by Melanie Rawn
“Hell of a shock when you did find out, huh? I can definitely empathize.” He said it with a smile, and Joss smiled back.
There was no need to construct a bed here; a deep, wide-arched alcove was fitted with a shelf obviously meant to hold a mattress. Blankets wouldn’t do as well, but they were better than sleeping on the floor. On the stonework above the bed were charming frescoes of local flora and fauna done by an amateur but talented hand.
“I think she’ll like this,” Mikel said.
“If she doesn’t, there are lots of other rooms to choose from. They say Scraller’s own chambers were something to behold. Evidently the guest rooms were more subdued. This one’s rather pretty.” He began shaking out another blanket. “Why so far from your mother, though? It’s three flights of stairs and a very long hallway back to the third floor.”
Mikel took a cloth from his back pocket and began sweeping the dust from the alcove. “They’ve never lived together before. Both of them are used to running their own houses. I figured that if they had adjoining rooms, they’d really get on each other’s nerves!”
Josselin eyed him thoughtfully. “Y’know, for your age, you know a lot about women.”
3
“I’M confused about Avin Sonne,” said Telomir as Sirron poured coffee. “Jored must’ve killed all the others at Peyres when he arrived—but why not Avin?”
Cailet nodded at the Bekke who would take Granon’s place as Master of the Captal’s Warders—though Sirron didn’t know it yet. “Thanks. You can sit down now for at least five minutes,” she added teasingly. “Consider it an order.”
“Yes, Captal.” He bowed gravely, and obeyed.
Cailet sighed. She’d have to teach him to have a sense of humor. “Avin Sonne? That’s easy,” she said to Telo, drawing her knees up to her chin. They sat on the floor, near enough to the vast hearth so Telo’s bones wouldn’t ache. “Avin was gone when Jored killed the others. Jored didn’t dare kill him, too—somebody could’ve seen Avin return to town. Besides, he was the only person besides me who would use that Ladder—and Jored had no idea whether or not I’d be capable by the time we reached Peyres.”
“If only we’d known about Joss earlier—” He broke off and shook his head. “A grandson. I have a grandson.”
“How did Lady Jeymian know about him? And how did she know to know—if you know what I mean!”
“Nothing so dramatic as a birthmark. Mother came to Roseguard when little Tamsa was born—though not as Jeymian Renne, of course—to see her first great-granddaughter. Sarra might remember her visit, back in 965, an evening at the Residence with my brother Orlin and the boys. He tried to get her to come clean on who she was, but she wouldn’t do it. Safer at The Cloister, she said, even after the Rising.” Telo sighed and shook his head. “Anyway, when Sela became pregnant again, I wrote Mother about it. She was on her way from The Cloister when we all had to leave Roseguard. Then came the Rising. Verald was killed, Sela died giving birth to Josselin at the Ostin house in Longriding. Lilen took both children to Ostinhold. So much we already knew.”
“But your mother—?” she prompted.
“After Ostinhold burned, she went looking for them.” He paused for a sip of coffee. “A little girl with a kitten, a newborn baby boy, all that chaos—it must’ve been a nightmare. But she found them. Joss, anyway. Tamsa had died. Mother Warded Joss and gave him to a Mikleine woman, along with some money and a letter to give me. The woman ended up dying, too, somewhere between Ambraishir and Sheve. After that he was lost to us. Until two days ago.” He shook his head again.
“Lilen knew his name—the ‘Josselin’ part, anyway. It’s not common.”
“How could she be expected to remember one baby in the midst of everything that happened next?”
“Well . . . I see your point. But Lady Jeymian should’ve been able to track him, if he was always known as Josselin Mikleine.”
“Joss told me yesterday that the first foster-mother he remembers was a Mikleine, widowed on the flight from The Waste, with no other children, though she did talk sometimes about a son who would’ve been his big brother. She died when Joss was about four. Now, imagine your husband and your only child died on the trek across The Waste and Ambrai. All at once a baby is abandoned, alone, and available. You take this baby in, love it as your own—maybe move to a new location where no one knows you and therefore can’t know that the baby isn’t really yours. One day someone comes to your village asking about just such a child as you took in and made your own.”
