Fortress of Owls

by C. J. Cherryh

  The abbot bowed, and bowed again, white-faced. “Your Grace,” he said in a faint voice, and then took several breaths before starting over. “Your Grace…yes.”

  “And what did you answer?”

  “Nothing,” said the abbot. “I sent no answer. And if the lord across the river should send again, I would tell Your Grace immediately, on my oath.”

  “Are you telling me the truth?” Tristen asked, listening in both realms, and the abbot nodded and bowed fervently.

  “On my life, my lord, on my life and on my faith, I tell you the truth.”

  It was the truth, at least that the abbot had not betrayed him.

  The gift glimmered faintly, ever so faintly, full of fear, and there was no deception in the gray space.

  “And have you heard from other men?” Tristen asked.

  “From Earl Crissand’s father,” the abbot said anxiously.

  “From the old earl. And him I upheld. The king’s viceroy I cursed,” the abbot added on a little breath, “and all his men.”

  “Don’t curse the Guelens,” Tristen said mildly, “since all the Guelens we have left are mine and choose to be here, and Uwen, beside you, is Guelen. Don’t wish ill at all, sir. You can, and I strongly wish you will not.”

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  “Yes, Your Grace.”

  Blessings and curses alike had abounded in Efanor’s little Quinalt book of devotions. But that book declared they all flowed to and from the gods.

  He was not so sure they did not flow from men like this, a slight wizard, a whisper of a wizard, less even than Her Grace, but gifted with a hard, single-minded devotion and a steady purpose. He peeled through it like layers of an onion, bruising nothing, laying bare the heart.

  “Go to master Emuin,” Tristen said to the abbot, “immediately, and help him in any way he asks. You’ve helped him before. Help him now.”

  “My gracious lord,” the abbot said, still whitefaced, and bowed, and sought his leave. Uwen took him toward the door.

  So there was a man in the midst of all Crissand’s father had done; and by the letters he had, he knew this man had sheltered noble and common folk alike when the viceroy’s justice was for hanging them.

  “Who are these nuns?” he asked on a sudden recollection.

  “Emuin said there were nuns.”

  With women he had had very little to do, and nothing Unfolded to him to tell him whether that was common or not, or whether the gods, whom the Quinalt book said considered women as vessels and not as capable of acting, were quite the same for the Bryaltines. It all eluded him.

  “My lord?” said the abbot.

  “Are there nuns?”

  “Priestesses,” said the abbot in a quiet voice, utterly honestly.

  “As the Quinaltine never admitted. They’ve been with me for all my service here. But now they go in their habits, and we serve Your Grace in whatever modest way we can. Praise the gods, we do it in plain sight now.”

  338 / C. J. CHERRYH

  “The Quinalt doesn’t approve of priestesses,” he said later to Uwen, having taken a second look in Efanor’s little book, and having found what he recalled, that the Quinaltines thought women were a source of evil. But he disbelieved a great deal in that book.

  “That they don’t,” Uwen said. “Women’s fine enough by me, howsoever, an’ a smile an’ a wink from a lass is an even better thing, so ye might say.”

  “The Quinalt doesn’t agree with that.”

  “The Quinalt ain’t in charge here, an’ besides, I fear I ain’t that good a Quinalt.”

  “You used to wish to the gods. I seldom see you do it now.”

  “That.” Uwen gave a faint laugh. “’At’s a soldier’s habit.”

  Then he became sober. “I watched the dark come down at Lewenbrook, an’ ’twixt us, m’lord, I ain’t been a good Quinalt since.”

  What could he say to such a thing, when he was not sure whether Uwen regretted it or not?

  That, however, was the sum of matters from the council, except the abbot’s servants, the priestesses, arrived at his chambers within the hour, carrying a thick parcel of letters, all from the other side of the river, all very small, and tied up with red cord.

  “Be assured,” said the older nun, a plain woman robed all in gray and black, “His Reverence never did any of the things the Elwynim asked, save only to send aid to His Grace the Lord Regent.”

