by Helen Lowe
“Kin and Blood,” his officers said as one, and many others echoed the words.
“Light and safety on your path,” Myr said, pulling herself together, although her thoughts continued to spin. Her bafflement centered on Ise and her father, because if they, or anyone else in Blood, had known that her mother—and therefore she herself—was kin to the Countess of Stars, no one had ever told her.
51
Out of Time
Kalan thought he had known what tiredness was when he constructed his shield-wall, but he had passed far beyond that boundary now. His part in the recent battle had felt like instinct, muscle memory, and a fair degree of Ornorith’s luck—although the heralds, he reminded himself, would say there was no such thing. Listening to the account of Taly and Namath’s mission to Adamant, he was not sure he agreed. It seemed very like pure chance that Tiraelisian—or Tirael, as he said they should call him—was on his way to the Keep of Stone and so heard Namath’s mindcall for help, thrown out moments before the marine was knocked unconscious. Tirael had also detected the wyr hounds’ presence outside the Adamant watchtower and enough of their agitation to guess the mindcall had come from there.
Just be glad he did, Kalan told himself. He was under no illusion that only the boldness of Tirael’s flank attack had saved the camp, taking the Darksworn by surprise and playing to their reluctance to take losses. Killing one of their captains appeared to have reinforced that aversion, but more importantly, Arcolin would know the Derai Alliance was now aware of his presence. In the sorcerer’s place, Kalan thought, pushing back against fatigue, I’d consider withdrawal: either that or accept the losses involved and commit every resource to taking the camp. Arcolin’s decision would depend on how important the camp was to whatever strategy the Darksworn were pursuing, as well as the feasibility of pulling back. If they were the intruders that Stars had detected, then any retreat along the same route would be a fighting one. Although now that the word’s out, Kalan thought, they might as well fly their true colors and use gates—assuming they have that capability.
From what Tirael had indicated, the Darksworn were still screening their power use. Initially, all the Stars company had detected was a dissonance that intensified as they drew closer to the watchtower and no-man’s-land. Rook, the young Adamant farspeaker, had experienced the backwash as a headache, but had not understood the cause until Vael, the Stars medic, explained. Vael had been kept busy, Kalan reflected, first pouring healing into Taly and Namath so they could survive the ride to the camp, and now helping Kion tend the wounded and dying in the infirmary.
Far too many wounded and dying, Kalan added grimly. Among the exiles, Dain and Nhal had fallen, and the reserve was reduced to ten. The enemy would have had us, he thought again, if the Star knights had not arrived. Yet uneasiness niggled, the sense that there might be a fact he had missed or detail he was overlooking. He ran over both their defenses and recent events, again in his mind, but could detect no previously unseen weakness. And Tirael’s company, he reminded himself, also includes a farspeaker. The knight called Liad had contacted Stars when their company left the watchtower, which meant a relief force should already be on its way.
“You might say,” Tirael said now, with a smile that belied his lazy manner, “that I’m counting on it.”
Kalan nodded, reluctant to settle back in the camp chair in case he fell asleep. Holding their council within the Storm Spear’s tent was a nuance both Myr and Nimor considered important in dealing with Stars, but which he could have done without. Even finding chairs had been a business, one that had fallen to Faro since Murn could still barely stand. The boy had returned in triumph with an assortment of seating, before Nimor drew Kalan aside to insist he be excluded from their discussions.
“A page wouldn’t normally be included,” Kalan had replied, but he knew Faro’s unknown history with Arcolin made the precaution advisable. Frowning, he pulled his focus back to those gathered in the tent. He was seated at Lady Myr’s right hand, with Taly on her left, but Jad was absent, because with Dain gone he could not be spared from the perimeter. Nimor had Murn and Tehan, while Tirael was accompanied by Elodin, his escort captain, and Liad. Namath was there because of his mission with Taly, and like her, looked much the worse for wear. The other person present was Rook, who so far had not spoken.
