by Mark Anthony
“Did not this preacher on the television tell you why?” said a sibilant voice.
Travis turned to see Child Samanda approaching. The girl was clad in the same old-fashioned dress she always wore, and the pale oval of her face was like a cameo set off by the dark frame of her hair. Sister Mirrim followed behind the girl, her dress just as severe, but her hair wild and fiery. She stared with milky eyes, her hands on Samanda’s shoulders, letting the girl guide her.
“Yes, he did,” Travis said in answer to Samanda’s question. “He said he’s raising an army for God.”
“But which God?”
Travis shuddered. “Mohg,” he said, the word bitter on his tongue. “That’s who Carson is raising an army for. ‘To prepare the way for His coming.’ The wraithlings are kidnapping people, turning them into ironhearts to make an army. And once the gate opens, they’ll go through to clear the way for Mohg so he can break the First Rune and destroy Eldh.”
Samanda nodded, her purple eyes solemn. “Sometimes the only way to save something is to destroy it.”
At least Travis felt an emotion: anger. “No, I won’t believe that. Destruction can’t be the answer. And Mohg wants anything but to save Eldh. If he breaks the First Rune, he’ll remake the world in his own image.”
“No,” Cy said, “he’ll remake both worlds. For they are two sides of the same coin—close and getting closer all the time. What affects one affects the other now.”
Travis hung his head. This was too much; the weight was crushing him. He couldn’t save one world, let alone two. “I can’t do this.”
“But you will,” Sister Mirrim said. “I have seen it, shining like a gem among all the darker possibilities.”
He looked up at her. “Can you really see the future?”
Mirrim’s porcelain face was stricken. “Which future do mean? There are many, and which one of them will come to pass—dark or light or something in between—depends on many choices. Especially yours, Stonebreaker.”
No, he didn’t want that power, he never had. Only that was the one choice that wasn’t up to him. He hadn’t asked for any of this, but that didn’t matter. All that mattered was what he did with the choices he had been given.
He gazed at these three otherworldly preachers—these fey, immortal beings who for some reason had taken it upon themselves to help him.
“You say the worlds are drawing closer.” He was no longer afraid; with resignation came strange peace. “There’s no stopping it, is there? Even if Duratek never finds a way to open a gate, eventually Mohg will be able to cross back to Eldh.”
Brother Cy nodded. “That’s right, son. And it may be that it’s better to face the darkness now, before it gathers yet more strength, than later, when perihelion comes and the gap between the worlds shrinks to nothing. For by then Mohg’s army will be great indeed, and he will march to Eldh and make the Pale King bow before him, and all the world will fall under the shadow of the Lord of Nightfall, whether or not he breaks the First Rune.”
“But break it he will,” Samanda said, “for when that time comes, there will be nowhere on either world where you can hide the Great Stones from him.”
“So what am I supposed to do?” Travis said. “If there’s no place to hide from him, where can I possibly go?”
Brother Cy laughed, a sound that rattled the walls and caused everyone in the room to stare. Then, as they turned their gazes back to their bowls of soup, Cy pointed at the TV in the corner. The talk show was over; another program was just coming on. The camera zoomed in on a gigantic building that loomed above a river, its glass-and-steel spires soaring like cruel mountains to the sky.
Travis let out a breath of understanding.
“That’s right, son,” Cy said. “There is still somewhere you can go. Into the heart of shadow itself.”
39.
Aryn paced before the window of Lirith’s chamber as the sky faded to gray outside. The sun had set, and by the time it rose over the world again the Warriors of Vathris would be marching north to Gravenfist Keep.
Or would they? Surely Liendra was not simply going to stand by and wave at Boreas and his army as they set out. But what did she and her witches intend to do?
“Please sit down, sister,” Lirith said. “You’re wearing out the carpet. As well as my nerves.”
“Sorry,” Aryn said and flopped into a chair. “I just can’t stop wondering what Liendra is up to.”
“You’re hardly alone in that.”
Lirith was tending to Sareth’s face while he sat on the edge of the bed. There was a mottled bruise along his jaw as well as a nasty scrape on his cheek where Duke Petryen had struck him.
