The Exiled Queen by Cinda Williams Chima Read Free Book Online

hiding among the warrior cadets at Wien House. His idea was that she’d stay in the temple close, cloistered with the dedicates, gardening and reading and studying healing and doing needlework with the speakers.
    There, she’d be less likely to be recognized by students from home. Few Fellsians attended the Temple School at Oden’s Ford. There were fine ones closer to home.
    Raisa knew mingling with the other students was risky, but she’d accept the risk. She’d spent enough time in a cloister. She wanted to learn about the real world.
    Raisa set her mug down on a rock, wrapped her arms around her trousered legs, and rested her chin on her knees. Sweet Hanalea in chains, she was tired of this.
    Hallie was on watch in camp. Talia Abbott was on patrol, looking for trouble over a three-mile radius. Everyone else huddled in the other two tents. Except for Amon, who was missing, as usual.
    Amon used the name Morley like a stick to keep her at bay. To bury the memory of the childhood they’d spent together, finishing each other’s sentences, using their assets and talents to support and defend each other.
    That younger Amon had taught her to hold her own in the physical, rough-and-tumble world outside of court. He’d taught her the skills her mother had neglected—riding bareback, longbow archery, and a dangerous form of soccer played from horseback. He’d taught her tavern games—nicks and bones, darts, battle cards, and dicing.
    Amon had been the conduit through which the skills he learned from his father and older cousins and on the streets of Fellsmarch were passed to Raisa. They’d sparred with wooden training swords. He showed her how to throw a knife and hone a real blade. When Raisa was twelve, he’d taught her how to disable an opponent in a street fight as soon as he learned it himself.
    Raisa had her own talents to contribute to their childhood enterprises. People naturally deferred to her lineage, granting her an authority she didn’t necessarily have. With Raisa to front them, they could get away with anything.
    Of course we’re allowed to ride out alone, she’d tell the stableman with breezy confidence. Saddle up Devilspawn and Thunderheart. Yes, those two. Yes, the queen approves. Do you really want to bother her?
    Of course Amon is invited to the party/allowed to help himself in the
    pantry/allowed to choose weapons from the royal armory/can ride any horse he wants.
    They were lucky they’d survived to their naming. But they’d had fun.
    Then Amon had turned thirteen, the age when warrior cadets were named and sent to Wien House, the military academy at Oden’s Ford. Raisa had gone to Demonai Camp, to be fostered with her father’s family. They’d been apart more than three years.
    Amon had returned to Fellsmarch at seventeen, tall, lean, and handsome, an intriguing combination of worldly soldier and familiar friend. Now Raisa wanted him to teach her different things, or to learn them along with her, but he was being uncooperative. A few tantalizing kisses—that was all they’d had. At first he’d seemed interested, but now —
    There was no chance of a marriage between them. Her mother had made it clear that she disapproved of a dalliance with an officer of the Guard. Was that why Raisa was so fixed on him? Or was it because she was used to getting what she wanted?
    That couldn’t be it. The threat of a forced marriage to a wizard had sent her into exile. A marriage that violated the N´æming—the agreement that had ended the wars between wizards and clans. Some days it seemed that no one got less of what they wanted than the princess heir of the Fells.
    Still, Raisa’s heart beat faster whenever she got close to Amon Byrne. She noticed everything about him—the way he moved, the way he sat on a horse, the way he tilted his head and chewed on his lower lip when working a problem, the way he rubbed his stubbled chin at the end of the day.
    Whenever he turned those gray eyes on her, the