by Melanie Rawn
“Not directly, if that’s what you mean. But they’re here.” He gulped coffee and leaned back against a concrete wall, stretching long legs before him. Two days in Ambrai had scarred his immaculate boots and stained his faultless uniform. “Truly told, what I’ve been pondering since this morning was a dream I had last night.”
Glenin did not voice impatience or scorn. She never dreamed—or at least did not remember what she dreamed. She had willed it of herself in childhood. For nearly a year after arriving at Ryka Court, all her dreams had been of her mother and sister and Ambrai—not dreams but nightmares. She feared them, was shamed by them, and did not want to remember them. So she had decided not to. Her will, reinforced later by a kind of personal Warding, remained intact.
“I know you don’t think of dreams as meaningful,” her father said, as if he’d followed her thoughts. “This one was strange, though. I can’t forget that girl’s face.”
“Who? Sarra Liwellan?”
“No. This girl . . . she reminded me a little of your mother.”
Glenin drew her cloak around her, wishing the window embrasure they sat in had a few pillows. Her back was aching. “You’re in Ambrai. It’s natural to dream about her.”
“But she wasn’t Maichen, that’s just it. Taller, no more than eighteen or so—and Mageborn. I knew that about her. She practically shone with power.”
“And on the basis of this, you believe the Mage Guardians are here?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But you implied it.”
“Very well, then—yes. Because it wasn’t just the girl I sensed. I saw her. But I felt Gorynel Desse.”
“In a dream,” she said, unable to keep the sharpness from her voice. “What about now, when you’re awake?”
“He’s gone,” Feiran stated flatly. “Since a little after Fourteenth. But all day long I could feel him, Glensha. Distant, not very clear, but—”
“Father, I don’t mean to belittle your instincts, but the Academy is deserted. The Ladders are all dead. There’s no one here but us.”
“Yes.”
“Do you think they were here, and somehow escaped?”
“I think they were never here at all. Not at the Academy.”
“Where else, then?”
Broad shoulders shrugged. “I only wish I knew. We’ll search tomorrow, of course. From the top of this tower we can spread a Net of sorts.”
“Of sorts?” she echoed.
“It is not a technique I ever mastered fully,” he admitted.
“Then let me direct the Net.”
“You don’t know what to cast for.”
“A Mageborn is a Mageborn,” Glenin reminded him.
“Only until training defines her magic. I know Mage Guardians, Glensha. You don’t. Imperfect as the Net will be, I must be the one to cast it.”
She subsided, composing herself for sleep. But as she curled around herself and spelled her cloak to comfortable Warmth, she wondered once more if, on finding Desse again, his former student would not allow him to escape again.
24
Sarra watched in numb grief as Imilial Gorrst closed and locked a door in the farthest corridors of Bard Hall. Within was a Battle Globe that would burst and burn at the Warrior Mage’s bidding thought. Until that time, the Globe would shine on the bodies of Alin Ostin and Valirion Maurgen.
Silently, those left alive walked to the next door. This time it was Tamosin Wolvar who entered to set a similar Globe over his uncle’s corpse. He lingered a moment, yielding only to Ilisa Neffe’s soft murmur of his name. Then he locked the door behind him, and the small procession moved on.
Kanto Solingirt, Scholar and senior Mage present conjured the Globe that would guard and eventually burn Captal Lusath Adennos. Elomar would have performed this rite for his kinsman, but Elomar could not be wakened. Neither could Cailet.
They returned to the small tower where the Ladder was. Sarra walked between Riddon and Maugir, but the person she was most aware of was behind her. Collan Rosvenir had sung for Val and Alin while Tarise helped Sarra wash their bodies and arrange them side-by-side in the same bed. He had sung also for the Captal and for Tamos Wolvar while they were readied, giving the Wraiths music to comfort their journey. It was traditional, and Sarra had heard the songs at other funerals, but Collan’s was such powerful and beautiful music that she had to struggle against tears. Yet when she glanced at him, her fingers smoothing Alin’s bright hair, she saw that he did not sing ease to the dead or consolation to the living. He sang for himself. Whatever feeling he had for the dead—all the dead, including those left behind on Ryka—was submerged somehow in the music. He did not sing to rid himself of his own sorrow, nor to express that of voiceless others. The music was a Ward against all emotion, including his own. Sarra marveled that such beauty and such feeling could mean so much to her and little if anything to him.
