by Melanie Rawn
She told him so when she finally found her voice. He laughed and gave her a full account of setting the Mage Globes at the Hall, and the Captal’s deranged behavior over the sword, and apologized that he hadn’t been able to kill everyone.
“You did brilliantly, darling. What did you think of the little courtroom comedy today?”
“Weaver have mercy, I’d rather not discuss it! But Chava was magnificent, wasn’t he? By the way, when did he grow the beard?”
“This winter, and for the same reason I had you grow one before you met with your cousins that time.”
“Of course, I should’ve realized.” He put an arm around her waist and leaned close, rubbing his cheek against hers.
“Mmm—smooth as silk,” she purred. “You’re looking remarkably well for all this time spent with the enemy.”
“And you’re as beautiful as ever. I’ve missed you so much!” He drew away, taking one of her hands. “So, Mother, what happens next?”
She smiled and with her free hand tucked a lock of hair back into his coif. “We’ve conducted our hunt, my love, and located the quarry. We’ve chased her to where we want her to be. And once she’s cornered and helpless, then comes the kill.” She described her plan—formulated many years ago with Saris Allard’s help, honed and rethought and reworked and revised constantly since then, and now ready for culmination. Before she was halfway through he was grinning, white teeth flashing in the darkness.
“Perfect.” He glanced around as someone hurried up the walk, and urged her more deeply into the sheltering trees. “I’d love to stay—it’s been so long since we’ve talked, and I do miss you dreadfully—but I have to get back or my roommate will begin to wonder where I am.”
“What do you think of him? Should we spare him?”
“He’s an idiot,” he said at once, then paused and added, “a magically gifted idiot, though. Spare him if you like—he may amuse you. At the very least, he can father a few Mageborns.”
“I’ll consider it.” Glenin took his face between her hands; he closed luminous gray eyes and smiled. “I’ve missed you, too.”
“Another week. Then we can be together always.”
“Just be careful, darling.”
He circled her wrists with his fingers, turned his head from one side to the other to kiss the hollows of her palms. “You, too, Mother.”
And they went their separate ways back to Ryka Court, to anticipate the kill.
THE KILL
1
CAILET sat bolt upright in bed when the earthquake hit, grabbing frantically for something to hold onto. The “earthquake” grinned down at her, gave the carved bedposts another shake, and asked, “Planning to sleep all day, kitten?”
She fell back into the pillows, dragged the quilt over her head, and moaned. “Go away, Collan!”
“Come on, get up. Everybody’s awake but you.”
“Good for everybody,” she muttered. Then, as the bed quivered ominously once more, she threw back the covers and sat up. “All right, all right! I’m awake!”
Col tossed her a bedrobe and wandered over to the windowside table, selecting an apple from the bowl of fruit left there. “Sun’s shining, but Rillan’s postponed the hunt until the eleventh. Not that he cares about the riders breaking their necks, but we’re going after triplehorns.” He said this as if it ought to mean something to her. When he saw that it didn’t, he added, “They’re smart, and lead the chase through the swampiest ground they can find. So we have to wait for things to dry out a bit.”
“Oh.” She slid her arms into the robe and rolled to her feet.
“Come on, it’s too nice a day to sit indoors and wait for somebody to do something.”
Cailet stretched, yawned, and glanced at the little gilt clock on the mantelpiece—Saints, nearly Seventh—before wandering over to inspect the fruit bowl. Nothing particularly appealed to her, but she picked up a bunch of grapes and began popping them in her mouth anyway. “I’m getting a little tired of pacing the Council Gardens, myself.”
“You weren’t there last night. I looked.”
Cailet grimaced. “Don’t tell Sirron or Ollia. Warrior-type Mages hate it when they don’t know exactly where the Captal is at all times. I hiked halfway around the lake last night—felt like it, anyway—so I hope you’re not planning anything too strenuous this morning.”
“You frail little thing, you,” he mocked. “Get dressed. The twins are waiting.”
“And Sarra?”
