Fortress in the Eye of Time

by C. J. Cherryh

  “You do.” Cefwyn seemed faintly amused, and then sober again as he leaned back in the chair and shoved it back a little to face him across the corner of the table. “Lucky for everyone you were able to get the lady Ninévrisë to come to Henas’amef.

  I dislike encouraging you to your folly, but I think there would have been a far worse issue without you.—Emuin did explain that you felt something was about to happen, and that you went for that reason.”

  “I couldn’t defeat him.”

  “Who? This Hasufin?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Forget the ‘sir.’ Forget ‘m’lord’ while we’re talking in private.

  Tell me the absolute truth. Tell me every detail you know and I shan’t interrupt.”

  He did try. He began with stealing Petelly, and ended with their coming to Henas’amef; and once a guard came in to say a councillor wanted to see Cefwyn and once to give Cefwyn a note, for which Cefwyn excused himself a moment and wrote a brief reply, but Cefwyn would not let him go on until he had seated himself again and heard everything. Cefwyn made him tell about the Regent and the gray place. He made him tell about Ninévrisë meeting him there, and about what he had told Ninévrisë about his having the portrait. It was the longest anyone had ever listened to him, except Mauryl, and he was less and less certain, when he came to the business on the road, that Cefwyn wanted to hear him in that detail, but Cefwyn said leave out nothing. He was not certain that his talking to the Elwynim about the portrait might not make Cefwyn angry; but Cefwyn gave no sign of it. Cefwyn kept all expression from his face.

  And when he had finished, and said so, Cefwyn nodded and seemed to think for a moment.

  “You dream of this Hasufin. But you say he’s very real.”

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  “Very real, sir.”

  “And can cause harm?”

  “I think that he could. I think certainly that he moves the Shadows. And the wind. He made the door come in. He cracked the walls. He made the balconies fall.”

  “Certainly substantial enough,” Cefwyn agreed. “But he can’t come here.”

  “The lord Regent said he could come where he had something to come to. Someone who listened to him. I think Heryn listened to him. Not well. And not the way the lord Regent did, because I don’t think Heryn was a wizard. I think it’s most dangerous if wizards did it.”

  “But to some extent, Hasufin could come here.”

  “If we began to listen to him, he could, yes, sir, that’s what I think.”

  “Very good reason not to do that, is it not?”

  “I agree, sir. But he’s much stronger. Much stronger. And we should go there.”

  “To Ynefel.”

  “Yes, sir. We should stop him.”

  “How?”

  Tristen bit his lip. “I don’t know. I tried.” He felt the failure sharply. “If the lord Regent had been stronger, maybe the two of us could have driven him back. We did, for a time.”

  “Could you and Emuin do so?”

  He did not want to say the truth. But Cefwyn had expected him to be honest, and Cefwyn was listening to him. “Emuin is afraid,” he said. “Emuin is afraid of him.—And the lady can’t help. She’s only just able to hear me when I speak to her. She could be in great danger. She’s not as strong as the lord Regent.

  Maybe she could learn—but I couldn’t say.”

  Cefwyn seemed to think that over a time. “Tell no one else about the lady.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I have offered to marry her. She’s accepted. I expect to meet with her—in not very long. Should this wizardry of hers prevent me?”

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  It was loss for him. But he could not mislead Cefwyn from what was good. “I don’t think so, sir.”

  Again Cefwyn gazed at him a long time without speaking. “I don’t think it should, either. You don’t affright me. You dismay me at times, but you have no power to frighten me, not when I have you close at hand. It’s when you’re gone that I’m afraid.”

  “Of me, sir?”

  “No, not of you. Of your not being here. No matter what, Tristen, always be my friend. And, damn it all, don’t say ‘sir’

  to me.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “You mustn’t steal horses, either. If I gave you a horse—which would you?”

  “I don’t wish you to give me a horse.”

