Lycian slipped to the paving stones, adjusted her gown, and proceeded up the wide steps to the entrance. The doors swung open, revealing a dimly lit chamber.
Zevaron hesitated, caught between reluctance to go inside, his duty as Lycian’s bodyguard, and curiosity about her mission here. Tsorreh said that the priests of Qr had the ear and confidence of the Ar-King. Had Lycian come to ask them to intercede for her husband? Just how much influence did they have over Cinath?
Lycian disappeared into the shadowed interior, and the doors closed behind her. Zevaron, fighting a wave of repugnance, reached for the latch. The door opened fractionally and a priest stood there, not the young one who had led the onager away, but another, older man with fiery dark eyes.
“Can I help you, my son?”
“I serve the Lady Lycian. She—”
“She is in no danger here, under our protection. Indeed, there is no place in Aidon, or in all the wide world, where she would be safer than in Qr’s holy temple.”
Chalil had often said that only a fool would argue with a man on the threshold of his own castle, so Zevaron bowed politely and withdrew. He found the place where the riding animals of those nobles attending the service were kept. Lycian’s onager was one of a half-dozen, all of excellent quality and richly harnessed. A boy brought them handfuls of grain and stroked their long ears, singing tunelessly to them. Zevaron hunkered down beside the watering buckets and waited.
In a surprisingly short time, Lycian emerged. Her face was flushed, her breath as rapid as if she had been running, and her eyes gleamed. Zevaron decided she had gotten whatever she had come for, a favorable omen or assurances her prayers would not go unanswered, or whatever the priests thought she wanted to hear.
Perhaps, a poisonous thought wound through his mind, she had told them what they wanted to hear.
Back at the compound, Zevaron saw Lycian safely back to her own chambers. He found Danar in the atrium, talking to two somber-looking older men. From the understated richness of their clothing and the way they carried themselves, they seemed men of importance. That they had come so quickly and in person indicated how serious they considered the situation.
Silently Zevaron took up a position just inside the inner doorway. He met Danar’s gaze with the merest flicker of acknowledgment.
“Who’s that?” one of the nobles said, glancing at Zevaron.
“My new bodyguard,” Danar said. “Denariyan, you know. Fierce in combat, but doesn’t understand a word of Gelone.”
Zevaron tried to look stolid and uncomprehending.
“Cinath means to move quickly, while public sympathy for the death of Prince Thessar remains strong,” one of the men said.
“The question remains whether the Ar-King, may-he-someday-attain-wisdom, will adjudicate the charges himself, or turn Lord Jaxar and the Meklavaran woman over to the priests of Qr,” the other said.
Qr. Where Lycian had gone this very morning.
“Surely, they have no jurisdiction over my father and his guest,” Danar protested.
“We must not underestimate their influence. After all, was it not at their instigation that Cinath issued the order to arrest any Meklavaran without legitimate business within the city? Understandably, they also claim sole authority to prosecute any cases of sorcery.”
“I beg you, do whatever you can to make sure that does not happen,” Danar said.
“Would Cinath listen to you, as his close kin?” the second man asked.
Danar looked stricken. Zevaron thought, He has passed his life in the shadow of his father. He has no voice of his own. Or perhaps he has not yet found his voice.
“It might be better if you stayed out of sight, to avoid reminding Cinath of the loss of his own son,” the first man said. “Some consider Prince Chion unfit to rule, and there is sufficient historical precedent for excluding him from the succession. The Lion Throne has not always passed to the next son, but sometimes to a more competent nephew. Especially the first-born male heir of the older brother,” referring to Jaxar’s seniority and the accident of his birth that barred him from the throne.
Danar’s mouth tightened. “Neither my father nor I have any aspirations—”
“Do you think the Ar-King believes that?” the older man demanded.
“Enough of such talk!” the other said, clearly nervous. “We must not meet again. If Cinath suspects a plot, he will bring us all down.”
