Exhaling a sigh that was as much a release of his lingering doubts as hope for the future, Trell held the little flask over the river and let it fall, a token offering before beginning yet another important journey. He believed Naiadithine would be pleased. Lily’s vial was meaningful to him in a way that only Graeme’s dagger had been. He recalled too well the moment he’d first heard Naiadithine’s whisper. Now her words seemed to define him as much as his name.
He gave the river one last parting smile, and then he led Gendaia and Alyneri’s new stallion across the shallow fording and back to the farmstead.
***
As Alyneri and Yara hurried to pack the last of their things for the journey, Alyneri could tell the old woman was deep in her thoughts. She didn’t mind the silence, for her own head felt too full. The ramifications of Trell’s survival were vast, and as each new idea dropped into the glass of her mind, it displaced the whole until she was struggling to keep all her thoughts from spilling over the sides and being lost.
And what about Yara’s startling story of the blind Seer? Had it not so obviously been divine intervention that brought her and Trell together, Alyneri never would have believed it. Despite the romantic stories, the idea that a God would take an interest in Man seemed simply outrageous—the very idea of gods existing at all, in truth, felt far-fetched to her. But Alyneri couldn’t deny the inexplicable coincidences in their lives. For the first time, she felt touched by grace, and it scared her immensely.
The women finished the house quickly, for much of the work had already been done in preparation for this day. Strange to think that all this time Yara had been packing for a journey foreordained decades ago. Alyneri couldn’t quite get her head around such a thing—it disturbed her on several levels. Was there a difference in divine intervention and fate if all of your choices were already made for you? If you weren’t free to live your life by your own choosing?
As they were putting the last of Yara’s supplies into a satchel, Alyneri finally broke the silence. “Yara, did you ever discover anything about the Seer? Her name? Where she was from? Anything?”
“No, soraya,” the old woman replied as they worked together. “I knew that if she’d wanted me to know such things, she would’ve told me.”
Alyneri shook her head in wonder. “I don’t think I could stand it.”
“Stand what?”
“Living my life as if my entire path was predestined.”
Yara paused in her packing to settle Alyneri a shrewd eye. “Every once in a while, soraya—if you are lucky—a person comes into your life, and you are forever changed just by having met them. Meeting the blind woman was like that.”
She dropped her eyes and gazed at the little winter apple in her hand as if it held all the mysteries of the universe beneath its ruddy flesh, as if eating it would open the door to secrets unknown by mortal man. “I never felt that I lived my life by design of another,” Yara told Alyneri then. “I simply felt that…well, that she merely saw the outcome of choices I’d already made—that it was my future she was seeing, not someone else’s path laid out for me. And as each new thing came to be—even though it aligned with what the Lady told me—I saw that it was indeed my choice that brought me to that place, and I saw that I would’ve made the same choice again, if given the chance.”
She gave Alyneri a wistful look that somehow encompassed the ages of her life, her choices far and vast, and the many trials and joys she had experienced. Then she smiled sadly. “Even if some of the things that happened to me since meeting the Lady have been tragic, I cannot blame her for them, and I feel that I am blessed for having known her.”
Alyneri dropped her eyes to her hands. “Your wisdom humbles me, Yara.”
“Pshaw,” grunted the old woman, waving off her praise. “We live and we learn. What else would be the point of life?”
Yara returned to her packing, but Alyneri remained. She couldn’t help thinking of the zanthyr.
On that night spent with Phaedor in Rethynnea, she’d seen into Phaedor’s soul, and it was brilliant to behold—in all her many healings far and wide, she’d never seen a spirit so ablaze. Whatever source fueled Phaedor was something far beyond her understanding. She knew, also, that she had been forever changed by that encounter. It was strange and unsettling to realize it was not the circumstances of their healing Ean together that had changed her, but simply the intimate contact with Phaedor.
She’d been altered that night, and like so many of the mortals in the stories she’d always before discounted as fantasy, Alyneri knew she, too, would never be the same.
