Chapter 6.2

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We were not yet friends the first time I hit him so. We were both new to the Guildhall, both friendless. Our classmates had paired off to practice wrestling in the Bardhall’s open yard, and we were left with each other. He sneered at my size; I laughed at his girlish voice. He shoved me to the mud; I caught his hair and yanked him down with me. He spat in my face; I slammed my fist into his chin. He fell to the ground like a cloth doll.

I waited for him to rise, but he didn’t. He lay still, his head cocked to the side, his limbs sprawled oddly. The wind chilled my back, and all the other bards-in-training turned and stared. I stood frozen while Master Meiltung walked up.

"That’s one way to end a fight. Not all are affected in that way, so don’t count on it." He pulled Sharp into a sitting position and patted his face until he awoke.

It is strange how an act of cruelty and the guilt that comes with it can lead to friendship. By the end of the week we were sworn brothers, inseparable for the next five years.

Yet this sworn brother had just tried to kill me.

Chapter 6.1

I backed away from the point of Sharp’s sword. Geldswan was back in my room, and the only metal on me was the heavy crucifix and its thick chain.

"I see now why you’re so silent." Sharp’s voice cooed like a dovekeeper before he broke a bird’s neck. "You’re a Silent Monk. But not a good one, we find out. Was my lady pleasant enough for you?"

Hardly, I thought as I glanced around frantically. The hallway was bare and cramped, murky in the afternoon’s dull light, and there was nothing close enough for me to lay my hands on. If I ran for help, my disguise would be shattered.

"Your pet bullies aren’t with you today. So tell me, would you prefer to fight, or to die quietly?"
I pointed to his sword, and motioned that I had none.

"True. I have my sword, and you have your God." He spat the last word out, then lunged. I ducked right, toward his weak left side. Since my left side was stronger, that usually gave me more room – but I lacked a weapon, save my fist. His sword kept from getting close enough to use it.

"What’s the matter, monk? Can’t you fight? Of course not – you only have time to pray to your one little god. Your god so weak he couldn’t even save himself. Where is your god now? Listening to some other sniveling coward?"

Damn it, we should have given him to the Christians.
Again he lunged. I ducked right again, and my shoulder slammed the wall. I had run out of room. Had I only something with which to block the sword...

The heavy crucifix slammed into my chest.

I yanked it off and held it in my left hand, the chain dangling toward the floor.

"So you agree with me? But that won’t stop this." Sharp raised his sword and brought it down in a slashing blow.

This time I ducked left, striking back with the chain as I moved. It looped over the blade and slid down to the hilt, where it caught. Throwing the crucifix to my right hand, I yanked the sword from Sharp’s grip and flung it, with the crucifix, down the hall behind me. Startled, he watched it go, pausing just long enough for me to slam my left fist into his chin.
Without a sound, he folded to the floor.

Chapter 5.7

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With relief , I heard the tower doors shut behind me. I had walked into the mouth of danger, and I had come out. I slipped into a service hallway, took a deep breath, and straightened my shoulders. I lifted my head, carrying it as a true man does.

And I looked straight into Sharp’s eyes. He grinned like a wolf as he raised the cold steel blade in his hand.

Chapter 5.6

The others turned to look at me. Then one of the younger ladies called out, “Good brother – come scrub my back!”

I paused, then hurried to the task. Absolute service was the creed of the Silent Monks, though I had thought that they would never attend a lady at her bath unless she were infirm. Still, I would have to do their bidding or risk shattering my disguise.

I bent to my task, keeping my eyes to her well-shaped back. Her shoulders were smooth and round, and curved down in a perfect line to her perfect breast, creamy white and shaped... I saw Elise in my mind’s eye, impatiently tapping her foot, and remembered my job. Finishing quickly, I blessed her and moved back.

“Now me,” cried none other than the Lady Victoria.

Following her bidding, I set to work. I did not feel quite so guilty about admiring her charms, having seen them displayed so brazenly in the greenhouse.

Another woman, almost a child, moved to sit beside her. She spoke quietly, beneath the chatter of the others. “How are things going with that Bard of yours?”
She giggled. “Quite well, m’lady. What he lacks in substance, he makes up for in style.”

My opinion of the Lady Victoria fell a bit more, to as low as it could go.

“Other than that,” the other woman said dryly, “does he believe what you tell him?”

“Every word, I’m sure. He’s told me that he’s written several ballads on the grisly deeds of the evil Lord Reinard, and he said he’d show me tonight his song about the babe in your belly.” The Lady Victoria giggled.