And that, Zevaron thought, ends any hope that they will help Jaxar or Tsorreh. He caught the faint shift in posture of the two nobles, the hint of withdrawal. No, they will let Jaxar hang, or burn, or however they execute people here, before they risk their own skins.
For Tsorreh, they would do nothing.
He waited until they were gone before approaching Danar. Danar looked wrung out, torn in a dozen different directions.
“They will do what they can.” Danar struggled for a hopeful tone.
“As long as they themselves are not placed in jeopardy,” Zevaron said. “Danar, what about Tsorreh? What will happen to my mother?”
“I know that, so far, we have concentrated on my father’s fate,” Danar said, raking back sweat-damp hair from his forehead. “Since she is legally in my father’s custody, he himself must act as her advocate, and for that, he must be free.” He lowered himself to the bench where, only hours ago, he had sat at breakfast. “Do not fear, he will not forsake her.”
“I am not worried about his good intentions,” Zevaron said, “only his ability to carry them out. If Cinath has turned against his own blood-kin, who then will stand up for my mother?”
“I will.” Danar turned to look him full in the face. Zevaron saw a dozen shifting emotions behind those sea-gray eyes: terror, resolution, denial, courage. Which were real, and which the reflections of his own desperate hopes?
* * *
The next few days passed in a whirlwind of comings and goings. Zevaron continued to accompany Lycian on her twice-daily visits to the Qr temple. In between, he kept up the pretense of being Danar’s bodyguard. Danar went throughout Aidon’s rich hill districts, where Zevaron would occasionally be admitted to a meeting with one important man or another. Usually he waited in the entrance chambers. Danar explained that it would be considered a serious insult to require a bodyguard inside the private compound of a noble.
Danar emerged from these meetings looking increasingly more somber. Zevaron did not understand Danar’s explanations of what had transpired. The Gelonian legal system, a complex and often contradictory blend of tradition, formal laws, and royal decrees, seemed capricious and arbitrary. There had been Kings as well as Ar-Kings in Gelon’s past, and apparently the latter had the power to take any action they pleased.
“So the fate of my father and your mother becomes one of jurisdiction,” Danar explained as they sat together in the rooftop observatory. Evening was drawing nigh and the compound lay around them, cooling in the darkness. From one of the manicured fruit trees, a bird sang, then fell silent.
“You mean whether it is a judge who hears the case or Cinath himself,” Zevaron said. “A savage arrangement.”
“What, did you not have Kings in Meklavar?” Danar replied sharply.
“Of course, as you very well know. But our holy texts tell us that no one man should have the power of life and death over others in more ways than one. If a King is to command in battle, he cannot also judge criminal cases.”
“That’s very odd,” Danar said.
Overhead, the stars glimmered in a milky swath. His mother had sat here, watching the fiery star grow brighter and then disappear into the northern horizon. Jaxar had entrusted her with his instruments, and together they had studied the heavens.
“No, not odd,” Zevaron said, regretting having provoked a quarrel with his one ally. After all, if Tsorreh and Jaxar could become trusted colleagues, or even friends, he and Danar should strive to do the same. For the moment, their interests worked toward the same goal. “It’s just different.�
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* * *
After four or five days, Zevaron’s desperation grew even more urgent. Danar had told him there were no facilities in the royal palace for holding prisoners for any length of time, and it was unusual for a trial to be so long delayed. Danar’s efforts seemed to be having a small effect. Jaxar’s friends had presented daily inquiries to Cinath regarding his health and welfare, and a few had made speeches in the public spaces calling for a speedy disposition of the case and disclosure of the facts.
“If there is proof of sorcery in Gelon, whether it be from Meklavar or Azkhantia or Southern Firelands, we have a right to know it!” one of the speechmakers had thundered, shaking his fist at the palace. The crowd had responded with such an uproar that the Ar-King’s Elite Guard came out to restore order.
Lycian and Zevaron were forced to detour around the area on their way back from yet another visit to the temple. It was late in the day, and the sun dipped toward the western hills. Lycian broke her usual silence to grumble about the inconvenience for the entire rest of the journey. By the time they arrived, twilight had almost faded.
