Goldenmark

by Jean Lowe Carlson

  About everything that had happened these past few months. About how she had changed. Pausing as she set a leather-bound volume into the crate, she lifted her hand. Gazing at her pale skin, seeing blue veins beneath her long, slender fingers. Rubbing her fingertips together, it was almost as if she could feel a buzzing sensation in them, like some strange energy poured through her now – something more than excitement; more than alertness.

  Suddenly, she felt a breath of wind stir the catacomb. The hard thump of boots hitting stone came, as if two someones had fallen from the ceiling. Every hair upon Eleshen’s body was instantly alert. Dressed in her Kingsman garb, she shifted immediately into the deep shadows behind a stout cendarie stack, both longknives from her belt drawn. Crouched in a fighter’s stance, she waited. Invisible, ready. Waves of thrilling energy poured through her – eager for a fight, to battle whatever intruder had surprised her.

  She held it in check. It wouldn’t do to accidentally skewer a Jenner monk who was here to help her – though how anyone could have fallen from a ceiling of solid stone was unfathomable. The smooth voices beyond the sconce-lights at the end of the stack were not anyone she knew.

  “No one’s here. Let’s move.” A medium baritone spoke, smooth like ghosts on a dark wind.

  “Dammit, Khouren! You could have warned me we were going to drop thirty feet!” A man’s tenor voice held a rough growl, but also a laugh of humor in it.

  “I didn’t know it was so deep,” the first retorted. “We can get to the larders from here, fetch something to eat.”

  The speaker slid from the shadows, and Eleshen beheld a man of slender muscles and medium-tall build, dressed in silken charcoal garb that ate the light. The hood of his grey gear was down, braids pulled half-back from his face, their incredible bluebottle color glinting in the light of the glass lamps. His pale grey eyes flicked around, arresting Eleshen from a chiseled, handsome face – though he didn’t spy her in the shadows at the end of the stacks.

  And suddenly, Eleshen knew him.

  The Ghost of Roushenn.

  Elohl had been beautiful in a rugged sort of way, but the Ghost was disarming, a haunting kind of masculine perfection. Those eyes stared at her, not in apology, not with any kind of emotion except a possessing fervency that she could almost feel radiating out from his silent being. It was almost as if he could see her in the shadows, but then his gaze slipped past, surveying the rest of the room. Tingles rioted through Eleshen, like she’d been struck by live lightning.

  The Ghost seized his taller, red-haired companion by the arm and urged them forward, one hand to the hilt of his longknife. Suddenly, Eleshen knew she had to make herself known or they might move on and be gone, and she would never see her savior again.

  “There’s no path to the larders from here. Besides, if you’ve come to raid them, you’ll find them disappointingly empty at present.” Eleshen’s voice rang through the darkness from between the deep stacks. Hard yet sultry, her voice was almost unrecognizable even to herself: it was a voice of command, of battle. A voice of challenge and righteousness. The Ghost of Roushenn startled so badly he jolted, one foot falling down through the stone floor before he righted himself. The red-haired man with the long Elsthemi braids spun to face their unseen foe with both longknives drawn.

  “Who are you?” The redhead demanded. “Show yourself!”

  “I might just ask, who are the both of you? And how did you get in here?” Eleshen demanded from the shadows. She slid forward showing herself in the light of the glass lamps, knives still ready, and saw both men arrested by her appearance – undone by what she was now.

  Eleshen had been golden-haired and pretty the last time the Ghost had seen her, but now she wondered if he even recognized her. Her heart-shaped face was similar now that she’d gained some meat back, but she was still far more lean than she’d been. Her cheeks were high and full, her jaw strong and defiant, and she set that jaw now, giving the intruders a stern eyeball. With a toss of her head, she flicked her long cable of otter-sleek black hair back over her shoulder – her longknives still ready in her hands.

  But as the Ghost of Roushenn stared in shock, she realized that he did know her. His dark eyelashes flickered, his lips fallen open. “Eleshen den’Fenrir!”

  “You know this woman? Sweet Aeon! Why don’t you introduce us instead of standing there with your tongue falling out all over the floor while we’re in danger of being gutted?” The red-haired fellow was a rogue, Eleshen could smell it. In a sweep of courtly but renegade glory, he slid his longknives away, then executed a perfect bow – his laughing green eyes not leaving her violet ones for a moment.

