Without Ravenna.
Well, it had left Ishbel unmoved. He had truly destroyed whatever had once been between them with his ill-thought guilt over Ravenna's pregnancy.
A movement below caught his eye.
It was Ishbel, leaving her tent. She stopped outside to talk with the Isembaardian soldier--Madarin, Maximilian thought his name was--who guarded it, then Madarin was turning to the hill and pointing.
Ishbel turned to look, her hands shading her eyes in the bright sunlight, and then she started for the hill.
Maximilian felt a flutter of nerves in his stomach.
He sat down on a patch of exposed, dry rock, his eyes following Ishbel's progress toward the hill. She walked and then climbed smoothly, without any hint of breathlessness.
All the months in the saddle had strengthened her, Maximilian thought, and then had to fight to stop himself wondering just how strong and supple her body--always slender and lithe--might be now.
"I thought you would have seen enough of me for the day," he said as she reached the summit and sat herself down beside him.
"You just happen to be occupying the top of the hill," she said, "where I thought to sit and digest my lunch."
He smiled. "Who is that soldier--Madarin? He seems devoted to you."
"You haven't heard of him?"
Maximilian shook his head.
"Well, you'll need to ask Axis for the details," Ishbel said, "but he is devoted to me because many, many months ago, when he was part of the detail accompanying Axis to bring me to Isaiah, I healed him of a twisted bowel. My skills as the Archpriestess of the Coil did not only encompass death."
"I keep finding ever more hidden depths within you, Ishbel."
She made a noncommittal movement of her shoulders, and they sat in silence for a little while.
Maximilian's attention was eventually caught by a movement to the west. There was something in the sky...
"Icarii," Ishbel said, who had caught his look and frown of concern. "Can you see? One of them has such pink feathers!"
Maximilian smiled, relaxing. "Yes. I can see. There must be fifteen or sixteen of them. Where have they come from, do you think?"
"Perhaps they have heard that they have a new Talon, and that he travels with you."
Maximilian nodded slowly. "Word must be filtering out into the eastern lands."
"StarDrifter will be happy to gather his people about him."
Maximilian nodded again.
Ishbel drew a deep breath. "I came up here because I wanted to apologize for the way I spoke to you this morning."
"I deserved it."
Another small silence.
"Surely we must be done apologizing to each other now," Ishbel said, and Maximilian laughed softly.
"If you say so."
Now the silence was a little more awkward.
"I don't want to hurt you, Maxel," Ishbel said. "If Ravenna has shown you a vision where I--"
"Don't..." Maximilian said. "Come with me to Elcho Falling. You are a Persimius, and it is your home as much as mine. Whatever happens, happens."
He picked up a small fragment of rock where the frost had splintered it from the greater one, and turned it over and over in his hand. It struck him, once more, just how different were Ravenna and Ishbel.
Ravenna had not once stopped trying to persuade him that Ishbel was a nightmare just waiting to wake, while, contrariwise, Ishbel had not once, in all the months she'd had the opportunity, said a single thing against a woman she had every cause to loathe.
Ravenna would hate it that Ishbel had offered to stay behind, and he had refused.
"All Persimians must be true fatalists," Ishbel said, and Maximilian laughed out loud.
"Grim fatalists," he agreed, still smiling.
"I wish our baby had lived," Ishbel said.
Maximilian hesitated, wondering where this would lead. "So do I," he said.
Ishbel didn't take it any further, and Maximilian thought that somehow they had, in those two simple statements, probably encompassed as much--and as well--as if they'd spent hours beating their breasts about the tragedy.
Ishbel took a deep breath. "Are you looking forward to Elcho Falling?"
"Yes," Maximilian said. "How long have I been on the road now? Eighteen months? Longer? You almost as long. I left Escator to find a bride...and here I still am, on the road. So, yes, I am longing for Elcho Falling--longing for a home. Longing for an end to this journeying."
