Banners in the Wind by Juliet E. McKenna

Author:Juliet E. McKenna
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy
Publisher: Solaris

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Litasse

Marlier Castle,

Winter Solstice Festival, Third Day, Evening,

Souls’ Ease Night

SHE HAD WAITED till nearly midnight. Now the castle was quiet, after the exuberant relief of the first day of festival and before the more desperate revelry of the last to bolster everyone’s spirits against the hungry days of Aft-Winter. This middle night, the longest and coldest of the year, was given over to commemorating the beloved departed even by those who seldom set foot in a shrine year round.

Not that spirits seemed particularly high this festival. Litasse had noticed guests drinking in moderation, talking quietly among themselves. What were the Marlier nobles discussing? But she had no loyal maids to listen at keyholes, to gather scraps of conversations from stairwell shadows.

Reaching an unfamiliar corridor, she hesitated. Which way now? Litasse didn’t think she’d ever learn her way around this rabbits’ warren. The dukes of Marlier’s castle sprawled this way and that across the broad hill that it dominated.

A jousting ground had been added here; there, a further courtyard to accommodate some newly married heir in anticipation of his children. The original keep had fallen into disfavour many generations ago, so a second great hall had been built. New ducal accommodations had soon followed, not to be outdone by its splendour.

Marlier’s dukes remained mindful of the perils of war. The outermost curtain wall had been rebuilt several times to enclose these successive renewals. The remnants of older fortifications were seldom entirely demolished though. Rather, they were incorporated into stables or kitchens or storehouses; whatever the castle was now deemed to lack.

After growing up in Sharlac Castle, where the four-towered keep was neatly flanked by twin turreted gatehouses marking the limits of the rectangular outer ward, all Litasse saw was disharmony and confusion.

Though she wasn’t lost now, she realised with relief. This corridor led to Duchess Adarise’s Hall. She cared nothing for that long-dead duchess but she knew the old keep beyond housed the castle’s shrine to Poldrion.

Litasse ran along the corridor, her slippers silent on the carpet. Prudently shielded lanterns shone beside each closed door but she could have found her way without them. Only just past its full, the Greater Moon’s clear light poured through the tall leaded windows. The cloudless sky was bright with stars scattered around the fading quarter of the Lesser Moon.

The door to the old keep was unlocked. Litasse stayed alert for Duke Ferdain’s cat-footed night watchmen, but none prowled these echoing stone stairs. Plucking at the skirt of her black velvet gown, she hurried upwards. The longer she was absent from her chamber, the more likely she’d be missed by one of Marlier’s suspiciously attentive maids.

She halted outside the shrine. What if someone else was in there? Litasse squared her shoulders. She outranked any noble lord or lady, all but Duke Ferdain and his duchess herself. Why should she explain herself, any more than she should excuse her absence to mere servants? She would remember her dead on Souls’ Ease Night and Poldrion’s demons could bite anyone suspecting worse of her.

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