Amazing to realize how one’s entire life could change in an instant. For good or ill, through tragedy or triumph, a single moment can define the path of one’s future. She wondered at what point she arrived on her current path—the road that brought her back to Trell, and the new path that now stretched ahead. Was it when she met Sandrine in the apothecary? Was it when she went into the city instead of sitting at Ean’s beside? Was it when she agreed to accompany Ean on his quest—or even earlier than this? Had she always been on this path?
“Let it go, soraya,” Yara murmured without looking up from putting jars in a box. “You’ll never come to any conclusion that seems to fit, and it won’t matter anyway.”
Alyneri turned to her sharply. “How did you know what I was thinking?”
“Because I know that look,” she replied, glancing up at her under wispy grey brows. “I’ve seen it in my own eyes far too many times. The Kandori say every step ahead is a stone behind.”
“What does that mean?”
“That the past cannot be altered. Only the future is open to change.”
Alyneri exhaled quietly, for she saw the truth in this. Her future was certainly in motion—in fact it looked frankly chaotic—but she saw so much promise mixed into the chaos that she felt more hope than fear.
Trell lived. There was nothing she might not now do, when such miracles were possible.
***
By the time Trell returned with the horses, Yara and Alyneri were loading the last of the old woman’s things onto the wagon.
“Well, it’s about time,” Yara grumbled as Trell rode up, but she had a smile in her dark eyes. “We were about to set off without you.”
“I thought it prudent for the Lady Alyneri to have her own horse.” Trell led the animal to Alyneri and introduced, “His name is Baiard.”
Alyneri gave him a startled look. “From the romance?”
Trell grinned.
“What’s this?” Yara muttered as she secured the last of her things in the wagon.
“It’s a famous Veneisean legend from the Chansons de Geste,” Trell supplied, still marveling that he could remember entire books he’d read as an adolescent but not where or when he’d read them. “Baiard was the name of a magic horse that belonged to the four sons of Aymon. The stallion had the ability to grow larger or smaller depending on which one of the sons mounted him.” He looked to Alyneri. “Deon’s father assured me he’s steady and strong. We’ll need to ride fast.”
“I know,” she said, holding his gaze, and a look passed between them, an acknowledgement of all that had come before and was yet to be.
Yara shut the farmhouse door. “Well…that’s the end of it.”
Trell secured the last of his things to Gendaia’s saddle, and then, suddenly, there was nothing left to do, no reason to linger.
It was barely midday and already time for goodbye.
Yara handed a bundle to Alyneri, who unwrapped it to find a dagger in a silver case. Her eyes widened. “Another foretelling, Yara?” she asked uneasily.
“Just common sense,” the old woman said, winking. “Come now,” she told the both of them as she opened arms to embrace them. “One day you children shall come to see me in Agasan, and I will rejoice in the reunion. Until then, fare thee well. May Jai’Gar watch over you.”
“And you also, Yara,” Trell and Alyneri said together.
; Trell helped Yara onto her wagon and Alyneri into her saddle, and then they were all heading up the hill together. At the road, they parted ways. Yara turned west, toward Tregarion and a ship to Agasan, and Trell and Alyneri headed south to Rethynnea. Trell’s last sight of the old woman was of her iron-grey head dwarfed by her bulky wool sweater.
He looked to Alyneri. She smiled in return, and there was much in her gaze that was wonderfully intriguing to him. Alyneri seemed to be everything he might’ve wanted in a friend, a companion…or a wife. Odd to think about such a thing after so long, but certainly within his right now.
But he dared not get ahead of himself.
He nodded toward the road before them, and together they set off.
They made good time while their horses were fresh. Somewhere during the afternoon they crossed from Veneisea into Xanthe, but the lines between the Free Cities and its northern neighbor were hazy. Many of the people in that part of the land spoke both languages fluently—and Agasi and Bemothi besides—for the Cairs played host to people of diverse nationalities and backgrounds, and as the cities grew ever more crowded, prudent families moved further to the north.
