Graceling (Graceling Realm #1)(19)
Author: Kristin Cashore

“Have you had those thoughts before? Had you thought those things, while you were in his presence?”

“That I don’t trust him? That he’s an opportunist and a thug? I think of it every time I look at him.”

Giddon was practical y spitting, but Katsa didn’t see. She bent her knees and set her bow on the ground, slowly, deliberately. She stood, and turned away from him. She walked, one step at a time. She breathed in and breathed out and stared straight ahead.

“You’re afraid I’ll cause him offense,” Giddon yel ed after her, “your precious Lienid prince. And perhaps I will tell him my opinion. Perhaps he’l leave more quickly if I encourage – ”

She didn’t listen, she didn’t hear. For there was too much noise inside her head. He had known Giddon’s thoughts.

And he had known her own, she knew he had. When she’d been angry, when she’d thought highly of him. Other times, too.

There must be other times, though her head screamed too much for her to think of them.

She had thought him a fighter, just a fighter. And in her foolishness, she had thought him perceptive. Had even admired him for his perceptiveness.

She, admire a mind reader.

She had trusted him. She had trusted him, and she should not have. He had misrepresented himself, misrepresented his Grace. And that was the same as if he’d lied.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

She burst into Raffin’s workrooms, and he looked up from his work, startled. “Where is he?” she demanded, and then she stopped in her tracks, because he was there, right there, sitting at the edge of Raffin’s table, his jaw purple and his sleeves rolled up.

“There’s something I must tell you, Katsa,” he said.

“You’re a mind reader,” she said. “You’re a mind reader, and you lied to me.”

Raffin swore shortly and jumped up. He ran to the door behind her and pushed it closed.

Po’s face flushed, but he held her gaze. “I’m not a mind reader,” he said.

“And I’m not a fool,” she yel ed, “so stop lying to me. tell me, what have you learned? What thoughts of mine have you stolen?”

“I’m not a mind reader,” he said. “I sense people.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean? It’s people’s thoughts that you sense.”

“No, Katsa. Listen. I sense people. Think of it as my night vision, Katsa, or the eyes in the back of my head you’ve accused me of having. I sense people when they’re near me, thinking and feeling and moving around, their bodies, their physical energy. It is only – ” He swal owed. “It is only when they’re thinking about me that I also sense their thoughts.”

“And that’s not mind reading?” She screamed it so loudly that he flinched, but stillhe held her gaze.

“Al right. It does involve some mind reading. But I can’t do what you think I can do.”

“You lied to me,” she said. “I trusted you.”

Raffin’s soft voice broke through her distress. “Let him explain, Katsa.”

She turned to Raffin, incredulous, flabbergasted that he should know the truth and stilltake Po’s side. She whirled back on Po, who stilldared to hold her eyes, as if he’d done nothing wrong, nothing completely and absolutely wrong.

“Please, Katsa,” Po said. “Please hear me. I can’t sit and listen in to whatever thoughts I want. I don’t know what you think of Raffin, or what Raffin thinks of Bann, or whether Oll enjoys his dinner. You can be behind the door running in circles and thinking about how much you hate Randa, and all I’ll know is that you’re running in circles – until your thoughts turn to me. Only then do I know what you’re feeling.”

This was what it felt like to be betrayed by a friend. No. By a traitor pretending to be a friend. Such a wonderful friend he’d seemed, so sympathetic, so understanding – and no wonder, if he’d always known her thoughts, always known her feelings. The perfect pretense of friendship.

“No,” he said. “No. I have lied, Katsa, but my friendship has not been a pretense. I’ve always been your true friend.”

Even now he was reading her mind. “Stop it,” she spat out. “Stop it. How dare you, you traitor, imposter, you…”

She couldn’t find words strong enough. But his eyes dropped from hers now, miserably, and she saw that he felt her ful meaning. She was cruel y glad his Grace communicated to him what she couldn’t verbalize. He slumped against the table, his face contorted with unhappiness. His voice, when he spoke, toneless.

“Only two people have known this is my Grace: my mother and my grandfather. And now Raffin and you. My father doesn’t know, nor my brothers. My mother and my grandfather forbade me to tell anyone, the moment I revealed it to them as a child.”

Wel . She would take care of that problem. For Giddon was right, though he couldn’t have realized why. Po was not to be trusted. People must know, and she would tell everyone.

“If you do,” Po said, “you’l take away any freedom I have. You’l ruin my life.”

She looked at him then, but his image blurred behind tears that swel ed into her eyes. She must leave. She must leave this room, because she wanted to hit him, as she had sworn she never would do. She wanted to cause him pain for taking a place in her heart that she wouldn’t have given him if she’d known the truth.

