“I did my best, Father! The servants had fled. Those who remained were weak or still sick. I did my best to step up and take command of the situation.”

“You wrapped them in blankets and tumbled them into their graves. You didn’t even trouble with coffins. You gave your mother’s body to the worms, as if she were some pauper found in the gutter. You held no prayers, you made no offerings. They don’t even have stones to mark them!

“You shoved them in the earth to be forgotten. And then you and your sister proceeded to enjoy yourselves, to take for yourselves what had belonged to your betters.”

I glanced at Yaril. I had heard her gasp for breath several times as my father painted his ugly images into her mind. She was shaking. Anger flooded me at what he was doing to her. “Trusted me? Trusted me? You left me locked in my room to starve! I went days without food or water, and no one gave a thought to me. If Sergeant Duril hadn’t come looking for my body, I’d be dead, too. Would that have pleased you?”

He looked back at me, his eyes as flat as a fish’s. Then he turned to Yaril and said, “He’s lying. He’s obviously lying. Does he look to you as if he has been starved? He’s trying to turn you against me, Yaril. He wants you to agree with him, to say I’m mad. Then he could petition the king to take control of the estate. And then he’d find a way to have himself declared heir.”

Yaril had bunched her napkin up in her hands. With both hands, she held it up before her mouth. She was shaking as if we’d doused her with cold water. I could barely understand her words. “Stop this. Stop!” She sounded as if she couldn’t catch her breath. “I don’t know anything. I don’t want anything except for this to stop. Stop fighting!” She leapt up from her chair, took two steps toward the door, and then collapsed, weeping, on the floor. I was shocked. She had seemed so strong, so recovered of late. I had not guessed how close she was to breaking. She tried to rise as I stood up. When she could not stand, she tried futilely to escape by crawling toward the door.

I hurried to her. Awkwardly, I went down on one knee and then, with an effort, raised us both. She trembled in my grasp, and sobs shook her with each breath she took. Her eyes were closed. Her hands still gripped her napkin convulsively. My arm around her shoulders held her upright. I spoke flatly. “I am taking my sister to her room. She is overcome. You have judged me wrongly, Father, and judged Yaril even more unjustly. We have been nothing but loyal and devoted to our family throughout the hardship. We are all you have left. Why do you want to turn us against each other?”

We were nearly at the dining room door when he let fly his last volley of barbed words.

“I know why you want her good favor, Nevare. I know why you coddle the sister you earlier ignored. You know that the man she marries may very well be your last refuge when you are old and need a shelter for your fat and doddering years. You know you won’t find it with me, don’t you? Because I disown you. I know everything you’ve done, every disgraceful deed: posturing about my Landing, pretending to be a proper soldier, giving orders, and swaggering about. Do you think I haven’t heard of your drunken carousing in my Landing? I know how you shamed my name there, drinking with peasants and whores! You ruined my dreams for you! You are nothing to me. Nothing! Nothing!”

At his words, Yaril broke free from my grasp. She fled from the room. I turned to face him. I drew myself up tall and straight and met his gaze. “As you command me, sir,” I said coldly. Deliberately, I saluted him.

It threw him into frenzy. “You great sack of blubber! How dare you salute me! You’ll never be a soldier. You’ll never be anything. You’re nothing! Nothing! I take back my name from you! I take back from you your right to say you’re my son.”

His words should have horrified me and frozen me with terror. Instead I was flooded with a sensation that was now becoming too familiar. The magic roiled in my blood and rejoiced as it spoke. “Take it all back and welcome to it, old man. It has been years since I belonged to you. Take care of yourself. I won’t be around to do that anymore. I’ve a destiny to fulfill, and it isn’t here.”

I cannot explain the sense of destiny I felt when I said those words. I felt power shimmer all around me. No task was beyond my ability to do. There was no anger in my voice. I stated my thoughts calmly, and when I looked at the gaunt old man at the head of the table, he was suddenly no longer my father. He was thin and querulous and entirely bereft of authority over me. All this time, I’d thought I’d needed him. But the opposite was true. He’d needed me to fulfill his dreams, and when I had grown fat, I’d taken that from him. I didn’t need him. I had a life of my own, and it called to me.

As I turned to leave the room, he lifted his soup bowl and banged it on the table at me, like a thwarted child. “Get out of my house! Get out! Get out!”

He was still shouting those words, over and over, when I let the door close behind me. Yaril was standing frozen outside the dining room, her hands knotted into fists and curled against her chest. She looked as if she could not breathe. “Come with me,” I said, and when she did not move, I stooped and lifted her bodily. She whimpered like a baby and curled up in my arms. It was awkward to carry her because of my own bulk, but at least I did not lack for strength. Her weight was nothing to me as I bore her up the stairs and to her room. I managed to get the door open, and only bumped her head lightly on the door frame as I carried her in. I set her down on her bed. She curled into a tighter ball there, and sobbed harder than ever.

I looked around the room. I pulled her dainty white-painted chair out from her secretary, and then knew it would never hold my weight. Gingerly, I sat down on the foot of her bed. It creaked in response. “Yaril. Yaril? Listen to me. You and I know what is true. We have done nothing shameful. We have both done the best we could, while that hateful old man huddled in his bed and did nothing. He has no right to rebuke us. None at all.”

She only sobbed harder. I didn’t know what to do. Just an hour ago, she had been a strong young woman defying disaster with spirit and courage. Had that all been a show for me? It horrified me that my father could so quickly reduce her to a shambles. It was a double horror that he would do so. I recalled my earlier skepticism when my Cousin Epiny had told me that a woman’s life was very different from my own, that in many ways she was a valuable asset to be bartered off to the highest bidder. I had scoffed at her, but tonight, witnessing the horrible power my father had over Yaril, I had a glimmer of understanding. I sighed and helplessly patted my sister’s shoulder until she had sobbed herself out.

Eventually, she quieted. My belly betrayed me by growling softly. For an instant I thought of the lovely dinner we had abandoned: prairie fowl with an onion stuffing was to have been the main course. Vindictively, I hoped my father would choke on it. My belly growled again, more loudly, and to my surprise, Yaril gave a stifled laugh. Her shoulder muscles relaxed, she gave a great sigh, and sat up on the bed next to me. “He’s a vile man.” She spoke the accusation hopelessly.

“He’s our father,” I said reflexively. I wondered if he was that to me anymore. Probably not.

“He’s our father,” she said, accepting the correction. “And he’s a vile man and still I love him, and long to have his regard and approval. Can you understand that, Nevare?”

“I can. Because I feel much the same way about him.”

“Oh, I don’t think so. Not like I have.” She pushed her hair back from her wet face. I offered her my handkerchief. She took it and matter-of-factly dried her face. As she gave it back to me, she shook her head wearily. “I’ve always been the ‘extra’ daughter, Nevare. Always striving for any crumb of approval I could win from him. When he turned on you, I joined him. Some part of me even felt glad that you had finally done something disgraceful and fallen out of his favor. Because your failure gave me a better chance with Father. There. Now you know what a coward and a weakling I am.”