  “Well, you can’t be stealing them, either. How is that to look, the King’s friend, a horse-thief? You have an excellent eye for horses. I should like a foal of that red mare, I do tell you. You may have Gery, if you like, though. Look over the horses I have.

  Take the one you want, except Danvy. You should have at least three or four.”

  “I should like Petelly,” he said. It did not console him. But that Cefwyn wished to give him something said that Cefwyn wished to please him. That was something.

  “Which is Petelly?” Cefwyn asked.

  “The one I stole. I like him.”

  “That’s not very ambitious. I have far finer.”

  “Petelly is a very good horse.”

  “Well, I’m sure. And if you picked him out I should have another look at him. But he’s not enough for heavy armor. And I shall ask you to do several things for me.”

  “What are they?”

  “First—” Cefwyn marked the item with a finger. “Go down to master Peygan. Do you know him? Uwen does.”

  “The master armorer.”

  “Exactly. These are chancy times, and if you ride off again into a fight, by the gods, you’ll go wearing more than you 572

  wear about the halls. Choose anything you like. I’ll give the armsmaster his orders. And you’ll want a horse that can carry you wearing it. I have one in mind. One of mine, in fact, out of a mare I have.”

  “I would be very pleased,” he began, and intended to say he hardly knew what to do with such an extravagant gift. From abandoned—he found himself smothered in gifts he supposed proved Cefwyn’s forgiveness—perhaps even Cefwyn’s determination not to abandon him. But Mauryl had given him things just before—just before the balconies fell down.

  “Good!” Cefwyn said. “That’s settled. You’ll join me this evening. Will you?”

  “I would be very glad to.”

  “Then—” Cefwyn gathered himself up, leaning on the table, and Tristen understood it was dismissal, perhaps business disposed of with that. But unaccountably Cefwyn embraced him, and held him at arms’ length and looked him close in the face.

  “My friend. Whatever happens, whatever you hear of me, whatever I hear of you, no one will ever make us distrust one another. You’ll take another oath, do you see, in a few days—but I shall not ask you this time to swear to obey me. Only tell me now you’ll take me into your confidence. Kings should not be surprised. Kings should never be surprised. That’s all I ask.”

  “I have promised Uwen, too. But I might have to go.”

  “Do you know that already? Damn it, what do you know?”

  He didn’t know how to answer. Cefwyn reached toward him, toward his collar, and pulled at the chain he wore, of that amulet Cefwyn had given him.

  “Does this,” Cefwyn asked, “—does this give you comfort?”

  “That you gave it comforts me.”

  “Does it protect you?”

  “I haven’t felt so.” He had never looked for it to do so. “But I’ve never looked at it in the gray place.”

  “The gray place.”

  “Where Shadows live.”

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  “Tell me. You can tell me. What gods do you serve? Emuin’s?”

  Gods should, perhaps, be a Word. Men seemed to hold it so.

  But he found nothing to shape it for him. He reached for the chain and slid the amulet back within his collar. “I don’t know.

  I don’t know, Cefwyn.”

  “And, with you, not knowing…encompasses much, does it not?—Can you say what the Elwynim are doing, up by Emwy?”

&nb
sp; He shook his head. “But they will know that the lady is here.

  Aséyneddin listens to Hasufin. I am sure he does. He will dream it. He most likely knows.”

  “Is he a wizard?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t met him.”

  “I heed you,” Cefwyn said at last. “You are free. But I ask you, wait and ride with us. Will you?—We shall ride to Emwy and deal with the Elwynim rebels. If you learn anything, by whatever means, you will tell me. Promise me that.”

  “I promise it.”

  “And don’t keep me wondering where you are, or what you think. I am fond of you, damn you. I need you. I shall be sad all my life if you leave me.” Cefwyn shook at him a little. “I shall have to be a king. I’m obliged to. It’s a damned boring thing to be.—Join me tonight. Will you?”

  It was a dismissal. But Cefwyn embraced him a second time, and with a fierceness that said he was welcome, and wanted, and would not be abandoned, and he held tightly to that embrace, his heart beating hard even while he asked himself was it only kind, what Cefwyn did, and did it hide what Cefwyn knew he would do.

