Many thanks to all who read and reviewed the last installment, you kept me writing all weekend. I promise that no new heartbreak is introduced in this chapter. I'm not Tamora Pierce, I'm just occupying myself on her lovely set while I wait for election results to come in.
"Maybe we can all go out and do something once the pages are done with morning practice," Arielle said hopefully as she and Grania joined Dalton and Penelope and their squires on the edge of the courtyard.
Dalton nodded and they all glanced carefully at Rissa, who shrugged apathetically.
"Or maybe we'd better do something restful today," Penelope said slowly.
"You can leave me alone." Rissa spoke in a monotone. "I'm not a child."
Penelope didn't like the way Vina's eyes flew to the dagger on Rissa's belt. If anyone could predict Rissa's darker impulses, it would be Vina.
"I'll sit with her this afternoon," Selena offered. Then she turned to face Rissa. "If you don't mind my company."
Rissa shrugged again. "Suit yourself."
Dalton blinked at Selena, who had apparently shuffled out to the practice courts in her slippers. "Aren't you supposed to be in bed?"
"Isn't sitting close enough?" Selena asked.
Dalton glanced skeptically at her bandaged arm. "But your—"
"Did all men become impossible overnight?" Selena demanded. "Or are you in on Wyldon's conspiracy to keep me from even contemplating motion?" She sighed loudly and uncharacteristically. "First Jeck tried to smother me in blankets—in the middle of the smithy, I might add—in the middle of summer. And then Jason tried to stuff me full of soup. And now—" she frowned and sat down as a wave of dizziness hit her.
Dalton swallowed and refrained from remarking on this.
"I'm not up for much else today," Selena admitted. "But sitting I can manage."
"I can watch her," Rissa muttered, soundly slightly more alert.
Dom walked by just then, carrying one twin in each arm. "Are you sure you should be out of bed?" he asked Selena. "I heard you took a bad bite yesterday."
"Well," Vina remarked, "that would appear to validate your theory that they all went impossible overnight."
"Some of us love them anyway," Penelope said, wrapping her fingers around Dalton's forearm. "And would like to go out riding with one in particular this afternoon."
"Can we go to the forest?" Arielle asked.
Dalton glanced at Grania, who shrugged her agreement.
PDPD
It happened because Penelope was too busy glancing back at Rissa and Selena to pay proper attention to Nicolas, the first year page whose spear thrust she was supposed to be blocking. And Nicolas naturally expected her to duck or block his sharp practice weapon. Only she didn't duck or block and wound up with a spear lodged loosely in her left arm.
She flinched and ripped it out, biting her lip to keep from introducing new and potent curses into the pages' vocabulary.
"Sorry," Nicolas said, sounding genuinely repentant and slightly intimidated. "I didn't mean—"
"No real harm done," Penelope assured him, clapping a handkerchief over the wound to staunch any bleeding. It was a good thing the boy's eyes were green, she thought. They resembled Dalton's—actually Nicolas looked much the way she imagined a younger brother or son of Dalton's would. Penelope shook her head to clear it of this somewhat disconcerting thought.
"Excellent stance, by the way," she told Nicolas.
"Yes," Dalton added dryly as he ushered Penelope towards the sidelines. "Very effective."
"I'm fine," she informed Dalton. And then promptly flinched when Dalton attempted to peel away the handkerchief and inspect her injury. "Just a little sore," she amended.
"And clearly well-practice at the art of understatement," Grania observed, hopping off the fence and hobbling towards them. "Not that—" she winced and ducked her head, lifting her fingers to her own forehead.
"Are you alright?" Dalton asked. He knew from painful experience that the sight of blood didn't make Grania the least bit queasy.
"Fine," Penelope and Grania snapped simultaneously, turning sharply towards him. Then they both hissed in discomfort.
"Is it another of your headaches Gran?" Arielle asked, setting a gentle hand on Grania's shoulder.
"You should have said something," Dalton said. He and Arielle exchanged a dark glance and Penelope knew they were thinking of the fever that had left Grania crippled and barren, among other chronic symptoms.
"It only just occurred to me," Grania hissed through clenched teeth. "It's already passing."
"Still," Dalton said. "You should probably both visit Queenscove."
"Really—"Penelope began.
"I insist," Dalton said, before Grania could add her own protests. "Or I'll set him after you."
Selena coughed amusedly from the bench where she sat with Rissa.
