The Lord-Protector's Daughter

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  She had to remember that. She had to.

  After several moments, she stiffened and then eased her way back through the slaughterhouse. Once outside, still holding the concealment shield, she took a deep breath before walking back across the rear courtyard toward the palace. She’d discovered that her Talent was more than just a tool for observation—much more.

  She shivered again, this time at the thought that she could no longer claim she was powerless. She kept walking.

  44

  True early spring had finally arrived in Tempre—or at least several days and afternoons warm enough to enjoy the private gardens to the northwest of the palace, and on Decdi afternoon Mykella slipped away from the palace to the gardens and their budding foliage to be alone. She was edgy and still had trouble sleeping, even though the ledgers showed no more diversions, and the actual receipts continued to match the ledger entries. There were no more tack entries assigned to “Berjor” for the Southern Guards, either. For all the brighter and warmer weather, her father remained withdrawn, spending even more time with his brother, and drinking more wine than he should have.

  One of Mykella’s favorite places was the small fountain in the northwest corner of the extensive walled garden. There, water trickled down what resembled a section of an ancient wall, and tiny ferns circled the shallow pool below. In summer and fall, miniature red-bells bloomed.

  She was halfway across the garden on the side path when she heard a feminine laugh from behind one of the boxwood hedges forming the central maze. The laugh was Rachylana’s, and Mykella could sense that her sister was not alone. She moved closer, drawing her sight-shield around her.

  “You’re much more beautiful than Mykella.” That voice was Berenyt’s.

  “Mykella has her points.”

  “But so many of them are sharp…”

  Mykella snorted. Time to put a stop to this particular scene. “Rachylana! Where are you?” As if she didn’t know.

  There was absolute silence from the hidden bower, but Mykella dropped the sight-shield and moved toward it, making sure her boots echoed on the stones of the curving pathway. When she came around the last corner of the boxwood hedge before the bower, Berenyt stood.

  “Mykella.” His tone was pleasant.

  Mykella could sense the unvoiced condescension and the irritation. “Good day, Berenyt,” Mykella said politely. “I didn’t realize you were here.”

  “It was a most pleasant end-day, and I happened to encounter your sister, and she suggested we enjoy the garden. It has been such a long and gray winter.”

  “It has indeed,” Mykella agreed, “some days being even grayer than others.”

  Berenyt bowed. “I will not intrude further. Good afternoon, ladies.” His smile was clearly for Rachylana. He stepped gracefully past the sisters and made his way down the hedge-lined path that would lead him out of the maze.

  Mykella waited for the outburst that was certain to follow once Berenyt was out of earshot.

  “You came out here looking for us, didn’t you?” accused Rachylana.

  “No. I came out here to be alone, but you were giggling and making over him. He’s your cousin.”

  “He’s going to be Lord-Protector some day. Father won’t wed again.”

  Mykella had tried to avoid thinking about that. “If Lady Cheleyza doesn’t have a son, and if nothing happens to Berenyt.” She almost said that Cheleyza was expecting, but realized that she’d have to explain.

  “He’ll still be first in line.”

  So long as Cheleyza doesn’t poison him. Mykella managed not to swallow at the implications of that thought. Had Cheleyza tried to poison Rachylana because a marriage between Berenyt and Rachlyana would have reduced, if not eliminated, the chance for her child to become Lord-Protector?

  “Mykella?” pressed Rachylana.

  “He’s your cousin,” Mykella repeated, almost lamely.

  “So?”

  “Berenyt’s just using you,” Mykella said, regaining her composure and not concealing the exasperation in her voice. “You’re behaving like every other silly woman, even like a tavern trollop. You think that he cares for you. All he wants is information and power. He really doesn’t even want to bed you, except to make his position as heir apparent to his father more secure.”

  “That’s not Berenyt.”

  “That’s very much Berenyt. While you’re thinking he’s appreciating you, he keeps asking you questions, doesn’t he? He flirts, but never says anything.” Mykella’s words were edged with honey more bitter than vinegar. “He hints, but never actually says anything.”