Yet she could feel his strength as he walked behind her. It was not what she had known with Orlin or Val or Alin: their strength had invited her use, been offered to her need, stood ready always to protect her, hers without even the asking. Collan’s was not of this kind. Not exactly selfish, but never to be given unless specifically requested. He would never give anything of himself, she thought resentfully, unless bludgeoned into it.
Ah, but that was unfair. Had she not seen him cradle Alin’s head in his hand, and reply in a voice almost Val’s when Alin called his lover’s name? Perhaps the imposture had been the only way to get Alin to take them through the Ladder. Sarra didn’t think so. There were generous impulses in Collan Rosvenir—he needn’t have sung to Cailet, after all—but he would probably deny or explain away every one of them.
He had not sung for Gorynel Desse.
The Mage’s body lay in the room next to Cailet’s. But for the faint movements of her breathing, exactly in time with Elomar’s, she might have been as dead as he. The Healer Mage was the one who twitched and whimpered in his sleep—at least, Sarra hoped it was sleep for both him and Cailet. People woke from sleep. Until Cailet woke, she who was now Mage Captal, Sarra and all the others were trapped in Bard Hall.
She sat with Taig Ostin and Telomir Renne in the noon sunshine, cups of wine untouched in their hands. The inner garden was renewing itself, only one day before the Spring Equinox: herbs and roses grown wild showed new leaves, and the white cherry tree trembled on the verge of blooming. Another week of sun, a little more rain, and the grass would be ankle-deep.
“They’re at the Academy,” Telomir said into the stillness. “There was smoke all day yesterday, and no reason for it except to burn Ladders. We can go only to Longriding, and only if Cailet learned all that Alin knew.”
“Was there time?” Taig asked bitterly. “He lived not even fifteen minutes.”
“We must trust that the necessary was accomplished.”
Sarra looked down at her wine and said nothing. There was a vine climbing the wall opposite her, untrimmed for not quite eighteen years. She wondered what color the flowers were. Well, blue, of course. Bardic Blue.
“None of the other Mages know this Ladder,” Telo went on.
“It was rarely used,” said Taig. “The house was a dowry five Generations ago. There were Bards in my ancestor’s line, and he was from The Waste, so I suppose that’s why the Ladder exists at all. Now it’s the only one left in all of Ambrai.”
“The only one we can use,” Telo corrected. “They won’t burn the one at the Octagon Court, or the one to Malerris Castle.”
The breeze was chilly, even sitting here in the sun, and brought a distant sting of smoke. There would be nothing left at the Mage Academy now—even less nothing than Auvry Feiran had left not quite eighteen years ago. Sarra wondered dully if anyone had noticed that there were books missing from the cellar vault. She almost said something about searching Bard Hall for folios of songs, then asked herself what was the use: Alin was dead
.
But Cailet lived. Cailet—and Alin’s knowledge of Ladders, and Tamos Wolvar’s of Mage Globes, and Lusath Adennos’s of whatever it was that made a Captal worth saving at all costs. Sarra mused on what Gorynel Desse had known that Cailet now knew.
“There must be no magic until we go through the Ladder to Longriding,” Telo said. “They’ll search for us. They’ll use magic first, and when they find nothing they’ll come on foot. All of it will take time.”
“Enough for Cailet to recover and wake?”
“We must trust so.”
“You keep using that word.”
“It’s a good one, Taig.”
“I don’t find much comfort in the concept right now.”
“Don’t you? I learned it from my father, when first he Warded my magic,” Telo replied serenely.
“And never unWarded it.”
“That will be the Captal’s decision.”
He was talking about Cailet. Cailet—not quite eighteen years old, and the most important and powerful Mageborn in the world. She could hear Collan demanding to know if anybody had asked Cailet whether she wanted this.