“You lied to me,” she said.

She turned and ran from the room.

———

Helda took her damp eyes, and her silence, in stride.

“I hope no one is il , My Lady,” she said. She sat beside Katsa’s bath and worked soap through the knots in Katsa’s hair.

“No one is il .”

“Then something has upset you,” Helda said. “It’l be one of your young men.”

One of her young men. One of her friends. Her list of friends was dwindling, from few to fewer. “I’ve disobeyed the king,” she said. “He’l be very angry with me.”

“Yes?” Helda said. “But that doesn’t account for the pain in your eyes. That will be the doing of one of your young men.”

Katsa said nothing. Everyone in this castle was a mind reader. Everyone could see through her, and she saw nothing.

“If the king is angry with you,” Helda said, “and if you’re having trouble with one of your young men, then we’l make you especial y beautiful for the evening. You’l wear your red dress.”

Katsa almost laughed at that bit of Helda logic, but the laugh got caught in her throat. She would leave the court after this night. For she didn’t want to be here any longer, with her uncle’s fury, Giddon’s sarcastic, hurt pride, and, most of all, Po’s betrayal.

———

Later, when Katsa was dressed and Helda grappled with her wet hair before the fire, there was a knock at her entrance. Katsa’s heart flew into her throat, for it would be a steward, summoning her to her uncle; or even worse, Po, come to read her mind and hurt her again with his explanations and his excuses. But when Helda went to the door, she came back with Raffin.

“He’s not the one I expected,” Helda said. She folded her hands across her stomach and clucked.

Katsa pressed her fingers to her temples. “I must speak to him alone, Helda.”

Helda left. Raffin sat on her bed and curled his legs up, as he had done when he was a child. As they both had done so many times, sitting together on her bed, talking and laughing. He didn’t laugh now, and he didn’t talk. He only sat, all arms and legs, and looked at her in her chair by the fire. His face kind and dear, and open with worry.

“That dress suits you, Kat,” he said. “Your eyes are very bright.”

“Helda imagines that a dress will solve all my problems,” Katsa said.

“Your problems have multiplied since you last left the court. I spoke to Giddon.”

“Giddon.” His very name made her tired.

“Yes. He told me what happened with Lord El is. Honestly, Katsa. It’s quite serious, isn’t it? What will you do?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t decided.”

“Honestly, Katsa.”

“Why do you keep saying that? I suppose you think I should have tortured the fel ow, for doing no wrong?”

“Of course not. You did right. Of course you did right.”

“And the king won’t control me anymore. I won’t be his animal anymore.”

“Kat.” He shifted, and sighed. He looked at her closely. “I can see you’ve made up your mind. And you know I’ll do anything in my power to stop his hand. I’m on your side in anything to do with Randa, always. It’s just… it’s just that…”

She knew. It was just that Randa paid little heed to his son the medicine maker. There was very little in Raffin’s power to do, while his father lived.

“I’m worried for you, Kat,” he said. “That’s all. We all are. Giddon was quite desperate.”

“Giddon.” She sighed. “Giddon proposed marriage to me.”

“Great hil s. Before or after you saw El is?”

“After.” She gestured impatiently. “Giddon thinks marriage is the solution to all my problems.”

“Hmm. well, how did it go?”

How did it go? She felt like laughing, though there was no humor in it. “It began badly and progressed to worse,”

she said, “and ended with my coming to the realization that Po is a mind reader. And a liar.”

Raffin considered her for a moment. He started to speak, then stopped. His eyes were very gentle. “Dear Katsa,” he finally said. “You’ve had a rough few days, what with Randa and Giddon and Po.”

And Po the roughest, though all the danger might lie with Randa. Po the wound she would remove, if she could choose one to remove. Randa could never hurt her as Po had.

They sat quietly. The fire crackled beside her. The fire was a luxury; there was barely a chil to the air, but Helda had wanted her hair to dry more quickly, so they’d set the great logs burning. Her hair fel now in curls around her shoulders. She pushed it behind her ears and tied it into a knot.

“His Grace has been a secret since he was a child, Kat.”

Here they came, then, the explanations and the rationalizations. She looked away from him and braced herself.

“His mother knew he’d only be used as a tool, if the truth came out. Imagine the uses of a child who can sense reactions to the things he says, or who knows what someone’s doing on the other side of a wall. Imagine his uses when his father is the king. His mother knew he wouldn’t be able to relate with people or form friendships, because no one would trust him. No one would want anything to do with him. Think about it, Katsa. Think about what that would be like.”