  To Ninévrisë’s father, that meant, during his time in hiding.

  That was certainly no fault in the man: treason against Lord Heryn, as it happened, but none to the fair cause.

  And the letters were not the only object of curiosity the Bryalt abbot had sent…and that not without conscious decision, Tristen thought, gazing at the women who had brought the letters, the elder a quiet woman, common as FORTRESS OF OWLS / 339

  any face in Henas’amef. She might have been a grandmother in the market…or perhaps she was.

  For there was, indeed, when he probed it, a little spark of a presence.

  “Do I know you?” he asked, for the face seemed familiar to him, and the women made a little bow like willows in a gale.

  “We served in the Zeide.”

  “In this room?” he asked, for suddenly that was the point of familiarity…he recalled women gathered together about sorcerous objects: Lady Orien and all her company, with Hasufin’s presence attempting the breached wards.

  The gaze that looked up at him, suddenly direct, was dark and wide and terrified.

  “You were here,” he accused her.

  “I served the Aswydds,” came the faint response. “But all the while I served the gods, by your leave, lord. As does my sister.

  Let us go.”

  A lit straw, that was all the woman’s wizardry was, the sort a wisp of wind might cause to flare or extinguish altogether…and was not that the danger in what Emuin called hedge-wizards… that they might set a whole field alight?

  “What is your name?” he asked, holding her with his stare.

  “Faiseth,” she said, or that was what he thought he heard.

  Faiseth. It seemed to echo here and there at once, and now she knew she was observed. So did her sister.

  A presence flitted past him, sought concealment in the gray space. A hare in a burrow, the woman was, heart beating quickly, and her sister with her. She had not wanted this errand.

  The lord abbot had not wanted it either, and the abbot commanded. So much he knew in an instant. And the other woman…

  —“Pei’razen.”

  340 / C. J. CHERRYH

  The woman looked at him, stricken, addressed in the gray space as well as the world.

  — “Orien’s servants.”

  “The gods’ servants, your servants, at your will, my lord.”

  He considered the women, and the knowledge he had, as thorough as if it had Unfolded to him. The women concealed nothing, to the walls of their souls they concealed nothing.

  It was worth knowing the nature of such servants. It was worth remembering. Such as a lord could lay a ward within a soul, he laid one, sure and fast, so neither woman should betray the house, or him, without his attention, not in all they ever did. They were his.

  And sharply a breath came in, and the younger covered her mouth with her hands as if her soul were trying to escape. The other pressed a hand to her heart.

  “I’ve not harmed you,” he said, “but you touched the wards of this room on that night, and now I’ve laid new ones.” He abhorred what they had done, but he saw in them now a small, a wavering hope, a desire of life, of favor, of something he had to give that these woman desperately, fervently lacked and adored and sought with all their life.

  “What do you wish of me?”

  “Nothing, Your Grace.”

  “That’s not so,” he said. “What do you wish that I might give you?”

  “To be the gods’ true servant,” she said, then, and that was false.

  “The truth,” he said,
and took it, not that it was right to do, but that they sought mercy, and there was one safe way to pour it out to them. They wished to have skill, to be greater than they were. They wished to be regarded by one and all, feared, for it was fear they had understood.

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  “You need not,” he said, “be afraid of anyone. You need never be afraid.” He held out his hand, and took cold, thin fingers he could break with the pressure of his hand. He wished her well and wished her sister the same, and she began to tremble.

  “Master Emuin would tell you,” he said, “and will tell you, when you go to him, that breaking things is no help.” He warmed the woman’s hand in his, and reached for her sister’s—so slight a pressure, her fingers, against his, as if he held one of his birds. “Don’t do anything so foolish as that again.

  Don’t curse. Don’t fear anything.”

  He let go their hands, but now they tried, in that other place, to hold to him, as if he, after all, was what they had wanted.

