For several moments, the king paused, fingering the glowing bauble at the tip of his staff. Finally, he quietly bent down to Wittendon as if to consult and said, “Examine him.”
Wittendon arose and was about to take the prisoner to another room for questioning when the king said, “Not in words. Use your magic if it happens to exist and examine this slave’s memories. Tell me whether it is truth that nestles among his words. Or lies.”
Wittendon put his hand to the man’s head as he was expected to do, but as usual no magic poured forth. Instead he looked into his captive’s eyes and saw fear and hope, rebellion and desperation crossing like stars tumbling through the night sky. “I believe he speaks true,” Wittendon said.
His father sighed audibly, clicking his staff to the marble floor so that the sound echoed throughout the hall. “Believe nothing. You must know.” In a bound, the king came forward and placed his palm to Jager’s temple. Jager paled and staggered backwards.
The king nodded as though an idea had been confirmed. He motioned to his Veranderen guards to hold the weakened human up so he could look to the king. “You are aware that this year we once again celebrate the centennial tournament of the Motteral Mal.”
“Yes, Lord King,” Jager whispered.
From beside the throne, Crespin took a Grey-painted scythe and placed it in front of the prisoner. Slowly, deliberately, he lifted the tip and with it, cut a line along Jager’s hand. Jager winced as a trickle of blood rose to the surface, but he did not cry out. Indeed the shock of the cut seemed to revitalize him and he regained his footing.
The king replaced the weapon and looked steadily at the human. “A tip of any kind can harm a human, but only one made from the mighty Grey can affect those of my kind. Its very presence weakens those of my race. Your kin, inept as they are with magics of any kind, are surprisingly unaffected by the power of the Grey. You will mine and then produce these weapons for our tournament. Exact measurements and qualifications will be given you by the captain of my guard, and you will be escorted promptly to the forge for a night’s rest. Thereafter, you will be taken to the mines.”
Jager did not move to go with the guard, but stood solidly before the king and said, “And instead of tidings of my death, food and firewood will be sent to my family.”
The king paused, a hint of amusement in his eyes, as though he thought the prisoner was joking. With a wave of his hand he dismissed him. “You ask too much.”
Jager did not move, even when the wolves of the Königsvaren flanked him on either side. “I have very little to lose, your majesty. And, as you must know, I ask but little.”
Wittendon stared at the prisoner, remembering again the heat he had felt as the man had touched his head to that of his wife. On the other side of his father, Wolrijk’s lip curled up, revealing blood-red gums and long incisors. Several of the general’s teeth were cracked and jagged, yet still strong and sharp like multi-bladed swords.
Sitting on the great chair, the king asked, “You consider your own life so little to lose? You would go to the executioner rather than work at my forge for free?”
“Whether I live or die makes little difference if food is not sent to my family. At least,” Jager paused. “It makes little difference to me, good king. To you, it would matter a great deal more. The smiths of your race cannot fashion the tips. Doing so weakens them to the point of sickness and even death. I know, too, of your ancient and ailing human blacksmith. Rumors run in the villages of his crumbling bones and the withering muscles that can barely lift a hammer to strike.”
Wittendon braced for his father’s anger. He could feel it surge through his father’s bones like a current of lightning through a metal rod. And then, just as quickly, it stopped, halted by his father’s calmest, quietest voice. “And what,” the king asked so quietly it seemed almost gentle, “makes you think I will need to comply with such a petty bargain. You care much for your family. You wish wood sent. You wouldn’t want them to be cold. Well, then, if you feel so deeply for their welfare, consider this. If you do not mine and smith for me, I will send wood to your kin and much of it. Your wife and child will be strapped to a stake and burned at the center of your village where the fire will then be allowed to spread to as many straw-lined huts as it can before the slovenly human forces can subdue its flames. Now,” the king paused, smiling, “give me one reason, one tiny reason, captive human, why I should not do this if I wish for your compliance.”