  Rachylana lunged toward Mykella.

  Mykella stepped aside, but also called up the unseen webs of greenish energy.

  Rachylana reeled away from the unseen barrier and staggered back, nearly toppling over the stone bench. “You hit me!”

  “I never touched you, but I certainly should have.” By using her Talent to avoid a physical confrontation, Mykella realized, she’d only made matters worse. “You were so ready to lash out at me that you tripped over your own feet, and you’ll trip over more than that if you’re not careful.”

  “You and your pride. You and Salyna. The two of you seem to think that you can do anything a man can, and you can’t,” snapped Rachylana. “You’re the one who’ll trip.” She straightened herself and smiled. “You seem to forget, Mykella, that you’re a woman, and women need to carry themselves with care if they’re to acquire what they wish.”

  Mykella had never forgotten that she was a woman. How could she, reminded as she was at every turn about what women couldn’t do, shouldn’t do, or ought not to do? She said nothing more as Rachylana turned and stalked down the garden path.

  Only after Rachylana had left did Mykella walk to the far corner of the garden. How could she make people pay attention to her—truly pay attention to her? She was half a head shorter than her sisters, and she was a woman. Her voice and perhaps her posture were the only commanding aspects she possessed.

  Could she use her Talents…? Could she summon the Ancient?

  Standing in the shadows of late afternoon, she concentrated on the soarer. Nothing happened. How could she reach the Ancient? Through the blackness below? This time, she reached downward toward the greenish black darkness. Surprisingly, touching that underground web was far easier immediately away from the Table. Did the Table make it harder?

  The Table interferes with many things. The soarer hovered to Mykella’s right, in the deeper shadows. You have called me. A sense of amusement radiated from the soarer. What do you wish?

  “Some assistance with a few small things,” Mykella said.

  Why should I offer such?

  “You wanted me to deal with the Ifrit, didn’t you? I did. Now, I may need to deal with others.”

  Mykella gained the sense of a laugh.

  You need little from me. You have repulsed the Ifrit. So long as you guard the Table, your world will be safe from him and those like him. You can already tap the lifeweb of Corus.

  “Outside of the shields and the sight-shield, and seeing the lifeweb, I don’t know much,” Mykella confessed.

  You can kill and travel through stone near the web, reminded the soarer.

  Mykella winced. Did the Ancient know everything?

  Only what you have done when you are close to the lifeweb. You can do much. If you link to the web itself, and do not just draw upon it, all that you do will be strengthened. A sense of somberness radiated from the hovering soarer. Anything of value and of power gained through the lifeweb bears a cost. Those with great power—and you will be one of them, if you follow your destiny—can often avoid bearing those costs themselves. But there is a price, because those costs will not be denied, and they will fall twofold on others linked to you who have no Talent.

  “Twofold?”

  The soarer vanished.

  “Who are you talking to, Mykella?”

  At the sound of Salyna’s voice, Mykella whirled. “S
alyna?”

  “I thought you were talking to someone, but there wasn’t…there isn’t anyone here.” Salyna frowned.

  Hadn’t Salyna seen the soarer? Did one have to have some vestige of Talent to see the Ancients? Was that another reason why the soarer had contacted Mykella?

  “Mykella?”

  “Sometimes…sometimes I just have to talk things out to myself,” Mykella temporized.

  “What’s a lifeweb?”

  “Oh…that’s something I learned in the archives. Everything in the world that is living is tied together. That’s what the Alectors thought.” Mykella hoped that her hasty explanation would be enough. “I was trying to work out…about why some things happen. Sometimes, it helps to put it in words.”

  “I thought I was the only one who did that,” offered her younger sister, pausing, and then adding, “You know…you really made Rachylana mad.”

  “I’m certain I did, but she shouldn’t be sneaking off and flirting with Berenyt. They’re cousins.”

  “He can be nice.”

