Lady of Mercy

by Michelle Sagara

  As if his words were a trigger, the men began to head for the ruined wall like a single bolt. They converged upon the grounds they had once guarded, and little was left to stop them; beneath the ruins of rubble a stray limb could be seen here and there. They paid little attention.

  “Now comes the test,” Lorrence said, calling to his men. “Play your part as agreed. Corrin, take your sixty and head immediately to the barracks.”

  “Sir!”

  “The rest of you, follow me. We work toward the chamber of the governing council.”

  They flowed past like water, weapons out and ready.

  Unremarked on, Trethar followed behind them. He had served as promised, but he was still curious to see how the rest of the play unfolded.

  Tiras held his place beside his student, lending both light and encouragement. Twenty feet below, Erin and Darin waited, shunning the darkness with Lernari light.

  Erin’s arm rested gently on the shoulders of her companion. He could feel the constant trembling in it and was surprised to find that he himself was not shaking.

  “Damn this thing!”

  Darin winced.

  “Renar—”

  “No, I can do it. You’ve never seen it in operation.”

  The words had a hollow ring to them when they reached the two that waited. Darin counted the seconds, unsure whether he counted accurately, but unable to stop. It kept him from wondering if Trethar was still alive, and from wondering if any of those guards loyal to Renar had even made it to the castle.

  Damn. He’d lost count again. He started over and heard Renar give a short, sharp sound. He glanced up.

  Erin smiled. “I think—”

  “Got it!”

  From above, the dimmest of lights filtered down to touch their upturned faces. It was real light, not blood-light. Darin wanted to shout for joy—he hated these dark, cold tunnels.

  Anticipating him, Erin gently touched his lips with her fingers. Both Renar and Tiras scrambled up, and, after a few tense seconds, lowered the rope back down into the pit. Erin caught it and made a slipknot of it.

  “Ready?” she asked softly as she pushed it down around Darin’s arms.

  He nodded, and she gave the top of the rope an urgent tug.

  Soon. Soon they would be free to act.

  Tiras shed his winter garments with a silence and a speed that defied his age. Renar did the same. Both men wore light, smooth clothing that allowed for easy movement without the hindrance of bulk. They fumbled a moment with pockets, and then straightened out.

  It was odd to watch them mirroring each other’s actions so closely. But Darin could believe, as he struggled out of his jacket and two layers of sweater, that Renar had indeed been among the best of the older man’s students. There was a precision about his movements, an economy of action, that spoke of skill and experience. He pulled the staff out of its sling with a soft smile.

  Bethany glowed a faint green.

  Initiate.

  Bethany. He held the staff out a moment in front of his small chest.

  Let us not be parted again until the battle is done.

  Darin nodded, allowing the word battle to sink in.

  Renar crossed the carpeted floor, moving quietly to the door.

  “Back ways?” Erin whispered.

  He paused for a moment, considering. Then he shook his head. “No. Too often used, too well known. My father was not as apt a concealer of ways as my mother. And besides, the tunnels do not lead directly to the chamber; we would be no better off with their use.” He touched the door, and then turned back. “Your sword, Lady.”

  “Too obvious.”

  He winced slightly, remembering its biting glow. He wished that his mother could have requested private chambers with a view to the outside; at least that way he would know how much success—or failure—his people had had.

  They were close enough to the Lesser Cabal’s chambers now; there was no suitable or subtle way to approach them. The halls were too well-lit—lavishly so—but with good reason. “Your sword,” he repeated.

  She hesitated a moment before unsheathing it.

  She was right, Darin thought, as he looked at the naked blade. No one would be able to miss it. And if Renar thought it didn’t matter... He gripped his staff more firmly.

  “Tiras?”

  A hint of a smile flashed in the darkness. Tiras gave a low, smooth bow, and then knelt at the door. He worked quickly, and in absolute silence.

  “Back.”

  Both Erin and Darin followed Renar’s command, as did Renar himself.