He shook his head. “Meetings. This is Ryka Court, remember? She’ll be with the Council from Sixth to Fourteenth.” He didn’t sound as resentful as he once had; Cailet surmised his own work with the Minstrelsy occupied so much of his time that he and Sarra were about even.
A short time later, Cailet was back on the shores of Council Lake, watching the trio race toward her across the beach. Col sprinted the last fifty feet and did a nosedive into soft sand (imported at great expense from a Seinshir island beach). Three steps behind him, his daughter attempted to avoid a suddenly out-thrust paternal foot, failed, and went sprawling. Mikel, a half-step behind Taigan, tried to swerve sideways on ridiculously short notice, only to have his ankle caught in his father’s strong grip. He, too, measured his length in silky white sand.
Taigan levered herself up, whooping for breath. “No fair! You tripped me!”
“But you fell for it,” Collan laughed, earning groans from his offspring. “Still think you can outrun the old man?”
“No, y’Lordship—not me, y’Lordship,” Mikel panted piously.
Cailet strolled over to stand at the waterline. “You three have all the precision and grace of hobbled galazhi.”
“What a sweet thing to say,” Col observed pleasantly, and exchanged a quick glance with the twins.
Too late, Cailet backed off. Going down under a triple assault, she yelled a protest as they dumped her in the shallow surf. She struggled to her feet, spitting water, only to be caught behind the knees in a gentle wave that sent her staggering. She barely caught her balance in time, and glared, dripping, at her three grinning tormentors. Proximity to their father had evidently reinfected the twins with his total lack of decorum—but all at once Cailet cherished their rowdy spirits. When Taigan and Mikel were little, she’d been their adored Auntie Caisha. . . . Ah, but it was with their father that they played—Sarra said once that their favorite toy was Collan—not her. Not the Mage Captal. Still, she wasn’t about to argue with the results. Saints and Wraiths, how she’d needed to laugh!
“What was that about precision and grace?” Col enquired.
Slicking wet hair back from her face, she concentrated for a moment. Collan blinked, developed a look of alarm, twitched a hand toward his groin, fisted his fingers, and at last was compelled by Cailet’s playful—if slightly sadistic—spell to scratch.
“Damn it, Cailet—! Stop that!”
She opened her eyes to their widest and most innocent. “Stop what?”
Taigan and Mikel were howling with laughter. Cailet unWorked the spell—only to be rushed in a tackle that sent her and Collan into knee-deep water with a splash.
“Truce!” Cailet shouted, surfacing only to be pushed under again and tickled. When she came up once more, she went for Collan’s ribs.
“Need some help?” Mikel asked his father.
“Doing fine, thanks.” He twisted, and somehow Cailet found herself arcing over Col’s shoulder to land flat on her back in the shallows. “No more magic?” Col asked warily.
“Would I do that to you?”
“Yes!”
She regained her footing, and lost it again as Col swept her legs out from under her. She lifted her hands in surrender, fully aware of the ludicrous picture she presented—sprawled in lapping waves, soaked to the skin—and not minding a bit. “I’m never setting foot out of my own rooms again without a Warrior Mage to protect me!” Then, f
ixing the twins with a terrible gaze, she demanded, “And what about you? Aren’t you supposed to get into this on my side?”
“Against him?” Mikel shook his head. “Not if I want to live to see my eighteenth Birthingday.”
Col held out a hand. Cailet took it, watching for signs of another somersault into the lake. He grinned, pulled her to her feet, and slung an arm across her shoulders as they staggered back up the beach. All four collapsed on a grassy hillock, and Cailet hauled off her boots and dumped the water from them—giving her sister’s husband a sour look that inevitably dissolved into laughter. Col was as good for her as he was for Sarra; she could almost forget there were such things as threats and betrayals and murders by magic.
“Why don’t you show some consideration for the old folks,” Collan said to Mikel, “and get us something to drink from the boardwalk stands up there?”
“Old?” Mikel turned to his sister. “Did he say ‘old,’ Teggie?”