“She can get us to Longriding,” Taig said. “But where we go from there is problematical. Ostinhold, maybe.”
“The Captal will discover if it’s safe.”
“Damn you!” Sarra flung her winecup down, surging to her feet. “She has a name!” She ran indoors, ignoring Taig’s stunned “Sarra!” behind her.
If one counted Lusath Adennos as a caretaker—for that was exactly what he’d been, Sarra realized—then the only image she had of a Mage Captal was Leninor Garvedian. Her memories of the fiery Captal belonged to an overawed little girl. Tales she’d heard since had confirmed her impressions: Leninor had been powerful, energetic, reckless, and arrogant. In some ways, truly told, the Captal and Grandmother Allynis had merged in Sarra’s mind.
Cailet was Allynis’s granddaughter. She was also the Mage Captal. She’s not even eighteen years old!
Maugir stood guard by the open door of Cailet’s room. Sarra went past him without a word and stood gazing down at the frail girl in the bed. This child, Mage Captal? My sister, she told herself, ferociously protective. Cailet is my sister first. The Mage Guardians and the Rising have second claim.
She turned suddenly as a soft stir in the air announced another visitor. Bard Falundir stepped silently toward the bed, bare feet and ragged clothes making no more sound than his voice ever could. Still stinging from their initial encounter, she looked away. He paused beside the cot on which Elomar lay, then moved to the other side of Cailet’s bed. Sarra could feel him willing her to meet his gaze; at length, she did.
Never had she seen such loving warmth, such tender compassion, in anyone’s eyes. This man knew grief beyond anything Sarra had ever experienced; she had twice lost family and friends and home, but he had lost the words and music that were the essence of his being. Yet there was no bitterness, no lingering fury or outrage at what had been done to him, even though the greatest Bard in ten Generations had been silenced for as many years as Cailet had been alive.
Sarra drank of his serenity without knowing how she did so. And it occurred to her that Mageborn or not, this was magic. To give in silence; to create music with eyes and heart. Knowing pain and anger, Falundir offered that with which to bear them. This was the essence of the true Bard. No matter how magnificent Collan Rosvenir’s musicianship, he would never become a true Bard until he learned such giving.
She wanted to thank Falundir, and did not know how. He smiled very slightly and settled at the foot of the bed, useless hands lax in his lap. Sarra took the same position on the other side.
“I promised her I’d be here,” she said.
Falundir nodded. Together they watched over Cailet, and waited.
25
An inarticulate cry spun Glenin on one heel. “Father?” She ran in from the balcony surrounding the top of Captal Bekke’s Tower and approached the circle of Malerrisi. Auvry stood in its exact center, laughing. “Do you have them? Are you sure?”
The weariness of the day-long search sluiced from him as if success was a bright waterfall. “It’s them.” He paused, closed his eyes for a moment, then said, “But you’ll never guess where.”
The Malerrisi, fifty-one of them shoulder-to-shoulder, shifted as they were released from the Net. They shivered in the evening chill as minds became aware again of bodies. A few slid down to rest with heads lowered to bent knees, and others began to pace off the stiffness of hours of fruitless searching.
“The Council House?” ventured Glenin. “One of the Guildhalls?”
Chava Allard, as fresh-faced and chipper as if he’d just risen from a full night’s sleep, gave a snort. “They’re in Bard Hall! Even I felt it!”
Feiran nodded approvingly. Glenin eyed the boy with concealed annoyance, understanding something of Vassa Doriaz’s apprehensions.
“Can we do anything about it tonight?” she asked her father.
“Everyone needs food and sleep. Tomorrow will be soon enough. Believe me, they’re not going anywhere.”
Chava was practically dancing with gleeful anticipation. “Only one Ladder at Bard Hall—straight to Ryka Court!”
“Yes,” she said. “I know.”
He was crestfallen at the rebuke, but not long enough to suit her. “I’ll go start dinner!” And he bounded out to the balcony and down the exterior stairs.