  Tiras stood—a motion so graceful and fluid he seemed to be jointless, seamless—and threw the doors open.

  For an instant, in the light that flooded like sudden dawn into the room, Erin could make out the glint of black metal on either side of the door. She thought it to be chain, but it didn’t matter; the forms clattered noisily to the ground an instant after Tiras bolted out the door.

  “Now!” Renar said, running forward.

  She leaped out the door, closely following the light pad of Renar’s steps against stone.

  Darin’s speed matched neither of theirs, but he ran. As he cleared the door, he closed his eyes briefly, knowing what lay to either side of it. It was perhaps the last chance he would have to allow for squeamishness.

  It was too much to hope that the hall would be somehow deserted. It wasn’t. What was odd was the way it was full; men in armor running to and from a large hall that branched to the left of the one they were running down.

  “Damn,” Renar said, loudly enough that it carried. “We’re late!”

  He drew a sword as a group of six men came down the hall toward them.

  “The attackers have penetrated the castle!” The voice was one of mixed confusion, anger, and despair.

  Six pairs of eyes bore down on Renar. In none of them was the glimmer of recognition that he’d been faintly praying for.

  “I’ve the back!” Erin cried, and pivoted lightly on one foot. Darin skidded to the right to avoid the point of the blade she held at ready. He turned, less neatly than she had done, to stand beside her.

  If magic is a weapon, Darin, it must most closely resemble the readied bow.

  He kept his grip on Bethany as a detachment of six men came rushing toward him.

  It’s always better not to close in battle, boy. Let them come to you—but don’t be foolish enough to let them reach you.

  But they were coming so quickly ...

  Erin shoved him slightly to the side, jarring him out of his state of shock. She took a quick step, brandishing her blade as if it were a ward made for battle. It created a lattice of light across the air, burning the afterimage into the eyes of any who watched.

  The guards, damn them, were good. The presence of the sword didn’t phase them or in any way halt their progress. But the sword-work of the woman who wielded it did. Blood came, an answer to the call of her blade.

  The sight of it galvanized Darin.

  He swept his arms back and cleared the momentary panic out of his thoughts.

  Don’t close your eyes, Darin. You have to be able to use your ability in combat—and no one fights blindly.

  He shut out Trethar’s teaching. Too much was happening, and too quickly, for him to be able to do otherwise. Later, he would have time to wonder how Erin had ever learned to ignore the sounds and smells of close combat.

  In the darkness behind his eyes, the gate formed. He kept it small, remembering what had happened the last time he had just called power—and knowing that he would have to hoard his resources.

  The tingle that rushed down his arms and the back of his neck told him all he needed to know. His eyes snapped open to the sight of wordless combat, his ears once again hearing the crash and clatter of metal.

  Fire snaked outward, giddy in the small freedom that Darin permitted it. It caught a guard in its lethal embrace.

  Darin forced himself to watch.

  Power like this, a
t a distance, could be too heady, too impersonal. The fire burned its grip of destruction into his mind. He wanted to see, wanted to remember just how horrible a thing it was.

  He did.

  The flame moved onward, straining against the control he exerted. He held it through the strength of his revulsion. The death that Erin offered was an easy one, a pleasant one, compared to this. He stopped wondering how she could do what she did. He refused to start wondering how he could.

  And then it was over, for the moment. Erin’s cheek was grazed; blood beaded as it tried to get through the slight scratch another sword had managed to put there.

  She, too, looked at the dead that surrounded her. She bowed once, her face hidden. But when she spoke, her voice was steady and cool. “Renar?”

  “We’re ready.”

  Darin turned to see Tiras and Renar near the bend in the hall. Their dead, unlike his, lay almost peacefully where they had fallen.

  “Not a pretty sight, Darin,” Tiras said softly. His eyes, always cloaked and distant, had grown cold. “This—fire, it interests me. Where did you learn it?”

  Renar caught his former master’s shoulder in a firm grip, and the older man turned. “Enough, Tiras. You recognized his office. The riot and the burning took place when he was too young to act in it.”