Cailet nodded. “She would’ve gotten rid of the letter as soon as she could—if she ever even had it at all.”
“That’s how I see it.” Telomir rubbed a shoulder. “What’s really bothering me is something that happened back at Mage Hall. I thought only close family could get through one’s Wards. How did Joss get into your chambers there that night?”
“That is intriguing,” she agreed, not having considered it before. “Other than my own, the Wards were Granon Bekke’s, arranged so Marra and Aidan could come and go at will. But he was dead by the time Josselin arrived upstairs, his magic dissipated. Jored got in because he’s family, of course—same thing for Taigan and Mikel.”
“But Joss? The nearest you and he are related is—” He thought a minute. “Your great-great-grandmother married a Desse, and that’s as close as it gets. And that’s not close enough. So how’d he do it?”
Cailet was about to say she hadn’t the first clue when she heard Gorsha chuckle inside her head. And what, First Sword dear, are you about to amaze me with now?
Nothing really. Only that Joss isn’t your family, dear—he’s mine. And I taught you all the Wards you know.
She damned near dropped her coffee mug. You’re kidding. The family resemblance in magic let him enter where he shouldn’t have?
That’s essentially it.
To Telomir she said, “I think—I think it was probably because I wasn’t exactly in my right mind that night. It certainly could have affected the Wards.”
The explanation seemed to satisfy him.
Good recovery, Caisha.
No thanks to you! It’s not as if I could tell him you’re here, and invite him to have a talk with his father!
You could try, and see what happens!
She was distracted by a minor bustling at the kitchen door—and scrambled to her feet when Lady Lilen Ostin came in, flanked by her daughters Lenna and Miram and her granddaughter Mircian. Riddon Slegin and Pier Alvassy followed, arms full of packages.
“What’s all this, then?” Lilen asked. “Here I’ve made my poor grandson-in-law Fold us all the way from Longriding and nobody’s even at the front door to welcome us!”
“Speaking of Wards,” Telo murmured as Cailet helped him to his feet. “I know, I know—Pier’s a cousin, and your grandfather was an Ostin, so they can all get through. Remind me to find somebody who isn’t related to anybody to Ward this place!”
Lilen, Lenna, and Miram were busy greeting Sarra. Mircian—who resembled her mother Geria in every superficial physical feature and in no substantial character trait whatsoever—nodded shyly at Cailet. “Cousin,” Cailet said with a smile, and held out her hands. “I can call you that, can’t I? It doesn’t utterly humiliate you to be related to me?”
“To so desperate a character as the Mage Captal, you mean?” Mircian laughed, her lovely face that was so like Geria’s made lovelier for the humor and sweetness Geria utterly lacked. “I’m crushed and despondent, you can be sure.”
“What about your mother?” Cailet winked.
Lenna came up in time to hear this, and snorted. “Having conniptions this very instant.”
“Personally,” said Mircian, “I find that conniptions take up too much time and energy.”
“I wish First Daughter health of them,” Cailet said. “Come meet Sarra and Taigan—Mikel’s around here somewhere, too.”
&nb
sp; “Did I hear Mikel’s name mentioned?” asked Lady Lilen, coming up to Cailet with arms spread wide. As they hugged, she went on, “He and Taigan are the reasons we’re here!” More softly, for Cailet’s ears alone, “How are you, Caisha?”
“Better. Feeling safe helps. And coming home.” She drew away, smiling.
“Home to The Waste—Saints help you.” Lilen glanced around the kitchen. “Not too dreadful—but I can just imagine what the rest of it must be like. We’ll stay a day or two, if that suits, and help.”
“You’re more welcome than I can possibly tell you. But what’s this about Taigan and—oh, no!” she exclaimed.
“I had a suspicion they might’ve been forgotten in all this bother. Send someone to find the boy, would you? We can’t begin until he’s here.” Lilen turned to the door. “And I’ve brought someone else as well—without whom we couldn’t possibly have a party.”
