Sweet Black Waves Read online

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  For Jack

  Ne vus sanz mei, ne mei sanz vus

  —Marie de France, “Chevrefoil”

  DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

  IVERNIC ROYAL FAMILY

  HIGH KING ÓENGUS OF IVERIU—father of Princess Eseult, uncle of Lady Branwen; he holds his court at Castle Rigani, in the province of Rigani

  QUEEN ESEULT OF IVERIU—mother of Princess Eseult, wife of King Óengus, aunt of Lady Branwen, sister of Lady Alana and Lord Morholt; she’s originally from the province of Laiginztir

  PRINCESS ESEULT OF IVERIU—daughter of King Óengus and Queen Eseult, cousin of Lady Branwen, niece of Lord Morholt and Lady Alana

  IVERNIC NOBILITY

  LADY BRANWEN CUALAND OF LAIGINZTIR—heir to Castle Bodwa, daughter of Lady Alana and Lord Caedmon, cousin and lady’s maid of Princess Eseult, niece of Queen Eseult and King Óengus

  LORD MORHOLT LABRADA OF LAIGINZTIR—the King’s Champion, uncle of Branwen, brother of Queen Eseult and Lady Alana

  LADY ALANA CUALAND OF LAIGINZTIR (deceased)—Lady of Castle Bodwa, mother of Branwen, sister of Queen Eseult and Lord Morholt

  LORD CAEDMON CUALAND OF LAIGINZTIR (deceased)—Lord of Castle Bodwa, father of Branwen

  LORD DIARMUID PARTHALÁN OF ULADZTIR—heir to Talamu Castle, son of Lord Rónán, northern clan leader, and Lady Fionnula; he’s a descendant of High King Eógan Mugmedón

  LORD RÓNÁN PARTHALÁN OF ULADZTIR—Lord of Talamu Castle, father of Diarmuid; he’s a descendant of High King Eógan Mugmedón

  LADY FIONNULA PARTHALÁN OF ULADZTIR—Lady of Talamu Castle, mother of Diarmuid

  LORD CONLA OF MUMHANZTIR—nobleman from the province of Mumhanztir, former love interest of Princess Eseult

  MEMBERS OF THE ROYAL GUARD AND HOUSEHOLD

  SIR KEANE OF CASTLE RIGANI—member of the Royal Guard and bodyguard to Princess Eseult; he’s from a coastal village along the Rock Road

  SIR FINTAN OF CASTLE RIGANI—member of the Royal Guard and bodyguard to Queen Eseult

  TREVA OF CASTLE RIGANI—head royal cook

  DUBTHACH OF CASTLE RIGANI—servant at the castle, son of Noirín

  NOIRÍN OF CASTLE RIGANI—castle seamstress, mother of Dubthach

  MASTER BÉCC OF CASTLE RIGANI—the royal tutor to Princess Eseult and Lady Branwen

  SAOIRSE—becomes an assistant to Queen Eseult in the infirmary at Castle Rigani; she’s from the coastal village of Doogort

  SIR COMGAN OF CASTLE RIGANI—member of the Royal Guard

  GRÁINNE—an orphan girl from the Rock Road befriended by Princess Eseult

  KERNYVAK ROYAL FAMILY

  KING MARC OF KERNYV—uncle of Tristan, brother of Princess Gwynedd, son of King Merchion and Queen Verica of Kernyv

  PRINCE TRISTAN OF KERNYV—heir to the protectorate of Liones, nephew of King Marc and the King’s Champion, son of Princess Gwynedd and Prince Hanno

  PRINCE HANNO OF LIONES (deceased)—navigator with the Royal Kernyvak Fleet who became a prince through marriage to Princess Gwynedd of Kernyv; he’s the father of Tristan, and his ancestors came to Kernyv with the Aquilan legions from Kartago

  PRINCESS GWYNEDD OF KERNYV (deceased)—mother of Tristan, older sister of King Marc, daughter of King Merchion and Queen Verica

  CREW OF THE DRAGON RISING

  MORGAWR—Captain of the Dragon Rising, member of the Royal Kernyvak Fleet

  CADAN—cabin boy on the Dragon Rising, member of the Royal Kernyvak Fleet

  PART I

  THE OLD WAYS

  KISS OF LIFE

  SMOKE AND SCREAMS AND LOVE.

