by Melanie Rawn
“Think again, my fine Lady of Malerris! And why didn’t you let me get around to Mirya’s trial, and the Liwellan deaths, and—”
“You mean there was more?” Mikel interrupted, eyes as wide as he could make them. “Considering all the rest of it, don’t you think that would be a little over the top?”
Vellerin snarled at him. Glenin looked amused.
“Which is not even to mention your timing,” the wrathful Lady continued. “When you gave me the signal, I was completely unprepared! I thought we’d agreed to begin after—”
“—dessert?” said Mikel. “I agree—a despicable lapse. Not even half a dinner, no dancing—and not a couplet of his Lordship’s sterling poetry.”
“Close your mourn, boy, or I’ll have the Weaver’s servants sew it shut!” To Glenin she said, “There’s other work to be done—we’ll discuss this later,” and slammed the door.
“Fascinating woman,” Mikel observed.
Glenin shrugged. “One works with what one has.”
“Tell me if I’ve got this right,” he continued conversationally. “She had to know enough to convince her this would succeed, so her speech would be convincing. But she couldn’t know all of it, because there was always the chance she’d blab.”
Glenin nodded. “And her shock was necessary, as it created fellow-feeling among everyone else when they were shocked.”
“I understand. I don’t think she will, though. By the way, has she consulted a physician about her blood pressure?”
“She won’t die of an apoplexy, if that’s what you mean. I have something else in mind for her—something I intend she’ll live to enjoy.”
“Truly told?”
“Never more truly. She’s about to be ruined financially.”
“How will you do it?” he asked, genuinely curious. His father’s son, truly told.
“By destroying confidence in every bank in which she has a share. She thinks we’re working together on this. My Malerrisi have been withdrawing large sums planted for the purpose all over Lenfell—”
“—to cause a panic,” Mikel said, “after which the same money—her money—will buy up the tottering banks cheap, so she can run the banking system pretty much as she pleases.”
“So she believes. Instead, the money to purchase bank shares will not be forthcoming. I intend to use it to establish my people in positions of influence all over Lenfell.”
“And Vellerin Dombur—?”
“She’ll have to sell large portions of her personal property to complete the planned purchases of banks, at which point she’ll be suspected as the instigator—especially when the original account deposits are traced back to her. She’ll then be found liable and have to sell nearly everything to make good to depositors.”
“And as she dismantles her own holdings, the rest of the Dombur Web will suffer.”
“Collapse,” she corrected. “She wove her affairs so tightly with the rest that they’re compelled to support her in her ambitions—and will join her in her downfall.” She laughed softly, avidly. “So much for the Domburs!”
Mikel was both awed and appalled. It wasn’t just Vellerin Dombur she’d ruin; the panic would affect every Shir. Fa had educated him in the finer points of finance, with an eye to his one day becoming a husband who oversaw business affairs and maybe a whole Web. He’d learned how to add and subtract sitting on Fa’s knee, “helping” with the account books. Mikel understood how the economy fit together, and that the wheat harvest in Brogdenguard could affect not only the price of bread at Wyte Lynn Castle but also something so seemingly unrelated as the production of leather in Cantrashir. “Hell, Mishka, why d’you think they call ’em ‘Webs’?” And nothing was more entangled in itself than the banking system.
“But why?” he asked.
Glenin only smiled.
“No, truly told, I want to know,” he insisted. “Why ruin her?”
Gray-green eyes darkened grimly, the smile gone. “Because her family ruined the Feiran Name. We were originally from Domburronshir, with vast lands and wealth. The Domburs coveted what we had, and set about obliterating us.”
“No wonder I never did like any of them,” he remarked, and she nodded approvingly, but he was thinking furiously behind his casual manner. The panic that would sweep Lenfell, the economic troubles that would follow, all those Malerrisi with all that money . . . and all that magic. With Mage Guardians censured and despised because of their Captal, the Malerrisi would move in to fill the gap.
“So you see why I tolerated working with Vellerin Dombur,” finished Glenin.
“Yes. Have you decided about me yet?”