Whenever he thought himself unobserved, the young farspeaker looked both eager and absorbed, but his manner became guarded as soon as anyone looked his way. Kalan imagined that the wariness reflected the youth’s position, which was undeniably difficult. Not only had events swept him into the midst of a Blood camp and Darksworn assault, but Adamant would almost certainly view his flight with Taly and Namath as treachery—which it was, when considered from the narrow perspective of one House alone, rather than a wider duty to the Derai Alliance. “What of Adamant?” Kalan asked him now. “Should we expect a force from the Keep of Stone?”
Rook straightened and spoke stiffly, as though making a report. “I tried to farspeak the keep before leaving Adamant territory, but the headache I had then made it difficult. Also, I’m still only an initiate, which may be why they didn’t really listen.” The wariness deepened into a bleakness that Kalan understood, because if the farspeaker’s attempt to fulfill his duty and inform Adamant of events had failed, it made his situation even more precarious. Rook’s gaze shifted to Tirael, the bleakness easing into admiration, then back to Kalan. “Lord Tirael and his knights were amazing, the way they crept out without anyone noticing. But I think Rul and Torlun will come after us, even though their force isn’t large.”
“Armed to the teeth and bristling with aggression,” Elodin murmured.
Rather than taking offense, Rook nodded. “I was their only farspeaker, so they won’t be able to send for aid that way, even when they find . . .” He swallowed, his expression closing in again. The Stars warriors all looked grim, too, but it was Taly who explained Rook’s pause.
“There were more death standards on Adamant’s border, Captain.” Having taken note of Kalan’s appointment, she was observing formalities. “The bodies were Adamant scouts who’d been sent out to investigate our story. But because it wasn’t believed, they may not have taken their work seriously enough.”
“I’m sorry,” Kalan said to Rook, guessing he would have known the scouts.
The youth’s expression worked briefly, before he bowed acknowledgment. When he straightened, he spoke as though working his thoughts through. “Rul and Torlun will probably send riders for aid when they find the bodies. And once they’re reinforced, they’ll definitely come here, because Rul said that if Ensign Talies’s story was genuine—” He broke off.
“Then they would have to ensure,” Tirael put in coolly, “that Lady Myrathis became Adamant’s hostage against the closer alliance between Blood and Night. And added, no doubt, that they did not wish to share such bounty with Stars. You’ve given nothing away,” he said, as Rook looked uneasy. “Even if I wasn’t a truthsayer, I could read your Rul like trail sign.”
Taly had taken that last remark well, Kalan thought, barely twitching at the mention of truthsaying. Although doubtless she was becoming hardened to the company of power users since the Stars company had rescued her. “He’s not my Rul,” Rook said defiantly. “I don’t want to be like him, or Torlun. It’s why I—” Flushing, he broke off again.
“Helped us,” Taly supplied quietly, and he nodded, his expression set.
“You don’t have to be like them,” Kalan said. “Kinship, for all its importance, is an accident of birth. Who we associate with and how we act in this life is always choice, however much we may pretend otherwise, even to ourselves.”
Rook nodded again, studying Kalan with open curiosity. Tirael looked quizzical, and Lady Myr was gravely attentive, as she had been throughout. Kalan was beginning to realize that was her innate nature as much as her Rose training. When she first met Tirael, he had thought she was dazzled by the Stars glamour, of which her new kinsm
an had more than his fair share, but now she was reserve to her fingertips.
Battleworn or not, Kalan had also felt certain, observing Myr then, that the kinship tie to Stars was as much a surprise to her as everyone else. Blood, the Rose, and Stars, he thought, shifting in his chair, ostensibly to get more comfortable but in reality to see Myr better. The web of alignments she embodied was proving to be spun more widely than anyone—with the probable exception of Ise—had realized. Now came the marriage into Night, which meant any child born as a result would be able to claim kinship ties into what were traditionally the three most powerful Derai Houses. Yet leaving Myr in ignorance of her heritage made her as much a Rose pawn as a Blood one. Put together with her Rose kin’s apparent indifference to her existence, it suggested she might have been bred solely for that purpose.
