Chapter 1464: A Request Denied

Nyrielle’s midnight blue eyes searched hers for a long moment, and then the tension in her expression eased by a fraction.

"I can teach you what I know," Nyrielle said. "I’ve never confronted Loman directly, but I’ve talked to others who have. Everything I’ve heard from Lord Jalal and High Lord Dirar’s men suggests that Owain fights in the style of his great uncle, Caleb, and I’ve tested Caleb’s might myself in order to break his blade."

"Owain didn’t just admire Caleb," Ashlynn said as one hand hovered briefly over her abdomen. "I think he was as close to a hero as Owain ever had. Enough that, if we’d ever had children, Owain wanted to name our eldest son after him."

"Hmmpf," Nyrielle snorted, taking Ashlynn’s hand in both of her own. "Just as well you escaped that fate. The last thing the world needs is more Lothian Lords. The last one is being troublesome enough during his stay in the Vale," she said with a sigh.

"Loman?" Ashlynn said, rising up enough to meet Nyrielle’s midnight blue gaze directly. "What about him? What kind of trouble is he causing for you?"

"It isn’t anything to be worried about," Nyrielle said. "Virve is keeping an eye on him during the day to make certain that he doesn’t try to repeat what he did in Hanrahan, and he has no chance of succeeding at anything dangerous at night."

"Still, he came to me last night," Nyrielle said, and her tone shifted into something cooler and more detached. "He came to beg this time. He wants to attend his father’s funeral."

Before they learned of Bors’ death, Loman had attempted to use an apology issued on behalf of his family to plead for mercy for his father. It had infuriated Ashlynn and Nyrielle both, and they’d chastised him for it at the time. Ashlynn had hoped that would be the end of it, and that her brother-in-law could take the time he’d been granted when Sybyll spared his life to contemplate what it really meant to work towards peace between their people.

But it seemed like he was still making unreasonable demands and attempting to play on the hearts of others in order to get his way.

"And you refused," Ashlynn said, reading the answer in the set of Nyrielle’s jaw.

"Of course, I refused. Even if he honored his promise to attend in disguise, the funeral will be presided over by the man who murdered his father." Nyrielle’s lips pressed into a thin line as she recalled the foolish notions that had tumbled from the young priest’s lips one after the other.

"I asked Loman directly whether he could sit in silence while Owain played the grieving son over Bors’s pyre," Nyrielle added. "Whether he could watch his brother accept condolences and shed false tears without rising from his seat and denouncing him before the entire court."

"And?" Ashlynn asked, wondering whether Loman had managed to delude himself into believing that he truly could sit through the scene of his brother delivering Bors’ eulogy.

"He had the decency to admit that he couldn’t," Nyrielle said. "Which is perhaps the first honest thing to come out of his mouth since he arrived. His grief is at least genuine, I’ll grant him that much, even if his judgment remains appalling."

There was a pause, and in it, Ashlynn felt a weight that went far beyond Nyrielle’s assessment of Loman, encompassing the long shadow of the Lothian name and everything it had cost her over the past century.

"He’s still a boy playing at being a man," Nyrielle continued, her voice quiet but precise. "He spent years distributing charity from the Church’s overflowing coffers and believed that made him virtuous. Now, when he’s finally faced with something that costs him personally, he begs and pleads and makes promises he can’t keep."

"That’s not entirely fair," Ashlynn said gently. "He’s lost his father and his faith and his freedom in the space of a few weeks."

"You lost just as much, if not more, when Owain turned on you. You never begged or pleaded. You fought to reclaim what you lost, and you’re fighting even now." Nyrielle replied. "You’ve shown me that it’s possible to suffer great loss without becoming a monster consumed by your own pain and rage," Nyrielle whispered, cupping Ashlynn’s face and looking deeply into her lover’s eyes.

"You’ve given me a reason to believe in humanity again," Nyrielle said softly. "Even when men like Loman disappoint me so," she said, letting go of Ashlynn’s face and shaking her head. "Grief is not an excuse for endangering other people’s lives, and Loman’s grief would have done exactly that if I’d allowed him to indulge it."

Ashlynn said nothing for a moment, letting the words settle. She knew better than to push Nyrielle on the Lothians. A century of war with that family had left scars that no amount of diplomacy could fully smooth, and while Nyrielle’s grudge had cooled from vengeance to something closer to weary contempt, the name still carried a weight between them that required careful handling.

"You were right to refuse him," Ashlynn said finally. "If Loman had disrupted the funeral, it would have unraveled everything."

"It would have," Nyrielle agreed. Then, after a deep breath, she continued. "But I did not enjoy it. Whatever else he may be, the boy loved his father, and denying a son the right to grieve is a cruelty I don’t take pleasure in."

That admission was something that wouldn’t have been possible for Nyrielle just a year ago. Before Ashlynn had helped to rekindle the passions in her heart, the cold, hard woman who ruled over the Vale of Mists wouldn’t have felt any remorse at doing what needed to be done in order to protect her people. She’d been as ruthless with herself as she’d been with her enemies, and she’d have felt very little at denying a Lothian the comfort she herself had been denied when Cellach Lothian burned her parents at the stake as heretics.

Time, however, along with her bond with Ashlynn, allowed her to slowly lower the frozen mask that had covered her beautiful, expressive face, revealing the beating heart of a woman who had only learned to be ruthless when the world left her with no other option.

"Now," Nyrielle said, sighing slightly as she ran her fingers through Ashlynn’s soft, blonde locks one last time. "If you think it would give you an edge to learn what I know about how the Lothians fight," she said. "I’m willing to indulge you... even if I think you should relax and let me pamper you until the sun sets."

"You’re always good to me," Ashlynn said sweetly. "Even when I’m being willful."

"Of course," Nyrielle said, cupping Ashlynn’s face gently with one delicate hand. "The world has taken so much from you. It’s up to me to fill in the gaps until you’ve taken back everything that belongs to you," she promised.

Then, Nyrielle rose from the sofa in a single fluid motion, her dark hair cascading over her shoulders as the dream shifted around them. The garden remained, but the sofa and the silver tray and the scattered fruit faded, replaced by an open space of moonlit grass bordered by flower beds.

In Nyrielle’s hand, a sword shimmered into being. It wasn’t a real blade, but a dream-forged practice weapon, its weight and balance perfect for the lesson she intended to teach.

A second sword appeared on the grass at Ashlynn’s feet, and she recognized the shape of it instantly. It wasn’t Water’s Edge, but something close with the same weight, the same curve, and the same clipped point.

"On your feet, my darling," Nyrielle said, and the tenderness in her voice had been joined by something harder, something that glinted like the edge of a blade. "Let me show you how the Lothians fight... and the flaws they fight to hide."