Free Sword of Hemlock (Lords of Syon Saga Book 1) by Jordan MacLean Page B

he’d stumbled in the stall
where he stood, so deep was his exhaustion.  Renda had stopped a moment to
stroke his muzzle and speak some soothing words to him, but she had seen the
sad realization in his eyes: today Alandro would stay home.
    Instead, she had had the grooms saddle and bridle her
brother’s sorrel stallion Hero, a powerful creature who since Roquandor’s death
had become well used to carrying her father’s weight, and with full armor.  It
was Hero whom she now tapped up into a gentle gallop over the smoother flats
that led toward the southeast.  The sun was high already, and she judged that
they would reach the temple by midday.  She was not inclined to hurry.
    Riding along the road beside the bright sunlit fields of her
father’s lands and past the farmers who worked them, instead of stacks of
golden amaranth and wheat she saw the discolored bundles of parchments that
still lay waiting on the library table.
    Would that it were not so. 
    Now looking back over the grim adventure of the night, she
wondered bleakly, would it be so much to trade, all the famous errantry of her
life, to have little Pegrine back, chirping and skipping through the castle
halls again?
    She and Gikka had returned to the castle just before sunrise
for no more than an hour’s sleep and fresh horses after their ride from
Farras.  Some stubborn, disbelieving part of her had expected to find Pegrine there,
dancing with anticipation in the entry hall, waiting to share with her some
glorious miracle in the bailey gardens, a spider’s web or a fat squirrel
patting away his winter cache.  Renda’s sword hung at her side, only freshly
wiped clean of Sir Bernold’s blood, and she at last knew the name of Pegrine’s
killer. All the same, she had found herself looking for the little girl at the
door.
    Instead, she was greeted by silence and the unforgiving
wretchedness of a home that had seen the death of a child.  No one stirred
within the walls.  The sheriff, Lady Glynnis and most of the servants had spent
the night in vigil and had not yet emerged from their chambers. Those few
servants who had risen with the sun praised the gods for chores that took them
out of doors and into the light and life and sun of the world.
    The whole of the castle felt dead, empty of life and love.
But as she walked through the ancient corridors of the keep, the air fairly
bristled around her with a dull and restless outrage rising from the crypt
where her kinsmen’s bones—Roquandor’s bones—whispered for vengeance.  Patience,
she prayed them.  I shall not fail you.
    On the way to her chamber she had seen the temple priests
making their ways through the entry hall between the crates of Pegrine’s
belongings that the maids had brought down.  Nara would live, they announced
wearily when Renda saw them out, although they had not the strength between
them to awaken the nun.  That would come with time.  They declined Renda’s
offer of guest chambers saying they would be expected at the temple, but she
suspected they were anxious to leave the house of mourning.  One, the elder of
the two, saw the angry purple bruise on her wrist where she had caught the hilt
of Sir Bernold’s sword and bowed his head in prayer.  The two clerics exchanged
glances before the second put two drops of healing oil on her wrist and rubbed
them into the skin, apologizing for their weariness.
    Then they were gone, and Renda stood rubbing her aching
wrist, alone and undefended amidst all the gathered treasures of Pegrine’s
life.
    The maids had spent the early morning hours crating
Pegrine’s dolls, her wooden horses and knights, faded puzzles, toy animals,
clothes and hair ribbons, everything, to free the child’s soul of attachments and
speed her through the stars; the coachman from the orphanage in Farras would
come in the afternoon to fetch the crates with many sympathies and grateful
kowtows to the household, and then he would carry away the trappings