Fall of a Kingdom (The Farsala Trilogy) by Hilari Bell Read Free Book Online

cloud passed over the sun? But the gahn was still bathed in light.
    Soraya looked up. A blanket! Someone on the roof had pulled a blanket over the grid that had speckled her with light.
    “Wait, there’s—”
    “Wait!” Her father’s voice overrode hers, drowning it, even in the dome. “I would make one more request.” His eyes flickered to Soraya’s, urgent, commanding. She ground her teeth.
    “I would be allowed to accompany my daughter on her final journey, to offer her the comfort of my presence.”
    “But what assurance do we have,” said the priest swiftly, “that a father’s love will not overcome your duty to do all that you may in defense of the land?”
    A new sense of danger prickled down Soraya’s spine. Not for herself, not anymore. But what was the penalty for a high commander who was caught disobeying the gahn’s orders? Who defied the temple?
    She glared up at the blanket. Lying bastards. The clean heat of anger burned away her fear.
    “I will go also,” said Jandal suddenly. “As witness for Kay Amin that the maid is abandoned as promised.”
    Soraya barely listened to the gahn’s reluctant agreement—she was watching the men who mattered. Garshab’s brows jutted in a faint frown. Her father’s face showed no change, but the tension in his shoulders eased. This was part of his plan then, not Garshab’s. She wished, passionately, that she knew more details.
    Jandal, whose gazelle stood next to the gahn’s horse, was a powerful ally, but this was a more intricate pattern than any she’d stitched. And embroidery wasn’t Soraya’s best skill either.
    “The temple would send a witness too.” The priest barely waited for the gahn to finish speaking.
    Jandal glared at him. “You doubt my word, priest?”
    “No doubt is implied,” said the gahn soothingly. He sounded far less regal than he should, in front of so large an audience. Was he frightened too? He probably had reason. How many gahns had been cast down by ambitious deghans who could manipulate the deghanate, their house statues moved to the farthest end of the line? “One witness for the temple and one for the deghanate. That is fair.”
    Now both her father and Garshab looked satisfied.
    “We shall celebrate the assurance of our victory tomorrow,” the gahn went on, “with a day of feasting and a flags-and-lances match. Leopard against Raven!”
    The crowd roared again, with complete approval this time. Garshab wasn’t the only one who could manipulate.
    “And two days after that the lady Soraya will take her leave of us.” He managed to sound sorrowful, the hypocrite. “But what of you, Lady Soraya? Is there anything in our power to offer you that might make your burden lighter?”
    I want to get out of these robes and walk straight into the nearest fountain. And it wasn’t just the honest sweat of a hot day, or even her own fear, that she wished to rinse away. “No, High One, there is—Wait.” She remembered the maids’ greedy, secretive gazes. “Could my cousin Pari accompany me on the journey?”
    Sudaba disapproved of Pari, who talked too freely with commoners. Improper. Unladylike. Most of the younger deghasses were jealous of Soraya’s beauty and her family’s position, but Pari had become a friend.
    “That is both modest and fitting; it will be made so,” said the gahn. He did regal better now that he wasn’t afraid. “We offer praise,” he went on, “to the courage and nobility of a true deghass, and to the father who raised such a daughter.”
    Soraya lowered her gaze again. She was too angry to lie and too frightened to speak true.
    Her father suffered neither temper nor fear. “I thank you for your praise, High One, but it is Soraya alone who deserves it. She is the treasure of my heart.”
    And that made it all worthwhile.

Chapter Five
Jiaan
    T HE MATCH WAS WELL into the second round of battle, and Jiaan could barely see the flags-and-lances field through the dust. Most of the mobile,