“We have plenty of runners available, First of Gilán. Do not worry,” Randolph assured him, unphased that Jimmy was aware of the magic he held. “Please, join the conference and I’ll have menus brought to you immediately.”
“Thank you, Mr. Randolph,” Jimmy said cordially, then turned for the door to the conference room. He wasn’t happy with his decision, expecting the worst. My guess was he had a fifty-fifty chance of breakfast coming off well from a logistical standpoint. One of Randolph’s men held the door open for us, showing us they were quite interested in getting us inside. Jimmy peered in the doorway, then, as Randolph passed behind us, pulled a curious twist of magic and reflected the disinterest spell Randolph placed on the hallway entrance onto this doorway. It would only last a few minutes, but it would cover our entrance well enough as we filed in.
“So much for an entrance,” Kieran muttered.
“First snuck us in,” Ethan said quietly. “Look at the door. Do we want to take the dais? We’re expected again.”
“Nicely done, First,” Kieran said. “Very thoughtful of you and a very good method. It’s fading already.”
“The dais will make getting breakfast easier,” I said.
“And it’s not like we have to take the assigned seats,” Jimmy said, heading that way. “Didn’t y’all do something like this at Fuller’s?”
“They did, but I had to be the good one,” I whined. “Not this time. Pick your places, guys. It’s my turn to play with the name plates.” Just to make things interesting for me, I stole Jimmy’s idea and banked the disinterest spell off the front hallway through a few dimensional gateways to split the signal and multiplied it along the whole dais. It held Randolph’s signature, which was the beauty of it all. As Jimmy led us around the edge of the room, we kept going through his spell arc to mine, perfectly hidden behind Randolph’s work. We took the right side of the dais, filling in from the end and leaving two chairs next to the lectern. Quickly replacing the nameplates for people randomly on the table, I came to Jimmy first and pulled his nameplate into my cavern. I replaced the word “First” with “Not a She,” pushed it back out into reality, and slapped it onto the table in front of him. On Kieran’s, I put “Red-headed Enigma.” For Peter, I changed his to read “Brunette Sex Expert.” Ethan got “Blond Muscle God” and Davis got simply “Mouthpiece,” though I’m not sure that was a common enough reference outside the US.
I disabled the web that allowed the disinterest spell to exist once Randolph came into the room with two of his people bearing menus. It caught him off-guard that the spell existed but didn’t show on his ward and that it turned out to be his confused him more and that he had no control over it… Such small things shouldn’t amuse me so much, but we were in the room now and not making much of an impression, which is our preference. The two men came to us by the front of the table with the menus, while Randolph went through the tables in search of someone, presumably Bishop.
“The ‘Other Brown-headed One’? That’s the best you could come up with?” called a familiar voice from the room.
“Darius, you made it,” Peter called out across the room. “It’s good to see you again. How’s Sean doing? Have you agreed on a new school yet?”
“I’m pretty sure I’m wearing him down now,” he said, grinning as he approached the dais. Randolph found Bishop and was busy whispering in his ear at a table near the doors. Bishop looked over at us and grinned.
“Thousand pounds if you can put a bell on him,” I heard him tell Randolph as he stood up. Then the man was in my way asking what I wanted to eat. Opening the menu, I started ordering a horrendous amount of food and realized I have been eating like this for quite a few weeks now without thinking about it. That explained the growth spurt.
“You’ve got my security team acting as waiters?” Bishop asked blithely. “And you sneaked into the room with Randolph’s magic. How?”
“You mean he didn’t do that on purpose?” Kieran asked innocently. “He was working so hard to get us in here that we assumed he did.”
“You could have told us you wanted us here by breakfast, Thomas,” Ethan said. “We’d have been here earlier.”
“Honestly, I didn’t expect you for another couple of hours,” he said.
“I called in a few favors and had someone else attend to a few matters for me this morning,” I said. “What’s the itinerary for the day?”
“The Hilliards’ will begin accepting our staff at eight and delegates at nine,” Bishop said. “I was going to ask if you’d go over with me beforehand to check on things.”
