift settled heavily on the shards of Ferdinand’s heart, and he found himself staring at the etching until the letters blurred in his vision. He couldn’t look at Osana in that moment, and when he asked the question his voice was smaller than even the flickering flame of the lone candle.
“Does this gift mean a final good-bye for us?”