Danar was not at home, although it was unusual for him to prolong his meetings into the evening. The steward, looking worried, said that Danar had been summoned to the royal palace.
“I must go after him, then,” Zevaron said.
“You will do no such thing,” Lycian said. “All will be well, I am certain of it. I have prayed to Qr, and I have been granted guidance. Do not interfere with the ways of the gods.”
She strode from the entrance hall to the colonnade that led to the household chambers, then paused. “Do not stand there like a witless savage, even if you are one. Make yourself useful in the kitchen if you cannot find anything else to do. I specifically forbid you to leave this compound and stir up trouble where none exists.”
“Come on, boy,” the steward said kindly. His voice betrayed his worry. “There’s naught to do but keep ourselves busy until the young lord returns.”
If he returns, Zevaron thought.
Zevaron was sitting in the kitchen, helping the cook chop onions and garlic, when he heard voices from the front gate. He could not make out words, except for Lycian’s bird-like shrieking, but the clamor had the wrong rhythm for a fight. Excitement, certainly…
He put the knife down on the work table in a pile of chopped onions and bolted for the entrance hall.
Jaxar stood there, flanked by Danar, who was grinning broadly, and Lycian, the steward, the two bodyguards, and most of the household staff. The cook had followed Zevaron and now let out a cry of celebration. Everyone was talking at once, hugging each other.
“Free—you’re free,” Zevaron said, half-stunned. His words were lost in the general rejoicing.
Jaxar met his eyes, and his expression turned somber. He motioned for quiet. “Zevaron—”
“Where is she? Where is my mother?”
Silence answered him. His body turned cold right down to his bones, except for an explosion of incandescent fury behind his heart. “Cinath still has her! You walked out of there and left her!”
“It’s not like that—” Danar began.
Jaxar cut him off with a gesture. “For the time being, that is true,” he said to Zevaron. “I have been exonerated of all charges. My brother now believes that Tsorreh placed me under an evil spell. She is currently being held in one of the cells beneath the Old Temple of Justice, while Cinath deliberates the manner of her execution.”
Zevaron felt as if he had been pierced with a blade of ice. His chest muscles locked. He could not breathe.
“Do not lose heart, for this is only the middle of the story,” Jaxar went on in a kindly, encouraging tone. “It is not yet the end. We will—we must—work on her behalf, and do everything we can.”
The sincerity in the older man’s voice only fueled Zevaron’s anger. These people were Gelon, the enemy. They took care of their own and only their own. Why had he expected otherwise? They cared nothing for anyone or anything else.
A sense of fairness, however, gave him pause. Tsorreh had been brought here as a prisoner, but that was not Jaxar’s fault, nor was the madness of the Ar-King.
“My husband, you must rest,” Lycian pleaded. “You have been through a terrible ordeal, but it is over now.”
Zevaron’s vision cleared, so that he looked on Jaxar with different eyes. The older man was clearly worse, his eyes ringed by cadaverous shadows, his puffy cheeks ashen, and his breathing labored. Yet Jaxar refused his wife’s supporting arm and kept his attention on Zevaron, waiting for a response.
“Go with her, Father, please,” Danar pleaded. “I’ll try to make him see reason.”
Zevaron dipped his head, ashamed. He had been ready to heap judgment upon a man who had tried to befriend his mother under very difficult circumstances. He searched for words, but none came.
“My boy,” Jaxar touched Zevaron’s arm, his fingers soft and cold. “I cannot promise—” He broke into a spasm of coughing.
Lycian gave orders to the servants to bring Jaxar to his bed chamber. This time he did not resist.
Danar remained, glaring at Zevaron. “Come up to the laboratory, where we can talk.”
When they were safely out of hearing, Danar turned on Zevaron. “How dare you make things any harder for my father, after everything he has done for Tsorreh? Don’t you think he is as worried about her as you are? Can’t you see what it cost him, those few days as a prisoner? He could have died, you insolent lout, and he still might!”