  Tiras forced himself to relax. He had heard about the old man’s power and had accepted Renar’s claim that it could be utilized to take the gate—but he had never seen it displayed. And if Darin was so minor a power compared to his master... He felt a momentary pang of shame—to be so obvious in front of a student and two strangers! To hide it, he spoke again.

  “Are there others who can wield so mighty a gift?” His voice, soft, was the cat’s voice.

  “Tiras!” Renar said.

  “At least three.” Darin replied.

  “Those three?”

  “My teacher, the high priest, and—and one other.”

  “Tiras,” Renar said again, a warning note in his voice.

  “My apologies, student.” There was just a little emphasis on the last word, which was not lost on Renar. The hand that held the old man was withdrawn. “It is not my way—nor should it be yours—to trust too easily.”

  “Trust now,” was Renar’s clipped reply. “It’s rather too late to do otherwise.” He turned. “We’ve lost enough time to questions.”

  “True.” Tiras straightened. “But the council has undoubtedly been alerted. Shall we, my lord?” He bowed.

  Renar raised an eyebrow, then nodded briefly.

  As one person, they turned to the large double doors at the end of the hallway. The doors were grand; they conveyed, by their inlaid work and large brass handles, the majesty that was contained behind them. Those doors were firmly sealed shut, as always—but there were no guards outside of them. It could only be hoped that the two that should have been posted there were among the fallen.

  “Come,” Renar said softly.

  Together they walked to the end of the hall.

  chapter nineteen

  Trethar was thankful that he had enough power left to take advantage of the shadowed halls to mask his presence. Fighting developed a ferocity he’d rarely seen as they progressed inward through the castle. He carried no weapons for such a man-to-man confrontation; he’d never taken the time to see to their proper use.

  He winced as one of the guards—hard to tell which side he fought on—fell. In the poorer light the blood was an inky stain that welled along the base of his throat. The sight of it was almost hypnotic.

  He shook himself, drawing back; he was dangerously tired, but he forced himself to think of other things. They had made progress. He’d caught a glimpse of the floor plans that Tiras had so carefully drawn up; they lay open to his sharp memory as if they were now in front of him. He hoped that he was not too late.

  Renar gripped the large handle of the left door in both hands. Erin, sword reluctantly sheathed, did the same with the right door. Tiras stood ten feet back, taut as a strung wire. He nodded.

  Even before the doors were fully open, he began to run at them, his feet light and soundless on stone.

  Darin, flush against the right wall, caught a glimpse of the inner chamber as Tiras tucked his chin in and went into a roll along the ground inches before he passed through the door.

  Two bright lengths of steel cut the air where his chest should have been. They clattered ineffectively against each other as Tiras gained his feet and threw his arms back in a perfect, semicircular arc.

  The audacity of his entrance took twelve of the thirteen who sat around the long, large table by surprise. The Lesser Cabal of Illan gaped at his black-clad form a moment in silence.

  “Your ‘Majesty.’ ” Tiras gave a low, easy bow.

  The two men at the doors crumpled, almost unnoticed. As their armored bodies slid partially into the doorframe, Darin could see that they were Swords. The black and red crest on their surcoats buckled and folded, mere cloth without life to give the office strength and fear.

  Erin nodded, and together she and Darin stepped into the room to stand just behind Renar.

  At the head of the long table, in a chair with a high, velvet-lined back, sat a man with a circlet across his brow. Darin had never seen him before, but knew the trappings of office well: the sceptre and the crown of Maran. Along the sides of the table, robed in black, with the red of the broken circle as crests, sat several men. These, too, Darin knew, although he had never seen them before in his life: they were high priests and priests, none of them Karnari. Seven had come to their feet at the interruption; five remained seated. He looked at those five, saw two women, and wondered which one was Lady Verena. Whichever she was, she showed no sign of recognition.

  Along each wall, weapons drawn and readied, stood six Swords. A further six waited behind the king’s chair.