"You were right," Penelope called to her, still glaringly lovingly at Dalton.
"We might ask Master Salmalin to explain it," Selena agreed. "But he's probably just as bad as the others.
"If not worse," Vina muttered.
In the end, Arielle's murmured, "you probably should see a healer," sent Penelope and Grania walking towards the infirmary, while Dalton and Arielle—with considerable help from the wet nose Bandit insisted upon sticking in Vina's ear—coaxed Vina away from her twin for a walk around the palace the grounds.
PDPD
"I thought you came back from yesterday's mess in one piece," Neal muttered when Penelope appeared in the infirmary door.
"I might have left a little common sense behind." Penelope ducked her head sheepishly and let him examine her arm. "Or lost a little sleep."
"Or let a first year page attempt impalement," Grania added.
Neal scanned her face in surprise. "And who might you be?"
"I'm Dalton's older sister, Grania." She clasped Neal's hand and then let him get back to investigating Penelope's arm.
"One of those formidable women you warned me about," Penelope added, twitching her nose at the tickling sensation of healing magic. "We're here for her headache."
"Which pales in comparison to her arm," Grania assured Neal when he turned to glance in her direction.
"Quite literally," Neal muttered.
"I've always been fair," Grania informed him. "I'll wait my turn."
Neal grimaced as though he were anticipating a headache of his own and finished bandaging Penelope's arm. Then he set a finger on his former squire's nose and backed her onto a cot.
"You are to spend the next few hours resting while your body recovers from that healing," he informed her.
"Which was completely unnecessary," Penelope lied.
"You would have made it through the morning completely uninjured if you'd been well-rested in the first place."
Neal took a moment's satisfaction from watching Penelope's jaw snap shut and then turned to Grania.
"Headache, pale complexion—"he glanced at her weak leg. "Any other complaints? Dizziness? Fatigue? Lack of—"
"I'm a person." Grania folded her arms and glared at Neal. "Not a list of symptoms."
"Thank you for reminding me," he said quietly. "All healers forget sometimes. In any case, I wouldn't be able to find 'sharp-witted and recalcitrant' in any of the medical encyclopedias."
"Perhaps it's next to the invisible entry on 'independent women and other oddities'," Penelope put in. "Or near the section on 'healers who keep perfectly healthy people in bed with minor injuries'," she added pointedly.
"It's so good to see that your cynicism survived intact," Neal muttered, searching his shelf for feverfew, which would relieve Grania's headache. "But sometimes I have an urge to write a section on 'lady knights, otherwise known as obstinate individuals who can't distinguish between paternalism and common sense advice'".
"How unfortunate that you no longer have a squire to do your editing." Penelope glared at the foot of her cot.
Neal did not answer. He was too busy glowering at the shelf on which he expected to find his jar of feverfew. He scowled, sighing, and scanned a few other shelves before pouncing on the correct jar.
"I might have to reorganize for you," Grania muttered as she watched him brew her tea. "Your mess is aggravating my headache."
"Then it can't have been that grave to begin with."
"That's what I've been telling everyone." Grania set aside her mug and marched towards the shelves.
Neal retreated, ducking quickly out of her way. "If I didn't know any better," he told Penelope, "I'd say you married Dalton for his sisters."
Penelope shrugged, mostly to prove to Neal that her injured shoulder was perfectly mobile. "They were an additional benefit."
PDPD
Dalton left Vina and Arielle throwing sticks for Bandit to fetch in the creek that cut across the Riders' pastures and headed back to the palace, and doubled back to check on Rissa.
She'd saved him the trouble of a long walk, however, and was standing with her arms wrapped over the pasture fence as though it were the only thing holding her up. She sighed and cocked her head at him as he approached.
"Hey," he said. "Let's go for a walk." Then he remembered that he'd issued a similar invitation to Vina—though for very different reasons—less than a month before and wondered how many such walks he'd go on before the twins were knighted.
Rissa shrugged and fell into step beside him. "It isn't fair," she said finally.
"No," Dalton agreed quietly. "It wasn't." Now was not the moment to point out that very few things in life were.
"He didn't deserve—I should have been the one who died."
"He didn't think so," Dalton murmured, though Rissa seemed not to hear him.
"He shouldn't have been—he was—we hadn't even done anything." Rissa blushed slightly, though Dalton thought she seemed more angry than embarrassed. "Not really," she spat. "Apparently he was too chivalrous to do anything with me but get killed jumping in front of monsters."