  “Tell the abbot I thanked him,” he said. “And go to master Emuin. He’ll know all you’ve done. Don’t be afraid of him.

  Don’t be afraid.”

  One and the other, they backed away, wanting his forgiveness, striving to reach into the gray space and not to let him go; but he had no wish to be their answer: he pushed them gently out into the world and shut it as it were a door.

  He could not be Mauryl. He was never made to be Mauryl, or Emuin, who could teach. He delayed for a glance at their departure and said nothing to Uwen’s look at him, before he added the letters to the pile.

  The darkness had not even bothered to devour these sisters.

  It had had other prey in mind, and their understanding had never told them their danger.

  Meanwhile, while the letters accumulated in lords’ hands, priests had contended with curses while Hasufin prowled the wards like the wolf at the fold…never ask what curses the Quinalt patriarch might have laid on them all a matter of days ago, before he left; but he had felt no trace of it. The wards of the Zeide were sound.

  342 / C. J. CHERRYH

  The harm a priest could do seemed not to have touched what he guarded.

  He went back to his burden of letters and confessions, his accounts and his requests, and his small stacks of coins.

  By ranks and rows they stood on the desk to remind him, Uwen’s lesson.

  By such means he understood the simpler things that did not Unfold to him, or leap full-blown into his sight in the gray place. The lord of Amefel needed such advice, and had before him the correspondence of the Bryaltines with the enemy, the earls with the enemy, and the earls with the falsified accounts.

  Now they began all to tell the truth.

  Even Lady Orien’s servants had told him their small truth at the last, and left running.

  C H A P T E R 8

  Aletter from Tristen and a letter from Anwyll arrived on Cefwyn’s desk in the same packet. Idrys brought them, on a cold, rainy night. Something close to ice was spattering the windows of the study. Water stood in beads on Idrys’ black armor, from a recent trip outside.

  “Two letters,” Idrys said. “And a bit of news I fear my lord king won’t like. The Amefin patriarch has just arrived at the Quinaltine, with four Guelen guardsmen, and on a lame horse.”

  “The Amefin patriarch,” Cefwyn said in wonder. Nothing he could imagine could deter him from the letter he had in hand, but that did divert him a moment. “Why? Did Tristen send him?”

  “With guards that haven’t reported to me,” Idrys said, “no.

  Without a message to me, no. And not wearing the Guelen red, no. Lord Tristen didn’t send them. One man arrived in his proper colors, and came to his officer. The others I would call deserters.”

  “With the Amefin patriarch.” Worse and worse news. It was not a flow of information this evening, it was a torrent becoming a flood, and by Idrys’ face, he had only part of it in hand, in these letters. Something was going on that involved the Quinalt. And a man who had no reason to be running errands, at his age, and who was not likely to be running 344 / C. J. CHERRYH

  to higher authority on any ordinary matter.

  With Tristen in charge in Amefel…was any matter of religion ordinary?

  “Report,” he said. “Master crow, don’t deliver me this diced in pieces. I want to know. Report, or hie you downstairs and find out.”

  Idrys did not go. He loomed, a standing blackness against the dull, glistening color of the stained-glass window. Night was outside. But a little of it had gotten in with the Lord Commander, as if it were one of those shadows Tristen talked about, the cold spots his grandfather had claimed to feel on the stairs.

  The world had been moderately ordered until Idrys came.

  Now there was no likelihood he would leave this office before dawn.

  “The one man,” Idrys said, “the honest man, to all appearances…that one pleads a sick mother. To deliver another piece of unpleasant news, the captain of the Guelen garrison is one that went into the Quinaltine, and my lord king will recall he was captain during your tenure, during Parsynan’s…”

  “I know the man,” Cefwyn retorted. “He’s a prig, a hardheaded and objectionable man. And a deserter, is it? A captain of the Guelens, a deserter.”

  “The man with the mother says they aren’t deserters, but disguised themselves, and he professes not to know anything, except they went with Lord Tristen’s permission, and met with the patriarch at Clusyn. It was, he says, the patriarch’s idea to disguise themselves, but he had his captain’s permission to go on, because of his mother.”

