Skirmish: A House War Novel

by West, Michelle

  “How are you certain?” It was Jewel who asked.

  “I can see them.”

  “Pardon?”

  “I can see them, standing outside of themselves.”

  Avandar crossed the carpet, his eyes narrowed. “What do you mean,” he asked—in clear and perfect Torra.

  Adam glanced at Jewel, who nodded. “When I first woke a sleeper, I didn’t see him clearly; not the way I do now. But I could sense him beyond his body. Outside of it. I could call him back.”

  Levec stiffened, but said nothing.

  “Call him?” Avandar’s voice was soft, but there was an edge in it. “The way healers call the dying back?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never called the dying. But…I’ve been called, and I don’t think it’s the same. Wherever they are, they’re willing to leave. It’s not like—” he swallowed. “They’re not near the bridge; they don’t want to cross it.”

  “Where are they, then?”

  This was clearly the question Adam had difficulty answering. “I…don’t know.” He took a deeper breath and turned the whole of his attention to Jewel. Not to Levec. “But it’s harder, now. I can see them, Matriarch. But it’s harder to reach them. I think—I think something else sees them as well, and it holds them.”

  “Are they dreaming, Adam?” she asked softly.

  “They don’t remember their dreams when they wake.”

  “That’s not what I asked.” She hesitated, struggling with Torra for reasons that had nothing to do with translation. “When you see them, before you call them, are they aware of you?”

  He shook his head.

  “Can you see where they think they are?”

  Creases appeared in his forehead; they’d leave when his frown did. “I haven’t tried.”

  “Try. Try for me.”

  “ATerafin.”

  Jewel turned toward Duvari.

  “Where do you think they are?”

  “In the dreaming,” she replied.

  “And where, exactly, is that?”

  “I don’t know.” It wasn’t the answer Duvari wanted. She bit her lip and looked toward Avandar; her domicis nodded.

  “It is not the land of Mandaros,” he replied, dragging Duvari’s attention—and obvious suspicion—away. “It is therefore not the land the dead or the dying reach. If it were, other healers would be able to rouse the sleepers. They can call the dying back to their bodies because they have the ability to heal the bodies; I suspect Adam can reach them because he can touch more than just the physical.

  “They are dreaming, in my opinion. They dream small dreams; it is why so many must sleep.”

  “Must?” Duvari said.

  “The dreaming is not part of our world.”

  “It is not part of the world of the gods.”

  “It is not, no. But there are ancient roads and paths that exist between mortal fields and forests; they exist beneath mountains and through the causeways of deep stone. They exist in the deserts and in the storms; they exist in the cold of the Northern Wastes.”

  “If I ask you how you know this?”

  Avandar shook his head, a strange smile touching his lips. “You will not ask; you have far, far too much to contend with at the moment to waste your time on a pointless endeavor.”

  Duvari offered no answering smile. “Continue.”

  “These ways have long been hidden.”

  “The hidden path?” Jewel asked.

  Avandar nodded.

  “Why?”

  “Because you know, as I know, that the gods once walked this world. You know that one such god has returned. What you have not completely understood is that when the gods left; their children—those that survived—did not. It is said they could not; they were born of this world.

  “The gods agreed to the binding covenant of Bredan. They were then left with a choice: to destroy their children, or to leave them alive. It was a bitter argument. But in the end, a compromise was reached. Do you understand it?”

  “The hidden path.”

  “Yes. It is a place where the gods themselves might once have walked. It is wild in the way the whole of the world was once wild, and it is carved into the ancient earth, the ancient stone. It is called hidden, ATerafin, because very, very few can find it who were not born at the dawn of the world.”

  Jewel rose, pushing herself up and out of the chair as if by movement she could escape the weight of his words. She knew he spoke the truth; she knew he spoke only as much of it as would make the situation clear to the Lord of the Compact. But she knew, as well, that speaking, he was waiting for her reaction.

  “Ariane is the Winter Queen.”

  “And the Summer Queen, yes.”

  “She lives on the hidden path.”

  “Yes. She was kin to gods, and she faced them on the field of battle; she was much feared. There were always ways in which she might find moments of freedom beneath the mortal moon; Scarann. Lattan. There are nights when the hidden paths converge with merely mortal ones.” He was still waiting.

  “She wasn’t the only person I met when you and I walked that path together.”

  “No. You begin to understand, ATerafin. They came to meet you.”

  “They came to meet me because I was on the path, Avandar.”

  “Perhaps that is true of Calliastra; she was always willful. I admit that I have never clearly understood Corallonne; she was never my ally. But if they came because they sensed a mortal in their world, the same cannot be said of the Oracle. Do you not recall her?”

  “Yes. She appeared as the ghost of my Oma.”