Jager paused, and the whole room seemed to quiet. Wittendon watched the human, as he stood pale and perfectly still. Wolrijk licked his lips.
“Kill us,” Jager said at last. “And find another to mine and fashion your metal as well as I would have.”
The king sat silently for several minutes before speaking.
Wittendon was surprised. Usually his father was swift in his decrees and merciless in his judgments. At last the king spoke. “It is good,” the king said, “that I have forbidden gaming halls of any variety in your villages. It seems you are a gambler.”
Jager looked straight at the king. “But you, my lord. You do not take chances. Certainly not with things of great importance.”
The king did not speak, but smiled slightly and stared directly into Jager’s bright blue eyes. Jager began to tremble.
The king moved to Jager and held Jager’s chin in his paw—the long, golden nails extended up the cheeks of the human, as though Jager’s face was framed with daggers. “I do not take unnecessary risks,” the king said.
Still holding Jager’s face in his hand, the king signaled for a servant to take a message with instructions. “Your family will be sent food and wood, but that which they receive will be deducted from that which would have been given as rations to you. Do you understand?”
Jager nodded.
“If, for any reason, the lack of remaining rations leaves you unable to do your job and do it well, no more food will be sent. I do not need my smith fainting into his own fire. At least not until after the scythes are complete.”
Again, Jager nodded. Sweat had begun to drip from his forehead. The king flicked it off, leaving four long scratches. Crespin turned to Wolrijk. “Watch anything he touches. He will live until the blades are completed at which time we will fulfill the requirements of the law.” The king stamped a piece of paper, leaving Wolrijk to oversee that two cabbages and a duck be sent with half a cord of firewood to the family of the enslaved.
After Jager was escorted from the room, his wrists still in chains, the king turned to Wittendon. “Pity does a prince no favors and often leaves him dead at the end of the day. Is that clear?”
Wittendon nodded, surprised at the rebuke.
His father snorted with disgust and continued, “Nevertheless, this human’s skill as both miner and smith exceeds any I have yet known. He will indeed be worth more to us alive than dead. For a time.”
When his father left the room, Wittendon felt as though he were the slave while Jager was the esteemed son. The prisoner had a skill his father valued and a bold, almost reckless courage that could not be denied. While Wittendon had a weakness called pity. Somehow it didn’t seem to compare.
Chapter 10
“Why is it that the humans are unaffected by a metal that can bring a Verander to his knees. Or lower.” Wittendon fastened the weapons belt onto his practice tunic and looked to his trainer for an answer.
Sarak shrugged as they walked to the weapons room to retrieve their practice blades. The clouds hung low in the skies, threatening rain. Today they would practice on the Hill of Motteral—the point at which the third round of the Mal would begin.
“If they had access to it, the humans could even wear such a metal upon their wrists and necks as a type of adornment—the way our women wear gold and bronze.”
“Women like shiny things,” Sarak said, obviously distracted. They retrieved their weapons and began to walk towards the tall hill. The tips of their scythes had recently been painted with one inch of Grey by th
e ailing smith—not yet the real weapon, but enough of a taste to make their practices challenging and more real. Beneath the point of the mountain where they would practice was the only mine where the Shining Grey could be found. Under his very feet, Wittendon knew that the slave Jager was bent over the stones with a pickaxe in hand, searching for the dangerous ore with more fear of cave-ins than of the metal itself.
They walked on until the skies began to rattle with thunder. Sarak frowned. “We may have to alter our practice today. This mountain pulses with the power of the Grey and I do not like the idea of great bolts of electricity above us trying to reach the metal beneath.”
For most Veranderen, practice on the hill was exhausting. Wittendon, on the other hand, found it exhilarating. The grass and sky and fresh air, even if it was filled with cracks of thunder—it worked on his nerves to make him feel stronger than he ever felt in the stone-walled pavilion below. “Just a few rounds, perhaps,” he said to Sarak.