"And Elcho Falling is home, not Escator?"
"I think so. Escator seems so far behind me. I don't think I could go back there and be happy. I would always be restless. I was always restless there, I think, perhaps knowing that it would not be where I
ended my days."
"You should not talk so about ending your days."
He shrugged.
Ishbel chewed her lip, looking over the vast encampment. "Do you worry about this army?"
"Yes. I have no idea what I can do to hold it together. Isaiah could barely do it, and I am not Isaiah."
"Perhaps you need to allow it to fracture apart."
He looked at her, frowning. "What do you mean?"
"Look at us, Maxel. Here we sit, talking comfortably, and when have we ever done that? Neither of us keeping any secrets...and when before have we had such truth between us? What did it take, Maxel, for us to reach this moment where we could trust each other and be friends?"
She rose, and Maximilian had to squint into the sun in order to look up at her. He thought she smiled at him just before she turned to walk down the hill, but was not sure.
He watched her all the way back to her tent, thinking about what she had said.
Perhaps you need to allow it to fracture apart.
What did it take, Maxel, for us to reach this moment where we could trust each other and be friends?
The frown smoothed from Maximilian's face, and he smiled, tossing the fragment of rock high into the air before catching it again.
Suddenly he could see the road ahead to Elcho Falling clear and straight.
"Thank you, Ishbel," he murmured, then rose and made his own way down the hill.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The Sky Peaks Pass
Ishbel sat in her tent, the Goblet of the Frogs in her hands. It was late at night. Madarin had long settled down in his bedding in a small shelter built into the back of the tent, and Ishbel supposed that she, too, should go to bed. The Lealfast were due to arrive in the morning, and it would be a day partly of excitement, partly of nerves. No one truly knew how the Isembaardians would react to the arrival of such a supernatural force--or even how the Lealfast themselves might behave.
She turned the goblet over and over. It felt wonderful in her hands: the glass was smooth and warm, and even when it did not whisper to her the goblet managed to convey such love and warmth that Ishbel found it difficult to pack it away.
It was so beautiful. Ishbel thought that her ancestor, Tirzah, must have been extraordinary to have created something this beautiful.
It was because she loved the man for whom she created me, the goblet said.
"Boaz," Ishbel murmured, so relaxed by the goblet's soothing presence that the fact it spoke to her did not mar her serenity in the slightest.
Love can do many amazing things.
Ishbel smiled, just slightly. "You think that Maximilian and I..."
It is a possibility only.
"I don't think so," said Ishbel. "I am the stronger without him."
Possibly.
"I can't think that--"
"Talking to yourself, Ishbel?"
Ishbel looked up, startled.
Salome was standing just inside the door of the tent, looking at her quizzically.
"Talking to myself only," Ishbel said, folding the goblet away in a piece of cloth. She smiled. "I find it helps, sometimes."
Salome smiled back, sitting down on a stool and arranging her robe and wings to her satisfaction.
> "The baby?" Ishbel said.
Salome rested a hand on her growing belly. "He is doing well, but I am almost at that point where I will be happier with him outside of me than inside. StarDrifter will not allow me to fly. He says I still am too ungainly in the air--" Salome made a moue "--and my flight muscles not yet strong enough to bear us both. I might harm his precious son should I topple from the sky."
"I am sure he is just as worried for you, Salome."
"Well, perhaps."
"Maxel and I saw some Icarii flying in today. What do you know of them?"
"Ah! StarDrifter is so pleased! Apparently BroadWing sent word back with several Icarii when first he realized StarDrifter was heading north with Isaiah's force. Now Icarii are heading to join with their Talon." Salome smiled. "Many are coming, including a goodly number, BroadWing told me this afternoon, who were once with Axis' vaunted Strike Force. All I can hope for, my dear, is that StarDrifter's entire family does not reappear. I simply could not manage."
Ishbel laughed.