  “As your dead, yes; not mine. It was not to me that she came, nor to me that she meant to speak, ATerafin. But the three, and Ariane, are all firstborn.”

  “They’re not the only ones.”

  “No, they are not. And if you have seen the three, it is my suspicion that you have already felt the handiwork of a fourth. Adam, I believe your sleepers are standing on the edge of the hidden path, called and held in the dreaming. What is interesting to me is that you can see them, you can call them back, if even for a short time.”

  “How is he reaching them?” Jewel demanded, thinking of forests of gold, of winged cats, and of ancient trees; of demons, of assassins, and of The Terafin.

  “I do not know,” was the grave reply. “I was never prey to the Lords of dream and nightmare.”

  “There are two?”

  “Two?”

  “A Lord of dream and a Lord of nightmare.”

  “There are two who are one.”

  “You’ve met him. Or them.”

  Avandar fell silent. She thought he’d finished; he hadn’t. “The dreaming wyrd, ATerafin, the three true dreams which you have experienced more than once in your life: those come at the behest of the Lords.”

  “No—they—” she fell silent. Celleriant had said something similiar. “The Lords are willing to do the work of others?”

  “Demonstrably,” was his dry reply. “The tree, ATerafin, and the Kialli Lord, are evidence of that. But what the Lords want, I cannot easily say; I am mortal. Nor is that your only concern now.”

  “No,” she whispered. “It’s not. If Adam can see the sleepers—”

  “Yes. Eventually, if it has not already come to pass, the Lords will see Adam. I do not know if they can touch or harm him where he now stands, but if, in the process of waking the sleepers, he is vulnerable, he is at great risk.”

  Levec’s Torra was not good enough to allow him to follow the entirety of the conversation; it didn’t have to be. He watched Jewel’s expression shift, saw her lose color, and saw where she looked; it was enough. More than enough. He rose.

  Duvari, however, once again came to Jewel’s rescue—a fact that would have made her nervous in other circumstances. “It is not what you think,” he said in Weston. “They are now concerned that the waking of the sleepers is of great danger to Adam. There should be no sleepers here.”

  “The—the waking of t
he sleepers?”

  Duvari nodded. “I will speak with the Princess,” he said quietly. “And we will determine how best to approach your task.”

  “What danger is he in?”

  “If I understood all of what I heard, and in much simpler terms, he risks falling prey to the sleep itself. If he does, there is no one to wake him, and no one to wake those who sleep now; they will starve to death.”

  Levec nodded.

  “Let us adjourn on the matter of the illness for the three days of The Terafin Funeral. You, at least, will be present for one or two of those days, if you choose to accept the invitation offered.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t dream of missing it.”

  The heavy irony of the words appeared to be lost on Duvari, as so much was. “I understand your concern, Healer. But for the next four days, while the Astari are in residence in the Terafin manse, no harm will come to Adam. I doubt, given the circumstances surrounding Jewel ATerafin, that he will even be noticed.”

  But Jewel lifted a hand. “I think I have a solution to the possible danger,” she said to Levec.

  “And that?”

  “The cats. The mouthy, irritating cats.”

  He blinked.

  “I can’t guarantee they can protect him, but I can guarantee that they’ll know if he’s in danger.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know,” she replied, turning to him. “But they’re part of the hidden path; they’re part of wherever it is that the sleepers reside while they dream.”

  “But they’re here.”

  She nodded. Before she could speak again, there was a loud knock on the doors.

  “Enter,” she said, because if it was Ellerson, he wouldn’t until he heard her voice. It was Ellerson. “ATerafin,” he said, bowing. “The regent requests your presence in his office at your earliest convenience.”

  “Thank you, Ellerson.”

  The walk to Gabriel’s office was hectic and crowded. There were, in Jewel’s estimation, half as many ladders in the halls as there were people—and there were a lot of people. The servants who were usually invisible were out in force; Jewel caught a glimpse of the compressed, pinched expression of the Master of the Household Staff and almost cringed. She wasn’t, however, required to bow, grovel, or salute; House Councillors weren’t, in theory, supposed to acknowledge her at all while she went about her duties.

  But Jewel did pause to watch the servants at work, because she had never seen a full House funeral before. The whole of the gallery was slowly changing from the familiar one she knew; tapestries and banners replaced paintings, and some of the standing statues were carefully adorned with black-and-gold shawls. Even the paintings that now hung in the hall were not paintings she immediately recognized, although she recognized some of the names etched in brass on their frames: they were the previous rulers of Terafin.

  Avandar walked by her side like a prickly shadow. It was comfortable to have him there, but his absences—and his utter failure to mention their cause—made her nervous. She glanced at him every so often, but stopped when she realized two things: she was checking to see if he was still there, which was bad, and he knew it, which was worse.