Someone sighed. “Would that Velireon the Provider would provide us with another cook.”
Glenin forced a smile. She wanted to share the mood of triumph. She had done nothing to earn it. All day she’d kept her magic in check, except for one or two stealthy forays that gleaned nothing but a directionless impression of obstacle that was almost but not quite a Ward. Evidently her father had run into the same thing until a few minutes ago.
“Let’s go downstairs, Glenin,” he said, touching her elbow gently.
“I’ll be along later,” she replied. “I want to watch the stars come out.”
“Don’t wait till it gets too dark. These stairs—”
“—will be lit very nicely by a Globe. Stop worrying. Do you take me for a Novice Mage?” Because he was her father, she softened the words with a smile.
He nodded, saying nothing more. The comprehending sympathy in his eyes galled her. When she was alone, she went back outside and found the outlines of Bard Hall against the blackening sky. He would be a fool not to discern her resentment at being excluded from the Net, but he would need the abilities of Elinar Longsight, patron of fortunetellers, to sense the rest.
Once again—Damn Garon!—she was pregnant.
26
Sarra had no idea when she’d fallen asleep. She woke when something moved the blanket against her cheek, and sat up groggy-eyed. Falundir was gone. So was Elomar. She and Cailet were alone in a delicate half-darkness.
And Cailet was awake.
“You’re here,” she said softly, black eyes set in bruises of fatigue, eyes that were huge and unfathomable and utterly calm. “You stayed with me.”
Sarra struggled to sit up. “Of course I did.”
“The others are gone.” Cailet drew her legs up and hugged her knees, looking barely twelve years old—except for those eyes. “Our parents, our sister, the other Mages. They’re all gone. Some of them died.”
“I know.”
“Do you know what I am now?”
Sarra raked her hair back with both hands. Her fingers felt numb. “You’re my sister.”
A vague surprise, a subtle curiosity, a small gentling of her face. Then: “Do I scare you?”
“No. You’re my sister. I love you.”
“I—I know,” Cailet replied shyly. “I felt that.” Then her shoulders tensed. “Gorsha loved me, too. But I frightened him. Do I frighten you, Sarra?”
“No,” she said once more. “Oh, Ca
isha—” She held out her arms to this strange, fey child who was her sister—and the Mage Captal.
Cailet clung to her, trembling just a little. “Sarra—help me,” she whimpered. “Stay with me, please—”
“Always, dearest. I promised. I’m here, Caisha, I’ll always be here. Hush now, sweeting. It’s all right. All over now.”
“It hasn’t even started. I’m scared, Sarra. There’s so much inside me and I’m dangerous now, don’t you see?”
Sarra held her by the arms, looking into tear-filled eyes. Her own eyes; their mother’s eyes. “I see my sister. Cailet Ambrai.”
“That’s the first time I’ve ever heard it aloud.” She gulped, rested her forehead against Sarra’s, and whispered, “Please, say it again. One last time.”
“Cailet Ambrai.” Sarra held her close once more.
After a time, the girl drew away. “You didn’t question that it was the last time.”
“I’m not entirely ignorant of certain realities,” Sarra responded with a smile. “You and I know, and Telomir Renne, and Elomar Adennos—”
“The Healer Mage who kept me alive,” Cailet interrupted.
“Yes. Taig knows. And Lady Lilen.”
“And Bard Falundir, I think.” Bitterly: “Well, he’s safe enough.”
“Cailet! You can’t possibly think the others would—”
“—betray us? You don’t know me very well yet. I meant that he’s safe from the danger of knowing. The others aren’t. I told you, Sarra. I’m dangerous. And in this, so are you. To everyone who knows us.”
“We’ll be careful. Caisha, how do you feel? It’s been days since you’ve had anything but water and a little soup.”
Cailet began to laugh silently. “Are you always so practical?”
“Ruthlessly.” She laughed and got to her feet. “You’ve much to learn about me, as well. Stay right here and I’ll go find you something to eat. I wonder what time it is?”
“Just past First. Alin had a good time-sense, too,” the Captal added.