“Phorenna was given this land forty years ago,” Emeena said of her least-favorite sister. “Her reward for helping the king with the inconvenient matter of his legitimate brother.”

  Nira gazed across tilled fields at the manor house, a structure sufficiently modest in scale and workmanship that no member of the nobility would be inclined to seize it for himself, but grand enough that when it was new, Iglian’s lady would have considered herself well pampered. A large tower loomed just separate from the main residence, resplendent with flowering vines that rose as high as the crenelated terrace at its crown.

  “The upper room of the tower is her den,” Emeena continued. “She’s there now. I can sense it. It’s as I predicted. She is in one of her trances, and will continue to be until supper hour or later. Her guardian will be in the receiving chamber at the base, making sure she is not disturbed.”

  “He'll be alone?” Nira asked.

  “I am certain of it.”

  A single bodyguard. Phorenna was mighty among the Eleven, with the influence and the means to surround herself with a castle full of men-at-arms if she chose, but that was not her style. Her reputation was heightened by the degree to which she dismissed the possibility she could be threatened. Here, she was in fact well protected by sentry charms and her slaverhounds, and of course by what she herself could bring to bear.

  However, at the moment, she was blind to what might be happening around her. Her magical wards and snares, and her dogs? Those could be thwarted with the resources of an opposing sister of the Eleven. Nira faced a clear path to the tower. There she would find Lithus. A veteran of the War of Four Towers, he and his sword had been by Phorenna’s side for twenty-two years, serving her as Nira served Emeena.

  “You know what to do,” Emeena said. “I know you will not disappoint me.”

  She did not say the words aloud: Kill him. The rules of the covenant were uncompromising on that point. Nira was expected to infer Emeena’s desire, and carry out what was necessary to fulfill it. In years past, that process of interpretation had always been enough.

  Nira had always been eager to be Emeena’s instrument. She had never doubted her purpose. But in times past, Emeena had been different, not as given to grudges, not intent upon enemies but upon her own accomplishments.

  Duty was duty. Nira proceeded toward the tower.

  She found Lithus at his post in the tower’s audience room, stationed at the base of the stairs that led to Phorenna’s sanctum. He was nibbling at the fare on a trencher a servant must have recently delivered from the kitchen. He spat out the mouthful the moment Nira appeared in the doorway, recognizing at once what she was—perhaps even who she was.

  Nira darted into the center of the space, brandishing her pike.

  The spear was a gamble. Such a lengthy weapon was not recommended for enclosed spaces. But Lithus was large and well-muscled. Rumor said he was fast, too, despite his years. She needed something to keep him at a distance, at least at first. So far the plan seemed sound. The chamber was roomy and nearly unencumbered by furniture.

  And it was circular. That was key.

  He wasted no time with words. He encroached immediately on her half of the space, sword ready, but not committing. She recognized the maneuver. He was trying to corner her. It didn’t work. The room had no corners. Her heels never touched down as she sped clear of him, running along a wall for three steps and regaining the major area of the floor, with plenty of margin of safety. His sword was longer than most, but not that long.

  She reached behind her back, seized a fling knife, and threw it at his head.

  He dodged, but she was cobra quick. The point of her spear sank home in his abdomen, just below the ribs.

  His sword clanged loudly off the pike as she pulled back. The blow having struck the metal portion, not the staff, her weapon remained intact and in her possession despite the force of the stroke.

  They circled. As ever, he made sure to stay between her and the base of the stairs, but his frown suggested he had deduced that it was he who was the target, not the lady he served.

  He kept his hand pressed against his side. Blood continued to leak between his fingers. His complexion grew pasty. She suspected she would not have to engage with him again. To ensure his demise, she had only to keep him from retreating to a place where he could be tended with bandages and stitches and doses of his patroness’s elixirs.

  She was therefore already halfway to fulfilling her instructions. Why was the prospect making her insides churn?