  “He can. Of that, I’m most certain, but I’m also certain that he’s selfish and that he’ll bed any pretty woman he can, and that, if Rachylana and he are matched, she’ll be miserable within seasons, if not sooner.” Mykella smiled. “Not that she will listen to either of us. We might as well head back so that we won’t be late for supper.”

  “She won’t…but that makes it sad. She can’t see that we worry. All she can see is Berenyt.” Salyna shook her head, clearly unhappy about Rachylana and Berenyt, but knowing the truth of Mykella’s words.

  After Rachylana’s reaction, and her father’s withdrawal, Mykella knew she had much to practice—and learn—in the days ahead.

  45

  Mykella had waited a glass before trying to find Rachylana, hoping that her sister had calmed down, but Rachylana was nowhere to be found, and when she returned late that evening, she immediately locked herself in her room.

  Disturbing dreams and thoughts had kept Mykella from sleeping well or long. When she woke on Londi morning, the warmth and sunshine of Novdi and Decdi had vanished. Outside was dark and gloomy under heavy gray clouds. After she washed up and as she dressed, the soarer’s words about others bearing the cost of her Talent kept running through her mind. Why should she or others have to pay for gaining an ability or power? But had Jeraxylt’s death really come from her Talent? Her discoveries of the golds stolen from the Lord-Protector’s accounts had begun even before the soarer had appeared to her, and that meant Joramyl’s plotting had as well.

  So why had the Ancient warned her about the cost of Talent? Was the growing distance between her and Rachylana because Mykella’s Talent allowed her to see more? But wouldn’t that have been true as well if she’d been perceptive in the ways in which her mother had been? If this…if that…and what about that over there?

  She wanted to scream.

  Instead, she waited several moments to let herself settle, then walked calmly—outwardly, at least—from her chamber to the family breakfast room. Salyna was already there.

  No sooner had Mykella seated herself than Rachylana appeared and sat down. “Good morning, Salyna.”

  “Good morning,” replied Salyna.

  “Good morning, Rachylana,” Mykella said warmly.

  “I don’t know that I’m speaking to you,” Rachylana said, archly.

  “You might as well. There aren’t too many others around. Besides, whatever I’ve said has been because I love you. I also care what happens to you. You can fault me for saying what I believe, but it isn’t because I don’t care, and I’ve said nothing to anyone but Salyna, and I won’t.”

  “I know that.” Rachylana paused as Muergya appeared with a large teapot, from which she filled the three mugs.

  “Good morning, daughters.”

  Even without Talent, Mykella could have told that the cheer of her father’s greeting was forced. With it, the pain behind it was almost agonizing—and that bothered her. But she also knew that, had she or one of her sisters died, their father’s grief would not have been nearly so deep.

  How do you know that? she asked herself. But the answer was obvious, because Feranyt had not shown nearly as much grief when their mother had died six years previous. He had grieved, and he had refused to remarry, but he had not seemed so inconsolable. Could it be the loss of both of them? Mykella didn’t know, and she might never know, but she knew his grief over losing a daughter would not have been nearly so great.

  Jeraxylt’s place at the breakfast table remained vacant. Neither Rachylana nor Salyna wished to take it, and Feranyt had said nothing. His occasional looks to the empty chair had been more than enough to keep it vacant.

  “I do have some good news.” Feranyt forced a smile.

  The three waited.

  “Joramyl has informed me that we should expect an envoy from Midcoast later this week. He could arrive as soon as Quattri.”

  “An envoy?” pressed Mykella. While her father might be grieving, sending for another envoy or even agreeing to see one who had already set out from Hafin, so soon after Jeraxylt’s death, was anything but caring, even though he knew nothing about Rachylana’s feelings for Berenyt.

  “To consider a match, of course.” A faint irritation entered the Lord-Protector’s voice. “I won’t live forever, and you all need to be provided for.”

  Rachylana’s face paled, and her smile was faint.

  Salyna’s hand reached out under the table, as if to Rachylana, but dropped away. The table was too wide.

