by Melanie Rawn
“Depends on the suggestion.” Cailet unwound her arms from her knees and sank into a snowbank of pillows. “What does he do best? How can that be used so he feels necessary?”
Sarra regarded her with narrowed eyes. “You have something in mind,” she accused.
“I might.”
“What?”
“You think about it for a while.” She patted the coverlet beside her. “Come lie down. Let him stay awake all night in that gigantic bed, remembering just how gigantic it is without you in it—”
Sarra slid into bed and drew up the quilt. “What makes you think he’ll notice? He spends more time in it without me than with me, anyway.”
“Oh, stop feeling sorry for yourself!” Suddenly Cailet laughed. “Do you know how good it feels to finally throw those words back at you, big sister?”
“When did I ever—”
“Too many times to count. Here, have a pillow.”
“Cai?”
“Mmm.”
“You haven’t said anything about—”
“Glenin. What is there to be said?”
“Shall I write up a list?”
“All that counts is keeping the twins safe from her. Can I go to sleep now?”
“No. Why do you think she tried to take them?”
“She sees patterns you and I don’t. And if we did, we’d do everything we could to rip them to shreds.”
“She wanted to make Malerrisi of them.”
“Sasha, she’s not that deluded.”
“Then why—?”
“She’s trying out her power just the way I am—and you, too. These past years we’ve all been testing ourselves, finding our limits. When her son’s old enough, she’ll know the extent of what she can and can’t do, and weave her plans accordingly.”
“Cai . . . she won’t try again, will she?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“If you always chatter like this late at night, it’s a wonder Col hasn’t kicked you out of bed long since. She won’t try again because she tried once, failed, and learned from it. Besides that, she knows I’ve taken precautions now against this and several other eventualities—and no, I’m not going into details. All you need to know is that you don’t need to worry about Taigan and Mikel. They’ll be protected here. And then when they’re sixteen or so, you’ll send them to me, and I’ll protect them personally. Now, go to sleep.”
“I can’t. And don’t you dare spell me into it either! I can’t stop worrying about her son. Our nephew. I still can’t quite believe that.”
“I know what you mean. It’s as hard to think of him that way as it is to think of Glenin as our sister.”
“He’s thirteen, isn’t he?”
“Almost. At the Autumn Equinox, or thereabouts. Sarra, please go to sleep. Or at least shut up so I can. I don’t get much, and every minute is precious.”
“One more question, and then I’ll shut up, I promise.”
“All right.”
“You said to consider what Collan does best. Traveling Minstrel was his occupation before I married him.”
“And?”
“There are Mage Guardians enough now to begin working the way they used to—going from Shir to Shir, helping where they were needed. But you’re sending them out alone, not in groups of three, of Warrior, Scholar, and Healer, the way it was before. Do you have it in mind to use Minstrels the same way? With Collan organizing, and meeting with them around the world, the way you do with the Mages?”
“That’s more than one question.”
“Just answer me.”
“Yes. It’s exactly what I had in mind. I need this, Sarra. Minstrels go everywhere and hear everything. People talk to them more openly than they do to Mage Guardians.”
“If I were a vindictive woman, I’d be shouting right now that when I wanted to use the Mage Guardians to support the government, you turned me down flat. But now you want to use the husband of a Councillor—”
“No, I want to give Minstrel Collan Rosvenir something constructive to do. I trust you heard the difference in that.”
“There’s nothing wrong with my hearing, thank you very much. I still say you’re a hypocrite—or I would, if I were a vindictive woman.”
“And if you weren’t so worried about Col.”
“Stop knowing me so well, damn it! My point is that he is my husband, and that’s too close to the Council. It’d all have to be done in total secrecy. He can’t be known to be connected to this.”
“Truly told. But every Minstrel will have to be personally selected by him. That means he’d be gone a lot.”
“He’s miserable here, Cailet. If he has to travel, home may start looking better to him.”
“What about the twins?”
“Oh, Caisha—I found out something awful tonight—”
“What have they done now?”
“Not them, idiot—me. I found out that I’m a mother with two children whose childhood I missed.”
“You did what you had to. We all do. I’m sure they don’t blame you for it.”
“But I haven’t been what Lady Lilen was to you, or Agatine was to me. Learn from my example, Cailet. When you have children, stay home with them as much as you possibly can. Don’t miss the things I did.”
“You love them. They know that.”
“I’m going to spend a lot more time proving it from now on. But this group of Minstrels you want Collan to put together—he’ll have to think it was his idea, you know.”
“You’ve been on the Council nearly thirteen years. From what I hear, you’ve learned how to be slightly more subtle than a shipwreck.”
“I do wish you’d stop laughing at me. Do you honestly think I can use the same techniques on my husband?”
“Well . . . I’m sure you’ll think of something. Is it dawn yet?”
“All right, all right, I’ll go back to my own bed.”
“I was wondering when you’d take the hint. But if I know your husband, I very much doubt that once you get there, you’ll be any better able to sleep.”
“If only.”
“Sasha! Never tell me that’s a problem between you two!”
“No, of course not. It’s just— Cai, do you think he’s still angry?”