I glanced at the other woman, who I now assumed to be the Lady Laurice. The flatness of her stomach and the tightness of her breasts argued against the presence of a baby.

“I think I’d like to hear it before he plays it for the world,” said Lady Laurice. “If I sneak into the greenhouse with you – but not tonight. Can you hold him off until tomorrow night?”

Lady Victoria blew out her breath. “I could. But I hope you won’t ask me to continue this for much longer. He’s been fun – but there’s a knight I’d like to try, before he rides off.”

I was wrong. My opinion of the Lady Victoria could go much lower.

The look of shock on Lady Laurice’s face showed that I was not alone – I thought. “Come now – we must keep him for a month longer. I’d like the news of the babe to hit Lord Reinard’s ears at the time that the birth should happen, so that I can explain it away as an accident of childbirth. But that’s three long months away.”

Something here is very wrong, I thought as I glanced again at the taut belly of a woman who was supposed to be six months along.

“Monk, monk!” cried a dried-up voice from the other side of the pool. I hurried over to a pair of shoulders which were more bone than flesh. Loose skin moved easily beneath my fingers. I could still hear Lady Laurice and Lady Victoria, if I strained.

“I hope this works. He was to be married to Aunt Lyrica, but Peter’s birth put him off.”

That was something I hadn’t heard, that Lord Reinard had been engaged to someone else. And secrets did not stay hidden at Songless Castle.

“She entered a convent, did she not? In shame and disgrace?”

Lady Laurice snorted. “In joy and celebration, more likely. The man is a murderer. He burned his own wife and any music-maker he could put his hands on.”

Bard, not music-maker. There is a difference. Then I paused, suddenly realizing that she spoke of the Old Lord, not my Lord Reinard.

Did she not know the difference?

But then, when the Old Lord died, there were no Bards to sing him to rest and carry the news of his death to country folk – and the women in high, hidden castles. He had died in the silence he brought on himself. It was as he deserved – but as there had been no one to sing him out, there had been no one to sing my Lord Reinard in. For all Lady Laurice knew, she was to be married to an old, malicious husk.

The conversation continued as I thought. I cam back in a lady Victoria spoke. “But if I wait a month to release my Bard, he may be caught in the winter snow. And then I’ll have to serve him all winter. I’m starved for muscle, m’lady. Muscle and...” She raised her hands and held them a distance apart.

The other fine ladies in the pool laughed with her.

“If you stoke the fire properly,” advised the elderly lady beneath my fingers, “he’ll walk glaciers barefoot for you. What’s a little wind and cold when you’re already sending him to certain death?”

“He’s smart enough to stay out of Lord Reinard’s clutches, isn’t he?” Lady Laurice paused. “Tell him to go in disguise.”

From the look on Lady Victoria’s face, however, I guessed that Sharp’s falling prey to the bard-killer would solve her problem of his affection. It was a pity that she could be so ungrateful for the gift of affection he gave her.

With that, I slipped back from the circle of women and crept up the stairs. I had learned enough to save Lord Reinard’s marriage, should he be willing to battle a few rumors. And still foolish enough to bring women like the Lady Laurice and the Lady Victoria into his castle.

Chapter 5.5

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After the monks finished their mid-day service, I made my way to the Great Hall, and from there to the door leading to the ladies’ tower. The two guards barely glanced at me before pulling their pikes aside. Considered neither male nor female, but shadows flitting in between, the Silent Monks are allowed to give service to the ladies of the castle, and walk where no true man could go. I fingered a blessing, as best I could remember, and entered.

Behind the thick wooden door lay a different world, a soft world. A thick carpet of reeds, covered the floor, and tapestries warmed the walls. I climbed the stairway to the upper floor, a work room with wide windows, where spindle wheels and looms changed woolen fleece into cloth. Sewing needles and scissors turned the cloth into garments for man and table. The room promised perpetual activity, but a lack of humanity left it silent.

On the floor above, the sleeping chambers were also silent. Those I could not enter, not even as Monk, but I doubted that a lady would be abed in the middle of the day without some sort of frantic activity around her, activity which would echo through the floor to the room below.

And so I went down. There was a basement to the tower, a windowless room lit by candles. Not a cold room, either, for all that it lacked a fire. The well in the center of the room steamed with heat, a gift from the mountain gods. And it was in this water that I found the ladies, in much more compromising a position than if I had seen them in their beds. Indeed, I could see even more of the Lady Victoria than she had shown Sharp in the garden, and she was but one among the flock.