“Quite a tab you’re running up with the Lord of Faery,” Ethan said with a chuckle.
“He’s still on the negotiating side, so I’m taking advantage of it,” Bishop said brightly.
“What gave you that idea?” I asked, then looking down the table. “Should I start calling on the brownies?” Jimmy stood and drew on his aspect, not bursting into flames but showing definite sidhe. Every member of security shifted their attention to him and most of the people in the room noticed the change, a few of the English-speakers even chuckling at the pun on his nameplate. Randolph came running into the room, alarmed at the sudden existence of elf within his wards.
“They’re getting antsy, Mr. Randolph,” Jimmy called across the room as he sat back down. “You’ve seen one just playing around. Do you want to see all four?”
“Is there any coffee?” Peter asked mildly, looking toward the buffet at the large urns. “Industrial coffee, I wonder how old it is?”
“The ghost of coffees past, perhaps,” muttered Ethan.
“Did they stir it with Tiny Tim’s crutch, do ya think?” Kieran asked grinning, picking up on the Dickens reference.
“Damn, I hope not. Coffee takes on the taste of wood,” Peter said chuckling slightly. “And I hope we skip the rest. Coffee beans take some time to dry. That part of the hallucination will take days.” He fell back in his chair boneless on the last word. We were rapidly developing an audience as Bishop’s security suddenly turned themselves into nursemaids and waiters, rushing around to find coffee cups and fresh coffee and still maintain their positions.
“Why aren’t we negotiating, still, Seth?” Bishop asked, learning to keep his questions queued now.
“Because I already named the price, Thomas,” I said. “Weren’t you listening? You and the European council will help maintain the watch on the Hilliards to keep the compact correctly. It was how you would achieve that watch that would be discussed later and it won’t be a simple task.”
“No, it won’t,” Davis agreed.
“But yes, I will go with you. After breakfast. If we actually have breakfast,” I said. “However, while I’m thinking about it, Ryan, let’s have a quick word…” Touching Davis’ shoulder, I shifted the druid with me to Gilán, to just outside the Palace entrance. We were just a few moments from dawn and we had just enough light to identify the promontory and the vast canyon of the valley below us. Helping Davis gain a standing position, I aimed him in the rising sun’s direction and said, “Watch.”
I loosed Daybreak, then, and let myself feel Gilán and the Palace. Most of the faery were sleeping still, as were the Guard, but the Palace itself was stirring as the dawn approached quickly. I felt an ephemeral tug on my power and followed it, rising off the ground to float freely in front of the apex of the dome on the entrance, looking into my room from the outside. The Palace seemed to hesitate, from what I couldn’t say, but I turned to face the valley in that second and saw the first ray of sunshine shoot over the mountain. It hit me in the center of my chest and felt like it warmed the center of my being. Behind me, the Palace sang the first tone of my name, the tone the brownies couldn’t hear or emulate. It took six seconds before the song was in their range of hearing, but they were stirring at two, feeling the resonance of power more than hearing it.
This was an education for me. I was usually just waking up myself and didn’t see this. The brownies added to the c
horus of the Palace voices about twenty seconds into my Naming at a much, much higher register. The dome glowed in coruscating energy patterns, glistening in the sunlight against the jeweled surfaces. The light and color danced in counterpoint to the sounds within the Palace. Then the Guard joined in as the Palace entered their range of the geas. Deeper than the brownies, the men and women of the Guard were still somehow different in pitch from the Palace and much higher, as if the Palace song wasn’t actually a sound but a magic of its own. Which, of course, it was.
Davis heard the brownies singing after a few moments, especially after the sun hit the valley and those clans joined with the Palace. The nocturnal faery were singing themselves to sleep. Some of the daytimers were streaming out into the field in small groups, probably families, to enjoy the morning light. I could hear more faery of different orders, like the fairies and water nymphs, adding their own joyous voices. All across the valley, wherever the faery lived, I could hear my name being happily sounded in some way. It was brilliant, sharp, and clear, and utterly impossible to recreate.