Sarak nodded, though not without glancing once again at the threatening clouds just north of them. They stopped about a mile from the Sacred Tablet—now empty of the Sourcestone that had once empowered their race. Without the Sourcestone, the Tablet was, in its way, also verlorn—a simple monument—a place where eager travelers lined up to kiss it or touch it or scrape it for luck. Yet for the duration of the Mal, the Tablet would become hallowed again. No crowds would go near it and it was there that the winner would be crowned Chancellor, second to the king.
A crack of thunder sounded nearby and Sarak quickly raised his blade. Wittendon met it with a fierce clash and the two began. Today Sarak’s blade was not hot, but it pulsed with electricity. “I can tell what you’re focusing on,” Wittendon laughed.
“Well,” Sarak said, catching his breath. “It’s like I said before—if there’s an emotion close to the surface that can be useful to you, take it. And use it.” At the last word, he struck Wittendon on the shoulder, sending a powerful bolt of electricity through his arm. Wittendon withdrew several steps, breathing heavily and trying to recover. Rain began to pelt his face and it roused him.
“Think soggy thoughts,” Sarak said, breathing heavier than he ever did in the practice rooms or pavilion. “Perhaps you can make your scythe like a wet towel and swat me with it.”
Wittendon charged at him and when he struck Sarak on the wrist, the blade cut straight and long. Wittendon gasped.
Sarak staggered back. “You are a terrible student. That was possibly the worst soggy thought I have ever experienced.” Sarak was still smiling, but his lips had paled to a near white and he sat upon the hillside, his wound dripping blood.
“I’m sorry,” Wittendon stammered.
“Just fetch me a towel,” Sarak said. “And some of my sister’s tonic from that bag. It should have me recovered far more quickly than any yammering from you.” Sarak’s words were good-natured, though his lips were nearly gray now.
Wittendon hurried to get the tonic, and a bolt of lightning struck nearby. Sarak groaned and slumped down. Wittendon could feel it too—the connection of the bolt to the ground beneath them—the buzz of energy as fire connected to rock and metal. Quickly, Wittendon poured Sadora’s tonic into Sarak’s wound. The tonic was yellow and smelled of year old goose eggs, but as soon as he applied it Sarak began groaning again. His cheeks took on some color and Wittendon helped him up.
“Well, this has just been a smashing good time,” Sarak said. “As you help me down this hill like I’m an old man, I’ll take comfort in the fact that your father won’t have me hanged for neglecting your training. You do well, my friend.” Sarak hobbled over to his bag. “Oddly so, actually.”
Wittendon put his arm under Sarak’s shoulders and supported most of his weight as the two made their way back down the hill. The worst of the storm was over and the rain took on a sweet smell.
“Take these,” Sarak said, handing Wittendon both of the scythes. “Return them to the weapons room. I’m going to see if Sadora hasn’t saved me a bit of berry tonic and then put my feet up for a bit.”
Wittendon took the weapons from his friend. When he did, Sarak looked steadily into Wittendon’s eyes with an intensity that made Wittendon uncomfortable and asked, “Are you not affected by it at all?”
Wittendon stepped back, wishing to break their gaze. By what? he was about to ask, but Sarak spoke again before he could.
“Never mind,” Sarak said, back to his jovial self. “I’ve been too long on that ridiculous hill. My mind stumbles back to the myths and nursery tales of childhood. Soon I’ll be wandering around muttering to myself like an old nanny.”
Wittendon put the weapons over his shoulder and released his friend. “Tomorrow,” he said. “At noon.”
“I suppose—if I’m not stitching some stockings and sharing gossip with the local grannies—that we can practice once more on that blasted hill.”
Wittendon smiled, dropped his friend off in his quarters, and turned toward the practice room just as Sadora exited a chariot pulled by four servants. Her gown was a swirl of blue and when she caught sight of Wittendon, she gave a low curtsy. He raised his hand and she rose gracefully, her bracelets gathering around her slender wrists—several on each arm, all blues and greens. Wittendon had seen other Veranderah of the court adopt this fashion, but none wore it so well.