  “You needn’t die,” she found herself saying.

  “No?” he asked.

  “Not if you leave Phorenna’s service. Deprive her. Force her to find a new shieldman.”

  He laughed. And then winced, because the effort had made use of the muscles around his wound. “Would you do that to your mistress? Who are you to think I might be so false?”

  “I am a woman considering mercy to someone she has defeated,” she said. “I do not apologize for it.”

  “I think you are a creature of fumes. You do not belong here.”

  He charged. This time it was her turn to be surprised. He closed the gap so adroitly she could not bring the spear to bear in time to skewer him.

  Her weapon had become a handicap. She dropped it at once and threw herself to the left as his sword cut descended. He missed, in part because he had expected her to dodge right, so as to stay on his wounded side, and forcing him to reach farther.

  She drew her long knife. She kept close after that, where the range of his blade didn’t matter. He managed to get his shortsword out. After that it became fast and bloody and with no time for thought or speech or second-guessing, just battle. Those were conditions in which she knew herself.

  ~o0o~

  Nira crossed the fields along the hedgerows and between the haystacks and was not seen by the denizens of the estate. The shallow cut in her thigh made her limp, but the makeshift bandage kept her from leaving a blood trail.

  She spotted Emeena crouching in the shade of the thicket. The sorceress winced as she noted Nira’s gait, but overall her manner exuded triumph. After all, the mere fact that Nira was able to return meant the mission must have succeeded.

  “He is dead?” Emeena inquired the moment Nira reached her.

  “Yes.”

  The Emeena that Nira had known would have instantly turned her attention to practical concerns—first to an examination and proper tending of Nira’s wound, second to the execution of the escape plan they had made, given the reaction that was bound to ensue once Phorenna awakened from her trance and saw what had happened to her sentinel. Instead the witch actually laughed, and spoke of how this was only the beginning.

  She was not, after all, the Emeena Nira had known.

  Nira reached up as if to caress her patroness’s cheek. Instead, she closed her fingers tightly together and with a sharp jerk, freed the distinctive earring from the flesh to which it had clung.

  With shock still evolving over her face and in her posture, Emeena faded and became colorless as fog. Soon she lost her humanlike form altogether. Only the slightest vestige lingered, a wisp that could not withstand the force of the breeze and began to be carried away.

  “I know there are people out there who remember you at your best,” Nira called to the departing figment. “I will look for them.”

  She tucked the earring in her pocket.

  “I will look for them,” she repeated, but it did not ease the sorrow.

  Royal Daughters

  Elaine Cunningham

  The more you know about history, the more fun you can have with it. I pity people who are taught by the “just memorize facts” method; I once encountered a child who could tell me the tribe the colonists dressed up as for the Boston Tea Party and the dollar value of the tea dumped in the harbor, but who thought we fought the Revolutionary War so we could start our own post office. I took his textbook away from him (it really was dreadful), sat him down in front of the TV, and put on the video of 1776. That ended his complaints that history was boring.

  Elaine Cunningham is a New York Times bestselling fantasy author, best known for stories in shared-world settings such as the Forgotten Realms, Pathfinder Tales, and Star Wars. Her publications include 20 novels, about four dozen short stories, and a graphic novel. She's a history geek with a lifelong passion for folklore, and some of her stories, including "Royal Daughters," are a blend of history and myth. Elaine started reading the Sword and Sorceress anthologies back when they were in single digits, and she's delighted to be a part of this one. For more information, see www.elainecunningham.com.

  On a clear day, you can see a fair piece of Scotland from atop Cairnpapple Hill. The sight we awaited was Twice-hanged Johnnie, and finally there he was, riding like the devil was on his heels. When I saw the small, dark-haired woman holding on behind him, I muttered a vow to hang him myself, first chance. The third try was bound to take.

