The Dark Remains Read Online Free PDF Page B

white horse, sword in hand, before a castle with seven towers.
    Now the queen did look up, turning piercing eyes upon the two women. “It is said the magics of the Mournish are like dark seeds that can grow only into thorned flowers. You would do well to remember that. Sisters.”
    Aryn and Lirith could only nod. Together they stepped through the door, into the passage beyond, leaving the queen to her work.

5.
    “Going so soon this time, are you, my lord?” the woman said in a sleepy voice, burrowing deeper beneath the bedcovers.
    Durge only grunted as he sat up. He swung his legs over the edge of the bed. The stone floor was cool against his bare feet. He drew in deep breaths as sweat dried on his naked back. Dawn was still an hour away, and steely air drifted through the window along with the soft, lonely call of a dove.
    He shut his eyes, remembering. Ever were the doves her favorite. He would laugh at her when she threw grain on the ground for them in the morning. But as night fell, she would open all the windows of the manor and let their music fill the house. Back then he had never understood; he had thought it the most forlorn sound he had ever heard. Why had it taken him so many years to realize just how beautiful it was?
    “Shall I expect you again this eventide, my lord?”
    Durge opened his eyes. “You should never expect me.”
    He stood, took his breeches from a chair, and pulled them on. Behind him, he heard Lesa sigh and roll over in bed.
    He had found her not long after their arrival in Artolor. Lesa was a townswoman who worked sometimes as a maid to one of the queen’s ladies-in-waiting. Her husband had died a year ago, but she had been left barren by the difficult birth of her second child and so no man in the town would have her for a wife. She was plain and dull, but good-hearted enough, and kind to her children on the few times he had seen her with them. Durge had liked that. Besides, she needed coin for bread as he needed a mistress. It worked well enough.
    Durge cinched the waist of his breeches, then straightened. As he did, he caught a glimpse of himself in the murky depths of a bronze mirror. The mirror was short, so that he could not see above his shoulders, and for a moment it was like seeing a ghost.
    With his face hidden, he did not look so different than he remembered looking in younger days. His arms were still hard, the thick hair on his chest still dark, and his belly had not gone to pudding as with many men his age. It was his hands that gave it away. They were rough, big-knuckled, etched with lines and scars. The hands of an old man.
    He shrugged his gray tunic on over his head, belted it into place, then turned around. Lesa was sitting up in bed now, her snarled brown hair falling about her shoulders, watching him with small eyes. Her face was lined and battered beyond her years by a hard life, but her breasts were small and well shaped.
    She hugged her arms around her knees beneath the covers. “When will you make me your lady, my lord?”
    “I shall never make you my lady,” he said, and pulled his boots on.
    She laughed and patted the bed beside her. “I’m yourlady here, I am. So solemn you seem. But you’re bold enough when you press yourself to me. Is that not enough for you?”
    Durge laid three silver coins on a small table. “Buy some shoes for your children. I saw them barefoot in the town commons.” He moved to the door.
    “I will, my lord,” she said. “Buy some shoes that is. Jorus bless you.”
    Durge said nothing as he stepped through the door and shut it behind him.
    The castle was quiet; most of Ar-tolor was still abed. He trod the passages back toward his chamber, but he did not hurry. This was one of his rare moments to himself, and it was proper to savor it. Over the last two decades, Durge had grown accustomed to being alone, and he did not find it a burden. There was so much that could be heard—so much that could be seen and felt—only in the