Sareth winced as Lirith pressed a damp cloth soaked in herbs against his cheek. “I thought you were on my side, not theirs, beshala. That stings.”
“Then it’s working. Hold it in place.”
The Mournish man sighed. “You’re as bad as my al-Mama. As a boy, every time I was sick, she’d feed me potions that tasted like dung. I’ve never understood why the cure has to be worse than the affliction.”
“Of course you don’t,” Lirith said with an unsympathetic smile. She turned to mix together more herbs at the sideboard. “Now, be quiet, and I’ll brew you something for the—”
Lirith went stiff. A crucible slipped from her fingers, falling to the sideboard with a clatter. She turned around, her eyes wide and dark.
Aryn pushed herself up from the chair. “What is it, sister?”
“Ivalaine,” Lirith gasped. “Merciful Sia, it’s Queen Ivalaine.”
By the time they reached the dungeon, it was already too late.
At first the guard balked at Aryn’s request to see Ivalaine, but such was the force of her ire that he quickly reconsidered. He led them down a dank corridor past cells filled with thieves and miscreants culled from the town below the castle, as well as from the gathering army of Vathris. Hands reached out from between the bars, groping at the ladies, but Sareth beat them back; the stench of vomit and urine was thick on the air. A great dread came over Aryn, so that she was shaking by the time the guard unlocked the ironbound door at the end of the corridor.
By the state of things, Ivalaine was not long dead. Her flesh, though pale and stiff as clay, was warmer to the touch than the cell’s clammy air. She slumped against the wall, her flaxen hair snarled and matted, her pale eyes wide and staring. A pool of blood had formed on the stones around her, flowing from the long gashes in both of her wrists.
Lirith let out a wordless moan. She would have collapsed, but Sareth held her up, and she pressed her face against his chest. The guard stared at the queen’s corpse, slack-jawed.
A peculiar feeling came over Aryn. She felt she should fall to her knees and weep. Instead she remained standing. Everything in the room seemed gray, faded. Ivalaine had been so strong, so vibrant. Surely the very fabric of the Weirding had been torn by her death.
No, it was more than that. Aryn shut her eyes. She could see the threads of the Weirding coiling and stretching, filling back in a dark void in the web of life.
Aryn’s eyes snapped open. “Someone else was here!”
Her words jerked the guard out of his stupor. “Impossible, Your Highness. I’ve stood at the door since the queen was brought here earlier this afternoon. I’ve seen no one pass.”
Aryn had no doubt the man was telling the truth. “Go fetch the king,” she said to him. “Now.”
The man nodded and hastened out of the cell.
“She did it to herself,” Sareth said, his coppery eyes shining with sadness and horror. “She couldn’t take Teravian’s life, so she took her own.”
“Did she?” A strange clarity came over Aryn; she saw everything as if lit by a thousand candles. “And how did she do this to herself?”
The cell was empty, save for a wooden bowl of water.
Sareth shook his head. “Perhaps she used her own fingernails to open her wrists.”
Aryn knelt beside the queen,
not caring as blood soaked into the hem of her gown. She touched Ivalaine’s hand; the fingernails were chewed down to the quick.
“Someone else did this to her.” Anger blazed within her, burning away sickness and sorrow. “Someone who feared the queen might yet reveal something in her madness—something others wished to keep secret.”
Lirith pushed herself away from Sareth. “But whom do you mean, sister? Surely Liendra would not have done a deed such as this, not even to Ivalaine.”
“No, it wasn’t Liendra. The guard would not have willingly allowed her to pass, and I don’t think her magic is strong enough to have addled his mind.” Aryn thought of all she had seen and heard. Again she probed the disturbance in the Weirding, and she recalled Ivalaine’s words spoken earlier that day.
She would . . . in the shadows . . . not alive, and not dead . . . she thinks she can stop me. . . .
Who could be alive and dead at the same time?
