“They ordered me out because of this cursed hip,” explained the railway legend in frank disgust to Jovance. “Put Lomand and his gang in place. Didn’t know anything about it until the train stopped and they all got out. I’ll skelp the lot of them if we don’t find our hut entirely as we left it.” She was a small woman whose weight made scarcely a bulge in the netting of the hammock slung for her. It seemed implausible that the deep, forceful voice could be hers, or that the hulking Nathan could be her son. He had an inch on tall Fejelis and at least half his weight.
Then again, Fejelis knew within two minutes of climbing into the caboose that if personality had mass, the engine would have been in for a hard pull on the hills. Celeste inspected them with pale blue eyes, unimpressed. “Who’re these’uns? New blood? Look an unlikely pair. Pair of city lads run away from trouble?”
“In . . . a sense,” Jovance said, with a quick, cautious glance at Fejelis.
Gently, so as to show he had taken no offense, Fejelis said, “. . . I am Fejelis Grey Rapids. This is my brother, Orlanjis.”
She scowled. “If you’re going to pull my leg, my laddie, pull the one that’s not broke.”
His thoughts seemed to hit an unseen obstacle—thump. At his side, Orlanjis started to quiver and sank down to rest against the rocking wall of the caboose. Fejelis realized his brother was laughing. Jovance said, tremulously, “It’s so, Les,” and undermined her assertion by collapsing, giggling, beside Orlanjis.
After that, Celeste could not be convinced, particularly since, when she chose to fire some testing questions at them, Orlanjis had the answers. “Why would a prince’s son learn about trains?” she demanded. To that, Orlanjis had no response. To Fejelis he might confide his dream to flee court for a simple life as a railway engineer, but not to others. Fejelis left them to talk trains, glad to have Orlanjis distracted from the horrors of the night. He had heard the undertone of hysteria in his brother’s laughter.
He had no such diversion. “What am I going to tell Lord Vladimer?” he murmured, as he and Jovance sat side by side on the floor, backs against the rough wall of the carriage.
She made a small hand gesture, one he knew from Tam when he sealed a conversation against eavesdropping. He had always thought it was a quirk of Tam’s, but perhaps it was one they had both learned from Lukfer.
“What can you tell him?” she said, close-cropped head bent close. “He should know he’s reaping what he sowed.”
He twisted to face her. “The only thing he is guilty of, by Tam’s testimony, is inaction. The rest was other men’s doing.”
A flash of yellow eyes, unreadable.
He took his best guess at an answer to that flash. “. . . Jovance, I’ll treat with whomever I have to, to achieve my ends.”
“Which are?” she said, neutrally.
He let out a breath. “. . . My position back, of course.” He bounced the red bundle on his hand and had to snatch at it before it unraveled, sending the caul skittering across the cabin. “Unlike Jis,” he said, “I’ve never given any thought to an alternative occupation.” Then, more soberly: “. . . I have to speak to the archmage again. I’d like to be able to convince him that this is folly, but if it’s not—if it’s quite simply that the Shadowborn are too-strong mages and we have the choice of death, enslavement, or collusion—then I must know that. It may be”—he rolled his head on the rough wall to look at her—“that I too must treat with the Shadowborn, to try to secure the best possible terms.”
“For whom? For you? Their brightnesses?”
“. . . For myself, their brightnesses, the palace staff, the artisans and craftsman and merchants and indigents . . . for us, the Lightborn. I would count it my failure if Minhorne suffered what Stranhorne Manor has and I had done nothing to avert the stroke.”
Jovance’s hand opened and closed. Something moved in her face, something grim, powerful. Despite himself, he remembered the viscous red rain of a body ruptured in midair.
“Fejelis,” she said, slowly. “If it’s death or enslavement, I’ll take death. I’ll not have done to me what’s been done to Tam.”
He felt the words physically as a pang in his stomach or beneath his heart. He drew up his feet, bracing himself with his angled legs, and wondered what to say to her. Her determination would not change his decision—could not, even if he knew that by some choice or conciliation of his own, he could save her. Yet to say so aloud seemed cold, and he did not feel cold toward her fate.