Grateful that the hood held me secret, I tried to ease back up the stair, unnoticed. I did not wish to lose another part of my anatomy, so soon after finding one who appreciated it.

Too late. One of the older ladies looked at me and cried out. "Our Monk is here!"

Chapter 5.4

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"Aye said, why did ye lie to me?" Elise demanded, angry.

I was back in the world of the breathing, my concentration broken. I shook my head to clear it, then turned to my lady.

She stood beside my open trunk, holding the Silent Monk’s robe in one hand and the iron crucifix in the other. "Ye said ye weren’t a Silent Monk – but look what I see here? Ye’ve turned Christian on me, haven’t ye?"

Ison laughed out loud.

I shook my head. "Another packed my trunk, and he used the robe and cross to protect my harp." Yet even as I shaped the words, I realized how strange that excuse sounded.

"And I see ye speaking as a Monk!" Angrily she shook the robe, and a scrap of tree bark rolled out. "Yer men tricked me, saying ye were a secret Bard – but now I see I’ve been used, the way you Christians always use women. Know, then, that my sister is a Warlocker, and my mother was a sword-woman, and I know enough of their arts to give you pain for pain."

"He’s no monk," Jason assured her, with a chuckle.

"I don’t think he’s even a Christian," Charles said.

"Then why was he hiding this?"

I reached down and picked up the scrap of bark. It had writing on it. "Use this to pass through the teeth of danger. May God protect you as one of his own, as all children of Man surely are."
I showed the note to Elise. She stared at it, then passed it to Charles, who slowly read the words out loud. "I guess it’s some sort of gift," he added.

Indeed. And I realized what the Monk of my vision had been trying to tell me.

BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE

Author's Note and apology:

I intended for this to be updated five times a week, or at least more often than VG Cats. (VG Cats is a sometmes rude but ofttimes hilarious webcomic that parodies gaming, movies, and pop culture.) However, this is a crunch week. I am trying to prepare my panels at Millennicon 23 , and finish polishing my WIP, Bastard in the Promised Land, before handing it out ot readers. I'm in "the zone." However, I would like to encourage anyone who is interested in this story to go to Dead Fish Press (see icon on right) and download, for free, the first three chapters of By Blade and Cloth. If you like what you read, you can buy the entire book (180,000 words, so you'll get your pennies' worth) at Dead Fish Press.

Thank you for reading, and Gerard and Elise will be back next week!

Chapter 5.3

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I started with scales, but as my mind shook free, the marching notes drifted into short melodies and chords. With the spin-dice as an accompaniment, I began to weave a tune, a net for memories. Unburdened by bitterness, I lived again those summers where Sharp and I wandered together, collecting experiences and stories, leaning of life. We slept in fields beneath the stars, and in barns while it rained. We traded songs and stories for meals in road-side taverns. Once again I smelled the wood smoke and roasting meat, heard the thunk of mugs and the rattle of dice, and saw the crowd dancing to my tunes. Sharp would grin at me, a perpetually dirty face with bright eyes, then sneak our secret tune into his melodies whenever a particularly attractive girl walked by.

We’d made a pact never to play that tune without the presence of the other, and I had not even thought of it for almost ten years. I wondered if he had also forgotten it.
From the world of memories I stepped into the spirit world, which reflects our own in the same way that a glass-still pond reflects the sky. I saw Lord Reinard, standing alone, waiting for his bride. He looked across a pond to where a woman seemed to stand, but his way was blocked by Lord Guerney. I looked at the woman, and realized that she had no form, no features. Perhaps she was pregnant, or perhaps it was just the way her veils drifted around her figure. I could not see for certain.

Indeed, I realized. Unless I knew for certain, I could report nothing to my lord. Nothing that would convince him to leave this ill-fated union alone.

So, how to see the hidden woman? She kept herself within the ladies’ tower. If I hid myself in skirts, perhaps I could enter – but with my strong chin and deep-set eyes, I doubted I would keep the disguise for long. And with it, certain useful parts of my anatomy.

I now saw a Silent Monk before me, his hands moving in a complicated pattern. What was he saying? I didn’t know those gestures. I leaned forward, the better to concentrate, as he started again, then he seemed to say –

Technical troubles

Due to technical troubles, my attention is elsewhere today.

Sorry.