  Fractured images swirled in the back of Branwen’s mind, transporting her a thousand leagues away from Castle Rigani. She dug her fingernails into the armrests of her chair as her heartbeat accelerated. The dreams always grew worse this time of year. Snatches of color like stained glass that collided together and burst apart.

  “Really, Branny,” said Essy, interrupting her thoughts. “You’re such a mopey drunk.”

  Branwen inhaled. Her cousin had forgotten what day it was. She spared an extra second’s glance at the sea, preparing herself to meet Essy’s gaze. The waves were rough through the small, circular windows of the princess’s drawing room: indigo capped with white. She never liked to lose sight of them for long. A wildness stirred inside her as they broke against the shore. She did her best to smother it.

  “Elderberries loosen your tongue altogether too much,” Branwen said as she turned to her cousin.

  The princess giggled and touched another thimbleful of elderberry wine to her lips.

  Branwen kept her voice light. “What would dashing Lord Diarmuid say if he could see your cheeks so flushed?” Diarmuid was the son of Lord and Lady Parthalán from the province of Uladztir, whom King Óengus had invited to the castle for a feast this evening. Essy couldn’t stop talking about him.

  The princess responded by brandishing her bright pink tongue. “Diarmuid does make my cheeks flush all on his own.” Another giggle and a hiccup. “But if we’re going to be subjected to Lord Rónán recounting all of his youthful victories against the Kernyveu—again—then I think you’d do well to have another thimbleful yourself, Branny.”

  An anchor dropped in Branwen’s chest simply thinking about the people who terrorized her kingdom. Thieves and pirates all of them. Their assaults on the coast of Iveriu were relentless. She didn’t need any further reminders. Especially not today. Faceless raiders already lay in wait for Branwen whenever she closed her eyes.

  Perhaps a hazy glow was just what she needed to make the anniversary pass more quickly. Although no drink would ever be strong enough to completely dull the memories.

  Had it really been thirteen years?

  Essy measured another pour of the sweet and tart wine into her thimble, declaring, “Delicious,” while sighing in satisfaction. The princess had pilfered the wine from the personal supply of Treva, the head cook, which inspired a flicker of guilt in Branwen, but, then, there were certainly worse things Essy could do.

  “Delicious,” Branwen agreed as she swiped the wine-filled waterskin from her cousin, forgoing the thimble, and savored the taste of elderberries on her tongue. Essy clapped excitedly, giving her a conspiratorial wink.

  The princess adored making mischief and pulling pranks around the castle. One time she convinced Dubthach, the spinner’s son, that a bowl of hard-boiled eggs was blind men’s milky eyeballs and, as his future queen, commanded him to eat one. Poor Dubthach still couldn’t stand the sight of eggs. Or chickens, for that matter.

  Getting tipsy in Essy’s chambers when they were supposed to be studying one of the great Ivernic love stories for their lessons with the royal tutor seemed a small crime by comparison.

  Branwen pulled the waterskin away from her mouth, and her eyes flicked once more to the tumultuous waves below.

  They called to her. Strange how much she could love the dark depths that carried des
truction to her kingdom. In ancient times, so the bards sang, the island of Iveriu was invaded five times, and now the kingdom of Kernyv threatened to do it again.

  Fire and sea and fighting men.

  Branwen suspected peace was a dream as broken and elusive as her own, a puzzle from which key pieces had been stolen. She gave her head a small shake, the wine burning her throat nicely.

  At the center of her fragmented dreams was love. Always love. A pair of lovers intertwined until they shared the same heart; their faces blackened, ashen. The tide pulled them out into the Ivernic Sea. They loved while they burned and they burned while they loved. And always, always their arms reached for Branwen.

  It was her parents, she was sure of it.

