Read Online Path of Honor by Diana Pharaoh Francis - Free Book Online Page B

making the footing more treacherous. He eased each foot down carefully, pressing against the lighthouse wall to avoid looking down at the frothing harbor below. Reisil had no such anxieties and climbed the steps easily, nimbly skipping over the gaps in the stairway.
    They stopped at the gallery deck, where a scarred wooden door led into the watchroom. Juhrnus grudgingly had to admit that Reisil was right. The room was sound. Though the wind moaned and gusted, the mullioned windows remained impervious, despite the many cracks in the panes. Reisil had already cleaned the room and piled wood next to the hearth, but the rest of the round space was bare.
    “You need some furniture. A bed, a table and chair at least. I don’t want to sit on the floor when I’m here.”
    “Who says you’re invited?”
    “I’m ahalad-kaaslane . I don’t have to be invited,” he said loftily.
    He watched as Reisil unpacked her few possessions, folding her clothes and situating them on a shelf, setting out a plate, a spoon and a fork and a cup on the mantel as well as two candles. Her few toiletries she put next to her clothing and then spread her bedroll on the floor, bits of straw from Tirpalema’s stable still clinging to it.
    Juhrnus made a face. “That’s something I won’t miss about riding circuit.”
    “Don’t tell me you had trouble finding a soft bed every night? And some willing woman to warm it for you?”
    Juhrnus averted his face from her amused stare. “Not often enough,” he muttered. “Apparently you’ve had the same trouble.” Her blush was as hot as his, and he grinned. “So you need a bed, and a chair and a table.”
     
    Juhrnus walked back to Tirpalema’s with Reisil, wringing from her a promise to meet him for dinner. Not in the Temple, but at a kohv-house in the yellow district.
    “The Four Bells,” she repeated obediently. “An hour after sundown.”
    Satisfied, he returned to the Temple to retrieve Esper and hunt for Sodur. He snatched a cold meal in the dining commons and then departed for the palace.
    He came to the main gate of the palace grounds. It was situated beneath a towering stone barbican riddled with arrow loops and crowned with toothy crenellations. Flanking towers at intervals along the thick walls gave testimony that the castle had once been expected to defend Koduteel against invaders. It served now as its last bastion. The city had long since grown too large for its population to cram inside the palace walls. A massive curtain wall had been erected ninety years ago to protect the populace, but even that had grown too small to hold everyone. Those who could not afford to live inside were relegated to a chancy life in the Fringes, a hodge-podge of tents and ramshackle lean-tos huddled against the north wall of the city.
    The guards scanned him over and then waved him inside. Juhrnus nodded his thanks, wandering across the broad expanse of the bailey where skeletal copses of trees and mulched flower beds dotted the winter-killed lawns. He followed the long, spiraling driveway around the hill and toward the palace at the top. More guards passed him, dressed in midnight blue and gold livery over chain mail, red-eyed gryphons splayed on their chests, shining halberds carried stiffly above their heads. Juhrnus smiled greeting to them, suddenly conscious of his scruffy beard and travel-stained cloak.
    “Juhrnus! Bright day! Vesil said you’d come. I’ve been expecting you for more than a month. Did you have a good journey?”
    Sodur had come over the crest of the hill with several other men. He waved them on, stopping to hail Juhrnus with a welcoming smile and slap on the shoulder. His silver lynx trailed at his side, tufted ears flicking back and forth.
    “You look a sight. You got in yesterday?”
    “In time for dinner.”
    “Are you here for me?” At Juhrnus’s nod, Sodur turned them back down the hill. “Let’s walk. I was going to the Temple. Have to get away from all the