By the third month, the ice had melted and the first green was pushing up through the ground.
Since the old dynasty’s time, it had been custom for the great families to go down to the water on the Rite of Bealtaine, a day meant, once, for warding off bad luck, and for the old drinking game where a cup floated downstream and whoever it stopped beside had to drain it.
These days, the warding off part had mostly fallen away.
What people cared about now was the fashion for solitude and nature that had taken hold among the nobility, thanks to the old nature poets everyone still quoted, and Bealtaine had become an excuse to walk the hills, write verse, and enjoy the season.
Tents went up along the riverbanks, some grand enough to stretch for miles, carriages and fine clothes on every side, archery and riding contests staged for anyone who wanted to watch, feasting from morning to night.
It wasn’t just something the nobility did for fun.
It was one of the biggest occasions on the royal calendar too.
Every year, princesses, court ladies, and the wives of lords and ministers all came out for it.
This year, with Ronan still in the city, King Cathal chose Ravenswood Chase as the setting.
Ravenswood Chase sat twenty miles outside Dunmore, tucked against the hills, a vast royal hunting ground stocked with every kind of rare game.
Twice a year, in spring and autumn, the king brought his lords and ministers out there to hunt.
A few days earlier, Ronan had humiliated him openly in Solas Hall, and the king had been quietly stewing over it ever since, looking for a chance to win some of that dignity back.
Inviting Ronan to hunt at Ravenswood was exactly that chance.
Clan riders were famously good with horse and bow.
But the king had his reasons for confidence.
Every year, Kilmore’s own young men hunted these grounds, and by now they knew every trail, every den, every likely spot.
With servants to help flush the game, they filled their bags fast.
Ronan’s men, unfamiliar with the terrain, would waste half the day just finding anything worth shooting at, whatever their skill.
That morning, the whole royal procession left the palace at first light.
Banners were everywhere, gilded canopies covered every carriage, and the great families and every court minister turned out in their finest.
The whole line stretched on for miles.
Ronan rode along in the procession too, mounted on his prized black warhorse from the northern plains.
All along the road, ordinary people had put on their good clothes, herding the old and carrying the young, heading down to the water themselves to set up tents and lay out food and drink, faces bright with the day.
This must have been something like the prosperous land his mother used to describe to him.
The south really was richer than the grasslands.
It was fertile enough to feed crowds like this and skilled enough to build palaces and fine silks like these.
No wonder the southern court spent so much of its time indulging itself.
Ronan rode easily along Dunmore’s main road, his horse’s black coat gleaming under the sun, its legs and haunches thick with muscle, its head held high enough to make people nervous just looking at it, never mind the fierce rider on its back or the string of equally hard looking men trailing behind him.
People gave him a wide berth, only daring to whisper once he’d passed well out of earshot.
“They say the Prince of Dunmara wants an alliance marriage with us, but it’s been days now and nothing’s been decided.
Which princess is the king even offering?”
“Word is he’s turned down every one he’s seen so far.
That’s why nothing’s settled.”
That answer only stirred people up more.
“Our kingdom offering him a bride at all is already more honor than that man deserves.
And now he wants to pick through our noblewomen like a market stall?
Not even our own king has ever done such a thing!
If it comes to that, better not to marry him off at all!”
“You’re plenty brave now,” a young man in a headscarf mocked, “but not a peep out of you when his horse rode by.”
The other looked him over, plain gray hemp and no proper headwear at all, and sneered right back.
“What would you know, ignorant as you are?”
Even with Kilmore’s power fading, its people still carried themselves like the rightful center of the world, looking down on the clans as savages who lived on raw meat and blood. This chapter was taken from novelping . com without permission.
Fear and contempt sat side by side in most of them, an uneasy mix neither side quite admitted to.
None of these scholars, wrapped up in Dunmore’s comforts, could have imagined that within a few short years this very city would become a graveyard, its people scattered or worse, its glory ground down to nothing under the weight of what was coming.
Once the king and his party reached Ravenswood Chase and settled in, someone proposed a hunting contest to Ronan.
A general, perhaps thirty years old and dressed in full armor, stepped forward in front of the royal tent.
“The Prince of Dunmara’s courage is without equal, and I’m sure the young men of Dunmara grow up in the saddle, skilled with a bow.
I myself have trained eighteen years at archery and riding, and would count it an honor to test myself against you.”
Ronan sat on the seat set up for him, turning the little white bottle over in his palm.
Slowly, he lifted his chin, the strong spring light carving hard lines into his face, his mismatched eyes sharp as knives.
“How do you want to run it?”
“Whichever team brings back more game.”
“Fair enough.”
Ronan rose sharply, one hand resting on his sword hilt.
Standing, his height made every minister in the vicinity look small beside him, like men already answering to a king.