“Oh, I’ll let you live—for a while, anyway. You’re quick, and I find you almost as entertaining as your father.” She laughed. “And every time I think of your mother’s agony as she imagines you in my tender keeping. . . .”
“I can take care of myself. I’m my father’s son—that’s no secret.”
She eyed him speculatively, head tilted to one side. “Secrets, Mikel, are the most important things in the world. When you know the secrets of others, you have power over them—and you guard and cherish those secrets as a miser does her gold. When you have secrets of your own, you guard them just as scrupulously, in case others should find them out and use them against you. My sisters’ mistake was that they thought their secrets locked and Warded from everyone but me, and that I couldn’t denounce them without endangering myself. After all, I am also a daughter of Auvry Feiran.”
“But that was never a secret,” he replied. “I bet you have a few left to use, just in case.”
“Two,” she agreed readily. “The first is my son. The second—ah, but I’ll save that for the right time. That’s the other thing about secrets, nephew dear. Knowing them isn’t enough. Knowing when and how to use them is the trick.” She stretched her arms wide, then got to her feet. “Speaking of which, it’s just about time for you to meet your cousin. I’ve enjoyed our chat. You won’t do anything foolish, like trying to escape, would you?”
He shrugged. “Nobody’s made any secret of those four big Domburs outside.”
“Good boy. I knew you wouldn’t be stupid.”
“By the way,” he said sweetly, “if I were you I’d have that burn on your palm treated. My sister’s magic can be a little severe at times.”
Her eyes glittered appreciation of the remark. “Thank you. Very kind of you to be concerned about your auntie’s health and well-being.”
Truly told, he hoped it festered and she died of it. But as she left him alone, he reflected that whereas words had gotten him into this, and could be a telling weapon against some enemies, words wouldn’t get him out. Brute strength in the form of those big, dumb Domburs stood watch on both doors to the antechamber; no chance of overpowering them on their terms. He sat there in his shirtsleeves with nothing up them. He had his wits and his magic, and that was all.
Come to think of it, considering the former came from his father and the latter from his mother, not a bad arsenal.
18
“YOU’LL wish to change clothes,” said Granon Isidir in a stiffly formal voice that nonetheless conveyed the depths of his misery.
Taigan didn’t care how he felt. She waited for her mother to acknowledge the words—to say something, look at him, go through to her bedroom, anything that indicated she was paying attention. Sarra stood in the center of the reception salon, apathetic and silent.
“Mother.” No response. Taigan glanced at Isidir. “Councillor, if you’d leave us for a moment?”
“With regret, Domna, I cannot.”
Not “Prentice” or “Lady”—unworthy of the first, and no longer the First Daughter of a First Daughter. . . .
“Mother,” she said again, ignoring Isidir, “come with me.”
Sarra did as told, shivering intermittently. Taigan chose a warm woolen shirt and trousers fo
r her. The mother was dressed not as the mother had once dressed the daughter, but as a child dressed a rag doll. Taigan paused only to find salve for the reddened welt at Sarra’s nape where the chain had scraped delicate skin. She bundled the bronze velvet gown in a corner of the closet. Then she sorted through her father’s clothes, knowing she wouldn’t be allowed to go to her own rooms. Shirt, trousers, and sleeveless longvest replaced her silken dress—a Timarrin Allard original, the kind of dress she used to dream of wearing. How long ago that seemed. And how unimportant. She gave the gorgeous blue flowers a last look, doubting she’d ever wear anything remotely like this again.
Execution was unthinkable. Imprisonment . . . all Fa’s droll stories of being thrown into jail whirled through her mind. It wouldn’t be like that. Nothing at all like that. It would be a dark, damp cell in Ryka—or a suffocating cubicle in The Waste—
But for Mikel, a block of windswept ice in Domburronshir.
She slammed the closet doors shut and leaned her forehead against the carved wood, squeezing her eyes shut against tears.
“So you finally feel it, too,” said her mother, and she turned to find the black eyes looking at her, knowing her for the first time since they’d left the Malachite Hall.
“Feel what?” Taigan asked thickly.