Kalan shifted again, this time to conceal an instinctive revulsion. Deal with the Darksworn and the siege, he told himself sharply, and then with Adamant if you have to. Stars, too, if need be—for it had not escaped him that Myr and the camp would be as much in the power of a Stars rescue force as one from Adamant. “Right now, though,” he said, coming back to the camp’s defense, “I’ll welcome any help that arrives, regardless of motivation. Or Ornorith may smile and the Swarm withdraw, but I’m assuming not.”
They all nodded, and the subsequent discussion focused on the best disposition of the Stars newcomers. In the end Kalan decided to deploy them as the reserve, because it held the Stars company together as an effective fighting force. He was also uncertain how the Blood defenders—and Orth, he thought, with dour humor—would endure power users among their units. Utilizing the Star knights as his reserve also meant that he could substitute Tehan’s marines for the fallen company leaders. “The reserve, though,” he said, meeting Tirael’s gaze squarely, “remains under my command.”
“As does the camp.” Tirael bowed, demonstrating that he had the traditional Stars grace as well as his House’s glamour. Both drawl and smile were back in place as he regarded Kalan. “We are yours to command, my brother.”
Nimor’s brows rose, but he only spoke when discussions over the camp’s food supplies—which were strained, but should hold if rations were cut again—concluded. “There is one more matter,” he said, exactly as Myr had done two days before, and Kalan knew he meant Faro.
“You promised you wouldn’t give me to him,” Faro said, when everyone except Nimor, Myr, and Tirael had left, and Murn ushered him into the tent. Two wyr hounds stalked in after him, settling themselves with a whuff of breath that indicated they intended staying. Faro shook his head when Myr asked him if he wanted a chair. Instead he stood beside Kalan, not quite leaning on his chair-arm but close enough that Kalan could see he was rigid with tension.
“I won’t,” he replied. “But you need to explain how you crossed Arcolin’s path, because now that he knows where you are and who you’re with, he’s going to keep coming after you.” The despair in Faro’s face suggested he already understood that, but try though he might, the boy could not answer Kalan’s question.
Tirael, watching, grew more serious than Kalan had yet seen him. “He could be under some sort of compulsion,” the Son of Stars said finally.
“I’ve never seen anything like it.” Nimor was shaking his head. “We’ve been aware of Swarm activity in Grayharbor for some time, but when Faro stowed away on our ship no one detected anything amiss. I’ve had no reason for suspicion either, until now.”
“He looks Blood-born,” Tirael said to Nimor, “but if your ship accepted him . . . I don’t suppose you’re missing any weatherworkers?”
“Many lost,” Nimor replied shortly, “but none unaccounted for.”
Faro scowled from Tirael to Nimor. “My mam was an armorer, not one of your weatherworkers.”
“Well, you can tell us that at least,” Tirael observed. “What was her name?”
“Kara was what our Grayharbor neighbors called her, or Kara Armorer.” Faro frowned, as though realizing that was unusual in Grayharbor, where people had family names, then shrugged. “But I just called her Mam.” Obviously, his tone said, and Kalan’s inward smile reflected Tirael’s outward amusement.
The name Kara had a Blood ring: Kalan could see they all thought it might be one of the many variants of Kharalth. A Blood name did not lead readily to weatherworking, though—and if Faro had the ability, he was clearly unaware of it. Yet even the possibility raised the question of his father’s identity. Kalan had already guessed that Faro did not know that either, even before the boy confirmed it, answering Tirael’s next question. One of the Derai Lost remained an option, although from what Kalan now knew of Sea House ways, it was unlikely he would have originated there. In any case, Nimor had said there were no weatherworkers unaccounted for.
Another possibility was that Faro’s father could have been—or was—a Darksworn. Arcolin himself had used weatherworking magic against the camp, while Nherenor and his knights had worn a lightning symbol in Caer Argent. The real question, Kalan thought, was whether a Blood Lost, which Faro’s mother must have been, would have taken up with a Darksworn. She might not have known, of course—particularly if her lover was anything like Nherenor—and simply assumed Faro’s father was a fellow Lost from another House.