Trell and Alyneri spent little time in conversation that day, for both were absorbed in their thoughts, in their new companionship, in concerns of what the future held for them. But one moment from that ride made an indelible impression on Trell’s memory.
Early in the day they’d come upon a long stretch of road that ran flat between high hills, and Baiard was itching to stretch his legs beyond the steady trot they’d been keeping. Alyneri cast Trell an inquiring look, and then, laughing, had given Baiard his head. The horse shot into a hard gallop, only too happy to work out his energy, and Gendaia of course was obliged to follow. They ran them in the race then, letting the horses have their moment, both riders as exhilarated as the animals. Trell sensed that Gendaia wasn’t keen to take second, and he let her off the bit to find her own pace. She was rapidly gaining on Baiard’s flank when Trell lifted his gaze to Alyneri…
She spun him a challenging look over her shoulder. Her brown eyes were bright beneath her long pale hair, which the wind lifted and wrapped about her face, and with her silken cloak floating behind her and that exuberant smile, Trell was stricken by her beauty enough that he straightened in the saddle. Gendaia sensed his change both of position and of mental state, and hesitated. Baiard pulled free and won the chase by a length.
Alyneri slowed and reined Baiard in a circle. The wind caught her pale hair again, lifting it wildly about her face and shoulders as if it had a life of its own, and her sapphire cloak rippled and ballooned around her. Trell thought he’d never seen anyone so simply beautiful.
“What is it?” she’d asked, lighthearted and rosy-cheeked from the run.
Smiling, Trell shook his head. “Nothing. You took the race, my lady.”
She gave him a long look in unconvinced response, but the moment was too fair to bring suspicion into it. Soon they were off again in a canter that stole away further conversation. But the moment stayed with Trell, as well as that vision of her.
They’d ridden the horses hard through the day, but Rethynnea was still a day’s ride away when they stopped for the night in the hamlet of Lenth. By tacit agreement, Trell acquired a room for them in the hamlet’s only inn, giving their names as a married couple from Tal’Shira by the Sea and speaking only halting Common to do it. Alyneri kept her hood up and her eyes downcast, and Trell kept his sword hidden beneath his cloak. So it was that they gained a room and had a meal sent up to them feeling moderately secure in their lodging for the night.
Which was well and good, for Trell felt little certainty on much else.
Their room barely fit a bed and small table, but the linen smelled clean, and the one window seat boasted room enough for both of them to sit and enjoy the night air. They took their dinner together there as the sun set, looking out over the dark strip of mountains that bound the eastern horizon—the Assifiyahs in all their majesty. A storm was rolling in from the southwest, and its dark clouds eventually obscured the stars.
After the meal, they sat leaning against opposite walls of the alcove sipping on watery wine. Alyneri pulled her knees to her chest and gave him a look he’d been expecting for quite some time. It amazed him how well he could read her expressions—he surely must’ve known her in his past, for she was so wonderfully familiar to him in so many important ways.
“Trell,” she said with her fair brow furrowed in a way that was entirely too endearing, “there is much you need to know.”
Trell leaned his head back against the wall and let his grey eyes stray beyond the open window, out into the deep night. The air held the promise of rain. He could smell it coming on the rising wind. “Then I suppose you must tell me, Duchess,” he answered quietly. He could almost see them together under different circumstances, truly pleasant ones, and imagining it for a moment lulled him into a sense of peace which was quite shattered by her next words.
“It’s very likely that your life is in danger.”
Trell shifted his gaze to her at this entirely unexpected news. “Why?”
“Dannym is embroiled in a political struggle, made worse by the king’s continued support of M’Nador. The Duke of Morwyk is outspoken against the war, and many nobles agree with him. He is powerful and has aims upon the Eagle Throne, but there are…others, too, who have conspired against the val Lorian reign. I’m not privy to many details known by your brother and your cousin Fynnlar, but Morin d’Hain—your father’s Spymaster—did tell me some things. Enough to guess that the treachery extends beyond the seditious men within our single kingdom, and that both your life—as we thought at the time—and your eldest brother Sebastian’s, had fallen prey to this design.”
