He yanked on the reins. His stallion ground to a halt.
When he spoke, Arin’s voice was like the music he had asked her to play. “No,” he said. “That family is gone.”
They rode on in silence until Arin said, “Kestrel.”
She waited, then realized that he wasn’t speaking to her, exactly. He was simply saying her name, considering it, exploring the syllables of the Valorian word.
She said, “I hope you’re not going to pretend you don’t know what it means.”
He shot her a wry, sidelong look. “A kestrel is a hunting hawk.”
“Yes. The perfect name for a warrior girl.”
“Well.” His smile was slight, but it was there. “I suppose neither of us is the person we were believed we would become.”
Ronan was waiting in his family’s stables. He played with the gloves in his hands as he stood watching Kestrel and Arin ride toward him.
“I thought you would take the carriage,” Ronan said to Kestrel.
“To go riding? Really, Ronan.”
“But your escort.” His eyes cut to Arin sitting easily on the stallion. “I didn’t think any of your slaves rode.”
Kestrel watched Ronan tug at the gloves’ fingers. “Is there a problem?”
“Now that you are here, certainly not.” Yet his voice was strained.
“Because if you don’t like the way in which I have come, you may ride to my house the next time you invite me, then escort me back to your estate, then see me safely home again, and go back the way you came.”
He responded to her words as if they had been flirtatious. “It would be my pleasure. Speaking of pleasure, let’s take some together.” He mounted his horse.
“Where is Jess?”
“Sick with a headache.”
Somehow Kestrel doubted that. She said nothing, however, and let Ronan lead the way out of the stables. She turned to follow, and Arin did the same.
Ronan glanced back, blond hair brushing over his shoulder. “Surely you don’t intend for him to join us.”
Arin’s horse, perfectly calm up until this point, began to shift and balk. It was sensing the tension Kestrel couldn’t see in its rider, who looked impassively at her, waiting for her to translate Ronan’s words into Herrani so that he could pretend it was necessary. “Wait here,” she told him in his language. He wheeled the horse back toward the stables.
“You should vary your escorts,” Ronan told Kestrel as Arin rode away. “That one stays too close to your heels.”
Kestrel wondered who had orchestrated her ride alone with Ronan, the sister or the brother. She would have chosen Ronan—who, after all, had sent the invitation and would have encountered no resistance in asking Jess to stay indoors for the sake of a few private hours. But Ronan’s uncharacteristically foul mood made her think otherwise. He was acting like one might if his matchmaking sister had tricked him into something he didn’t wish to do.
The day, which had been beautiful to her, no longer looked as bright.
Yet when they stopped to sit under a tree, Ronan’s smile returned. He opened his saddlebags to reveal lunch, then unfurled a picnic blanket with a flourish, settled onto it, and stretched out his long form. Kestrel joined him. He poured a glass of wine and offered it.
She lifted a brow. “That is a rather large amount of wine for this time of day.”
“I hope to ply you with it, and make you say things you won’t regret.”
She sipped, watching him pour a second cup, and said, “Are you not afraid for yourself?”
He drank. “Why should I be?”
“Perhaps it is you who will reveal things he’d rather not. I understand you’ve been paying call to Lady Faris.”
“Jealous, Kestrel?”
“No.”
“Pity.” He sighed. “The sad, dull truth is that Faris has the best gossip.”
“Which you will share.”
Ronan leaned back to rest on one elbow. “Well, Senator Andrax has been moved to the capital, where he awaits trial for selling black powder to our enemies. The black powder hasn’t been found, despite the search—no surprise there, really. It probably vanished into the east long ago. Now, what else? Senator Linux’s daughter stole quite a few hours with a certain sailor on board one of the ships in the harbor, and has been shut away in her rooms by her parents for the fall season—probably winter, too. My friend Hanan has gambled away his inheritance—don’t worry, Kestrel, he’ll get it back. Just please, please do not play Bite and Sting with him for a few months. Oh, and the captain of the city guard committed suicide. But you knew that.”