"Now," Salome continued, "you must tell me all about you and Maximilian. You told me yesterday what transpired when you went to declare your love for him, but now it appears that Ravenna has been left to mope alone with her mother, and Maximilian is all of a sudden casting hooded looks your way!" Salome smiled in genuine warmth. "And now you tell me that you and he met earlier? Ha! Do you remember that day when first we became friends, and I said how I admired you for the fact that you so carelessly manipulated the love of kings and tyrants--without even being aware of it?"
"Yes."
"Any other woman would have crumpled with despair at Maximilian's rejection, Ishbel. I know of no one who could have managed such a disaster with aplomb and dignity. And now look at you! You wear your clothes with such...difference. Two days ago that gown would have hung dispirited on you. Now you wear it as though it were a vestment fit for the most powerful empress. As though you were the most powerful empress. What is your secret?"
"You asked me that on the first day we met, as I recall," Ishbel said.
"Tell me what happened once Maxel had walked away from you, Ishbel."
Ishbel gave a little shrug. "I became angry--at myself. I couldn't believe I'd allowed myself to sink so low. So, Salome, that is my only secret."
Salome's eyes drifted to the cloth-wrapped goblet, and she slid Ishbel a sly glance, but did not comment on it.
"How do you feel for Maxel?" she asked.
"Exhausted," Ishbel said, then gave a soft laugh. "I am exhausted with loving him, and am enjoying not having to do so."
"Well, then, you are finally your own woman," Salome said, rising to her feet with admirable grace considering her advanced pregnancy. "Ravenna is angry."
"She thinks I will ruin Maximilian's life, and the entire world besides."
"Venetia had a talk with me this morning," Salome said. "She worries about her daughter."
"I do not," Ishbel said.
"Perhaps you should," Salome said, then leaned down to give Ishbel a good-night kiss, and departed.
Maximilian was fast asleep in his tent when he was startled awake by a hand on his shoulder.
"Doyle?" he said, rising onto one elbow.
"My lord," Doyle said, his voice tight, "there is something I need to tell you."
Far distant, the Lealfast fighters glided through the night. They journeyed in their magical form, almost transparent crystals of snow that sliced through the air against the wind. At night they were invisible;
during the day they could be seen only in numbers, and only then as a filmy gray cloud high in the sky.
As they flew, Eleanon, Bingaleal, and Inardle talked, traveling far enough away from the others that they could not be overheard.
"The One is extraordinary," Bingaleal said, as he had said many times on their journey north toward Maximilian.
"He is dangerous, too," Inardle said.
"He promises more for us than Maximilian," said Eleanon.
"But at what price?" Inardle said. "What shall he ask of us?"
"We have always thought that only the Lord of Elcho Falling had the power to achieve what we needed,"
said Eleanon.
For a moment the three Lealfast shared the dream to which all Lealfast aspired. Wholeness. Freedom from their half-and-half nature--half Skraeling, half Icarii. The Lealfast despised both Skraeling and Icarii and yearned for their own future, their own identity.
Wholeness.
Formerly they had thought only the Lord of Elcho Falling had the power to strip them of both their Skraeling and Icarii blood, but now...
"Now, there is the One," Bingaleal said, "and suddenly we have a choice. Inardle, we must consider that choice, and we must keep our choices open. The nation depends on the decisions the three of us make."
"But we must not be hasty," Inardle said.
"Indeed not," said Eleanon. "We fly to Maximilian, we consider him, and then we learn as much as we can about the One and what he offers, and then we consider him as well. We shall not be hasty. But we shall do whatever is needed to better the Lealfast. But for the moment, our loyalty shall be publicly with Maximilian. Until..."
"We find a better choice," said Bingaleal, "and are certain in that choice."
Far below them a tiny dot scampered south.
It was the rat which had crawled from the Goblet of the Frogs, and it was moving supernaturally fast.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The Sky Peaks Pass
Maximilian drew the razor down the side of his cheek, then flicked off the soap and bristles into a dish of water at his feet. He drew the razor down his other cheek, and then again, flicking away the soap and bristles after each pass, and then over his chin.