  From the high seat at the end of the large, heavy table, Duke Jordan of Illan inclined his head. If there was surprise in his eyes, it was buried in their glittering darkness; his lips turned up in the pale ghost of a smile.

  “Tiras. How unexpected and how very disappointing. But at least we will have an end to it; this little subversion has lingered too long.” And he turned his head to glance at his nephew.

  “Ah, Uncle, precipitous as always.” Renar stepped further into the room.

  “Renar,” he said, his voice a little louder, but no less even. “I was always rather fond of you.”

  “A peculiar way to show affection, Uncle.”

  “Is it? Marantine was doomed to fall, whether sooner or later, it doesn’t matter. The Empire and the Church were omnipresent and near omnipotent. What I did preserves Maran much more effectively than any of your father’s plans.”

  “Doomed to fall?” Renar spit to the side; his cheeks were flushed, but his face remained near expressionless. “The walls were made by the Lady of Elliath; had we endured, they would have.”

  “And you believe that? Fool. You are not so perceptive as I once might have hoped.” He raised a hand in a gesture of command. “I saw a new power, Renar; I saw it and realized that it was greater than the old, dying magics.”

  Two more of the priests abandoned their chairs.

  “Jordan.”

  The king turned to face the only priest that had not yet taken to his feet. “And I fear, my dear nephew, that you will come to believe in its strength. As I did. Remember the fires.” His eyes, dark, left his nephew’s. “I would like you to meet Lord Marak of Cossandara.

  “Come, do not be petty. We’ve business which needs attention, and mere family squabbles should not interfere.” The man turned to raise an eyebrow at one of the women. “Lady Verena, it appears that your ‘warning’ has come late.” Voice icy, he added, “But we will deal with the question of you as we will deal with him.”

  She bowed her head, her hair a tightly drawn dark mass. When she raised it again, an enigmatic smile hovered at her lips. “Ah, Marak, ever the optimist. My warning, if you had cho
sen to support me, would have come on time.” Pale, she bowed to her cousin. “Renar of Maran. It’s been years, cousin. Perhaps it would have been wiser had you stayed away.” But her voice held no regret; instead, it trembled with fierceness.

  “You!” a pale, dark-haired young man said. “You betrayed us!”

  “I?” Verena smiled. She leaned, almost languid, into the tabletop; the edge of her braid skirted its polished reflection as she contemplated its surface. And then her smile hardened, sharpened; it turned from catlike to something inexplicably human and vicious. Fennis of Handerness barely had time to widen his eyes before her dagger found its perfect, quiet mark. “Very well,” she said, as shouting erupted around the table. “I have.”

  Renar stared at his cousin in shock as she twisted the dagger before drawing it free. As if aware of his gaze, she turned, and although other voices drowned out her words, he read her lips clearly.

  “I can’t always be upstaged, little cousin. Don’t fail!”

  Darin began to call the fire.

  If he had thought the sight of priests might upset his concentration, he had been wrong. Each of these black-robed men had held the power of life and death for so many, so long—but they had no hold over him. He was no longer a slave, to stand and fall at their whim; he was patriarch of Culverne; he was free—and he was irrevocably their enemy, in a position of what little strength he could muster.

  He had just a few seconds to react when the eyes of the seated priest turned steel gray.

  I saw a new power, Renar.

  Suddenly, everything was too clear.

  Renar leaped out of the way as a pillar of fire erupted through the floor that he’d been standing on.

  “Run, nephew, it does no good—this is a special flame; it follows where you go! You weren’t here for the fires, were you? Guards!” The Swords bridled at so common a term, and they hesitated for a moment. “Take the rest!” Only a moment, though. They knew a threat when they saw it and could only stand on formality so long before taking necessary action.

  Out of the corner of one eye, Darin caught the raised glow of Erin’s sword. It swept through the air in a pattern familiar to him. He turned to see Tiras standing almost immobile as he stared into the living pillar.