In Which Alina Won't Waste a Moment

August 23, 1160

Primus was dead. Primus was dead, and Karlspan was dead. Dead. Gone. Never to return.

The news had disturbed Alina to the point where she'd barely spoken a word to anyone since she had been informed. First of all, Primus had been her cousin--sure, he had been fourteen years her senior, but she had known him all her life, and they had grown somewhat close over the years. Secondly, he had also been her brother-in-law; with both Primus and Karlspan gone, that was two of her sisters who had been widowed in two years.

Meraleene, Alina knew, was no Laralita. Laralita had always been the one for theatrics, the one who would respond to widowhood by fleeing the kingdom with the intention of raising her unborn child in a new one, leaving her two boys in the care of her oldest brother and his wife; no, Meraleene would stay where she was, and do as she told by anyone she deemed worth listening to, just pressing on as if Primus had simply gone for a week's hunt.

But that hardly mattered. What mattered was that husbands died--eventually, even the healthiest, luckiest man alive would die--and it seemed that husbands of the Sadiel sisters were falling like dominoes. Who would be next? Haldred? Arkon? Severin?

And it could happen at any time, too! Primus, she had been told, had been killed in a freak accident, an entirely shocking and unexpected event. No one would have ever guessed that morning that he would be gone by the afternoon.

It was getting rather late, she realized suddenly, alarmed. Severin should have been home an hour ago; he'd only gone to briefly visit his mother. What if something had happened? Maybe there had been a fire, or he had taken a shortcut through the woods and gotten struck by a hunter's arrow? Maybe something had upset his horse, or maybe...

"Sorry I'm late, Princess. A little skirmish broke out in the market, so I felt obliged to stay and sort it out."

He was back--thank God.

"Was anyone hurt?" she inquired as she thought she should, though in truth she really only cared that he himself had not been.

"Well, the baker has a black eye, and the blacksmith has a fat lip," Severin answered with a sigh, "but nothing too serious, of course. It's all sorted out, although I doubt that those two will be back on speaking terms any time soon. You see--"

She pressed her finger to her lips, silencing him. Trance-like, she found herself slipping off the bed and to her feet, advancing toward him with such resolve that he seemed miles away instead of merely feet. At last, he was within her reach; she placed her hands on his shoulders and squinted, studying his face intently, desperate to memorize every shadow around his eyes, every hair in his beard.

There would come a day when he would not return home. Perhaps someone would be there to see it happen, or perhaps they would find his mangled body days later. For all she knew, he could be struck by lightning, or hacked to pieces by some frenzied, knife-wielding drunk--but no matter how it happened she was now acutely aware of his mortality. One day, he would die.

But until then, she did not want to waste a moment.

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