  He pulled up at the base of the hill and all but fell from his horse. “Lennox rides for Linlithgow!” he called as he charged up the hill afoot. “With four thousand men! They’re moving the wee queen to Stirling Castle come morning.”

  These were grim tidings, but worries must be taken in turn. My first concern was for the lass who’d ridden with Johnnie, never mind that I’d bid her stay at the palace. My Alice climbed the hill with that easy, swinging step of hers, but her dark eyes burned and the set of her jaw promised bloody battle to any who stood between her and her will.

  She met my gaze without flinching. “You’ll need me.”

  Everyone looked to me, as they’d done the night King Harry’s men had burned their cottages. Many had lost kin in the fires and the fighting. They’d been half mad with grief, ready to cast their lots with anyone who could promise them vengeance. I could, and I did, and so here we were.

  Angus Kerr spoke first, as he usually did.

  “And what is it, exactly, that you’ll be needing her for?”

  I was a little surprised, truth be told, that the question was so long in coming. A witch’s counsel is neither sought nor given lightly, for there may be a high price to pay and no telling when it’ll come due. But come what may, a witch must always speak the truth, especially when she means to deceive.

  “Here’s the long and short of it: England’s king wants to wed his lad to our lass. The regent is willing to let her go, for a price. How long can we stand against such men?”

  Shock slackened their faces; pride turned them to stone. “They’ll not have her,” growled Angus. “Not our Mary, not her throne. No man would stand for it, nor any woman. The stones in the street would rise and rebel!”

  I swept one hand toward the old cairn, then beyond to the hollows where standing stones once greeted the rising moon. “In the old tongue, Cairnpapple meant ‘stones of the People.’ Might not they arise, as well?”

  Long moments passed as the men puzzled over my words. Some of them looked to the bairn sleeping on a sheepskin, wondering what part an orphaned babe might play in this. I could tell from the look on his face that Angus took my meaning and liked it not.

  “Are you daft, Janet? Even if you can whistle up that wind, who could sail the storm it’ll bring?”

  “Not the English, I’m thinking.”

  He snorted. “Next you’ll be setting the lions of Hollyrood loose to hunt the city’s rats.”

  “And wouldn’t that make the rats think twice?”

  Angus threw up his hands and turned to Alice. “Talk some sense into your mother, if you’ve any to spare.”

  My Alice gave him a look that could freeze the tides. She shrugged off the sack she’d slung over her shoulder and shook out a tiny gown, the likes of which I’d never seen. Purest white, made of fine linen and taffeta with enough tucks and ruffles and ribbons to bedeck a full-grown queen.

  A thing so fine would surely be missed. With Alice gone, they’d know who took it.

  “I told you to stay at the palace, lass. Bundle a gown, toss it from the window, go about your business. Was that not clear to you?”

  “You need me.” She knelt to tend the sleeping babe.

  One red-haired bairn looks much like another, and when the orphaned babe was dressed in her stolen finery, she could easily pass as King Jamie’s get. I was fairly certain she was his in truth. Numbering our late king’s bastards is like counting stars; the longer you look, the more you find.

  The babe woke and wailed its hunger. Alice loosened her bodice—the finest thing she owned, good wool dyed a rich green. As she lifted the babe to give suck, it struck me what she intended to do.

  “The English won’t let you come with the child.”

  “How can they forbid me? They’ll need the babe kept quiet on the journey, and one of her own nurses can tend her better than any strange woman—if they thought to bring one.”

  “They’ll take the queen any way they can get her. You don’t need to do this!”

  “Oh, but I do. If they’ve a dram of wit, they’ll expect a nurse, for who but a nurse could steal the babe from the palace? I serve the true queen, so if they ask questions, I’ll have answers to give.”

  I could find no good argument, for she spoke truth. Alice always did.

  But how could I let her do this? She was my heart and my pride, a foundling child I’d raised as my own. If I were right about the People and their ways, she would be riding straight into a bloody hell. Were I wrong, she’d be crossing into England, which was no great improvement. How could I let her go?