Helen

Chapter 5.2

#

When I pulled out my harp that morning, I saw it in a way that I had seen for almost ten years. I caressed the wood, battered with age, and stroked the strings.

Most Bards do not have a harp of their own, and even fewer Bards-in-training. When they first come to the Bardhall, they are usually entrusted with a tambourine. After a few years they may earn the right to hold a lute or a horn. They might buy tin pipes or clay flutes in the market, and they learn to make drums. Harps, and other noble instruments, either stay in the Bardhall or are bought by Journeymen with enough gold to spare.

I had my own harp, which was not normal, but my path to the Bardhall had not been normal, either.

Before I could remember, I was apprenticed to a harpist and harp-maker in the village of Jerden. I learned to judge and shape wood, to make strings, and to repair broken pieces. I looked forward to taking the shop from his old hands, and keeping him as well as he had kept me, which was generously. But one spring, when I was eleven, he announced that I was to play for the Masters of the Bardhall in Slatten. Though old to be a Bard-in-training, I was accepted on the strength of my playing.

I then asked the old harpist why he had given me up. He handed me his harp, looked me in the eye, and told me that his life was almost ended. Indeed, he never returned to Jerden – and neither did I.

My harp, once his harp, made not by his father but by his grandfather, still held the spirit of the tree within it. I stroked my hands over the smooth, shaped wood, and wondered: How different could the flesh of a man and the wood of a tree be, if both were filled with life? Was it worse to make a flute from the bone of man than to carve a harp from the trunk of a tree? How was one wrong and the other right?

I questioned as I touched the strings, and so set my feet on a path I had not walked for many years.

Chapter 5.1

The next morning, when I woke in my bed, I was in a better mood than I had been in for years. Somehow I had made it out of the greenhouse, and my guards had gotten me back to my room, with no one noticing the disarrangement of my clothing. I hoped Elise had been as fortunate.
I stood, stretched, and threw open the shutters to greet the new day.

A sheet of wet wind wrapped around me.

"It’s still raining," Charles said, as if this were something lighter than a downpour.
"We’ll thank the mountain god if the town don’t wash away," Jason said, his spin-dice in his hand. He spun the four-sided dice on its corner, then tossed the others – six-sided, eight-sided, and twelve-sided – before it could land on a side.

"Twelve, eight, six." Ison peered at the spin-dice, then picked up the four-sided to see its hidden side. "And four! That’s five straights in a row! Are these honest?"

"They’re charmed by a warlocker," Jason admitted, as he raked the common pool over to his side. "She passed ‘em under a black cat’s nose, rubbed ‘em with herbs, and buried ‘em in a bog while the moon passed over. Promised me my luck’ll roll better than the dice."

"What did it cost ye?"

"Three scales from a freshly-killed dragon."

"You killed a dragon?" Ison dropped three coins into the space between them, spun the dice, and got a two, a one, a five, and a three. He spun again and everything came up twos. "Damn."
Jason smiled, dropped three coins, and spun the dice. The twelve-sided came up a one, the eight-sided came up a two, the six-sided came up a three, and the four-sided landed on four. A reverse straight. His smile dropped as he shoved half his coins, as well as the six in the center, toward Ison. "Not yet. When I do, the charm will be perfect."

The game rattled on.

Friendship is a set of dice, a pair of knives, and no blood on the floor.

Chapter 4.3

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Hands curled around my chest, and breath brushed my ear. The scent of bread and roses hung behind me.

“They won’t take notice of us,” a woman whispered in my ear. “The lady and her lovers are deaf to the world, once she starts with ‘em.”

I turned and saw Elise in the faint light. She leaned in and kissed me, hard. And then she led me to her great hall, and bade me take my leisure.

Chapter 4.2.2

The light dropped as Lady Victoria shielded her lantern. There was still enough for me to peer down at them, and I watched as she knelt beside Sharp and touched his face. "What’s this? Do Bards cry?"

"It is for the memory of a dear friend."

"What do mean?" She pulled his head to her breast. I caught my breath.

"The songs I sing: they were written by a man I knew, whom I loved as a brother. It hurts me to sing his songs."

"Is he dead?"

Blunt, wasn’t she?

"I believe so," Sharp replied, as if he had not looked me in the face earlier that evening.

"Why do you sing his songs, if they hurt you so?"

Because he cannot protest, I argued for him.

Sharp’s answer was different. "To fire my anger, to fuel my vengeance. Lord Reinard destroyed him, and so I will destroy Lord Reinard. I have come here to wreck his plans for marriage."