  “My name is Ihbram den’Sennia, milady Eleshen. Forgive my nephew and I’s rash intrusion on your—” His gaze flicked to the crate of tomes. “Cataloguing.”

  “Give me one reason to not cut your glib tongue from your mouth, rascal,” Eleshen lifted a dark eyebrow, pointing one longknife at him. “And I may think about it. State your business in the First Abbey.”

  The redhead, Ihbram, coughed in a spasm, covering a laugh. His green eyes were piercing, challenging and sexual. “Well, milady, with such beauty and ferocity hiding among the Jenners, how could I have possibly—”

  “Enough, Ihbram.” The Ghost of Roushenn slid forward in front of his comrade, and did far more than a courtly bow. He sank to one knee before Eleshen, his hands far from his weapons, lifting his amazing pale grey eyes up to hers.

  “My pardons. My uncle’s tongue wags inappropriately with women. We’ve come to the Abbey upon a mission of dire importance, and perhaps you can help. We need to meet with King-Protectorate Temlin den’Ildrian. At once. It concerns the safety of the Abbey against Lhaurent den’Alrahel.”

  Eleshen’s brows climbed her forehead. She knew the Ghost had dumped a veritable treasure-trove of Lhaurent’s documents upon Temlin’s desk, but from the way Temlin had described that interaction, she’d thought the Ghost long gone from the city. Yet, here he was – not an actual ghost, but a man of flesh and bone, gazing up at her, imploring her for help.

  “I—” Eleshen was undone a moment, as the Ghost watched her with his uncanny grey eyes. A pale, luminous color, they reminded Eleshen of Elohl’s. But where Elohl’s eyes had held unceasing storms, the Ghost’s gaze was both brighter and far more ruined. Something ancient held court in those eyes. Something that had seen so much darkness, it was almost startled to come back to the light.

  Eleshen paused, arrested, the knives in her hands forgotten. This man was her savior. He’d spied upon Abbot Lhem’s torture of her and come to her rescue. He was an enigma wrapped in a mystery, wrapped in a conundrum, and Eleshen quite suddenly wanted to figure him out. Gazing at him now, she still couldn’t tell if those grey eyes were sorrowful or menacing, but the shine in them spoke of a fervency she couldn’t deny. It pulled at something deep within her newly awakened self.

  “I can take you to see the King-Protectorate,” she spoke at last, mastering herself. “On two conditions.”

  “Name them.” The Ghost was fervent, rapt with attention.

  “One. No one inside the Abbey’s walls is injured by either of you in any way.”

  “Done.” The Ghost promised. “And two?”

  A slight smile lifted Eleshen’s lips. “Tell me your name. I assume you’re not called the Ghost of Roushenn by your uncle here. What name do you go by, and what can I call you?”

  Suddenly, all the darkness cleared from the Ghost’s haunting eyes. They shone, luminous, and he smiled as if startled to be seen. “Khouren.” He said at last. “You would do me a great honor, to call me by my given name. Khouren Alodwine.”

  “Get up, Khouren.” The redheaded man scoffed, rolling his eyes and palming a hand over his short-trimmed beard. “She’s not the bloody World Shaper.”

  But the Ghost, Khouren Alodwine, remained kneeling. Watching Eleshen, waiting for her as if she would bless him like a Queen. Slowly, Eleshen slid her longknives away. He’d promised her n
o harm, and in this moment, something inside her resonated with him like a plucked harp-string. Standing here, feeling intensity surging from him as he stared her down, she felt an answering fervency rise in her.

  She shivered, a rush of heat sweeping her as she stared into his eyes. Moving forward with a dreamlike intensity, she reached out. As her fingers neared his hand where it rested upon his knee, he turned his palm up. And then their fingertips met – shivering Eleshen to the depths of her soul.

  Her lips fell open; so did his. Eleshen couldn’t help it; she blushed furiously, and saw an answering flush rise upon his handsome cheeks. His eyes were wide, their pale grey almost burning with the heat of the current that passed between them. He hesitated, then lifted his other hand to cup hers, interlacing their fingers together. His touch was scalding. Eleshen shivered, feeling like she burned inside as his thumb brushed her knuckles.

  “Khouren Alodwine...” Eleshen breathed, hardly knowing her own words.

  “Milady Eleshen...” He answered, riveted.