Axis sat on a chair in the command tent, watching the Lord of Elcho Falling as he shaved in the predawn.
Maximilian looked more relaxed than Axis had seen him in a while, and he wondered at it. Axis had spoken to Insharah very early this morning, and the soldiers were more edgy than ever. They didn't know why they were sitting here in the snow when back home their land was, for all they knew, being torn apart and their families slaughtered.
Maximilian would somehow need to pull a miracle down from the sky if he wanted to retain control of the army.
The Lealfast.
"What will happen today, Maxel?" Axis said. "Tens of thousands of Lealfast are, presumably, going to descend from the sky. It might not do much for the mood of the camp, which is already restless. Do you have any..." Axis stopped, searching for the word.
Maximilian wiped the razor on a cloth, then set it to one side. "Plans?" He picked up a towel and wiped his face and neck clean of soap, then handed the towel to Serge, who cleared away the shaving paraphernalia. "Yes, of a kind. Axis, I need you to assemble as much of the army as you can manage by midafternoon, in the space surrounding that small hill about four hundred paces away to the north. You know it?"
Axis nodded. It was a good place for one man to address a huge crowd.
It was also a good place for one man to be obliterated by an angry mob.
"I can't protect you there, Maxel," Axis said softly.
"I know. I live or die by my words and actions today."
"You seem very calm about it."
Maximilian gave a slight shrug.
"Have you heard from Eleanon?"
"Yes. He and his fighters are close, gathered about an hour's flight from here. They know when to arrive, and where. Don't worry, Axis. I will be careful with the introductions."
"What do you want me to do with the generals?"
Maximilian didn't answer immediately, considering Axis. "The generals?" he said after a moment. "At the front again, as they were when we met Malat and Georgdi. Now, Axis, you have a couple of hundred thousand men to organize. Best get to it."
Axis gave Maximilian a measured look--the man was keeping something from him--but in the end he just nodded a farewell as he rose and left.
It had be
en a very long time since Axis had command of an army, and never one of quite this size. He had yet to feel out his chain of command through all of the units, and still depended very greatly on Insharah to relay his orders through the mass of men.
Still, Axis had spent a goodly portion of the nights on the long trail sitting about campfires talking, and entertaining with his harp and voice, and although there was initial disquiet and muttering, by noon most of the army was moving, as asked, north toward the hill where Maximilian would address them.
They took no gear with them and only hand weapons--Axis had thought about ordering they take no weapons at all, but knew that, firstly, he'd never be able to enforce such an order and, secondly, weaponless men were even more likely to be moved to anger and action when faced with a strange and unnerving situation than those who at least had a sword or knife to hand.
Once the bulk of the men were moving, Axis and Insharah walked toward the generals' tents. Axis wasn't looking forward to talking to them, and even less to persuading them to attend this gathering.
"They've been too quiet these past days," he said to Insharah as they approached Lamiah's tent. "I
should have spoken to them earlier."
Insharah shrugged. "No doubt they've been plotting and planning," he said, and then there was no more time for words as they halted before the sentry at Lamiah's tent.
"Your master is in?" Axis said to the man.
"Washing, my lord," the guard said. "He would not wish to be disturbed before he is fully garbed."
"Lamiah is a laggard indeed," Axis said, "if he still wanders undressed at this time of day."
He stepped forward, meaning to enter the tent, but the sentry grabbed at his arm. "My lord--"
The sentry got no further, for Insharah wrenched him back.
"Watch what you do, man!" Insharah barked, and Axis sent the sentry a hard look before he lifted the tent flap and stepped inside.
It was empty. Empty, that is, save for a stripped camp bed and dirty dishes with congealed and mouldy scraps stuck to their surfaces.
There was no man, let alone a general, washing.
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