  Mykella wanted to ask exactly why one of them couldn’t provide for the others…or even become Lady-Protector of Tempre, but she could sense the combination of anger and irritation behind her father’s words. And if she brought up Mykel’s proclamation, he’d claim it was a legend without substance—unless she could produce it…and she couldn’t. There was only the one mention of it, so far as she could tell.

  “Anyway…that’s that,” Feranyt announced.

  “As usual…” murmured Rachylana.

  “What did you say?”

  Rachylana smiled brightly. “I said ‘another formal dinner.’ Isn’t that so?”

  “How else will the envoy know how you appear in such a setting?”

  “Yes, Father.”

  Feranyt sighed, then pushed back his chair and stood. “I need to get ready to meet with Joramyl and Lord Porofyr.”

  Mykella glanced back at her father. He had eaten sparingly, leaving almost half the omelet on his plate, and he had not even finished his second mug of spiced tea. More important, Mykella had been so distracted and irritated that she hadn’t noticed that the grayness had returned to her father’s frame…and that breakfast had not reduced it, or not much.

  Once Feranyt had left, Mykella turned to Rachylana. “I’m sorry…about everything.”

  “It’s not your fault. We’ll all be sent away. It’s just who gets sent where.” Rachylana’s eyes were bright.

  “Father’s not himself,” added Salyna. “You know that.”

  “Yes, he is. He’s always wanted to send us away because we remind him of Mother.”

  Mykella frowned. None of them looked exactly like their mother.

  “It’s true,” protested Rachylana. “He just couldn’t do it until we were old enough. Now, he can say it’s to protect us.”

  Could that be true? Mykella hadn’t sensed that in her father, but Rachylana well might be right. Mykella would have to see what she could sense in the days ahead.

  Salyna glanced to Mykella, then said quietly. “Father is only doing what he thinks best.”

  “I know.” What he thinks best…but what about what is best? Mykella did not voice that thought, and, after swallowing the last of her tea, she rose and walked back to her own chambers.

  Almost for reassurance that she could do what she’d been doing, she slipped the gold medallion that had been her mother’s and Jeraxylt’s from its hiding place in the back of her jewelry box. She looked
at it for a long time, wondering what had happened to the chain. A rumble of thunder rolled over the palace, and she glanced toward the window, before realizing that she had never opened the hangings. As she turned back, her hand brushed the edge of the dresser, and the medallion went flying, clanking on the stone and vanishing.

  She began to search for it, but it was nowhere visible, and her Talent senses were not precise enough, she discovered, to locate a small metal object.

  Had it skittered under the bed?

  With the dimness in the chamber and the darkness in the narrow space under the bed, she could see nothing. Finally, she took the striker and lit the small lamp, setting it on the floor by the bed, but the lamp flame was too high to cast light far enough under the bed.

  Could she use her Talent to help focus the lamplight?

  She almost shrugged. She could only try.

  After close to a quarter glass, she managed to narrow the light into a beam that she could bend to search under the bed…and a golden glint rewarded her. Once she had replaced the medallion in its hiding place, she was about to blow out the lamp. Then she paused, and carried the lamp with her until she stood before the mirror.

  In the end, she managed to concentrate or focus light around herself without making herself less visible. The effect was to heighten her presence, as if she were outlined in light. She smiled. That was another way to stand out, especially for someone who did not have imposing stature—like her. If she were the Lord-Protector, such a skill might be valuable, but for now, it was merely a curiosity.

  She blew out the lamp and set it back on the bedside table, behind the water pitcher, then walked back to the mirror and studied her appearance, not that she looked any different from the way she did any other morning in her nightsilk tunic and trousers and black boots.

  When she stepped out of her chamber and into the long main corridor, she looked toward the Finance study. At that moment, she saw Maxymt turn eastward from the main staircase and continue his lizardlike waddle-walk toward the Finance study. Even his posture was smug and condescending. She wanted to unsettle him. He deserved it…and more. But how?