Kushiel's Chosen

conspired to free the Lady Melisande Shahrizai. And I know you are an anguissette trained by Anafiel Delaunay, who, outside the boundaries of Montrève, some call the Whoremaster of Spies."
    "Yes." I whispered it, and felt a thrill run through my veins, compelling and undeniable. I lifted my head, feeling the weight of my hair caught in a velvet net, and downed a measure of fine brandy from the orchards of L'Agnace. "It is time for Kushiel's Dart to be cast anew, Fortun."
    "My lord Cassiiinç will not like it, my lady," Remy cautioned, having left off his quarrel with Ti-Philippe. "Seven hours he has knelt in the garden. I think now I know why."
    "Joscelin Verreuil is my concern." I pushed my plate away from me, abandoning any pretense of eating. "Now I need your aid, chevaliers. Who will ride to the City, and find me a home?"
    In the end, it was decided that Remy and Ti-Philippe both would go in advance, securing our lodgings and serving notice of my return. How Ysandre would receive word of it, I was uncertain. I had not told her of Melisande's gift, nor my concerns regarding her escape. I did not doubt that I had the Queen's support, but the scions of Elua and his Companions can be a capricious lot, and I judged it best to operate in secrecy for the moment. Let them suppose that it was the pricking of Kushiel's Dart that had driven me back; the less they knew, the more I might learn.
    So Delaunay taught me, and it is sound advice. One must gauge one's trust carefully.
    I trusted my three chevaliers a great deal, or I would never have let them know what we were about. Delaunay sought to protect me-me, and Alcuin, who paid the ultimate price for it-by keeping us in ignorance. I would not make his mistake; for so I reckon it now, a mistake.
    But still, there was only one person I trusted with the whole of my heart and soul, and he knelt without speaking in the rain-drenched garden of Montrève. I stayed awake long that night, reading a Yeshuite treatise brought to me by Gonzago de Escabares. I had not given up my dream of finding a way to free Hyacinthe from his eternal indenture to the Master of the Straits. Hyacinthe, my oldest friend, the companion of my childhood, had accepted a fate meant for me: condemned to immortality on a lonely isle, unless I could find a way to free him, to break the geis that bound him. I read until my eyes glazed and my mind wandered. At length, I dozed before the fire, stoked on the hour by two whispering servant-lads.
    The sense of a presence woke me, and I opened my eyes.
    Joscelin stood before me, dripping rainwater onto the carpeted flagstones. Even as I looked, he crossed his forearms and bowed.
    "In Cassiel's name," he said, his voice rusty from hours of disuse, "I protect and serve.”
    We knew each other too well, we two, to dissemble.
    "No more than that?"
    "No more," he said steadily, "and no less."
    I sat in my chair gazing up at his beautiful face, his blue eyes weary from his long vigil. "Can there be no middle ground between us, Joscelin?"
    "No." He shook his head gravely. "Phèdre ... Elua knows, I love you. But I am sworn to Cassiel. I cannot be two things, not even for you. I will honor my vow, to protect and serve you. To the death, if need be. You cannot ask for more. Yet you do."
    "I am Kushiel's chosen, and sworn to Naamah," I whispered. "I honor your vow. Can you not honor mine?"
    "Only in my own way." He whispered it too; I knew how much it cost him, and closed my eyes. "Phèdre, do not ask for more."
    "So be it," I said with closed eyes.
    When I opened them, he was gone.

Two
    When last I entered the City of Elua, it was riding in triumph in the entourage of Ysandre de la Courcel, fresh from victory over the Skaldi, with the Royal Army and Drustan mab Necthana and the Alban contingent at our side. This time, my return to the city of my birth was considerably less dramatic, although it meant a great deal to me.
    It is a powerful thing, homecoming. I had come to love Montrève, with its green mountains, its rustic charm; but the City was my home, and I wept to see its white walls once more. My heart, a year and more accustomed to the sedate pace of the countryside, stirred within my breast and beat faster.
    We had been long days on the road, while the brisk weather of autumn turned to the chill of impending winter. When I had travelled before, it had been with no more than my companions and I could carry on sturdy mounts. Now, we were accompanied by laden wagons of