Davis was facing the valley when I floated down as the Palace fell silent again and the day’s activities began anew. For me it was a glorious eight minutes.
“Do you make them pay this tribute every day?” Davis asked me without a hint of condemnation.
“Make who pay what tribute?” I asked, feeling a side door to the Palace open and close as Ellorn stepped out and onto the Road. “Good morning, Ellorn. You’re up early after last night.”
“Good morning, sir,” Ellorn called cheerfully. “I’m always up with the Palace. I can’t help it!”
“Ryan Davis, this is Ellorn. He runs the Palace and is in charge while Jimmy and I are away,” I said in introduction. “Mr. Davis is our London solicitor and a druid. His type of magic enjoys a beautiful sunrise so I thought he would appreciate ours. Now what’s this about tribute, Ryan?”
“The faery here singing your praises, do they pay this tribute to you every day?” Davis asked again.
“What exactly did you hear?” I asked him, grinning. “And I actually don’t know why the brownies or any of the faery sing with the Palace. Ellorn, would you care to shed some light on that subject?”
Smiling up at us in a bright green shirt and matching voluminous pants, Ellorn said, “It’s merely a joyful reaction to the sound the geas makes at daybreak. We first heard it when Lord Daybreak accepted Gilán as his creation. It is not something he demands of us, Mr. Davis. Indeed, he asks very little of us, but when he does, it’s interesting. There’s a house in the Throne Room, for instance.”
“Thanks, Ellorn,” I said. “We have to be getting back now. I’m sorry I got you out here for nothing, though. I just needed a quick word with Ryan and this seemed an ideal time.”
“It is always a pleasure, Lord Daybreak,” Ellorn squealed merrily. “It has been good to meet you, Mr. Ryan Davis. Until we meet again, sir.” He bowed to us and disappeared from view, then darted off to the right of the Road through the gardens.
“Does all your kind teleport?” Davis asked, slightly awed.
“’Teleport’? No, that’s not what he did and it’s not what we do, either,” I told him. “Though I suppose from an outside perspective it’s not that different. But the reason I brought you here was to say one thing. You missed the compulsion the Accords placed on the Hilliard Clans by their designs on you, but you should know that I will not allow you to either teach or perform any of the blood rites that they taught you. Regardless of whether you are under my employment or not, you will not use blood rites to endanger another, ever, or that day’s sunrise will be that last you see. Am I clear?”
“Um, not quite,” Davis said nervously, shifting on his feet. “There are actually several important rites that require the druid or acolyte to offer the earth several drops of his blood imbued with his will and spirit to complete a binding. The most important of these are the transitions, from acolyte to druid, for instance. To disallow these is to end our culture completely.”
“That is not my intent,” I admitted, sighing. “It seems I’ve damned them to die a slow death, then. Would you be willing to educate me on this?”
“Certainly. It’s not like I’m bound by their codes anymore,” he said, the pained humor of the situation creasing his smile oddly.
“Good. I don’t want the Druids to die out so long as they are not as inherently wrong as blood magic and I don’t have that feeling,” I said. Then I sent over our link, Jimmy, do we have food yet?
No, sir, and your brothers aren’t helping matters, he answered. He kept his “voice” carefully neutral and tried to limit my sense of what was happening. That meant my brothers were up to more than “not helping.”
Shifting us to the Garrison kitchens, I called out, “Lt. Brinks, I have a situation!”
“Yes, Lord?” Brinks yelled as he trotted up carrying a tray of bacon. He’d been heading out to the service line with it.
Grinning as the cooks started preparing plates before I said anything, “I have three ornery brothers and a slow restaurant,” I said,. “Any chance I can steal enough from you to shut ‘em up?”
Brinks laughed. “Yes, Lord Daybreak, anything for you. Hart, Mendez, start traying it up, please.”
“I’ll take that,” I said as he looked down at the bacon and started to fumble for a place to put it. “Can you have someone follow me?”
“Yes, Lord Daybreak. Less than a minute,” he said with a smile as three of the Guard came into the kitchen in uniform, heading straight for us.
