Fire of the Soul Read Online Free PDF

thought of a way to make you understand.
But time went on and still I kept quiet, until finally it seemed to
me that if I did tell you, you’d be angry at all I’d kept from you
for so long. I beg you to believe I’m sorry now that I didn’t tell
you sooner.”
    “Will you stop dithering, girl? This is most
unlike you. Come to the point.”
    Those exasperated words from Lady Elgida
brought Calia’s floundering attempts at an apology to a halt. The
time for excuses and delays was over.
    “To begin at the beginning, I am
illegitimate,” she said.
    “You’ve made no secret of it,” Lady Elgida
replied with some lingering exasperation. “In any case, Adana
included that information in the letter she had you deliver to me
when you first arrived here. I haven’t raised the subject with you
because, until now, the unfortunate circumstance of your birth has
made no difference to me.”
    “It would make a difference if you knew who
my parents were.” Calia paused, waiting for a response. When none
came, she drew a long breath and continued. “My mother was a
certain Lady Casilde, wife of an elderly Sapaudian lord who was
often at King Henryk’s court at Calean City. That’s where she met
my father. He told me once that she was young and very beautiful,
while her husband was so old and infirm that he could barely
walk.
    “According to my father, Lady Casilde was so
eager for a man’s embrace that he didn’t have to seduce her. He
said she threw herself at him. Considering what I now know about my
father, I’m not sure that was the true version of my conception. I
can’t be certain that anything he ever said to me was the
truth.”
    “You knew your father, then?”
    “Barely. I used to think I was fortunate that
he acknowledged me. Some fathers just abandon illegitimate
children, especially girls. My mother’s husband died shortly after
I was born and she quickly remarried. I’ve been told she wanted
nothing to do with me.” Calia took a moment to think about that.
Deciding her own emotions were irrelevant to the discussion, she
continued, “When I was six years old the wet nurse who had fostered
me in her own home died. That was when my father took me to his
castle and left me there in the care of the seneschal’s wife.”
    “From what you’ve said so far, he seems to
have been a surprisingly caring parent.”
    Calia smothered a cynical laugh. Her father
hadn’t cared at all; he’d just kept her in reserve against the day
when he could use her for his own purposes, the way he’d used
Mallory; the same way that Mallory had used her for years as his
unacknowledged chatelaine and personal spy.
    “Tell me about your brother,” Lady Elgida
said as if she could hear Calia’s thoughts. “The brother who sent
you to Talier Beguinage against your wishes.”
    “I begged him to keep me with him. But
Mallory has his own purposes, his own ambitions. In that, he is
much like our father. My tears and all my pleas meant nothing to
him.”
    “Mallory,” Lady Elgida repeated. Her gaze on
Calia was so alert that the younger woman knew she dared not
prevaricate, though she wished she could evade this particular
truth.
    “Sir Mallory of Catherstone,” Calia said. “He
is six years older than I, our father’s bastard by one of the
castle women. Mallory was trained and knighted by our father and
kept at Catherstone as a household knight. Later, our father made
him seneschal of Catherstone after the old seneschal and his wife
retired to their own small holding. Fortunate old souls, to be
safely away from Catherstone when the blows fell. Fortunate to
escape the shame.” She fell silent then, swallowing hard, blinking
away the tears.
    “Don’t stop now. Tell me all of it,” Lady
Elgida said, her voice surprisingly gentle. “Every bit, every
detail. You need to speak the words out loud.”
    “You know!” Sudden comprehension tore the
tears from Calia’s eyes and melted the lump in her throat that
threatened to