  “Share and share alike,” said Essy, reaching for the waterskin. Branwen’s gaze flitted back to her baby cousin, whose seventeenth birthday had just gone. With no male heirs, the peace and prosperity of Iveriu rested squarely on Essy’s marriage. Ivernic law prohibited a woman from ruling in her own right—she needed a husband—and Branwen had heard rumblings that a foreign ally was crucial to protecting the waters that surrounded their small island. The difference in their stations had never been important, but Branwen sensed that one day it would be. Maybe one day soon.

  Essy would, after all, become her queen.

  A firm knock came at the heavy wooden door, and Branwen immediately stiffened in her seat.

  Queen Eseult entered, her gait graceful, her spine straight. Surreptitiously, Branwen hid the waterskin beneath her thick brocade skirts. She spied Keane, the princess’s bodyguard, make a face from the archway, but he said nothing. Keane was starkly attractive and he’d asked Branwen to dance twice at the last Imbolgos festival. Too bad he didn’t cause her cheeks to flush. That was entirely due to the wine.

  Scanning their rosy complexions, Queen Eseult lowered an eyebrow. “I see.” She cleared her throat. “It must be a highly amusing lesson that Master Bécc assigned you both today. I could hear your laughter from halfway across the castle.”

  Branwen’s eyes snagged on the queen’s and she ducked her head. Technically, as a lady’s maid, she was charged with keeping the princess safe—even from herself. Her aunt had never made her feel like a servant, however. She’d always treated her more like another daughter.

  Queen Eseult dropped a comforting hand on Branwen’s shoulder. She had an uncanny knack for reading other people’s emotions. Whispers abounded that the Old Ones had gifted her with the ability to see into the Otherworld, but Branwen was undecided regarding things she couldn’t hold in her hand and examine.

  If the Old Ones truly existed and were protecting the kingdom of Iveriu, then why did they permit the Kernyveu to continue their slaughter?

  Why hadn’t they saved Branwen’s parents?

  Essy remained happily ignorant of the silent exchange between Branwen and her mother. “We’re reading the most marvelous story, Mother,” she slurred.

  “And what is this marvelous story?” the queen asked.

  “‘The Wooing of Étaín.’ It’s terribly romantic.”

  Branwen snorted. “Terrible is right. She gets turned into a purple fly!”

  Essy twitched her nose and stuck her tongue out at her cousin, no longer pretending to hide her intoxicated state.

  “I don’t fancy being turned into an insect, but Étaín did live for thousands of years. Everyone in Iveriu still knows her name. And to be fought over by two supernatural men…” The princess clutched melodramatically at her heart.

  Branwen and the queen couldn’t stop themselves from laughing. Essy’s charm was nothing if not infectious, and she always drew Branwen back from the dark places in her head. Although Branwen didn’t understand why Essy loved the story of Étaín so much. It never ended well. In one version she was cursed by her lover’s jealous wife to be an insect. In another she was spirited away to the Otherworld forever. Maybe Branwen just wasn’t a romantic.

  Her aunt caught her eye, almost as if she knew precisely what Branwen was thinking. The corner of the queen’s mouth arced upward and she winked.

  Branwen would always be indebted to her aunt not only for raising her but also for taking her on as an apprentice healer. Queen Eseult was renowned throughout the kingdom for her skills with herbs. Branwen may not have believed in the Old Ones, but medicine was something she understood.

  She often worked by candlelight long after Essy had fallen asleep, grinding and mixing new remedies to test or practicing her stitches on cushions. Branwen wanted to be able to save somebody else’s parents, somebody else’s children.

  If her parents had reached a healer in time, could they have been saved? The queen made sure Branwen never learned the precise details of their deaths, but the question haunted her. Something had broken inside Branwen the day her parents died and never fully mended; something had ignited, too—a fiery hatred that she knew would consume her if she didn’t keep it carefully controlled.

  With a sly sideways glance at her daughter, Queen Eseult said to Branwen, “Once the princess has recovered her … wits, could I impose upon you to gather some mermaid’s hair?”

  Branwen nodded. Mermaid’s hair was luminous turquoise seaweed that made the surface of the water glow like a lantern on moonless nights. Fresh air and a walk would do her good.

  “Thank you, dear heart,” the queen continued. “I’m making a balm for the king. Óengus is suffering from gout again. The weather has been so temperamental lately.”