  There had been a time he would have been sure that Cefwyn would know what to do. There had been a time he had been sure that Cefwyn would protect him.

  Now, if nothing else, it seemed quite the other way about. In the lord Regent he had lost someone who might have stood with him against Hasufin, had his Road led him there instead of here—so certainly so he had to ask himself whether he had indeed mistaken his way in the world; for he knew now with 574

  clearest sight that Emuin had the knowledge, but lacked the courage to begin a fight, and that Cefwyn, who did have all the courage anyone could ask, was helpless against this enemy as they all were helpless to stop Cefwyn’s pain, or turn aside the danger that was coming against him.

  Mauryl might have helped Cefwyn. Mauryl could have worked a healing on him, and Cefwyn would not be in such unremitting pain as was beginning to mark his face.

  But none of them, not Uleman, not Emuin, not Cefwyn, were what Mauryl had been. He himself knew reading and writing and horsemanship; he knew the use of a sword. He knew things about buildings that no longer were, like what he now knew was an older state of the lower hall.

  But he knew nothing of what he most wanted, which was to be what Mauryl had wished him to be, and to make Cefwyn happy and safe and free from his wound.

  “Thank you,” he said to Cefwyn in leaving, and wished to the bottom of his heart that he were better than he was, and stronger than he was, and wiser than he was; and he wished that there were indeed some wise old man to take care of him and tell him his fears were empty.

  The fact was they were not empty. And would not be. He had to do something. He did not imagine what that was. But that was what Mauryl had left him to do—even if his worst fears were true, and he had been mistaken in coming to Cefwyn, he had to find a way to make things right; or, if he had been right, to turn things as they were…into what they had to be.

  The stables had sent in their accounts—Haman did not write well, and the scribe who had taken them down from Haman’s dictation had a florid hand clearly Bryalt in style, which he was trying to puzzle out, when Idrys came to say that the lady had answered his last missive, among missives they had been exchanging with increasing frequency since breakfast.

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  In fact, the lady was at the door.

  “Damn!” Cefwyn cried, and looked for a place to bestow the border reports, the maps. “Here.” He shoved maps at a passing page. “In the map-cabinet, for the good gods’ sake.—Annas!”

  More pages were running. He handed them the maps and the sensitive documents. “Put them in the bedchamber.”

  “Where in the bedchamber, Your Majesty?”

  “On the bed! Put them somewhere.—Idrys, let the lady in.”

  He did not want to use the stick. He set that in the corner.

  He had put on the cursed bezaint shirt under the russet velvet, as Idrys insisted, and carried a dagger, which was not his habit: he counted that precaution enough against murderous Elwynim intentions and subterfuges of marriage.

  “Are you quite ready, m’lord?”

  “Open the damned door, Idrys!” He forced the leg to bear his weight naturally. It would do so once the initial pain passed.

  He walked toward the door, and was prepared for an informal meeting such as he had requested in the last note he had sent upstairs.

  Ninévrisë wore darkest blue velvet, with silver cord—was in mourning, by the quiet black sash she wore; she wore velvet sleeves, and wore the Regent’s crown. Her hair was modestly braided now, with a black ribbon—and answering the provenance of it, Margolis was with her, Margolis, the armorer’s wife, a matronly woman of a constitution undaunted by relocation to the least civil province in the realm; Margolis could bring order to any situation—and if that gown had not been in the packs the Elwynim had brought, he could well believe that Margolis had stitched it up on a moment’s notice. He did not know who had enlisted her to Ninévrisë’s aid, but he was grateful.

  “Welcome,” he said. “Your Grace of Elwynor.” He took Ninévrisë’s offered hand, and after it, Margolis’ stout one. “Dear Margolis. Thank you. Gracious as always.” The last was for Margolis; but his eyes were for Ninévrisë whose demeanor was reserved, and whose mourning sash was a

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  reminder to sober propriety. “After a day of messages—thank you for coming. I would by no means press your attendance—”

  “My father is not lost,” Ninévrisë said firmly, and walked past him to look about the room. “Lord Tristen said so. So I do not mourn him for lost. Nor do I count my war lost before it begins.