"Good luck." The lady touched his face with his her fingers. "Lord Guerney is quite determined for it to be completed, despite the complication."

The what?

He caught her hand and kissed her fingers, then lifted his face to the base of her neck. He kissed her skin, then pulled her neckline lower and nuzzled the curve of her breast. "What is that?"

"She’s pregnant."

His hand, already pushing up the hem of her gown, stopped. "I had not heard that."

"Neither has Lord Reinard." Sharp’s hands were nowhere near her girdle, but it fell away.

He lifted her hem higher, revealing her calf, her knee, and then the silken curve of her thigh. "He does not know he has a child coming?"

Lady Victoria laughed and leaned back, pulling Sharp over her. "They’ve not been face to face, much less belly to belly. The child is not his."

What kind of a harlot did my Lord seek to make the Lady of Songless Castle? How many times would she hang horns on his ignorant head? What was the true price of a piece of weed-filled, wizard-cursed woods?

"And what will Lord Reinard do when he finds out?" Sharp’s hand was above her creamy hip, and his belt lay to the side. I shifted, uncomfortable.

"My Lord intends for him not to find out, before the vows are given and the marriage sealed. I know I can trust you to keep silent."

Instead of a reply, he kissed her lips, her neck, the valley between her breasts...

Chapter 4.2

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Much later, after my heart had been bled dry, I left the hall with my guards. They led me by a different route – one I supposed was meant to avoid trouble, until I found myself outside the greenhouse door. I stopped, awakened by the thought of the Silver-eyed and their taint within.

"Eh, go on," Ison said, giving my shoulder a shove. "Charles and I’ll watch the door, and ye can take as long as ye like. I need to teach him a thing or two, anyway."

I raised my palms, questioning. Why am I here?

Ison shook his dice bag. "Don’t ye worry. I’ll leave him with his weapons."

Charles leaned forward with a smile. "If you do find trouble, just scream. Like the time you found the drowned rat in the armory."

That had been a forgettable memory – in the dark, with my bare feet.

"But do it louder," Ison added. "I barely heard ye, all the way on the other side of the keep."

But why am I here? I shrugged my shoulder and looked around.

"She’s coming, never you fear." Ison opened the door and gently pushed me through.

Inside the greenhouse I moved cautiously, trying to remember the path from earlier. A few small braziers flickered, giving off just enough heat to drive the frost demons away, and just enough light to let the shadows dance on the glass ceiling. I walked past the silent bower, but at the crystalline flowers, glowing with their own cold light, I turned and made my way into a stand of ferns. I found a spot where I could huddle among the fronds, knees to my chin – and for the first time in many days, indulge in solitude.

It had been a common pleasure back at Songless Castle. There was the hayloft, where I slept before the Old Lord died, and there were fields and woods. The castle itself had more rooms than people. Here, though, I was a gilded prisoner, watched constantly by guards. Well-meaning guards, to be sure, but guards non-the-less.

Why had the gods sent me here? Why had they not left my in my comfortable nest of sorrow, at least with people who understood me? At Songless I was a commoner, a servant – but here I was something worse. I was a monkey, a fool, an idiot. I could speak to no one, therefore, it was assumed I heard nothing. Even my childhood friend treated me with contempt.

On the far wall something scraped, and then a light appeared in the wall. I frowned. – a secret entrance? A possible way to escape?

The light moved forward, and then shone upon the Lady Victoria. She wore a gown and gold-trimmed girdle, nothing more. Her curling hair lay on her shoulders; her bare feet pressed the grass. This was who I was to meet, the lady who had rudely scorned my flowers? Her beauty was dazzling, but...

I decided to stay quiet and let her walk past.

But she did not. She paused at a spot not ten feet away and lifted her lantern, thus revealing another secret of the greenhouse. Beyond the crystalline plants there had been dug a shallow in the ground, and at its center was a fish pond. Beside it stood a bench, and on the ground before the bench, Sharp had spread his cloak.

Chapter 4.1

"You cheated him at dice?" Ison asked.

I shook my head.

"You touched his harp?" Charles asked.

Again I shook my head. Yes, I had touched his harp at times, but with his permission and never in a way that bought offense.

"You touched his wife?" Ison asked.

I was sure I had not done that, and shook my head. My guards had been questioning me ever since we sat at the table, and some of their suggestions made more sense than others.