Seeing how unbothered Ronan looked, the general felt his confidence slip.
But remembering why the king had put him up to this, he swallowed his nerves and got his men organized, quietly hoping Ronan’s side would get lost in the woods and come back empty handed.
A quarter hour later, a long stick of incense was lit in the bronze brazier, smoke curling upward.
A heavy mallet struck the ceremonial drum once, sharp and loud, and both teams shot off like loosed arrows, vanishing quickly into the distant treeline.
Aisling arrived at Ravenswood with her father’s party, and almost as soon as they arrived, Gráinne came looking for her.
They rested for a while, straightened their clothes, and walked the grounds together, quickly hearing about the hunting contest between Kilmore and Dunmara.
Knowing what she knew of Ronan, Aisling suspected King Cathal was about to embarrass himself again.
But this was exactly the kind of game he liked to play, staying silent himself while quietly egging his men on.
If they won, he’d bask in the glory.
If they lost, he’d blame them for acting without his sanction, discard them without a second thought, and keep his own reputation as a wise, above it all king intact either way.
Two hours later, as evening came on and the incense burned down to its last inch, both teams came riding back out of the trees.
Everyone gathered to hear the results.
Aisling stayed back, uninterested either way.
A moment later, laughter broke out from one side, mixed with the northern tongue, while Kilmore’s side stayed dead quiet.
No one needed to ask who had won.
The night’s feast began.
Servants laid out cushions and low tables in front of the royal tent, poured fine wine, and cooked the day’s kills fresh, roasting and grilling them right there, serving everything hot while everyone talked and laughed.
Iron braziers on wooden stakes blazed on either side of the tables, lighting the whole feast nearly as brightly as day.
Having lost face twice now, King Cathal finally let the matter drop.
No one dared criticize Ronan’s manners anymore either, and the evening settled into something almost pleasant.
The master of ceremonies stepped forward and called out, “Bring in the dancers!”
A line of performers filed in, musicians playing alongside them.
Ronan’s men had never seen anything like it, and whether from curiosity or plain excitement, they watched wide eyed, barely blinking.
Ronan alone sat apart, cup in hand, the candlelight beside him guttering in the night wind, half his face thrown into shadow, radiating pure indifference.
When the dance ended, Lord Declan Riordan turned to him, something calculating in his eyes.
“What does the Prince of Dunmara make of our music and dance?”
“Nothing special.”
Declan wasn’t offended in the least.
He nodded like he’d expected exactly that answer.
“Ordinary talent, naturally, wouldn’t impress a man like you.
But we do have one beauty in this kingdom without equal.
I wonder if she might catch your eye.”
Ronan nearly laughed at the boast.
He had already met two princesses and a string of noblewomen in this city, every one of them some fragile, wilting thing that couldn’t survive a light breeze.
If anyone here deserved the word peerless, it was the one from that day on the road.
Just as the thought crossed his mind, contempt still on his face, he looked up and froze.
At the edge of the firelight, a woman in white stepped out of the dark.
His green eyes went wide.
A sudden gust snuffed one of the candles beside him, throwing half his face into shadow and sharpening every hard line of it.
The short hair at the back of his neck stood up like something drawn taut, matching whatever had just come loose in his chest.
It was her.
One glance was all it took.
He would have known that shape anywhere.
His stare fixed on her like something physical, nearly a weight pinning her in place as she walked slowly closer.
The figure in front of him and the blurred glimpse from that rainy street folded together into one.
His throat moved.
The veins in his neck stood out.
The whole feast went eerily quiet.
Aisling could feel every eye in the place turning toward her, one gaze in particular so intense it felt like it was trying to strip her down to the bone.
Her heart lurched, her whole body going rigid, but she kept her eyes forward and let the attendant guide her in.
A quarter hour earlier, at the women’s banquet in the palace next door, Sibéal had spoken up out of nowhere.
“Aisling would like to offer her congratulations on the alliance and has specially asked to dance before the king, to honor the occasion.”
Before Aisling could say a word against it, Lady Neala clapped her hands together, delighted.
“Wonderful!”
And just like that, servants were sent to “invite” her over.
There was no refusing.
She was pushed straight into the state banquet whether she wanted it or not.
That the two of them had coordinated this was obvious enough, clearly some scheme aimed at her, but Aisling couldn’t work out what they were actually after.
After turning it over, she could only land on one explanation: the alliance marriage.
Word going around said Ronan had taken a liking to Aoibhinn, who had been crying herself sick over it for days.
If Neala refused to give up her own daughter, perhaps she had turned her sights on Aisling instead.
But why assume Ronan would be interested in her enough to force her into performing?
Even if she could dance, surely his choice of bride wouldn’t come down to something as shallow as that.
Weighed down with all of it, Aisling walked step by step into the banquet, toward the wall of firelight waiting ahead of her.