“I think so. Which old folks is he talking about?”
“Us, after that race.”
“He cheated,” Taigan announced.
“He always cheats.”
Their father threw a handful of sand at them. “This is the respect I get? I thought I taught you some manners.”
“Who, us?” Mikel’s eyes widened. “Did you ever learn any, Teggie?”
“Not that I can remember.”
“Well, find some, fast,” Cailet said regretfully. “We’re about to have company.”
She nodded in the direction of the boardwalk, where a tall, stately blonde woman was approaching across the grasses. Mikel started to get to his feet, but Collan stopped him with a hand on his arm.
“Manners are the fool’s refuge,” Col said quietly. “You’ve got wits, both of you. Use them.”
“Yes, Fa,” Taigan murmured, green eyes glinting with the light of battle.
Glenin pretended very prettily to notice them, and portrayed surprise even better. Cailet consciously un-tensed her shoulders, forcing herself to lean back on her elbows with legs casually outstretched. Her eldest sister was impeccably dressed in casual plum-colored trousers and a white shirt, with leather sandals on her feet. Her hair was drawn back by a pair of silver clips that emphasized the gray of her gray-green eyes. Their father’s eyes; Cailet remembered them in his face, filled with loving pride in her as he died for her sake.
She hadn’t looked into Glenin’s eyes since that night at the Octagon Court. Between the callow girl she’d been and the woman she was now had come twenty years as Mage Captal. Years of authority and power, of teaching young Mageborns the full use of their gifts, of anticipating this moment—not these precise circumstances, but this very instant when her eyes met her sister’s. For Glenin, those same twenty years had brought the same authority, the same power, the same teaching. And the same anticipation. But Glenin was eager. Cailet was plagued by dread. And Glenin knew it.
“Good morning, Captal. Lord Collan. Lovely day, isn’t it?” She appeared to notice their drenched clothing for the first time. “But perhaps I’m interrupting a lesson for your Prentices.”
“Not at all,” Cailet said smoothly. “We were only discussing tactics.”
Col’s voice was a classic drawl. “Nice day for it. Lots of examples to draw on.”
“Indeed.” Glenin smiled, deepening the lines framing her mouth and raying out from the corners of her eyes. Cailet was startled by the evidences of age—even more by the realization that Glenin would be forty-seven this year. She knew her own face had changed, that she also looked much older. But at not quite thirty-eight, she was still in the prime of her life. Glenin had passed it, and must see old age looming, and fewer years ahead of her than behind. She might present a serene face to the world, but within her the impatience must be growing.
“Speaking of examples,” Glenin said, “the Captal seems constantly attended by such exquisite examples of masculinity! Including Lady Sarra’s son, whom I’m delighted to meet,” she added with a graceful nod for Mikel. “If it’s permitted, I’d like to be introduced to the others so I may offer my compliments.”
“I’m sure they’d be honored,” Cailet said in a voice to match her sister’s for sweet insincerity. Taigan was frowning slightly at the oblique reference to Jored, but what annoyed Cailet was the implication behind attended. After what Glenin had done to her twenty years ago, she could hint that these exquisite young men were the Captal’s lovers?
Glenin was smiling still, her eyes glistening as if at some private joke between herself and Cailet. “On the contrary, the honor would be mine. I should also be honored,” she continued smoothly, “if at some point during my visit here Lady Sarra would consent to allowing Lord Collan to sing for me.”
Col stretched his lips over his teeth and Cailet saw something dangerous and unpardonable coming. So before he could speak, she said, “His duties to Lady Sarra’s Web are such that he has little time for music anymore.”
“Indeed? A tragedy.” Then her expression altered to one of sadness. “I was sorry to hear about Mage Hall.”
I just bet you were. “Thank you,” said Cailet.
“Have you any idea who was responsible? There’s talk of a rogue Mage, succumbing to Wild Magic.”
As if you don’t know who did it. “Investigation continues,” said Cailet.
“Will you rebuild?”
