Dragon Prince 01 - Dragon Prince

by Melanie Rawn

  “My lady wife has told me of your goodness in coming to us,” he said formally, aware of being watched. He wished he could let down even a little of his guard, but that would have to come later, in private. “I thank you for your help, my lord, and will talk longer with you later. But for now I think there’s someone else here with a prior claim on your attention.” He nodded to Tilal, who was practically dancing with excitement.

  Davvi had scarcely been able to take his eyes off his son. Now he gave Rohan a slightly abashed smile. “Your grace, I’m honored by your friendship and your indulgence. I would indeed like to speak with my son.”

  The curve of his lips felt strange; it was the first genuine smile that had come to him in a long time. “Until later then, my lord.” As Davvi want to embrace Tilal, Rohan saw that Chay had dismissed the captains and sent them to give orders that should have dispersed the troops.

  But one of them shouted Rohan’s name, and the cry was taken up, turned into a chant, bellowed out loud enough to be heard by Roelstra all the way across the river. Rohan paused on his way to the tent, his people’s excitement and faith catching painfully at his heart. He lifted a hand to accept the tribute, then sought refuge in the cool, dim interior of the tent.

  Maarken, acting as Chay’s squire, presented chairs and goblets of wine to his princely uncle and his father, then stood waiting for further orders. Both men sat, drank, and stared at each other for a time. Chay roused himself first.

  “That will be all, Maarken,” he told his son. “Come back later to remove my things from here and—”

  “No!” Rohan exclaimed. Then, more calmly as he saw their startlement. “No, I don’t fancy being alone in this great wind-tunnel you call a tent, Chay. Maarken, you and Tilal set up a bed for me in here, please.”

  “I’m honored to serve you, my prince.” The boy bowed to him.

  Again Rohan felt himself smile, and it felt more natural this time. “You’ve grown up, I see. Lleyn has taught you very well. But I think here in private we may be as we always were to each other.”

  The stiffness went out of the young body and Maarken gave him a smile. “I could hardly believe it when I felt Sioned’s colors on the sun and she told me you were both safe! Did you hear the soldiers shouting for you? They say your dragons protect you—and their strength and cunning come with you.”

  “Is that what they say?”

  The edge in his voice darkened Chay’s quicksilver eyes. “You can go now, son. I’ll call when you’re needed.”

  “Yes, my lord.” Maarken bowed, formal again, and left them.

  “Very grown up,” Rohan observed. “You must be proud.”

  “I am,” Chay said simply. “Tell me what Sioned didn’t tell Maarken.”

  Rohan shrugged. “I don’t know that she left anything out.”

  Chay leaned back with a snort of derision. “This is me, Rohan. I’ve known you practically from a hatchling, my lord dragon prince. What happened at Feruche?”

  “What you really mean is why did Ianthe let us go.” He took a long swallow of wine. “Swear to me that this goes no further. On your sword and the lives of your sons, Chay—swear.”

  The older man froze for a moment. Then, slowly, he said, “You know me better, so you must be trying to impress me with how serious this is. Very well. I so swear.”

  “I meant no insult.” He rolled the goblet between his hands, staring down into the swirling dark wine. “Sioned—” The catch in his voice humiliated him. “She’s emptied Stronghold again. Those not with me went to Skybowl to take care of the Merida there, and will go on to Walvis at Tiglath. She says—and Tobin agrees with her—that if anyone gets close enough to threaten Stronghold again, there won’t be anyone left to save it for anyway.”

  “Logical,” Chay grunted. “Why are women always so logical?”

  “Most of the servants went to Remagev with the twins. Only a few stayed behind at Stronghold—those loyal enough to lie.”

  “About what?”

  “Ah. Then she didn’t tell Maarken.” He took another swallow of wine. “There’s to be a child in midwinter. Ianthe got what she wanted of me.”

  Chay’s expressive face was immobile with shock. Rohan shrugged.

  “Aren’t you going to ask how she managed it? The first time I thought she was Sioned. The second time—I raped her. I should have killed her. I didn’t. She timed it perfectly and now she’s carrying my child. Sioned says it will be a boy. Beyond that she doesn’t say much at all. She won’t talk to me, Chay, and I can’t talk to her, I can’t—”

  “No more,” Chay whispered. “This can wait.”

  “I have to talk to someone!”

  Chay set his winecup down and rose, deliberately looming over Rohan. “You have an army awaiting your commands. You have an enemy across the river who wants you dead. Feel sorry for yourself some other time—when you have the time!”

  Rohan knew he was being manipulated and part of him hated Chay for it. But this brother in all but blood was right—damn him. He saw the hard eyes watching for telltale changes in his face, and turned away. But even that movement was enough.

  “That’s better,” Chay said, resuming his seat. “Now that you’re capable of thinking again, turn that mental maze of yours to this. I’ve given Roelstra ten days to get half his army across the bridges, and he hasn’t moved more than fifty men. We can withstand two more battles if we’re lucky—but that’s all. I wanted half his troops on this side to wipe them out and then I was going to cross and take care of the other half. But he’s not obliging me. If you have any suggestions, I’d like to hear them.”

  Rohan nearly laughed. In camp only long enough to wet his throat, and Chay was asking him to make the kind of tactical decision he’d never been much good at anyway. He drank down the remains of the wine, got to his feet, and said, “I’m going for a walk. When I get back, I expect to see a bed waiting.”