“Yes. But that won’t prevent him from doing the other thing he does best.”
“Cailet!”
“I’ll tell the servants to let you sleep in tomorrow morning.”
“Do that. Good night, Caisha.”
“Good night, Sasha—no, leave the lamp on— please—”
And it was only then, hearing the note of panic beneath the words, that Sarra learned her sister the Mage Captal was afraid of the dark.
17
FALUNDIR’S List, once compiled and copied in Sarra’s fine, neat hand, stayed with the Bard only when he was at Roseguard. He never took it with him on his travels, for he had long since communicated to Collan, Sarra, and the twins that there was no one else on Lenfell he cared to communicate with.
Just prior to St. Mittru’s Day, Col returned from an afternoon at Wytte’s to find the List on his desk. This was remarkable enough; that the page had ink marks on it was unprecedented. The sight of short, wavering lines beside four words surprised him less, though, than the words they emphasized:
Know Minstrel Secret Travel
Two verbs, two nouns, none of which made any sense to him. Know what? Whose secrets? Travel where?
Minstrel?
“You found Falundir’s solution, I see.”
He turned at the sound of Sarra’s voice. She was sunburned from her tour of the new warehouse facilities, and looked inordinately pleased with herself.
“What’s he trying to say?”
“Think about it for a while,” she
advised, stripping off shirt and scarf on her way to the bedchamber. “I’ll even give you a hint: you’re the key.”
Col followed her, page in hand. “To what?”
Boots and trousers were tossed onto the floor. Naked, her every delectable curve caressed by golden lamplight, she rummaged in a closet for a silken robe. “I’ll be in the bath when you finally figure it out.”
He snatched the robe from her fingers. “You’ll stand there and stink until you tell me what this means, First Daughter.”
She made no move to reclaim the garment. “Isn’t it obvious? Considering what he wanted to tell me, he was very clever in his choice of words. Then again, a Bard always is. Add it all up, Collan.”
“To what?” he repeated.
“And here I always thought you were so clever!” She grinned over her shoulder.
Col ground his teeth. Travel and Minstrel described him in his misspent youth. That left Secret and Know—obviously related, but how they matched the other two words was—
All at once he gasped. “You’re both out of your minds!”
“Not really.”
“You want me to traipse all over Lenfell—?”
“If you like. But there are plenty of energetic young Minstrels eager to do the traipsing for you. Falundir would supervise them himself, I think, if he had the time. As I recall, you were complaining not long ago about having too much time.”
“Was this your idea?” he asked suspiciously.
“No.”
“Huh!” he snorted.
She twined her arms about his neck and smiled up at him. “I’d rather have you home, as you well know.” And she proceeded to prove it so thoroughly that two more hours passed before she got to her bathtub, and when she did, he joined her.
Thus was the Minstrelsy born. Collan spent the next twelve weeks selecting young musicians who were gifted, self-reliant, itchy-footed, and most especially unmarried. He started with sixteen Minstrels, but within the year expanded the cadre to nearly thirty. They were assigned to whichever Shir took their fancy, with orders to keep their eyes and ears open—and to report only to him.
In the spring of 983 Collan left Roseguard for a twenty-week tour of Lenfell, ostensibly to assist Falundir in finding new young talent and supervising productions of his opera. Along the way he set up a system of information transferral formulated by Sarra and Tarise—the very system, in fact, that Sarra had diagrammed with hair ribbons years ago. On Collan’s return to Roseguard, the Minstrelsy was so well-organized that all he really had to do was sit back and wait for the reports to come in. Instead, he went traveling whenever the urge hit him. Itinerant Minstrels naturally went out of their way to meet with the renowned Collan Rosvenir—who, truly told, was their exemplar in all things.
So it was that in 984, well in advance of an election in Dindenshir held to replace an Assembly member who had died, the Captal knew that the leading candidate was in fact a Malerrisi. On St. Rilla’s Day, a week before the polling, the candidate inexplicably withdrew and disappeared. It was rumored that she had been seen taking ship for Seinshir.
So it also was that in 985, a grain merchant at Roke Castle was beset with a plague of mice that ate up all his stores before he could load his ship, the Sea Spinner. The manifest read “Domburr Castle” but the captain had been ordered to sail for Seinshir—and didn’t. The grain merchant was financially ruined when her family’s Web refused to make good the loss.
A soprano at the Havenport Opera; a votary at a shrine to St. Gelenis in Kenrokeshir; a tailor in Longriding; a sheep farmer and her husband and two children in Firrense; a glasscrafter in Shainkroth—these and a dozen more were found, indisputably identified as either Malerrisi or their agents, and told the departure time of the next ship to Seinshir.
In early 987, a blacksmith working in Heathering, Tillinshir, was quietly escorted out of town by a Minstrel and three Mages from the nearby Hall. A local resident for fourteen years, an honest tradesman and taxpaying citizen, he loudly protested his innocence all the way to Pinderon. But once away from the iron bastion of his calling, the Mages knew him for what he truly was. They put him on a cargo ship bound for Dinn by way of Seinshir, and gave him a personal message from the Captal for Glenin Feiran. A simple note, not even sealed in an envelope, it read:
I look forward to meeting your son.
