Free Where Light Meets Shadow by Shawna Reppert Page A

question.”
    If Kieran were pining after a
Scathlan princess, it would do much to explain his bitterness toward love. It
would also give Alban one more reason to quash any feelings he had for the
bard, as though he didn’t have enough reasons already.
    Kieran plucked a few strings on
his harp, and his face turned thoughtful. Whatever he said next would be
honest, and not one of his flippant bardic answers.
    “I thought I loved her that way
once, when I was just growing into adulthood and starting to get an inkling of
all those things adults don’t discuss around children. I tried to imagine it,
you know how you do. But it just felt wrong, like having improper feelings for
a sister. I love Brona, but not in the sense you mean. I want her to be happy.
    “The worse things get for our
people, the more pressure is put on her to do something to fix it. Though there
is little she can do while the queen remains as she is, neither dead nor alive.
Some of the queen’s advisors are pressuring Brona to marry, hoping that will
somehow help. But I wouldn’t wish that on her. When Brona marries, it should be
for love.”
    “I thought you didn’t believe in
love,” Alban teased.
    “For myself, no. But Brona is
different. You’d have to meet her to understand. I wish you could meet her, the
two of you would get along like a hand and a glove.”
    Alban doubted it, even though his
resentment of the girl was irrational. He wondered if Kieran truly felt only a
sibling’s affection for her, or if he hid his true feelings even from himself.
    “She deserves to live her life
for herself someday, without carrying the burden of a doomed people.”
    “I’m sorry.” Alban felt fully the
weight of what his life had cost Kieran’s people.
    Kieran put his harp aside and
turned toward him. “None of it is your fault. You weren’t even born when the
war started.”
    “You didn’t feel so when first we
met.”
    “Then I was but a fool, O Prince
of Light.” Kieran reached out and put a hand on Alban’s arm. “It seems to be a
night for confessions, for speaking the words we’ve danced around before. So
let me say this. Though our peoples are enemies, I do consider you my friend.
If I didn’t say it before, show it before, then I am sorry.”
    “And my people?” Alban knew how
hard it had been for Kieran to say that last bit, and yet he would not take the
easy path, not with this undefined thing building between them.
    “Your people are still enemies of
mine. Alban, how could it be otherwise, with what they have done to us?”
    “The Scathlan spilled the first
blood.”
    “The Leas left us no choice. The
last war is something we will never agree on. Your people and mine are enemies,
but it’s all become more complicated than it was a few weeks ago.”
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     

Seven
     
     
    The next day, they went back to
the library and didn’t talk about anything that had transpired the night before.
Outside the window, snow lay stark white on the dark evergreens in the valley,
reminding Kieran that it was not the season for travel even were he fit to ride. But the fire blazed bright in the hearth, filling the room with
the distinctive sweet-sharp of cedar, and Alban brought him hot tea to warm
him. He tried to find the contentment that came with being cozy inside while
the world outside knew nothing but cold and wet.
    Yet he found only growing despair
as he paged through the maddening book, wishing that he had his father’s skills
and training. With both his father and uncle killed in the war, no true bard
masters had remained to train Kieran. His tutor had been testy, inadequate, and
all too aware that Kieran would surpass him one day.
    He’d had to take the bare bones
of what they had taught him and build on it from his father’s notes and from
what the harp itself whispered in his heart. His elders never failed to remind
him that he was not yet a master like his father, perhaps never