“How hopeless it is. I’ve fought for or against one thing or another almost all my life. I can’t fight this. I can’t fight anymore.”
Taigan knelt before her where she sat on the bed. “Are you ashamed? Do you think Mikel and I—” She took the small, icy hands in her own. “You’re the daughter of a First Daughter of Ambrai!”
“And of the Butcher of Ambrai.”
“What does that have to do with us?”
“We’re his get. The shadows are in us, too. Haven’t you ever felt them?”
“If I have, I didn’t give in to them.”
“How young you are. What do you know of evil and ambition?”
“Enough to recognize them in others. We were told by the Captal—” Aunt Cailet in truth as well as affection. She strangled on the rest.
“My sister is full of Mageborn clichés.”
“You’re Mageborn, and an Ambrai! Start behaving like it!”
Sarra gave her a look to shrivel her flesh. “Don’t presume too far, child.”
Taigan had never heard that tone of voice before. She flinched. “Mama—” But if she hoped for soothing words and assurances that she hadn’t meant it, she hoped in vain. Taigan stood up, letting go her mother’s hands. “Why didn’t you see this coming?” she demanded harshly. “Between you and the Captal, you ought to’ve known Glenin would—”
“Would do what, exactly? And what, exactly, should we have known to do?” Small shoulders in dark-brown wool shrugged. “Perhaps we thought Gorsha’s Wards were so strong and so thorough that nothing could make anyone believe, even if they guessed—or were told outright, the way Glenin did tonight.”
“Or maybe that’s what you wanted to believe.”
“They held for thirty-eight years, Taigan. Why should we think that one night they’d become useless?”
“You should have known!” Taigan cried—unfairly, she knew, but right now she wasn’t disposed to be fair.
“Maybe we should have. Cailet’s strategy was to let it play itself out. She learned long ago not to run headlong into a problem and hope that her strength matched it without really knowing how powerful it might turn out to be. A straight line isn’t always the best way to get from one place to another. It’s better to go around a wall than try to slam your way through.”
“Now who’s speaking in clichés?”
“You presume again, daughter,” said Sarra, but this time without much rancor. Truly told, she just sounded tired. “I believe that what Cailet wanted was to bring Glenin out into the open—and Vellerin Dombur, too. Well, that’s happened. And not in any way that either of us could have anticipated, so please don’t run on about it anymore.”
“But she knew who you are—both of you—didn’t it ever occur to you she’d use that?”
“Gorynel Desse’s Wardings, remember?” Another tiny shrug. “Nothing, not a hint of suspicion, in thirty-eight years. Of those who knew—Lady Lilen is the only one unWarded. Her children don’t even know, not anywhere in their minds that they can reach. I’ve always been very careful not to make too many references to Ostinhold—of course, Mother and I weren’t there very long before Cailet was born. Mother died a day or two later.”
Taigan was torn between wanting to ask about that time—and about the Octagon Court and her grandparents and great-grandparents and a million other things, questions she’d never even considered asking before (Warded against them?)—and the equally urgent need to find some reason for all this. Some explanation for why her entire life had ended before it had even begun. Two days short of eighteen, and her future was in a jail cell.
And Mikel—
“I don’t suppose there’s any real accounting for it,” Sarra said, as if she’d read Taigan’s mind. “Except that things happen because they happen. Perhaps that’s an excuse for being stupid and blind. I don’t know. But it’s done now. There’s no way out of it.”
“There has to be a way out! I won’t spend the rest of my life—”
“When Cailet and I make a mistake,” Sarra interrupted, “we don’t do it by halves.”
This infuriated Taigan so deeply that for a moment she thought she might slap her own mother. The impulse had barely been fought down when the door was flung open and Lady Alinar came in, leaning heavily on a silver-headed cane. Granon Isidir stood behind her.
“I had to see for myself,” Lady Alinar said querulously. “Isidir tells me it’s true. Is it?”
“Yes,” Taigan answered, and even though she had never knowingly deceived anyone about her lineage, she writhed inside with shame.