Trell gazed hard at her, his mind awhirl with these new facts. “You mean to say you think my ship was attacked?” he surmised. “Purposefully sunk? That I was the target?”
She held his gaze with her large brown eyes and nodded.
Trell arched brows. He drew in a deep breath and let it out again, frowning. “So this Lord Brantley who seeks you,” he mused, “a man sworn to the Duke of Morwyk. Do you think he might be seeking me now as well?”
“If he recognized you, it is possible. But more than this, Trell—” She stopped herself uncertainly, catching her lower lip between her teeth. “Well, it’s just that… assassins have been hunting Ean ever since he returned to the mainland. Morwyk was certainly behind some of these attacks…but…”
When she seemed reticent to say more, he leaned to capture her gaze. “But?”
She shook her head ruefully. “It will be very hard to believe this.”
Trell gave her a wry grin and sat back again. “You’d be surprised at the things that no longer surprise me, Alyneri.”
Holding his gaze, she let out a slow breath. “Very well…”
Alyneri told him then of his brother. Starting from what she knew of his kidnapping by the Shade and ending with his near death in Rethynnea. Trell sat in stunned silence when she finished. To have come this far, to finally learn he had a brother only to discover his life was in mortal danger…that indeed, he may not recover…Fate had never twisted a crueler thorn in his heart.
Alyneri reached a hand to rest upon his as he gripped one bent knee close to his chest. “Trell.” She drew his eye back to her. “I want you to know something, and I hope you can believe as I believe—that you can trust in what I’m about to tell you.”
“I do trust you, Alyneri.”
“I have no way of proving this to you other than by my own conviction, but I swear to you—and I know this with everything that I am—there is no way…absolutely no way that the zanthyr will let Ean come to lasting harm.” She caught her lip between her teeth again and implored him with her gaze. “If he must tread the paths of the dead to retrieve Ean, I assure you, Phaedor will. I don’t know why he is so sworn to Ean’s well-being, but I know that he most assuredly is, and—” Her
e she halted and closed her eyes for a moment, as if praying upon the words. When she met his gaze once more, there was an immutable glint of certainty in it. “And when the zanthyr is upon a mission,” she finished determinedly, “there is nothing he cannot do.”
Trell regarded her as he worked to make sense of all that she’d told him. He felt dazed. Odd pieces of his life seemed connected with Ean’s, yet he couldn’t quite grasp those connections. “Who is this zanthyr?”
“His name is Phaedor…” Again, she stopped herself, biting off the words even as she dropped her eyes, instantly disconcerted. It seemed Alyneri struggled with many aspects of his brother Ean’s activities.
Trell took her hand this time, enjoying the feel of their simple contact, of her skin against his. “We must trust each other,” he said quietly. “There is no other way to do this, Alyneri. As certain as you are of this zanthyr’s loyalty to Ean, I am certain that without trust between us, we won’t survive whatever is to come.”
Alyneri’s brown eyes were wide as she looked up at him, but she nodded. “Phaedor,” she said somewhat weakly, “is sworn to Björn van Gelderan. We know the Vestal has returned from T’khendar—he sent a Shade in search of Ean—and the zanthyr serves Björn, though he tries to be vague and ambiguous about it.”
Trell frowned at this news. He knew he was missing something important.
Alyneri hastened to fill in the rest. “You see, Ean has Returned—Returned and Awakened,” she added wondrously, “as impossible as it seems…”
Yet Trell no longer heard her, for his mind dwelled upon another’s words…
‘…so different in temperament, yet they are brothers to the core. One has the mind of a master tactician… The other has Returned, and has been long awaited… The time has come to hone them both, these, my kingdom blades. They can no longer go on being mere pieces; they must become players.’
The Dagger of Adendigaeth (A Pattern of Shadow & Light) Page 29