  May we dismiss our guards, Your Majesty, and speak frankly?”

  “Lady,” he said to Margolis. “Lord Commander.” The latter to Idrys, who offered the armsmaster’s wife a gracious retreat, likely no farther than the outside room.

  The lady of Elwynor was so beautiful, so—unreachable, so unattainable by any wile or grace he had ever used for any other infatuation he had had, offering herself to him—and yet not to be had, ever, if he made her despise him. He had felt as attracted to a lady, but never so unsure of the lady’s reasons in accepting, and never so unsure of acceptance when he had committed himself this extravagantly.

  “I was delighted by your acceptance,” he said, “and now—”—devastated by your coldness, he could finish, in courtly fashion. But it would be a mistake to enter that ground with this woman, he thought, because she would not quickly abandon the manner he set between them. “Now,” he said, with utter honesty, “I see that you have reservations that did not at all enter today’s messages. Constraint upon you was never my wish, Your Grace. I swear I shall keep my word. I am sad if you think so badly of me. And I assure you I shall be your ally in war. Common sense constrains that. So—you are not obliged to accept my suit.”

  She was not a woman, he had thought, who would use tears.

  But she turned away in the best tragic style and wiped at her eyes furiously.

  He was angry, then, seeing her set upon him with such common tactics.

  She stayed with her back turned. Wiped at her eyes a second time. “Forgive me,” she said. “I had not intended to do this.”

  “Please,” he said coldly. It had not yet reached him, how 577

  many of his plans were affected by her refusal of marriage, and how many more were threatened if he insulted her pride. He felt more than angry. He felt, rejected, the ground giving way under his feet; he was desperate for the peace that he might yet salvage, and he could not, like a man stung in his personal hopes, answer in temper. “If not your love, Your Grace, at least I hope to win your good regard. I never wished to imply a condition to my help. What do you ask of me?”

  She looked slowly around at him, and turned and stared at him as if she by no means believed it.

  “That you grant us the camp,” she said. “That you aid my men to cross to Elwynor an
d gain what help they can.”

  “I grant that. Freely.”

  “Why?” she demanded of him.

  “Your Grace, your enemies as well as your friends will cross the river to find you. They have killed my lord father as well as yours, and just as recently. If your men will hold them at the bridge and remove their legitimacy with their supporters, that would be a great service.”

  “And you would let me go.”

  “I promised safe-conduct. I give you alliance.”

  “I shall not support any claims of territory, Your Majesty of Ylesuin.”

  “Nor shall I make any. As I recall, you came to me. I did not seek this. I did not seek the war which you have graciously brought with you. But it is here, it would have been here eventually on any account, and I had rather support your legitimate claim and far more pleasant countenance than have my father’s murderers as neighbors. So you see—my offer was well thought.

  I am sorry to have conveyed any other impression. I thought, yesterday, that we understood one another.”

  She heaved a small breath, and another, and the tears were still on her face, but her face was calmer.

  “Yesterday we did. But—” Another perilous breath. “I thought all night—what your reasons might be.”

  “And then sent the message?”

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  “It seemed a way to be done with it.” She ducked her head, bit her lip, and looked up. “I have no better suitor. And I find you not the devil I thought. With many worse waiting in Elwynor—who would also take arms against Aséyneddin.”

  “Pray don’t consider me a last resort, m’lady. I do have some pride. You are free to go.”

  “I might like you. I think I do like you.—And I don’t consider you a last resort. To save my people, I would marry Aséyneddin.

  And put a dagger in him. That is my last resort.”

  “Good gods, do you consider putting one in me? I hope not.”

  “No.” She walked toward him, hands folded, and looked up at him. “I do think I like you far better than I thought I would.”