  “All right, lovers.” Ihbram moved forward, a curious yet wary expression upon his face. “We’ve got to speak to the King-Protectorate, remember?”

  Eleshen blinked, her trance breaking. A rush of color flushed Khouren’s cheeks as he released Eleshen’s hand suddenly. Placing his hands on his knee, he heaved up from the stone floor in an outrageously fluid movement. Eleshen remembered how effortlessly he had carried her when she was wounded, as if heavy burdens weighed nothing. She’d learned that much about the Ghost – that his lean frame held more strength than any man she’d ever met.

  But the rest was a mystery yet to be discovered.

  “After you, milady,” Khouren murmured, gesturing for her to precede him through the catacomb toward the far end of the vault. Eleshen dipped her chin in a quick nod, then paced toward the stairs, leaving the glass lamps behind. Though her heart hammered her chest to feel the Ghost following her up the dark spiral staircase, she kept her hands near her longknife hilts. Attraction meant nothing – he was her savior, but who was he really?

  Her mind churned as she led the Ghost and his uncle up to the bright day and shut the wrought-iron grate behind them. Beckoning in the midday sunshine, she moved along the gravel path that flanked the Annex to a side-door. Khouren stepped up, hauling the heavy ironbound door open like a gentleman before she could. Eleshen gave a brisk nod, meeting his eyes before proceeding in.

  The pressure of his attention upon her back as she jogged up the stairs to the upper gallery was electric. She was out of breath when she hit the upper landing, but not from exercise. Eleshen moved on with fast strides so the Ghost could not catch her eye again. Nodding to the four Kingsmen guards that stood at attention beside the double-doors of Temlin’s war-rotunda, she pushed in with no announcement. Temlin was there, just as she knew he would be. He hardly left this hall now, the myriad ironwood tables upon the dais cluttered with Lhaurent’s missing scrolls and ledgers, now guarded at all hours. Glancing up as she barged in, Temlin was thankfully alone in the vaulted space, lit bright in the rays of the lion pearled-glass window that captured the high afternoon sun.

  “The Ghost!” Temlin’s mouth dropped open, his green eyes bulging at their entry.

  “His name is Khouren Alodwine, he’s very real, and he’s here to see you.”

  Eleshen gave an efficient summary as she marched to the dais and sprang up beside Temlin. One hand settled to her longknife hilt as she turned, eyeballing the two men who approached more slowly. The redhead shut the doors, and the two moved forward in a synergy that reminded Eleshen of brothers rather than an uncle-nephew pair.

  “Well.” Temlin rolled up a scroll he’d been perusing and set it aside. “I suppose I should thank you, Khouren Alodwine, for the bounty of information on Lhaurent’s operations that you delivered us. The Ghost of Spies, I think, would be a better title for you than Ghost of Roushenn.”

  “King-Protectorate.” Khouren sank to one knee, and Ihbram did the same beside him.

  “Get up!” Temlin barked irritably. “Kneeling wastes your time and mine. I don’t have to ask how you got in here when the Abbey’s gates are locked and barricaded, do I? So what do you want?”

  “We’ll not waste your time.” Khouren’s gaze was intense. “My uncle and I have come to give you a warning.”

  “A warning?” Temlin’s red eyebrows climbed his face as he set a fist to the table. “Does Lhaurent issue threats that you deliver as errand-boy?”

  “Dammit, Khouren! Learn a little diplomacy in all your eons, will you?” Ihbram stepped forward with an exasperated growl for his nephew, then gave a genteel bow to Temlin. “King-Protectorate. My name is Ihbram Alodwine, though I go by the surname den’Sennia, and this is my nephew, Khouren Alodwine. What my nephew with his poor choice of words intended to say is that the Abbey is in danger. We have news of it, and have come to make sure you know.”

  “Ah.” Temlin straightened, but set his fist on his hip instead. His hawkish green eyes pierced one man, then the other. “So?”

  Ihbram gave a smile at Temlin’s brusqueness. “I’m afraid that my nephew, when he delivered Lhaurent’s more precious items into your care, did not think his plan through.”

  “Explain.” Temlin’s eyes narrowed.

  “As you may have surmised, my nephew has wyrria.”

  “Obvious.” Temlin snorted, but a grin stole over his lips now. “What are you getting at, Brigadier?”

  “Wyrria, as you most likely also know, tends to run in families.”