Collan answered that one in a properly controlled voice that nonetheless dripped acid. “The Malerrisi have tried to wipe out the Mage Guardians before. You haven’t succeeded yet.”
Glenin shook her head. “Those grievous years were Anniyas’s doing. These days, we—”
“Only met her once myself,” Col interrupted. “But once was more than enough. Whatever she touched, if she didn’t kill it, she corrupted it. But you’d know—you were married to her son.”
Score one for the Minstrel, Cailet thought.
“We are all fortunate to have survived contact with the late First Councillor,” Glenin replied blandly.
“But the Captal won,” Mikel said, blue eyes guileless.
“Yes, she did. And when she was about the same age you are now.” Glenin gave Cailet a respectful nod. “It’s humbling to be in the presence of a legend.”
Saints, how she hated being referred to as if she were a million years old and not quite real. It was time to end this verbal duel before somebody drew blood, and she’d never been opposed to a strategic retreat in good order. Accordingly, she glanced at the sun overhead and pulled on her boots. “Forgive us, but we do have appointments. Even though Mage Hall is gone, Prentices still must be taught.”
“I’m sure that every moment with the Captal is a valuable lesson.” She nodded again, her eyes laughing at Cailet, and continued her stroll along the beach.
“Delightful woman,” Collan muttered as he got to his feet. “Utterly charming. It’s going to be a real pleasure killing her.”
Taigan frowned. “But—”
“But nothing. You don’t think it’ll end any other way, do you?”
“Then why don’t we just have it out with her right now?”
“Because this whole mess has more twists than a back alley in Longriding.”
“Fa—” Mikel hesitated, then went on, “Will it really come to a fight? Will we have to—”
Col ruffled his son’s curls, bare to the sunlight and shining coppery-gold. “Whaddya mean, ‘we’? You leave the fighting and the worrying to us old folks. That’s what we’re for.”
Taigan sighed. “Old folks.” Then, with a wicked grin, she sprang to her feet and called out, “Race you, Fa!”
2
“. . . ASSIST the unfortunate and disadvantaged if the same percentage of taxes as is expended upon them by each Shir was returned to each Web, so they could use it to—”
An explosive “Hah!” sounded from the far end of the Council’s private conference
table, startling Sarra from the random designs she was drawing on her notepad.
“You had a comment, Councillor Maklyn?” said this year’s Chief of Council, Brishina Eddavar of Gierkenshir.
“She’s joking, right?” Vasha Maklyn of Brogdenguard was a mere sixty-eight to her cousin the Grand Justice’s ninety, but they had the same unmanageable white eyebrows and unmitigated disgust for pretension. Vellerin Dombur, four chairs away from Sarra, leaned forward and glared down the length of the rectangular table. Vasha glared right back down a long, narrow nose. “You really expect the Webs to take the tax money we refund to them and spend it on good works?”
“If it’s made a matter of law . . . .” ventured the junior Councillor for Ryka, Miriel Gorrst. Sarra marveled that the same family could produce a vigorous lion like Imilial and a flinching lamb like Miriel. Her own junior for Sheve was a Jescarin—and the only thing glum and gloomy Deiker had in common with the blithe former Master of the Roseguard Grounds was a Name.
“It is my belief,” intoned Vellerin Dombur, “that charity should not be coerced. Indeed, it must spring from the very deepest parts of our compassionate souls. Those less fortunate than we must be provided for, but how can the central government or even the Shirs know exactly what is needed in small, remote villages? Only the Webs who have family members there or who do business in such places can be certain of—”
“Lemme get this straight,” interrupted Vasha Maklyn. “Webs’re supposed to provide for all family members in the first place, right? But a lot of ’em can’t, so you propose the rich Webs take up the slack by contributing the same amount of money the Council and Assembly and Shirs now spend on the indigent, right?”
“Yes.”
A second emphatic “Hah!” made Sarra hide a grin. Vasha’s frown drew her eyebrows into a single swath of white above her nose. “What world are you living in?”