Page 9 of Silverbow (The Godsung Saga #1)

four

Liam

A runner arrived at the gate with a scrap of parchment bearing a royal seal before Liam had finished his oatmeal. It suddenly tasted like sawdust in his mouth. With a last hard gulp past the lump in his throat, he pushed the bowl away.

He did not need to read or be told what it said.

Those scraps of parchment only ever carried one message: by order of His Majesty the King, Pallas of House Davolier, High King of Estryia and Defender of the Dragon’s Dream, the occupants of the house are to remain in place to await inspection and the Testing.

The wielders would sweep door-to-door from manor houses to hovels, Testing those of age and checking papers against the house’s roll.

Liam’s name was inked onto the roll for Ryerson House when his father took up the stable apartment.

The following year, the scribes added Enya’s below it and Lady Ryerson’s was struck with the flick of a quill.

No names had come or gone in the intervening years, though the collaring of Elling Coblegh still made the stable boys hop from one foot to another whenever someone was foolish enough to mention the Testing.

At twenty-one, this would be his last. He almost dared to hope, despite the ominous quiet that rang too loudly in his ears. Without the hands and stable boys scuttling about, the old stone stable felt eerily abandoned .

But without the help, the occupants of Ryerson House had no time to sulk.

They would work from sunup to sundown to see to the herd, and even then, they wouldn’t meet his father’s usual standards.

Not even on feast days did Del Marsh let his stalls go unmucked, but on Testing days, he sometimes had to make exceptions.

No one felt much like talking and the only sounds in the stable were the dull scrape of pitchforks against hard packed floors and the thud of manure hitting the carts. It had a rhythm to it, Liam realized, and the jingling of the carriage harness in Enya’s hands made him snort a laugh.

She shot him a dark look from where she sat on an upturned bucket, oiling the rarely used leather with a rag.

It was an odd task to choose, he thought, casting a glance around.

There were stalls that needed cleaning, water to be hauled from the well, and hay to be thrown down from the loft, but there she sat, scrubbing as if the Testing depended on it.

Liam understood horses far better than women, but even he knew not to open his mouth and ask what she was doing.

On any normal day, the wrong words could earn him the rough side of her tongue, but today, she wore a scowl like a thundercloud, and he had no doubt lightning was looking for something to strike.

He had no intention of being her lightning rod. Not today. Not with his insides in knots and his hands trembling whenever they stopped moving.

One moment, she was polishing a buckle like feast day silver, and the next, she was throwing the harness aside and rising from the bucket like it was a throne.

By the squaring of her shoulders and the set of her jaw, she’d decided something, and Liam wasn’t sure if he wanted to know what.

Without a word, she stalked toward the gates.

Liam was on the next stall when she returned leading the colt they’d started calling Igg after the fabled God of Fire.

He said nothing as she saddled. He still said nothing as he trailed after her to the training pen, watching the horse toss his head and frisk, threatening to lift Enya out of her boots.

He wondered what Lord Ryerson would think if he learned the hands were betting coppers on who would win this battle of wills. Most favored the horse, but Liam doubted the colt had as much mule in him as Enya Ryerson.

“You should lunge him first,” he warned.

He’d known before he offered the advice that it would be ignored, so when she shot him a look that almost seemed to crackle, it was himself he sighed at.

Enya barely got a leg over before the colt tucked his head and launched himself into a buck that would have sent Liam sprawling.

But not Enya. He couldn’t remember the last time she’d been unseated.

“Did she cold back him?”

Liam jumped at the voice at his shoulder and whirled to see Lord Ryerson leaning casually on a pitchfork. Light . The man was as quiet as a shadow cat when he wanted to be.

“She did, my lord,” Liam muttered, stuffing his hands into his pockets. “She was looking for a fight.”

“When isn’t she?” Lord Ryerson asked with a wry smile.

Liam tried to hide his own grin by turning back to watch. Renley Ryerson was the unconventional sort of lord who mucked his own stables given the opportunity, but Liam’s da would box his ears if he thought he’d forgotten his manners. The man was still a lord, after all.

“Are your coppers on her or the horse, boy?” That made Liam jump again, and Lord Ryerson let out a laugh. “You ought to know by now, Liam. Nothing happens in my stable I don’t know about.”