She said, quietly, “I didn’t tell you that to influence your decisions, or make what you have to do more difficult. It’s difficult enough. I told you so you’d not be taken by surprise.”
“. . . ‘Difficult enough’?” he picked up from that bleak tone. “Do you mean ‘hopeless enough’?” A hesitation, longer than his usual. “. . . What do you sense?”
She shook her head. “I also told you,” she said, “so we’d not waste the time we have.” She slid work-hardened fingers under his jaw, turned his head, and kissed him.
“That’s playing dirty,” he said, huskily, when she drew back.
“So it is.”
“You’re not going to tell me.”
“No, I’m not. It’s a matter for mages, and it would do you no good to know.”
He chose to accept that, for now. At least she had not pointed out that none of the mages were under contract to him on this matter.
A far too few minutes later, the train drew into Strumheller, giving them no opportunity for more than that kiss, an interlude of the desultory, uncertain conversation between two people exploring a mutual attraction, and another kiss. Celeste gleefully observed, “That’s no prince, though the lad’s got taste.” Orlanjis looked worried, as well he should. Neither tradition nor compact allowed for a mage consort to the prince, and the Temple would still want Jovance’s strength for their lineages. Fejelis doubted he would meet the obscure fate of her first earthborn lover, though, who had been lost on his travels, possibly through the Temple’s doing. Whatever Fejelis’s fate was to be, it would not be obscure.
And if they escaped death or enslavement, the relations between princedom and Temple would change. He would see to that.
They listened as doors slammed open, so forcefully the train rocked, and the people inside spilled out. He heard bellowed orders from men, and shouts from men and women—if Darkborn women were submissive and meek, he did not hear much evidence of it—and children crying. At one point, there was a shot, followed immediately by a thoroughly profane rebuke from one of the voices in charge. Someone knocked hard on their door to tell them that they’d hear the bell when it was safe for them to come out. They waited more or less in silence. Talking was difficult with the racket outside, and flirting inhibited by tension, and by Orlanjis sitting on the floor on his other side. Though his young brother made a negligent chaperone, since by the time they heard the bolt slide back, Orlanjis had dozed off, propped against Fejelis’s shoulder.
“Wait until y’hear the bell,” the voice said from outside. “Lightborn quarters are off the west end of the platform—you’ll know from th’signage, if y’haven’t been here before. When you get inside and th’door shut and all, throw th’switch t’turn off the bell t’let us know. The baron and some’ll be down to join y’, very shortly.” He rapped on the door again, and they heard his booted feet move away.
Nat helped his mother to her feet, and she tucked crutches under her arms. He could have carried her effortlessly, but Fejelis had no doubt, even on this slight acquaintance, as to how she would receive that. He prodded Orlanjis awake and resisted the temptation to tease him with the request that he witness the formalizing of a contract, less on Orlanjis’s account than Jovance’s. They heard the bell, and Nat opened the door on chill night air; shivering, they climbed down.
Strumheller Crosstracks Station was an open station. He did not linger to look around, aware of the courtesy their hosts were extending them, surrendering even so small a portion of their pr
ecious hours of darkness on a night like this. The Lightborn quarters were easy to identify, even without the painted sign. It was the one building where the paintwork was truly decorative, not merely functional, the door, trim, and mounted panels on the sides brightly painted in a rustic, slightly garish style. Ordinarily the mounted panels would have held posters, but there was no one to read them here.
They closed the doors behind them, gladly putting the stone walls between them and the night. The building was surprisingly large, accommodating a dozen people in three bedrooms and a six-bed dormitory, and very well lit. The lack of posters outside was more than made up for by the many sheets of notice and instruction inside, which Nat and Les completely ignored. They staked their claim to their favorite rooms.
Jovance threw the lever to turn off the bell, saying, “The meeting room is through here.” She steered them into a modest-sized room dominated by a long glass table and an equally long glass sideboard. Six chairs of Lightborn design were pushed in on one side of the table, so that the occupants would face what looked like a large watercolor painting on paper, with a fine silver mesh over it: the paper wall. The painting would be backed by several layers of opaque black. Orlanjis, who had not had many dealings with Darkborn, eyed it dubiously. It looked flimsy, but any breach would be more dangerous to the Darkborn than to themselves. Jovance said, “Shall I get you something to drink, your brightnesses?”