“Good day, Lady Sadora,” Wittendon said. Normally, he would have gotten tongue-tied after that, but his fight on the hill had made him feel strong. “That color,” he said. “It suits you quite well.”
“Yes,” she said in her voice that always seemed to be laughing. “I rather like it myself.” She moved a step closer and he could smell the scent of moonflowers that always hovered around her. “The human slaves spin the silks in the east, then the Veranderen peasantry weaves it into fabric outside the southern gates. It’s dyed with the brightest dyes from the berries and roots imported from the mountainside villages in the south, and then finished and shipped from the Veranderen seaport, of course.”
Wittendon smiled politely. Maybe his brother Kaxon could have maneuvered through this conversation, but Wittendon knew he was in over his head. Sadora smiled and looked Wittendon in the eyes. “Imagine the labor that goes into such a dress.” Sadora paused, staring hard at Wittendon.
Wittendon looked down at his shoes, all his battle confidence lost in a discussion over blue fabric. When he looked up, Sadora was still staring at him with amber-colored eyes that shimmered and swam like layers of drizzled honey. He held her gaze without speaking for longer than he’d intended, until she blinked and laughed.
“Good day, my prince,” she said, curtsying again before gathering her skirts and hurrying to the art wing to meet a cluster of females all wearing similar bracelets and dresses.
Wittendon sighed. He’d heard some of the older servants cluck that the weight of Sadora’s gowns had squeezed the brains right out of her head, but Wittendon wasn’t so sure. Somehow whenever he was with her, he felt like the witless one.
Crespin had never intended to fall in love. Love was a weakness of the senses, a clouder of the mind, a drug worse than the human liquors. A fact that his departed wife had seemed intent on proving. She was the most loving Veranderah he had known, and the weakest of any of his race. He had been well aware that she had not wished to marry him. But he was unaccustomed to worrying about the wishes of others. They had wed two weeks after he had first desired it. Her station had improved. He had given her all she could ask and more. Yet still she refused to look at him. So many times he had stood in their quarters, holding her soft face in both of his hands while her eyes, ever, were cast down. Until several months after their marriage when she came to him at midday. She looked him directly in the face and spoke. “I come, my king, bearing flesh of your flesh and blood of your blood. The magicians and midwife both believe that several months hence I will bear a son.”
He had been pleased. Veranderen children were rare—born only to females between the 300th and 303rd years
and usually only to those who had been long-wed. It had not occurred to Crespin that he had married a Veranderah within that window, and even if it had, he would not have expected a child to come forth from such a short union. A rush of magic and something new shot through his frame and he pulled his beautiful wife to him. But she resisted, looking him again in the eye. “A king always rejoices for a son until that son rises in gifts and power. You are great, my king. And cunning. And your reputation is one of neither mercy nor meekness. I will not have you destroy my children.”
He stepped back, surprised. “My dear, he will be our son.”
“Which will make him both a threat and—when he is young—an easy target.”
For the first time since discovering her, Crespin paused to consider the Veranderah who stood before him. “I take what is good for my kingdom and I remove the rest,” he said.
“Perhaps,” she replied. “But your flesh is now carried in my body. You will make me a promise. Or I will destroy that which is your own twice over—my life, and his.”
The king could have crushed her, but he rather enjoyed his pretty wife and now that he knew she would soon produce for him something rare, he recognized—as he did with many of his most unique prizes—that he wanted to keep it. Furthermore, he was not much concerned over the babe she carried. It would be his and he would rule it as he did everything else. No other in his reign could usurp him; why then his child?
The king shrugged. “I will not destroy the child.”
“A promise,” she said. “A promise with an unbreakable spell.”
Her eyes, he noticed then, were the steely blue of a sword on a clear day. “Very well,” he said. “A promise.”
Grey Stone Page 7