  “Gout? Gross, Mother.” The princess curled her top lip in disgust. “Gentlewomen do not discuss gout.”

  “Wait until you’ve been married a few years.”

  “I’d rather be transformed into a fly like Étaín than be married to a man with gout!” With that, Essy liberated the elderberry wine from beneath Branwen’s skirts and took an indelicate gulp.

  The queen sighed. “Keep this up and I’ll be the one who needs a drink,” she said, wresting away the waterskin.

  “Good. Maybe that would loosen you up, Mother.”

  Branwen held her breath. Any other queen would have struck her daughter for being so insolent and behaving with such impropriety. A lady’s maid could also expect to be punished if her charge made such a remark.

  Queen Eseult simply recorked the elderberry wine. Then she stooped down, kissing the princess on the forehead. Essy made a noise of complaint.

  Branwen’s aunt turned toward her and kissed her temple, too. As warmth from the kiss radiated outward, she was choked by shame for failing in her duties.

  “Today is hard for me as well, my darling Branny,” the queen murmured before sweeping out silently.

  She remembered. A solitary tear slid down Branwen’s cheek, frozen in the afternoon light.

  “Come on.” Essy pushed to her feet, catching hold of Branwen’s hand. “The Queen of Iveriu commands us to catch a mermaid by the hair, and so it shall be.” She glowered in the direction her mother had vanished.

  “It wasn’t a command, Essy. It was a request.”

  “A queen’s request is always a command.”

  Branwen shrugged, letting her cousin tug her from the chair. Request or command, she would do anything to repay the queen’s love. Gladly.

  Essy stumbled along beside her as they wended their way from the castle to the beach below. When they were children, Branwen had resented her younger cousin’s following her everywhere, constantly pestering her, but the gap in their ages eventually meant less and less, and Branwen could no longer imagine her own portrait without Essy painted by her side.

  Keane kept a respectful but watchful distance from the princess and her lady’s maid. Branwen was glad she didn’t have a bodyguard of her own. It would get tiresome.

  She usually spent her spare time on the rocks below the ramparts. They seemed fierce and protective to her, like Queen Eseult; in the fading sunlight, the stone of the four rounded towers shone like emeralds. Branwen always knew she was safe within the castle walls. Its bastions ju
tting out toward the sea were lined with archers to fend off any invaders, like the Kernyvak pirates who killed her parents. And yet she couldn’t resist the urge to be free of them.

  Most people would avoid the spot where they’d learned their parents had been murdered. But, for Branwen, this was also the last place she had known they were alive.

  She felt closest to them here.

  Sometimes she could almost make herself believe they were merely at Fort Áine, the destination of their final journey. That they would be coming back for her soon. Her pulse spiked as the breakers crashed in her ears.

  “Did you even hear what I said, Branny?” Essy nudged her gently with her shoulder.

  “What was that?”

  Essy had the same eyes as Branwen’s mother, Lady Alana—green like Rigani stones. It made her love her cousin that much more. She, on the other hand, had inherited coppery brown eyes from her father, Lord Caedmon.

  The princess twisted a straw-colored lock around her finger and pulled, scowling at her cousin. “I said, do you think any man will ever love me as much as Étaín? Do you think Lord Diarmuid could?”

  Real sadness underscored her words and Branwen’s heart ached. Her cousin spent too much time losing herself in old, romantic ballads. It wouldn’t help prepare her for a political marriage. “I thought you didn’t want a husband?” she said breezily.

  “I don’t want a husband. I want a lover. I want a man who loves me—not my kingdom or my titles.”

  “Don’t let your mother catch you talking like that, Essy,” Branwen said, chastising her with a swing of the small wicker basket that she’d brought to collect the mermaid’s hair.

  “Why not? I don’t care who knows. I don’t care if everyone knows!” the princess said, raising her voice. Sidelong, Branwen glimpsed Keane furrowing his brow. “Why shouldn’t I choose whom I love?” Essy demanded.

  They both knew why.

  Essy was the kingdom. One day she’d be queen and her first duty would be to the Land. To Iveriu. When the time came, Essy would do the right thing for her people. Branwen only wished it wouldn’t make her so miserable.