PRENTICES
1
“WHERE is he? He’s late.”
“You worry too much, Mikel. Relax. He’ll be here.”
Mikel eyed his sister. “If we’re not back by the time Mother gets home—”
“She’ll have us skinned alive and our hides nailed to All Saints’ as a reminder to other presumptuous infants.” Taigan shifted uncomfortably in the saddle. “Damn! I forgot to fix the stirrup length again.”
“If only your feet didn’t grow every time your legs do,” her brother said snidely.
“You talk of big feet, with those size fourteen boots at the end of your shins?”
“Size twelve,” Mikel corrected loftily. “Perfectly in proportion to my height.”
“They’ll get bigger,” she predicted confidently. “You’re only fifteen.”
“Sixteen in seven more days, just like you!” he pointed out. “And if Mother finds out what we’re up to, we’ll get her dainty little size fours right in our backsides. I hope you know what you’re doing, Teggie.”
“They won’t even know we’re gone until after we’re back. Besides, I’m sick of being treated like a baby. I thought you were, too.”
“You know I am. But—”
“Here he comes!” Taigan broke in, and they both snapped to attention, dragging their mares’ heads up from succulent spring grass.
Taigan scraped wisps of long blonde hair from her forehead, gaze intent on the cloud of dust in the distance, while Mikel scanned the horizon for indications of other company. He was at first glance as unlike his sister as it was possible for siblings to be. He had their father’s blue eyes and curling coppery hair; she was as golden-fair as their mother, though with leaf-green eyes. Resemblance came in the freckles that danced across their noses, the long-legged grace of movement now that they had shed adolescent awkwardness—and the growing need, grown ever stronger in these weeks before their sixteenth Birthingday, to prove themselves as adults.
The lone rider galloped closer, reined in for a moment, then approached more sedately. Mikel held up his right hand, clenched it in a fist, then straightened his fingers, palm outward. The man hesitated, then replied with the same gesture. He was tall and lean, with a week’s worth of stubble darkening his wide jaw, and wore a dun-colored coif that concealed his hair. Even at shouting distance he seemed only a little older than they.
“Your pardon for the rudeness,” he called, “but who the hell are you?”
“We’re here to take the relay,” Taigan replied.
“I guessed that, thanks.” He kneed his exhausted horse a little closer. “Didn’t expect an official Roseguard reception, though.”
“How’d you—”
“Those are Lady Sarra’s horses.”
“Shit,” Taigan muttered. “Forgot about that, too.”
The mares ridden by the twins were unmistakable to anyone who knew horseflesh. Maurgen Dapplebacks were now as famous as Tillinshir grays—and of all their many patterns, the Moonstreak variety was possessed only by the Roseguard stables. Slate-colored horses with jagged white flashes on foreheads and rumps, they were Rillan Veliaz’s pride and joy. Tarise had only last week threatened to dye her hair black and silver, for her husband certainly never spent as much time combing and braiding her mane. To which he replied that he was Master of the Roseguard Horse, not a lady’s maid, and she had neither the complexion for black hair nor the years for silver. Though the twins, he remarked in their hearing, were capable of aging everyone around them five years for every one spent in their company.
/> “So the Lady sent you herself,” the young man went on, regarding them with cool gray eyes that, if there had been a little more amusement in them, would have been insulting. “I can scarce believe my luck!”
“Uh, well,” Mikel began.
Taigan interrupted smoothly, “Whatever you’re carrying can be trusted to us for safe delivery.”
The man dismounted. In courtesy, so did the twins, and wrapped their reins around a fence post. They walked forward, immediately and instinctively in step with each other—despite Mikel’s four-inch advantage in height, for he automatically shortened his strides a little to accommodate his sister, just as she lengthened hers to keep up with him.
All at once the man conjured a Mage Globe fully three feet in diameter and sent it wafting gently toward the twins. “Stay put,” he ordered. And as the bluish-green Globe neared, they found they had no choice but to obey.
There was nothing inside the sphere. It hovered before them, glimmering and opalescent, sparking something inside both young minds that was familiar and desired and thus far denied them. After a moment the Globe vanished. The Mage was nodding as if he’d seen something within it that answered all questions and settled all doubts.
“Well, it seems you’re telling the truth. You can be trusted. But I’ll tell you right now you were stupid times ten for so quickly trusting me.”
Though all magic was gone from the air, the twins continued to imitate statuary.
“My name isn’t important. But this is. For Lord Col-Ian, with my compliments.” From a pocket he produced a wrapped parcel eight inches square. He slipped it inside Taigan’s saddlebags, a grin showing whitely in his dark, bristled face as he grinned over his shoulder. “I wish I could be there to hear you explain how you happened to be the ones to receive it! Truly told, I do wish that very much!”
Blue eyes met green eyes; both faces winced.
“Nice to have met you at last. One hears a lot about Taigan and Mikel Liwellan.”
The twins exchanged glances of dismay. The Mage laughed to himself as he swung back up onto his horse.