  “So you also have some, is that it? Also walk through walls like smoke, can you?”

  “Yes. And no. I can block minds.” Ihbram gave a renegade smile, and Eleshen sensed that he and Temlin would get along famously.

  “Impressive.” Temlin lifted an eyebrow, shrewd. “Something like the Kreth-Hakir Brethren?”

  “I am nothing like the Kreth-Hakir.” Ihbram’s voice was suddenly cold, as his green eyes flashed with a subtle temper. “In any case, you can trust my information.”

  “Oh I can, can I?” Temlin countered, his head cocked with interest.

  Ihbram lifted his hands, slowly, making sure Temlin knew he wasn’t going for a knife. Unbuckling his worn brown High Brigade jerkin at its crossover collar, he opened it wide, then pulled open the laces of his white shirt. Baring his chest, he slowly grasped a rope-knife at his belt. Lifting it pinched in the web of his thumb with his hand still open as if in surrender, he used the small knife to nick the center of his chest. Blood flowed in a long, thick trickle, and upon his chest, curling out crimson like smoke in burning water, the Shemout Alrashemni Bloodmark of Kingsmount-and-Stars appeared. Though in a strange, highly stylized version than what Eleshen had seen upon Temlin’s chest.

  Temlin blinked, then inhaled a long breath. “Those are strangely done. Not a style I recognize.”

  “That’s because it was done in Cennetia, six hundred years before you were born.”

  Ihbram’s gaze was utterly level; no lie was in his eyes. Eleshen startled, and she saw Temlin ripple with astonishment at her side. Her mind reeled, face-to-face with a man who purported to be an ancient Shemout Alrashemni.

  “Is that the truth?” Eleshen’s gaze flicked to Khouren.

  He gave a quiet nod. “I myself am over four hundred years old. How do you think the tales of the Ghost of Roushenn haunting the palace have lived for so long? Because I have. My uncle is no different. Our clan is gifted with wyrria and immensely long-lived.”

  “There are others of you?” Temlin’s gaze was sharp. Eleshen could practically see his mind calculating exactly how these two could be used to his aims.

  “They live in secret.” Khouren was very quiet. “It is not our place to expose them, for it could do them harm. Just as you understand the secrecy in the cells of the Shemout, King-Protectorate, so our clan maintains secrecy of our identities, for safety.”

  “Only because of recent events do we take such a risk and make ourselves known
to you,” Ihbram continued. “And only because a Rennkavi has been Goldenmarked, the Prophecy of the Uniter come alive since Highsummer.”

  “Elohl den’Alrahel.” Temlin crossed his arms over his wiry chest. “You mean him, don’t you? Not Lhaurent.”

  “Indeed.” Khouren answered, almost too fast.

  “However,” Ihbram glanced at Khouren with an almost exasperated look, then back to Temlin, “Lhaurent is not to be underestimated. He has a tremendous amount of power, both from his own natural wyrria, the power to persuade and dominate, and what he has been blessed with by the Goldenmarks. And he has talismans, ancient artifacts stolen from the Alodwine line, that focus his power.” Ihbram gave Khouren an accusing glance, as if Khouren had something to do with that.

  “Because of an accident... after the Queen’s coronation,” Khouren spoke, avoiding his uncle’s gaze, “Lhaurent has wakened a vast wyrria throughout the city. One that he can resonate with, and harness. He’s able to track things, people. Spy without having any eyes in a location, if he focuses enough. He is still learning his power, but I made a regrettable mistake, delivering to you items he could summon to his mind, items he was familiar with.”

  Temlin blinked hard. He rubbed a hand down his short beard. “Fuckitall. You’re saying that Lhaurent knows exactly what you delivered to me, where they’re stashed, and who’s been reading them?”

  Khouren flushed. He looked down, unable to meet Temlin’s gaze.

  “Most likely.” Ihbram’s voice was hard. He stared Khouren down like a dog that had piddled on the rug.

  “We have no time. The negotiation is in three days.” Temlin murmured it to himself, though Eleshen heard. A tremor shook Temlin’s hand as he reached up and rubbed at his beard again. He suddenly looked old, as if his years had come tumbling back, even though his body was young. His gaze met Eleshen’s, and she read there everything he feared: that if Lhaurent knew about the cobalt tomes, he’d come get them. By any means necessary, with whatever secret force he was hiding.