  “It is not yours to say where I go and when I stay,” she said. “I will do as I choose for reasons of my own, and there’s the end to it.”

  “She’s your daughter, and no doubt about it,” Angus grumbled. “If this thing must be done, let’s get on with it.”

  Alice wrapped the sleeping babe in the sheepskin and placed it on the ground near the cairn. We made a circle with our backs to the child. The sunset colors had faded to silver, and a slim moon climbed the sky as I keened and called to the coming darkness.

  It was near midnight when the first tremor came—softly, at first, no more than the swaying of ropes beneath a mattress when a bedmate stirs. But in less time than the telling would take, the hill began to shake like a tree in a storm. Far below, from somewhere deep in the earth, I heard the creak of a stone door opening.

  The man next to me started to cross himself, then thought better of it. We stood in silence, feet braced wide, until the ground beneath us went still. At a nod from me, we turned to the still-sleeping babe.

  It looked the same as ever it did. The same royal gown, the same wisp of hair peeping out from under the lacy bonnet. For all I could tell, King Jamie’s bastard still slept atop the faerie hill.

  My daughter stooped and stroked one downy cheek. Quick as a snake, the creature struck. Alice calmly pinched the tiny jaw with her free hand, forcing it open. She raised her bleeding finger for us to see the small punctures made by teeth like needles. Or fangs.

  “Changeling.” Angus muttered the word like a curse, and so it was.

  And so were we—accursed in this life and any that might come after. No one knew for certain what the People did with stolen children, or why they left one of their own in exchange, but I had no doubt we’d just sacrificed that orphaned babe, as surely as if we’d set it aflame.

  I tried to keep that image from mind as we built a signal fire, tried not to worry for my Alice as we waited for the English to answer.

  A band of riders came, a hundred or more. The Kerr men’s eyes lit at the sight. Horses were better currency than gold in the Borders, and no one cared to ask who last rode them.

  Alice led the way down the hill and showed the changeling babe to the English. Their leader nodded, satisfied, and why wouldn’t he be? Who but a queen could wear such a gown?

  They tossed Alice up behind a rider and handed her the babe. She nodded to me, once, and touched the dirk at her belt. And then they were gone. Being thieving English whoresons, they took every one of our horses with them.

  But our signal fire did its work twice. A band of Kerr men rode to Cairnpapple, leading horses enough for the rest of us. We rode south, hard and fast. My worries had no trouble keeping pace.

  A witch is seldom wrong, if only because once can be one time too many. Since I’d survived this long, I’d come to think well of my own opinions. Maybe this was justified and maybe it wasn’t, but where this night’s business was concerned, I was certain my reasoning was sound.

  Everyone knows the fey don’t like to be beholden to anyone. We’d given them a babe of royal blood, dressed as a queen. Surely they would feel compelled to answer in kind. And once they’d given their daughter to Scotland, I didn’t believe their pride would permit them to let her be taken from this land. I was as certain of this as sunrise.

  But I also knew the English, and they had my Alice.

  It was not difficult to follow the tracks of a hundred riders, not even in the faint moonlight. We had them in sight before the moon set.

  The fey came suddenly, and even though I was expecting them, the shock of it stole my breath.

  A trio of seeming boulders shifted and stood, revealing three powries, man-shaped creatures as stout and short as barrels. Stone gray they were from beards to boots, but for the dark caps on their heads. In the moonlight, those caps looked black.

  Anyone who’d heard the old tales knew better.

  “Red caps,” muttered one of the Kerr men, and this time he did cross himself.

  More powries rose from the east, then the south. The stench of old blood filled the air like mist. As one, they raised axes to the sky and let loose a howl that would set a pack of wolves running, tails tucked.

  Horses screamed with fear, rearing and pitching as they fought to break free of their riders. One of the beasts bolted, dragging a fallen Englishman by one stirrup.