“Stop hovering, Isidir,” rapped out Lady Alinar. “I doubt they’ll murder me—why bother? And even if they do, what do I care? The Liwellan Name is well and truly dead now. And I should have been, long before I found out about this.”
“Lady,” he said, bowing his head and withdrawing.
She hobbled in, and suddenly lashed out a foot to hook around the door and slam it shut. Nothing about her now was fragile or elderly as she came rapidly forward to the bed. “There’s not much time. We have to get you out of here.”
“Why bother?” asked Sarra.
“Because I assume you have no wish to die, and your sister and your children with you—or do you entertain any illusions that this is precisely what Glenin plans?”
“She won’t kill Taigan. She needs Taigan,” Sarra said bitterly.
Lady Alinar gave a start, then nodded briskly. “Yes, of course. Be that as it may—”
“Why me?” Taigan demanded.
“Use the wits the Saints gave you,” her mother snapped. “You’re a Mageborn Ambrai—the only young woman in the world who can say that until you have a daughter.”
Taigan nearly gagged.
Lady Alinar let the shawl drop from her shoulders. Gathering it, she unfurled the heavily woven gray silk to show its embroidered underside. “I’m getting foolish in my old age—I meant to give you this at our last meeting, Sarra, and forgot. It’s very, very old, made by Cloister women from a pattern of tiles in a shrine to St. Mikellan.”
Taigan peered at it. “You mean the Ladder Saint?”
She smiled slightly. “On the walls of Firrense, he looks like Alin Ostin—or so I’m told. I gather that’s why your brother’s name is Mikel. ‘Alin Liwellan’ would be quite a mouthful. Take this and give it to the Captal.”
Sarra made no move to accept it, so Taigan did, trying to work out the design of black and silver and gold. It made no sense to her—until she recalled whose shrine the pattern came from. “Ladders,” she whispered. “All the Ladders on Lenfell.”
“Most of them. I haven’t tried them all, no one has since The Waste War. But the pattern is here, and requires only a map laid under it—and the correct version of ‘The Ladder Song,’ of course.” She glanced over her shoulder. “Someone’s here—one hopes it’s my idiot son at long nerve-wracking last. He certainly didn’t inherit his father’s sense of timing.”
The salon door crashed open and a familiar voice called urgently, “Are you decent? Hurry up—we have to get out of here!”
Josselin Mikleine, wild of eye and black curling hair, filled the doorway. Jored was right behind him, just as agitated and even more disheveled.
“My mistake,” murmured Lady Alinar. “Great-grandson.”
Taigan barely heard her. She stared at the two young men, not understanding for a moment. Then, with a rush of loving gratitude for Jored, she gave him a dazzling smile.
“Come on, Mother!” She yanked Sarra to her feet.
“No,” Sarra replied, stepping toward the bed. “Not with him. Never with him! Don’t you understand?”
“Lady Sarra,” said Joss, taking a few more steps into the bedchamber, “I have no idea what you’re talking about—and no time to discover what it is. Councillor Isidir very kindly let us in, and very kindly invited Jored to knock him out—not too hard, I hope?” he asked over his shoulder, and Jored shook his head. “Good. We can escape with a clear conscience. But we must escape now.” He noticed Lady Alinar then, over by the windows, and gave a start.
“Oh, don’t mind me, young man,” she told him almost merrily. “It would scarcely require fisticuffs to subdue me.”
“I would never dream of it, Lady,” he said, bowing.
All at once Sarra stood up and caught Taigan’s gaze. “Mageborn Ambrai, am I? All right, then.”
Grabbing the shawl, she hurried to her dressing table. Taigan’s eyes popped when, at the touch of a finger here and there, a drawer appeared where there shouldn’t have been a drawer. From it Sarra extracted a small wooden box—one Taigan had seen before, long long ago. Sarra opened it, dumped its contents—some dried flowers, some jewelry, a black silk glove—into the shawl, and knotted the material around the hoard. Taigan could suddenly hear her father: “Never be without something small and portable to sell, pixie, preferably jewels—a lesson I learned the hard way!”