Zevaron fully expected Danar to strike him, so hot and passionate were Danar’s words. “I am sorry,” Zevaron said slowly. “I hope he will recover.”
“You’d better pray to whatever gods you believe in, because if he does not get better, Tsorreh has no hope.”
In the space between one beat of his heart and the next, Zevaron saw everything in a different light. “She has you.”
Danar took a step backward, his face going pale. Zevaron thought he would insist he had no power to help. Then Danar’s expression softened.
“You are right. I do not know what I can do, but I have been finding out. I do not have my father’s influence, but I am not entirely helpless. Whether you believe it or not, I love Tsorreh. Perhaps not the way you do, as a mother. These four years—I think I would have gone mad, living in the same house as my stepmother. Tsorreh has been my elder sister, my teacher, my friend.”
“I did not know,” Zevaron said, mortified. Yet why should it come as a surprise that Tsorreh had made friends even in the stronghold of her enemies? He had seen her only as the mother he had sworn to protect.
“She said,” Danar’s voice choked and he looked away, drawing a breath before he could continue, “she said the first time we met that I reminded her of you.”
And you have been a faithful ally to her. She has not been alone because of you. And Jaxar.
“Let us work together for her sake,” Danar said softly. “We are not your enemies, my father and I.”
“Tell me, then, what I must do.” Even if it means waiting in silence.
“Rest, be ready. Tomorrow, if he is able, my father will arrange for us to see her. Then you can give her your strength and courage. The rest—it will not be easy, but we will keep trying.”
After Danar departed, Zevaron sat alone in the laboratory, trying to reconcile his jumbled, discordant impressions. For so long, things had been simple. He had known who was on his side and who was not. The fact remained that his mother was in the hands of Meklavar’s most ruthless adversary, that once again her life was in jeopardy. There was nothing he could do, alone, to save her.
He went to Tsorreh’s sleeping pallet and picked up the folded cloth she had used as a pillow. He buried his face in it, inhaling the lingering scents. And tried not to weep.
Chapter Thirty-two
DURING the night, Zevaron wrestled with the almost overpowering desire to rescue Tsorreh himself. In the end, he accepted that while it might be p
ossible for him to reach her by stealth, there was no chance for the two of them to escape that way. He’d have to rely on Jaxar for that.
The next morning, however, Jaxar was too ill to leave his chamber. His steward dosed him with various herbal infusions and insisted on a regimen of rest. Jaxar’s interpretation of rest must have been very liberal, for by the early afternoon, he had arranged for Danar to see Tsorreh, accompanied by Zevaron as his bodyguard. Lycian went about her own affairs, taking several of her own maidservants as her escort.
Danar emerged from his chamber dressed in a cloak over a tunic of linen so fine, it shimmered in the light. The cloak was trimmed in purple and blue, a reminder of his royal lineage.
“You’ll do very well as you are.” Danar indicated Zevaron’s Denariyan clothing.
“I won’t attract too much notice?” Zevaron asked.
“That’s just what you will do. You will be so garish and offensive to the eye that no one will see the Meklavaran beneath the Denariyan disguise.” When Zevaron gave his best piratical scowl, Danar laughed. “Everyone knows Denariyans are too barbaric to understand Gelone.”
Danar was right. Zevaron was just another strange, colorful servant in a city filled with the exotic. A Meklavaran attempting to contact Tsorreh would only furnish further proof of a conspiracy. That would be all Cinath needed to execute her without further delay.
They walked, following the route Zevaron had taken with Lycian. Danar strode through the more crowded intersections with practiced ease, clearly accustomed to going everywhere in the city on his own feet. Zevaron tried to look fierce, scowling at everyone the way the bodyguard of a son of a noble family should. Whereas he had not particularly cared what happened to Lycian, now he was acutely aware of the dangers Danar invited by walking, unarmed and undisguised, through such crowds. Everyone clearly knew who he was, or whose son he was. Zevaron remembered what Danar had said about the value of making the arrests public.
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