She was prompting him back into a role; he supposed he should be grateful. “I’m not sure my stomach is up for more bedeeth tea,” he said, “but I need something to keep me alert. It has been a long night.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” she said, and left.
Orlanjis said in a low voice, “Fejelis, she’s a mage.”
“. . . I’m fairly sure there’s no ensorcellment involved,” Fejelis said.
“That’s not what I meant,” Orlanjis said. “I mean, she’s not eligible to be consort. And if you’re not serious, I mean—” He flushed deeply, to Fejelis’s well-hidden amusement. So his indulged younger brother had a sense of ethics in romance.
“. . . I could be quite serious. And if it comes to that, we will deal with it then.”
“But why should she—”
“Who’s he insulting?” Jovance interrupted, coming into the room with a tray. “Me or you?”
She must have used magic to heat the water that quickly. She offered them their choice of cups and dispensed tea from the common pot. Orlanjis’s scowl dissipated as he fell on the bannocks and cheese. Self-appointed food taster or ravenous adolescent? Finding himself in a losing race for the spoils, Fejelis concluded it was the latter. Jovance helped herself to a portion and then simply watched the scrum with a sisterly smirk. She never did get an answer to her question.
Fejelis was halfway through his second cup of bitter Darkborn tea and wondering if there was any more cheese in the stores when they heard the door open on the other side. He put down the bannock he had been holding, and, wanting a napkin, wiped his mouth on his sleeve.
Jovance leaned down to breathe in his ear. “Eight people. Three mageborn. Two pretty strong.”
A voice from the other side of the wall said, “Your brightnesses?” A prompting murmur. “Magistra?”
“Yes,” Fejelis said. He made himself speak steadily, without his habitual hesitation. “This is Fejelis Grey Rapids, prince of the Lightborn; my brother, Orlanjis; and Magistra Jovance.” He realized he had no idea how she styled herself on such occasions. Earthborn Lightborn clung to a fashionable minimalism in using titles, although they were as prideful and hierarchical without them as the mages with their ranks, or the Darkborn with their layers of nobility. It did help, when dealing with either of those, to have a title to brandish, but he was not sure she would want to use her Temple rank, even if he knew it.
“I am Baron Reynard Strumheller,” the Darkborn on the far side of the wall said, in an aggressive, light baritone, as though daring Fejelis to dispute his claim. “I have with me Lord Vladimer Plantageter, the brother of the archduke”—Jovance’s face hardened at the name—“Baronet Boris Stranhorne, Baronette Laurel Stranhorne, Lady Telmaine—Mrs. Balthasar Hearne, formerly Lady Telmaine Stott.” That a woman, but not a man, could gain or lose rank by marriage was one of those Darkborn nuances that had taken hours of study to understand. “Magister Farquhar Broome”—he saw Jovance nod in recognition—“and Magistra Phoebe Broome.”
Jovance leaned over to whisper, and he pointed to his ear and the wall in warning, and indicated the paper and pens and ink laid out on the sideboard.
“My companions and I are deeply grateful to you for your timely retrieval and hospitality, Baron Strumheller,” Fejelis said.
Jovance dealt out pens and paper. Orlanjis eyed his dubiously. Incongruously, the pen was of Darkborn manufacture, the wooden barrel carefully carved, with a metal nib and hidden bladder that stored ink. The first time one of these had been laid before Isidore, the prince had laughed himself breathless at the cheek of the Darkborn, out to best the Lightborn there as well.
Fejelis uncapped the pen, tapped it to start the ink flowing, and scribbled, 3rd mage lady T. He had not named her when he told Jovance and her colleagues the background to Tam’s, Orlanjis’s, and his sudden arrival beside the railway tracks, and he did not think Jovance or Orlanjis would connect name and account now. Even so, Jovance gave him a searching glance.
Vladimer Plantageter said, “I expected that the mage—Magister Tammorn—would have been with you.”