Dalton thought that this was probably just as well. Rissa was young and better off feeling she had too few memories than too many. Not that he wanted to brave telling Rissa this.
"He really cared for you," Dalton said instead, "in his own way. No one can doubt that."
"I suppose not," Rissa murmured. "And I'm still not certain exactly how I felt about him. I guess I never will be. It doesn't matter now, does it?"
"It will always matter, at least a little."
"Then maybe I loved him. Not that I'll ever know since I won't have anything to compare it to." Rissa looked across the pasture, pretending to watch a pair of chestnut ponies race along the fence. "Because no one will ever want anything to do with me —"
Dalton took Rissa's shoulder and gently turned her to face him. "You'll love again. I promise. You'll be loved again. You'll certainly be kissed again."
"How would you know?" she glared sullenly at him.
He hesitated a moment and then carefully kissed her—on the forehead, so neither of them would get the wrong idea—before stepping back again. "I just know," he said firmly.
Rissa nodded and wiped her eyes on her sleeve. Then she sighed. "I'm not sure I want to do this over again anyway. It's painful and confusing."
"Sometimes it is," Dalton agreed. "You're young Rissa, and--"
"Yes, grandfather." Rissa sounded like a shadow of her old self.
Dalton still grinned briefly at her. "Even younger than I am," he amended. "Give yourself time."
"Until I earn my shield, you mean?"
"I doubt you'll let Penelope and me off that easily," he muttered. "Not that we wouldn't appreciate it."
Rissa's chuckle was snot-laced and it ended in a brief bout of tears, but Dalton thought it was progress.
Apparently Vina thought so too. She smiled at Rissa when she and Dalton rejoined Arielle and Bandit at the creek. And Rissa nodded back her.
"Good," said Vina.
"Enough for now." Rissa shrugged and knelt to bury her fingers in Bandit's fur.
"Right." Vina glanced from Rissa to Dalton. "I think I might—"
"Go visit Karyna," Rissa finished, turning her twin's suggestion into an almost teasing command.
Dalton shrugged his approval and Vina touched her twin's shoulder before setting of towards the Riders' barracks.
Arielle, heedless of the danger of grass stains, spread her skirts and plopped down beside Rissa to scratch Bandit's rump in companionable silence.
The dog sighed loudly and Dalton echoed him as he sat down to watch the creek run by.
PDPD
"Jeck, we've been forgiven," Jason called as Selena returned to the smithy.
"Good." Jeck emerged from his place near the forge, wiping his hands on a rag.
"Jeck, we're being invaded," Jason hissed as Grania, Penelope, and Arielle followed.
"I'd recommend a policy of appeasement," Jeck muttered absently as he pulled Selena towards. "Since you appear to be outnumbered." He was too busy studying Selena's face to come to come to his friend's assistance.
"Right," Jason said. "What can I do for you ladies?"
"You could begin by offering us some soup," Grania answered.
"Especially after we've gone to the trouble of supplying bowls," Vina added, ushering Rissa inside with one hand and balancing a stack of bowls on the other. Dalton pulled the doors closed behind them.
"I can recognize an ultimatum when I hear one," Jason assured them, pulling a ladle from its hook with an elaborate flourish.
"Good." Grania smiled and took a seat at the table. "We can continue negotiations while we're eating."
"That will be quite unnecessary, my lady," Jason assured her, "you've already thoroughly disarmed me with your considerable charm." He set the first bowl before her and gestured for the others to serve themselves.
"Not entirely," Grania protested. "I suspect you're holding a stack of ginger cakes in reserve."
"Surely my lady knows better than to expect me to make such an admission at this stage in the proceedings." Jason set butter and salt on the table. "Especially not while I have other weapons in my arsenal," he added, pulling a golden-brown loaf of bread from his oven.
Eventually, however, Selena forced the admission by beginning to nod off at the table and thereby persuading Jeck to retrieve said ginger cakes in the hope of keeping her awake.
So, that's all for this week! I hope you enjoyed it. I'm about to enter midterm madness, but I promise to post at least one chapter before Thanksgiving, because Penelope has a few things to deal with:
She swallowed and met his eyes. "I'm preparing for all contingencies, some of them less likely than others."
"I should hope so," he muttered, raising an eyebrow as he scanned line again.