A shiver passed through Aryn, and at last she realized the answer. “Shemal,” she said, standing. “It all makes sense. After Melia left, the Necromancer Shemal must have come back. Those things Ivalaine said to us today—they sounded just like what Master Tharkis said to me in Ar-tolor. Shemal drove him mad, and then she did the same to Ivalaine.”
Only the addled fool—who once had been King of Toloria—had been murdered so he could not reveal Shemal’s presence. Just like Ivalaine. How long had Shemal been there, waiting in the shadows? From the start she must have seen Toloria as central to her plans. But why?
She felt she almost grasped the answer—then the sense of clarity fled her. A sob rose in her chest. Ivalaine had been a queen, a witch, and—in secret all these years—a mother. More than that, she had been the one who had first introduced Aryn to the mysteries of the Weirding. Only now she was nothing. A cruel despair gripped Aryn; if one so great as Ivalaine could fall, what hope did any of them have?
Lirith bent down and, with a touch, shut Ivalaine’s eyes. She kissed the dead queen’s brow. “Farewell, fair sister.” Then she rose and turned away.
The sound of boots and voices approached down the corridor.
“We must go,” Sareth said gently. “The king will wish to speak to us.”
He was right. They did speak with Boreas, but only briefly, in his chamber an hour later. He asked them to describe the state in which they had found the queen, and he listened without moving, sitting in his chair, his eyes fixed on the fire. When Aryn began to speak of who she thought had done this terrible deed, the king waved a hand, silencing her, and gave them leave to go.
Aryn hesitated at the door; Lirith and Sareth had already stepped through. “Your Majesty,” she said, her voice hoarse from weeping, “will you delay your journey north so that she can be properly mourned?”
Still he did not look away from the fire. “There are many who will depart this life before we see an end. Better we should wait and mourn them all. I leave on the morrow.”
Aryn slipped through the door, joining Lirith and Sareth in the corridor beyond.
“I don’t understand,” Sareth said as they walked. “Why didn’t he want to know who murdered the queen?”
Lirith shook her head. “Maybe it doesn’t matter to him. If he did know, would it change his plans? I doubt it.”
“Maybe,” Aryn said, though for some reason she doubted Lirith’s theory. She knew the king better than perhaps any other. Though he was given more to action and bluster than thoughtfulness and repose, Boreas was anything but stupid. She couldn’t imagine he would not want to gather all information available to him.
Which means he already knows who killed Ivalaine. But how can that be?
She didn’t know. But there was one thing she did know. “We have to go talk to Prince Teravian. I know she tried to kill him, but in her mind Ivalaine was protecting him, and now she’s dead. Shemal is somewhere around the castle—she might even be inside it. We have to warn him he’s in grave danger.”
However, when they reached Teravian’s chamber, they found the door guarded by Sai’el Ajhir, who refused them admittance. After the second attempt on the prince’s life, no one was being allowed in to see him.
“You don’t understand, my lord,” Aryn said, her frustration so great she shook with it. “We must see the prince. We have to tell him that—” She bit her tongue. What would Ajhir say if she told him a Necromancer, a being of legend, was lurking about the castle? “—I have to talk to him before he leaves.”
“You may speak to him on the morrow, my lady,” Ajhir said, “before he sets out on the journey north.”
That wasn’t good enough. Tomorrow could be too late. If Shemal could enter a locked dungeon cell unseen, what was to stop her from stealing into Teravian’s chamber?
“Please, my lord,” Lirith said in a calm voice, gliding forward. “Sareth and I will wait outside, but surely you will not deny entrance to Lady Aryn. She cannot possibly represent a threat to the prince. She is to be his wife.”
Ajhir’s dark face was proud and imperturbable. “Is to be, but is not yet. And before this day, would you have said Queen Ivalaine, at whose own court he was fostered, would have posed a threat to him? Forgive me—I know you care for the prince—but I cannot let any of you pass. I have my orders.”
“Whose orders?” Sareth said. “The king’s?”
Ajhir crossed muscular arms over his chest. “I have made myself clear. No one shall enter the prince’s chamber this night.” A smile flickered across his stern face. “None except for one, as Vathris knows.”
They implored the southerner for several more minutes, but it was no use.