Straight to the heart of the sticky questions, Fejelis thought. “So did I,” he said. At least he had had a chance to decide beforehand how to meet said. At least he had had a chance to decide beforehand how to meet it. Which was directly. “Magistra Jovance tells me that he has been sent by the archmage and high masters to open negotiations with the Shadowborn.”
There was a reverberating silence from the other room, no spurious or stalling questions as to his meaning.
“That is not news I wanted to convey,” Fejelis said, “any more than it is news you wished to hear. Magister Tammorn did not go willingly—he is a sport, and able to sense Shadowborn magic in a way that lineage mages do not, and his sense of them was of something hostile and dangerous—but being under Temple law, and being fifth-rank, he had no choice. If he had defied the high masters’ orders, he would have been coerced into it.”
“Well,” they heard the baron mutter, “that’s that, then.”
“That most decidedly is not that,” Vladimer said, his voice gritty. “That is not welcome news, but not, perhaps, unexpected.” And what exactly did he mean by that—that he expected treachery of the mages? Or the Lightborn? “However, Prince Fejelis, your being here in the Borders is unexpected. The report I had from Minhorne is that you had been deposed.”
And in the usual course of such things, should have been dead, yes. “My survival was Magister Tam’s doing. He lifted my brother and me out.”
“Why bring you here?”
Despite himself, he hesitated a half beat. “. . . He brought me to someone he trusted—Magistra Jovance, granddaughter to his master, Lukfer. Magister Tammorn is more than a contracted mage to me. He is a good friend.”
“That is not the usual relationship between earthborn and mageborn,” Vladimer said, crisply. A slightly reproachful murmur from the other side. Jovance scribbled, F Broome.
“You’re not the first to tell me that, Lord Vladimer.”
A woman’s voice spoke up, slightly hesitant but determined. “Lord Vladimer, neither my father nor I can detect any sense of Shadowborn about them.”
P Broome, wrote Jovance. Checking us. Orlanjis shuffled his chair closer, craning his neck to see.
Fejelis decided that he would not acknowledge that they themselves lacked a similar advantage. He scratched, Cn they tell yr lineage vs sport? She squinted, deciphering, and shook her head.
He’d be better reassured if her expression were more certain, though if any of the Dar
kborn weren’t Darkborn or were Shadowborn-held, he might be dead or ensorcelled before he knew he’d misjudged. The paper wall was a fragile thing. The vigilants would be disgusted with him for sitting still, so his voice could be placed, but instinct told him that he should stay where he was; the tension on the far side of the wall was palpable.
“And what do you plan to do now?”
Orlanjis was frowning at the other’s tone. Fejelis wished he were able to signal that he was choosing to let the Darkborn have control for a while, to let them settle. “Get back to Minhorne,” he said. “Hope to be able to influence the archmage—”
“To do what?”
That, too, he had thought through. “. . . To consider the interests of the earthborn as well as the mageborn in their actions. I don’t know why the high masters have chosen the course they have taken. Perhaps it was anger for your people’s attack on the tower.” He’d get it said, rather than leave it leering through the silences. “For me, I don’t think that in itself was enough, but if they felt themselves weakened by it, so that they did not feel they could fight . . .” Assuming, Fejelis said privately to himself, that they wished to fight under any balance of powers. His fear was that the Temple had decided that their loyalty lay with magic, whatever the nature of that magic. He could not say that to the Darkborn, and deepen their hostility against magic. Or was that what Vladimer had meant when he said that the Temple’s move was not unexpected? “. . . I could continue to enumerate reasons, but won’t know until I ask.”
“Which may satisfy your curiosity, Prince Fejelis, a motive with which I find myself in sympathy. But what will you do when you know?”
Jovance’s pen beat a soft staccato on her paper, leaving dots of ink. He quirked a smile at her; Lord Vladimer was obviously accustomed to provoking a reaction and letting others do the soothing. Sejanus Plantageter was superb at it. “. . . How is your brother the archduke, Lord Vladimer? I had had some bad news of him earlier.”
“If you are asking as to whether I have power to negotiate,” Vladimer said, “I do.”
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