Cailet craned her neck to see past Miram and Sarra, and all at once tears came to her eyes. Falundir smiled at her from the doorway. Cradled in one arm was his lute-case—containing the instrument given to Collan long ago. Rescued from Roseguard, brought all this way, now it would belong to Mikel: like his father, a gift on his eighteenth Birthingday.
4
THE party began with Mikel’s return—after Ollia ran upstairs yelling for him and Josselin so loudly that they thought the Ryka Legion had arrived to do battle. Lilen had provided eighteen gifts for Mikel and eighteen for Taigan, as was customary. The twins opened sixteen parcels and two envelopes while everyone else gathered around the kitchen hearth to admire the presents and sip the wine Riddon had brought from Longriding.
There were practical gifts of clothes and galazhi-hide boots, and thoughtful gifts of books (Lives of Famous Ambrais for Taigan; Ambraishir: A Personal View by Dirken Halvos for Mikel), and a dazzling gift of a Maurgen Moonstreak Dappleback each, promised by notes from Riena. Other envelopes from Jennis contained the information that saddles and bridles went with the horses. Cailet smiled then, telling the twins that she’d received exactly the same from Lady Sefana on her own eighteenth.
Taigan also received a necklace and bracelet of carved sand-jade—Cailet gave a start and told her they were the work of “Rinnel Solingirt”—and Mikel a wristlet and earring of the same material by the same maker. Bottles of wine, crocheted coverlets in Ambrai’s turquoise and black octagons, and small marble statues of their Name Saints completed Lilen’s gifting.
Falundir presented Mikel with the lute, and Taigan with twin throwing knives to replace the ones she hadn’t been wearing with her formal gown on Midsummer Moon night. They were very old knives, inscribed with strange sigils down the blades, the hilts wrapped in new gold wire. Sarra then opened the velvet pouch Lilen had provided, and came forward to place small shining objects in her children’s hands. Taigan gulped on seeing a pair of sapphire earrings; Mikel caught his breath at the thin wristlet of carved moonstones and turquoises.
“These,” Sarra said in a steady voice, “are from your father and me. There was more—”
“This is enough,” Mikel interrupted, his voice not at all steady. Taigan could only nod.
“Eighteen years ago,” their mother said softly, “I saw you for the very first time. I won’t say it seems like yesterday, because it doesn’t.”
“Well, I should hope not,” Cailet drawled. “Yesterday we were running for our lives in Kenrokeshir. Or was it Bleynbradden?”
“Both—I think,” said Telomir.
“And five other places besides,” added Mikel.
“Only five?” asked Taigan. “I could’ve sworn—”
“Oh, stop it!” Sarra laughed. “I’m trying to tell you that you’ve lived good lives in these eighteen years, and I’m proud of you—though I had little to do with it.” She held up a hand as they began to protest. “You are the children of your father, and an honor to him.”
For the first time in thirty-eight years, Falundir used his crippled hands to applaud his approval. Others began to join him, clappping louder and louder until Cailet went to stand at her sister’s side and raised a hand for silence.
“My gift isn’t exactly the one I intended, but it’s the most important thing you’ll ever own. I give you, Taigan, and you, Mikel, your true Name—our Name. Ambrai.”
“Taigan Ambrai!” Riddon called out, raising his glass of wine. “Mikel Ambrai!”
And amid the cheers and toasts they started to get used to their own names.
A little while later, Mikel drew his sister aside, finding a corner of the kitchen where they could talk in comparative privacy. “Happy Birthingday,” he said, and kissed her cheek. “You know, I clean forgot what today was. Do you feel as weird as I do?”
“That it’s not at Roseguard, and Fa’s not here?” She nodded, and kissed him back. “We’re surrounded by strangers who’re really our family. Miram’s the genealogist in the group, she’s offered to draw us a map of—” She broke off. “Like the map Jored drew of Mage Hall. Mishka, I helped him do it! I helped him plan out how to destroy Mage Hall!”
“That’s enough,” he said, echoing Josselin’s chiding of earlier. “How could you know?”