“Well, that was strange,” Lirith said, pouring wine for all of them in her chamber.
Aryn accepted a cup in trembling hands. This day was awful beyond all fathoming. All the same, something told her it was not over yet.
“Very strange,” Sareth said. He touched his wounded cheek, winced, and took a sip of his wine. “It’s admirable that Ajhir wishes to protect the prince, but under whose authority is he doing so? He made no mention of the king.”
Aryn sipped her wine. “And there was something else he said that was peculiar—how no one would be admitted to the prince’s room, save for one. What was that supposed to mean?”
Lirith slumped into a chair. “I have no ideas. Save that it seems to have something to do with the Warriors. ‘As Vathris knows,’ he said.”
“Maybe I should do a bit of asking around,” Sareth said, setting down his cup. “I’ve made a few friends with some of the men of Vathris in the castle. A couple even owe me favors.”
Lirith gave him a sharp look. “Really?”
The Mournish man gave her a sly grin. “Let’s just say I’ve been lucky at dice.”
“And luckier still I haven’t caught you gambling,” Lirith said, her eyes narrowing. “Losing only costs you gold; winning might cost you a knife in your back.”
“I’ll be careful,” Sareth said, then headed out the door.
The two women sat in silence, bathed only in the light of the fire. There was no need to speak; both had been shattered by the death of Queen Ivalaine.
After a while it occurred to Aryn that supper was likely being served in the great hall. She knew she should go; it would be her last chance to dine with the king, for tomorrow he would set out on the journey north. Only she had no appetite, and she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was going to happen before the Warriors could leave, something terrible. She stared into the fire, hoping for a shard of the Sight as Lirith had. However, though she stared until her eyes were dry and aching, she saw nothing save the flames.
Aryn looked up as the door opened and closed. Sareth drew close to the fire, an odd expression on his face.
“What is it?” Lirith said, sitting up straight. “Did you learn something?”
He hesitated, then nodded. “I think I know who’s going to be let in to see the prince tonight. Not the specific individual, mind you, but at least
what sort of person.”
Aryn frowned. “What do you mean, Sareth? Speak plainly.”
The Mournish man shifted from foot to foot. “Lirith, perhaps I should tell you first, then—”
“I am certain whatever you learned is fit for Aryn’s ears as well as mine,” Lirith said with a stern look.
Sareth swallowed hard, then nodded. “I found one of my warrior acquaintances standing guard in the entry hall. He’s a man from Al-Amún, like Sai’el Ajhir, and he owes me quite a few gold pieces. I told him I’d forgive his debt if he told me who was going to be allowed to come to the prince’s chamber that night. He didn’t know, not exactly, but he knew enough.”
“Well, who is it?” Aryn said.
Sareth paused, searching for the right words to say. “From what I gathered, it’s a tradition among the followers of Vathris. On the night before a man is to ride into his first battle, it is customary for him to become a man in all ways, if he is not already one.”
Lirith leaped to her feet. “They mean to make a man of him!” She gripped Sareth’s arm. “They will send a woman to his chamber to relieve him of his maidenhead.”
Aryn’s cheeks grew hot—and not from the fire. “But Teravian is not a follower of Vathris!”
“Isn’t he?” Sareth said. “His father is.”
Aryn didn’t know how to respond. It wasn’t as if she were jealous. However, fate had decreed she and Teravian were to be married. Surely if she was supposed to keep her purity until their wedding day, he could be expected to do the same.
Lirith clenched her hands into fists. “This is dark news. Dark news indeed.”
“I imagine it is upsetting for Lady Aryn,” Sareth said, giving the baroness a sympathetic look. “But I must say, beshala, it is hardly uncommon for a man to have been with a woman before he is married.”
“That’s not it,” Lirith said. “They mean to make a man of him. A full man.”
She looked at Aryn, and at last Aryn understood the source of her agitation. Long had the Witches labored to bring about a man of Sia, and with Teravian they had succeeded. He was a male witch, as strong in the Touch as any woman. However, according to Sister Mirda, he would not come into his full power until he was made a man. Quickly, they explained these things to Sareth.