  “Did he come with them?”

  “A very interesting point. He came just after Lord Tristen’s message and Anwyll’s. These came by the same man, Dragon Guard, from the river.”

  “From the river.”

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  “So the man says. Lord Tristen was there. Meanwhile the patriarch took to the road—whether Lord Tristen was in Henas’amef or not at the time remains unclear. And if we believe the man with the mother, they disguised themselves and the patriarch, and came as fast as they could.”

  “With Tristen’s permission, while he was at the river for some godsforsaken reason.”

  “The story is tangled, admittedly. I’d suggest, modestly, my lord king read the letters.”

  “You haven’t.”

  “I was inquiring after the patriarch. First the messenger through the gates, by a quarter hour later the man with the mother, and half an hour after that, in this weather, draggled and soggy, the Amefin patriarch and the rest of the men. We’d not have known, necessarily, except the one man wearing his colors reported to his regiment first, as he should have, and the captain of the Guelens fortunately had his wits about him and sent for me.” Idrys was dripping on the tiles, as happened…had had no cloak, by the soaking he had had, and a cold rain. Idrys had wasted no time on either end of his passage.

  “Your best guess, crow. Guesses, now. Free for the making.”

  “I don’t believe any of it. I think our man with the sick mother wants to reach her, doesn’t want to entangle himself—that part of the story is true—with the business at the Quinalt. He’s scared. The regimental captain had sent to know about the mother, who was ill, that was true; but recovered; she was at her house, knows nothing of all this, likely doesn’t know her son’s in the town. I’ve a handful of pieces with no ends that match.”

  “I agree. The whole pack is lying in some fashion, and Tristen didn’t send them—no, he sent the man

  346 / C. J. CHERRYH

  with the mother. I can guess that. He would. Stay. Let me read this.”

  “Read, my lord king. I’ve an order to pass, by your leave, maybe a report to receive, and I’ll be back before you finish.”

  What order that was he did not ask. The deserters had better secure sanctuary at the gods’ own altar before Idrys laid hands on them, Cefwyn thought to himself, for there was fire
in Idrys’

  eye.

  Ilefínian has fallen. I write this from Anwyll’s camp at the river, where Cevulirn has set Ivanim archers to watch the bridges…

  Cevulirn was with Tristen. Anwyll’s camp at the river. The names rang like blessed bells, familiar and sounding of protection, safety, matters well in hand…the two most loyal of his lords, aware of the calamity and taking precautions.

  I have set the thane of Modeyneth to be the new earl of Bryn.

  His name is Drusenan. His wife is Elwynim. He lives in the village.

  I have found women and children fled from the fighting in Elwynor and set them in his care. Also I have ordered a wall and gate across the road there, where two hills make a natural defense. The Emwy road is warded.

  Tristen broke laws. What else did he expect? Tristen appointed an unknown man to office, and he would wager there was good reason. The south was in good order—in excellent order, except he now knew his carts were farther away.

  What shall I do, Tristen? was his silent appeal, which he knew Tristen would no more hear than he could understand two wizards looking at one another and nodding. I need the damn carts, Tristen. Well-done on the

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  riverside, but my gear sits in camp, and it’s the better part of a month to move those carts here.

  Idrys’ footsteps heralded his return. Cefwyn ceased reading and waited, as his Lord Commander came back to him.

  “News?”

  “I’ve sent a messenger to His Holiness advising him things may not be as he’s told. I hear His Reverence was muddy, lame, and bruised. The report I have says he fell off his horse.”

  “Tristen couldn’t have done it. He was at the river.”

  “At the river, my lord king?”

  “With my carts. I know damned well that’s what he’s done.

  Go on.”

  “He’s almost certainly here to complain of the lord of Amefel.

  But not even the Majesty of Ylesuin can demand entrance into the Quinaltine.”

  “We can demand other things.”