“I should have. So much for any instincts I may have inherited from Mother,” she added bitterly.
“Teggie, I think your magic is absolutely instinctive,” Mikel told her.
“And that’s just the problem! You’d think there wasn’t any brain at all behind it—”
“You just have to learn to think it through.”
“Think about an instinct? Oh, that just makes piles of sense!”
“That’s not what I meant. Your magic comes without your having to think about it, in response to a threat.” He paused as a burst of merriment nearby filled the kitchen with the best kind of noise. Pulling her a little ways further from it, he went on, “What you need to learn is why your brain perceives a threat—if you think about it beforehand, and sort out the serious from the trivial, then your magic will be under much better control.”
“I’d understand it better,” she said slowly, “and trust it more when my instincts call on it.”
“Right,” he agreed. “And remember, you’re not a Listed Mage yet. You can’t be expected to know everything.”
“But I should have known to tell someone about Jored’s map of the Hall,” she insisted.
He shook her arm and said severely, “If you say ‘If I had, then Fa wouldn’t be dead,’ I’ll kick you into the middle of next Candleweek! Jored planned what he did, and Glenin planned to kill Fa. There’s nothing anybody could’ve done.”
“I wanted to kill him,” she whispered. “I had that sword in my hand, and—why did Joss stop me? Why did he do that?”
“Because it wasn’t right for you to kill him, and Joss knew it.”
“But his hands—” Her gaze shifted to where Josselin stood, clumsily cradling a wineglass in both gauze-wrapped hands. “Elo says they’ll heal, but he’ll have scars the rest of his life.”
“Maybe he did it because he cares about you.”
“Me? Joss?”
“You never saw anyone but Jored. Maybe Joss found a chance to make you see him.”
“Josselin?”
Riddon came to fill their glasses, and talked about when they might go up to Maurgen Hundred to select their horses. “My little brother Jeymi has several in mind, real beauties. And none of them close enough related to preclude your starting your own herd here.”
“Here?” Taigan asked in much the same tone her mother had used this morning. “Where would we put a herd of horses?”
Riddon laughed. “Do you have any idea how big this place is?”
“Not yet,” Mikel said, “but I get the feeling we’ll find out as soon as we start getting lost. Miram says Lenna will play with the title deeds for us so one of the Ostins owns the place. Make sure she keeps track of how much it costs—so
oner or later we’ll liberate some money out of the banks in Roseguard.”
Riddon grimaced. “If any bank is still standing after the mess going on now. But we’re not talking about unpleasant things tonight.”
Mikel nodded, but wondered privately just how unpleasant things might become for the Ostins—who had sheltered Cailet Ambrai in childhood and were closely allied to the Mage Guardians.
“Our First Daughter, Tevis, wants me to make particularly sure to tell you she and Alyn and Cailie helped me work your coverlets—and I freely admit I never would’ve finished in time without them.”
“Thank you so much,” Taigan said warmly. “And I hope to be able to thank my cousins in person soon—we are all cousins, aren’t we?”
“One way or another,” Riddon replied, smiling, and Mikel recalled that Orlin Renne’s father had been an Alvassy, so that made them all related . . . somehow. Definitely Miram would have to draw them a map for navigation of the genealogical waters. Riddon continued, “We’re all in the same wagon, you know—I’m told my Uncle Telo’s grandson is here.”
“Josselin Mikleine,” said Mikel. “Don’t tell me you haven’t met him? Come on, I’ll introduce you. He’s a little overwhelmed by sudden mobs of relatives, too.”
5
“HOW did you manage this in only two days?” Sarra asked Lilen, who smiled.
“We’d intended giving them a few things anyway. It was only a matter of doing a little more shopping—and Riddon and his girls sitting up late to finish the coverlets.”
“They’re beautiful.” After a brief hesitation, she said, “Lilen, did Dellian Vekke come with Falundir from Roseguard?”
Lilen hesitated. “I’d hoped not to tell you until tomorrow.”
It was a moment before Sarra found her voice again. “How—?” was all she could manage.