"You didn't touch his wife," Charles suggested.

I lowered my head into my hands.

"Sing for us!" Lady Victoria called from the high table.

I looked up to see Sharp standing before her table. He bowed, to her, and asked, "Does my fair lady have a request?"

"I would like to hear Lady Dysie."

The other women at the table nodded cheerfully, but Lord Guerney glowered. Sharp seemed not to notice this as he tuned his lute, then held up his goblet as a request for a drink before he began. Elise was the serving maid who answered, smiling at him as she filled his goblet with wine.

She had roses in her hair. The roses from my bouquet.

I scowled into my almost empty mug.

Sharp drank his wine and set it down with a flourish. Then he lifted the lute, played the opening line, and sang out in his clear, sweet voice:

"There once was a king, a very great king,
A king of pride and fame.
He had a lovely daughter so fair,
Lady Dysie was her name.
Oh, the word’s gone up, and the word’s gone down.
And word’s gone to the king:
Lady Dysie’s belly’s gone so round
And she hasn’t got a ring!"

The audience snickered, but Lord Geurney pulled his thick eyebrows together and deepened his frown. If had been in Sharp’s place, I might suddenly found my throat too sore to continue – but that is the gift of hindsight. Sharp continued on, singing the story of a tragic love. The king searched his castle for the lover, and found him to be a lowly kitchen boy, a Heathen with an Outlander mother and a Wizardland father, a boy as unsuited for his daughter as a plowhorse is for a purebred mare. Not only was the boy killed, but the king cut out his heart and sent it, in a golden cup, to his daughter. The last two verses, sung in a high, sweet voice, was her final lament.

"Farewell Father, farewell Mother,
Farewell to comfort and joy.
He died for me, I’ll die for him
Though he was but a kitchen boy.
Farewell Father, farewell Mother.
Farewell my brothers three.
You thought you’d taken the life of one
But you’ve taken the life of three."

A dark song, appropriate for my dark mood. As Sharp smiled and bowed, I drank deeply from my mug – it had been filled without my noticing – and brooded.

***
Author's note: Lady Dysie is an old English ballad that I paraphrased for this story. I've tried to retain the meter while bringing it into modern English -- I can still sing it to Gilligan's Island.

Chapter 3.10

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As the great hall filled for supper, I waited by the door to the ladies’ tower, my bouquet in hand. Charles and Ison were my guards tonight, a comforting presence at my back.

The door opened and a half-dozen blossoms of womanhood poured out – some mere buds and some past their prime, and one so withered and wilted that she may have nursed Lord Guerney’s father in his cradle. Both blonde and dark, they all wore colorful bliauts with wide sleeves that brushed the floor. At the center walked the Lady Victoria, with gold trim and white lace, the most delicate flower of them all.

"She’s not here tonight," Ison muttered, so low that only I and Charles could hear.

I turned my palm upwards.

"The Lady Laurice. Ah don’t see here."

"Unless she’s hiding in the monk’s cowl," Charles said a little too loudly. He gestured toward the Silent Monk who followed them out.

The ladies stopped and looked at us, then giggled. I hastily thrust my wild roses toward the Lady Victoria, a gesture of supplication.

She turned her face toward me, and I was trapped in the emerald beauty of her eyes. How smooth her skin was, how soft and full her lips. A faint rose blushed her cheeks, and she smiled.

And laughed. "What do you make of that?" she said to her companions.

"It’s like that little monkey your Uncle brought back from the Southern Wizardlands," said one of the other women, a thin-faced maid with limp hair. "It used to follow you around, didn’t it? What happened to it?"

"The dogs caught it." She didn’t sound sorry. Without further acknowledgment, she turned and led the entourage off.

My shoulders slumped. I shoved the roses into Ison’s hand and turned, then found myself face-to-face with Sharp. His was dressed in the formal clothes of a Guilded Bard – buckskin leggings and a linen shirt with Bardic symbols embroidered along the sleeves and hem, leather boots and belt embossed with more symbols of strength, and a woolen mantle lined with fox fur. I felt all too aware of my Christian clothing. Yet in that instance, I knew the gulf between us would be bridged, and we would be old friends in each other’s arms.

Sharp drew his sword.

On either side of me, my guards drew their weapons – a sword for Charles and a hunting knife for Ison.

"At least your keepers know what this means," Sharp growled. He slid his blade back into its scabbard. "A pity, though, that you can’t understand why I hate you."

With that he turned on his heel and stalked away.