It’s all anomalies, Kalan decided, exasperated because he was too tired for this sort of puzzle. Yet you accept him, he added silently, meeting a wyr hound’s lambent gaze—as the Che’Ryl-g-Raham did, too. Faro and Myr were both anomalies, he decided, remembering how he had used the same word in response to Kelyr’s conjecture about her Rose lineage. It was Nimor, though, who had first applied the word to Faro. Straightening, Kalan repeated that thought aloud as he looked toward the envoy. “When you asked me about stealers,” he added, since it was Faro’s use of the term that had sparked their earlier discussion.
“Stealers?” Distaste clouded Tirael’s expression. “I must admit, with calling lightning and the suggestion of compulsion—But all that was too long ago to explain Faro.”
“Yes.” Nimor was terse. “But when Khar used the term, which was what first gave me pause, he said he had it from Faro, who gleaned it from his mother.”
Faro looked embarrassed, as he had when Kalan used the word in Murn’s presence. “It’s what she said: that you were stealers and I must never go anywhere near you or your ships.”
“Yet she stayed in the main Haarth port for Sea House ships,” Tirael pointed out, “whereas as an armorer, I imagine she could have gone anywhere.”
“She was a great armorer,” Faro said, quick and fierce. “She got sent all the most difficult repairs, even from the big cities of the River. Andron said she could’ve been rich, if she would only charge what her work was worth.”
Which underlines Tirael’s point, Kalan thought. He supposed Faro’s mother may have thought wealth a greater risk than skill alone in terms of drawing attention, but none of this was leading anywhere. Nimor—all of us—will have to leave it, he decided.
But Myr, having listened intently throughout, was leaning forward. “‘Stars, the phoenix is their device,’” she quoted softly. “That’s what you said when we saw Lord Tirael’s banner. Was it your mother who taught you the list of Houses and banners?” Faro nodded. “And when you learned them, what was the Earl of Blood’s name?”
“Amrathin.” The scuff of Faro’s foot was loud. “I know it’s Earl Sardon now. Mam said you always have to update when people die, but the Houses and their devices endure.”
Stunned, Kalan studied Faro as though he had never seen him before. Everyone else was watching, too, held in silent thrall as Myr nodded. “Mistress Ise said the same when she taught me. What about the Sea Count? And Stars?”
“‘Tirunor for Sea, their insignia is the mer-dragon,’” Faro adopted the half chant of rote. “‘But they’re stealers so you must never go near them. Telmirieneth leads Stars, the phoenix is their device; Night is Eanaran, the winged horse their emblem. The Rose is Nagoy . . .
’” His voice died as he stared around their faces. “What’s wrong? Aren’t I saying it right?”
“You’re saying it perfectly,” Myr assured him, still outwardly composed, although Kalan saw her hands shake before she concealed them in the folds of her skirt.
“Well, it explains the stealers,” Tirael said, with an attempt at lightness.
“It’s just not possible,” Nimor protested. “There must be another explanation.”
The wyr hounds, Kalan saw, were still tranquil, apparently indifferent to the consternation around them. “You were saying it perfectly,” he agreed, putting an arm around Faro’s shoulders. “But it isn’t only Amrathin and Blood, you see. All the names are out of date. Over four hundred years out of date.”
“Out of time,” Tirael murmured. The gaze he bent on Faro was wondering, but the boy looked blank.
“Amrathin was the last Earl of the old line of Blood,” Myr agreed. “And Kara is almost certainly a Blood name. So in a sense,” she finished gently, “you’ve come home.”
Kalan thought of the camp’s reaction to Arcolin’s proffered bargain and was not surprised when Faro shook his head. “Grayharbor was my home. I only ever lived there before now.” He paused. “Maybe Mam did come from somewhere else, but Grayharbor’s a port so lots of people there do. And she never talked about it.” He craned to look at Kalan. “Leti and Stefa’s mam made them learn stuff that was different from at the dame school, too, and they’ve been Grayharbor people forever. My mam wasn’t any older than theirs either.” Not four hundred years older, his eyes said; he looked close to tears.
Kalan tightened his arm. “Whatever the mystery, it’s clear you don’t know what it is. As for Arcolin, nothing’s changed, including your orders to remain in the inner camp.”
Faro relaxed visibly. “Can I go, then?” he asked, and when Kalan nodded he slipped away at once. The wyr hounds rose, too, and padded after him.