“Her, of course, my lord,” he mumbled quickly, heat rising above his collar.

“Of course,” Lord Ryerson repeated. He scratched at the stubble on his jaw and watched Igg buck. “I’ll admit, boy, I put mine on the horse.”

“You don’t think she can tame him?” Liam stammered. “My lord.”

The man chuckled. “The rest of us have a little wager of our own, you see. We couldn’t all bet on Enya, so I took the horse. I’ll be happy enough to lose my coin to Griff and your da.”

Liam gaped.

“But I’ll admit, I’m not sure about this one, boy. Dragons aren’t meant to be caged.”

Liam considered pointing out some dragons took riders, but he held his tongue.

“Tell me boy, what do you think of the suitors?”

Light, what am I supposed to say to that?

He shuffled his feet, casting around for the right words. “She doesn’t like any of them, my lord.”

“I know she doesn’t, I was asking what you thought.”

Liam hesitated again. How in Sakaala’s watery domain…

He certainly couldn’t tell him the truth. Since he was a boy, he had known Enya would wed a lord or knight, but it never bothered him until they actually started riding through the gate. He still hadn’t worked out what exactly it was that knotted his insides almost as badly as the wielders did.

“I well…I don’t suppose what I think matters much, sir, seeing as she doesn’t like them.”

To his surprise, Lord Ryerson laughed again. Liam only stared, trying to work out the joke. Finally, Enya’s father sighed and said, “You’re a wise man, Liam. Much wiser than I was at your age. I reckon you’ve already discovered the secret to life.”

“What’s that, sir?”

He chuckled and vaguely waved a hand around at the walls. “My name might be on the gate, but I certainly don’t run this house. Remember it, lad, and you’ll find your road smoother for it.”

Liam still wasn’t sure he understood.

“What about you, boy? Any particular girl you have your eye on?”

That heat crept up to his face now. Sure, he danced with some of the farm girls on Sun Day and at the Harvest Festival. Last fall, Ella Coblegh, all big eyes and shy smiles, danced with him twice. Pretty as she was, he couldn’t help but shudder each time he thought of her brother.

“No, sir.” He shrugged. “I suppose Enya’s the only girl I really know.”

Time seemed to slow as Liam realized what he just said aloud.

“And what of Enya?”

Solignis’s nine hells. His da ought to box his ears for his fool tongue, talking about the daughter of a lord to that lord, nonetheless. Light. He cast around for the right words again.

“She’s a fine lady, my lord,” he stumbled. Her father smirked as if Liam told another joke, and he hurried on. “Any lord would be lucky to have her as his wife.”

Every word was true, even if they were bitter on his tongue, but he still felt that blasted heat spreading across his face under Lord Ryerson’s contemplative gaze.

“Indeed.” He frowned, and Liam feared he said something wrong, not that Renley Ryerson was the kind of man to punish him for it.

The Widow of Westforks had been a sharp reminder of his station and that Renley was a far better lord than most. His da often said him how lucky they were to be in his service, and the thought of another man running the house, regardless of what Lord Ryerson said about the running of such things, made him jittery.

Or at least, that was the reason Liam usually told himself for why the suitors seemed to get under his skin.

But it was another voice in his head that told him as pretty and shy as Ella Coblegh was, she could not hold a candle to Enya. Of course not, you bloody goose. She’s a lord’s daughter, not a farm girl.

Still, over the last few months, it was Enya that made him leap about like a fool. It was Enya that set his heart racing when she brushed too close. It was Enya that made his chest swell when she beamed at him. The thoughts were enough to make a bead of sweat trickle down the back of his neck.

All his life, Enya had been part wicked little sister, part scrappy stable boy, but she suddenly... grew up . He was doing his best to ignore it. It served nothing and no one to pine after her. And she wasn’t that different, after all.

She still looked much the same as she had when they were kids.

Her hair was held back in the same long braid; a braid he once cut and she’d almost strangled him over.

The freckles that would darken her high cheekbones in summer were only hinted at now, freckles he’d once teased her for.

But the awkward knees and elbows were gone, and smooth curves.

.. Liam halted that thought in its tracks, mortified.