  When she reached Gabriel’s office, it wasn’t empty. The doors were pegged open, and there were four House Guards—four Chosen—on either side of them. The room in which one might take a chair if one had arrived early had no chairs to spare—and almost no standing room, either. Jewel stopped just shy of the doorjamb and took a step back, into Avandar.

  Jewel.

  She took another step away from the room.

  ATerafin. What is wrong?

  I don’t damn it know. It was crowded, but she’d seen far larger crowds in the Terafin manse before—she just hadn’t seen one this large compressed into Gabriel’s outer office. Maybe The Terafin had had days that contained this many people—but The Terafin had had both Gabriel himself and a dozen of the Chosen standing between her and her visitors. Jewel hesitated at the door, and then turned back down the hall, moving quickly, Avandar in her wake.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Back to the wing.”

  “You’ve chosen to refuse the regent’s request?”

  “No. I was about to tell you to go find Celleriant, and I’ve come up with a better idea.”

  Sigurne Mellifas looked up at the sound of the doorknob. She was seated at the desk in her room, and papers—the lifeblood of the magi—were already stacked inches high to the right and left of her inkstand. A small sigil flaired to life above the height of the lintel; it was gray, but bright enough to read. Frowning, she rose. She had expected yet another delivery from Ellerson. The Order of Knowledge considered its daily business of vastly greater import than anything as simple as a state funeral.

  It was not, however, Ellerson; it was Matteos. “Enter.”

  The door swung open without a creak. Sigurne didn’t approve of its silence; there was something unnatural about it. Overly oiled hinges, like paperwork, were instantly relegated to trivial status when she saw Matteos’ expression.

  “Matteos?”

  “Jewel ATerafin has asked that you accompany her to the regent’s office.”

  “The regent wishes to speak with me?” She frowned; that wasn’t it. “Where is Jewel?”

  “She is in the front hall, waiting with her domicis.”

  Sigurne exited the room as Matteos held the door; he closed it gently, but firmly, behind her. “I’ve taken the liberty of preparing a stone—”

  “There is no room in this House that is better protected against magic or eavesdroppers than Gabriel ATerafin’s inner office, save the personal rooms of The Terafin herself.” She headed directly down the hall, walking at a brisker pace than she normally did.

  Jewel was, as Matteos had said, waiting with her domicis; she wasn’t, however, waiting alone. If Sigurne had been a woman to whom imprecations came easily, she would have run down the considerable list available in this wing; standing at a respectful distance from Jewel was Duvari.

  Jewel was pale, which only accentuated the dark rings below her eyes. She immediately tendered a bow as Sigurne walked into the room; it was an impressively correct bow, and she held it for far longer than etiquette demanded. “ATerafin.”

  “Member Mellifas.”

  “Matteos implied that the regent wishes to speak with me.”

  “Matteos,” Matteos said, at her back, “did no such thing.”

  “The regent doesn’t,” Jewel said quietly. “It’s an entirely personal request on my part.”

  “That I speak with the regent?”

  “That you accompany me. I’ve been summoned to speak with him.”

  Sigurne frowned.

  “If you wish to discuss guild fees,” Jewel continued, when Sigurne remained silent, “I can do that. It’s not a House matter; it would be for direct service to me, for this single occasion.”

  “In what capacity?”

  Jewel swallowed. “As witness, Member Mellifas.”

  “You are far, far too formal for my comfort, ATerafin. I seldom discuss my own fees because I am very seldom available for hire. Member Corvel—”

  Jewel shook her head emphatically. “It has to be you.”

  Something about her tone was so stark and so certain, Sigurne dispensed with the rest of her suggestion. “I am not young,” she said quietly. “But perhaps in my case, age has led to wisdom; wisdom is oft costly. Tell me what happened, ATerafin.” She was aware of Duvari’s presence, and equally aware that she did not have the time to request a writ of exemption from the Kings’ office.

  It galled her to have to ask Duvari for anything. “Lord of the Compact.”

  “Guildmaster.”

  “Your work in the Terafin manse, and on the Terafin grounds, no doubt requires at least one writ of royal exemption.”

  “It does, as you well know, Member Mellifas, since you are a signatory to all such writs. Why is this of significance?”

  Si
gurne looked at Jewel, who’d shrunk two inches. The mage could not quite bring herself to speak; to ask a favor of Duvari was the act of the naive or the addled.

  Avandar, however, said, “We will wait, Guildmaster, while you execute a writ; I will personally deliver it to Avantari, and I will wait until it is countersigned and sealed.”

  “That is still the work of hours.”

  The domicis’ smile was cold. “No, Member Mellifas, it is not.”