“Thanks, Lieutenant,” I said and shifted Ryan and me back to hotel where havoc was being wrought.
Well, not true havoc, but Jimmy was flustered. Ethan was challenging the Egyptians to build another pyramid while Kieran said he liked the South American ziggurats better. Peter was talking to Randolph’s security man about the age of the coffee—still—while pushing it out of the urn into a formidable ice sculpture of Arwene in miniature. No human hand guided a chisel in the creation of the webbing between the fingers of those hands or the details of the statue’s musculature.
Setting the tray down and sitting down, I watched. It took exactly three seconds for Ethan to turn and see us. “Ooohhh, Seth has bacon!” he cried loudly and started back across the room at speed. The Guard appeared behind us before the other two looked up and started setting plates of food from the trays down on the table. It only took another five seconds for all three of my brothers to come back to the table.
Not so easy being in charge, is it? I asked Jimmy as I chewed a piece of bacon calmly, grinning and watching Bishop calm the Egyptians and Randolph work on the Italians. I don’t know who did what to them, but three were laughing their asses off while the other four were seriously ticked off at the three laughing.
“They don’t always act like that,” Jimmy grumbled. “Why now? Just because I’m in charge? That’s not fair.”
“But you didn’t take charge when Ethan first acted up, did you?” I asked him.
“Hey!” Ethan objected, lobbing a biscuit at me.
“Guessed right, then,” I said, catching the biscuit. Kieran smirked behind a mouthful of food.
“Coffee?” Peter asked, almost pitifully.
“Next tray, sir. It was just finishing brewing when we left,” Cpl. Orli said just before shifting back to Gilán. The first two Guardsmen returned with two more trays and, true to Orli’s word, there was fresh coffee on the next tray. It got really quiet for a few minutes as we ate and the room watched in amazement, even Bishop. We were hungry and we had stuff to do, so we ate fast. The two Guardsmen were returning with nothing but dirty plates inside of four minutes. We sat back with our coffee mugs, fully sated, and let Davis continue to eat at his own pace.
“Remind me not to listen to wizards,” Jimmy drawled, glaring at Randolph.
“We did say…,” Ethan snickered. “And there are two wizards at this table, elf-boy.”
“What, I don’t rate?” I a
sked in disbelief.
“Not till he says ya do, no,” Ethan said, looking down the table, grinning at me.
“Ya know, my daddy had a name for that,” Jimmy said slowly, letting Alabama into his voice more than I’ve ever heard it. “He called it ‘grinning like a shit-eatin’ dog’.” Kieran laughed so hard that he almost wore his coffee and Peter slammed his cup hard on the table as he turned sideways to laugh. Even Ethan started laughing at Jimmy’s joke and soon enough the whole room joined in.
I sipped at my coffee as it slowly died down, just enjoying the feeling as everyone relaxed, their previous tensions forgotten for a moment.
“Did you enjoy Gilán’s sunrise, Ryan?” Jimmy asked the druid as he finished eating.
“Yes, sir, it was quite a beautiful view from the Palace’s doorstep,” Davis said, sending the room into utter silence. “And the valley below lit up wonderfully as the sun rose and the faery sang. It was almost a religious experience.” He looked out at the expectant faces listening to him. “What’s wrong?”
Darius answered for us. “Very few people have even been to Gilán, much less seen the outside of the Palace, Mr. Davis. That makes everyone extremely curious about it, especially where it is and how to get there.”
“You have to go through him,” Kieran said, pointing at me. “And he’s picky about who he lets in.”
“Are you ready to go, Thomas?” I asked, sending my cup back to the kitchen. “Who’s going with us?” Everyone on the dais stood as Bishop approached. “Are you sure, Ryan? You don’t have to, y’know.”
“Part curiosity, part distrust,” he said, shrugging. “I put a lot of effort into this conference and I’d like to see how well my previous masters pull off my plans without me. But frankly, I don’t trust them anymore and I don’t want to see my current employer dismembered just because he didn’t know about something.”
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