  “Have some dinner while you’re at it. The way you look now, you could hide behind your swordblade.”

  “Is that what you think? That I want to hide?” he demanded.

  A slight smile played around Chay’s mouth. “Much better. Now you’re a prince again.”

  Urival watched long fingers drum impatiently on the table where a meal lay untouched. Candlelight picked out each gem in each ring as Andrade’s fingers lifted and fell in angry rhythm: ruby-agate-amethyst-sapphire on the left hand, emerald-topaz-garnet-diamond on the right. Both thumbs were flat on the polished wood, amber on one and moonstone on the other. On Andrade’s fingers were symbolized formidable attributes: luck in war, persuasiveness, nobility, truth, hope, intelligence, constancy, and cunning. But somehow Urival was more concerned with the two other stones, the ones that promised protection against danger and wisdom. They were sorely in need of both.

  “Well? Is it merely the inactivity, or the inability to give them all orders?” he asked, deliberately provoking her.

  “Would any of them listen? At least we’ll be spared the fine Lady Wisla from now on. Thoughtful of her to remove to River View.”

  Urival nodded. The chamber in which they sat was Lord Davvi’s own at River Run, a tidy room unencumbered by his wife’s notions of elegance that burdened much of the rest of the keep. Lady Wisla had been faint with shock at receiving such august visitors, horrified by the revelation of Chiana’s identify, and only too glad to accept Urival’s private suggestion that she would find life much easier and safer at her late father’s keep of River View, five measures distant. Her absence freed them from her nervous whining and gave them a comfortable base of operations. The question, of course, was what sort of operations were possible. The faradh’im all knew where Andrade was—those not shut away from the light—and were constant in their reports. Andrade and Urival were close enough to observe both armies without strain, and far enough away to be undetected by Roelstra. If he decided to take Lord Davvi’s family hostage, they might find themselves in difficulties. But Roelstra had made no
move toward River Run, probably surmising that Lady Wisla had long since departed. Urival, with the best charity in the world, could not discover a reason why any man would want to ransom such a wife.

  Still, her household was efficient and she had left enough servants behind to cater to her guests’ needs. But lack of worry about ordinary matters here left too much time to think about the extraordinary events elsewhere.

  “Still nothing from Sioned,” Urival said to himself.

  “I can’t force her, thanks to the training you gave her,” Andrade snapped, fingers drumming faster now. “I need a Sunrunner at Stronghold, one I can trust to tell me what’s happening there.”

  “And you no longer trust Sioned. That’s what you’re really saying. Andrade, you placed her where she is! Trained her, took her to Rohan already half in love with him, showed her to him so he was just as in love with her. You planned it, Andrade, and now you’re going to have to live with it.”

  “You never let up, do you?” She paced in front of the windows, rings flashing as her ringers clenched and opened, clenched and opened. “How was I to know? What I foresaw and what’s turned out to be are so different. What should I have done?”

  He shrugged. “Probably nothing at all.”

  “Damn you, Urival, let me be!” she cried. “Don’t you know why I matched them in the first place? Faradhi princes would have ended all the petty quarrels—”

  “You still don’t see it, do you?” He went to her, took her shoulders in his hands. “You always forget people. That’s what your new manner of princes will be. People with all the honor and vices and feelings the rest of us have. But you’ve never been very concerned with feelings, have you? Except when you can use them.” He frowned at the stubborn denial in her pale blue eyes. “Did you think you could use the children the way you used the parents?”

  “Stop making me sound evil! I would have taught them, shaped them—”

  “Made them tools for your ambition. What gives you the right, Andrade?”

  “You want me to admit it?” she shouted, wrenching away from him. “Yes, I used them all, starting with my own sister and Zehava! I took the chance, hoping they’d produce a prince with the gifts. When they didn’t, I tried again with Sioned and Rohan.”

  “Who next? Tobin’s sons? Andrade, you can’t use people that way—not and stay human yourself!”

  “I loved them! I love Rohan and Sioned as if they were my own—and Tobin, and Chay, and their sons—” She leaned her shoulder against the smooth stone walls, arms wrapped tightly around herself. “I loved them too much. I wanted too much for them. And I hated Roelstra even more than I loved the others. Does that make me human enough, Urival?”

  “I think there’s something you haven’t learned yet,” he responded softly. “There’s nothing you can do now. Whatever you’ve set in motion, whatever your reasons, you’ll have to wait it through—just like everyone else.”

  He was astounded when tears glittered in her eyes. “Drive in the knife a little deeper, why don’t you? Am I bleeding enough yet?”

  He was even more astounded when he put his arms around her. “It’s not like you to be helpless,” he whispered against her silvering blonde hair. “It’s not like my Lady at all.”

  The gardens Princess Milar had planned and cared for so lovingly wilted as summer dragged on. The grotto waterfall dwindled to a thin ribbon and the pond below it was nearly dry, thirsty plants and mosses drinking up what little moisture the spring provided. But it remained a haven of cool shade in the oppressive heat and silence of Stronghold, and it was to the grotto that Sioned often went in the long days of her waiting.

  She did not go there to be alone. The keep was empty; she, Tobin, and Ostvel remained, along with Myrdal and three servants. The rest had gone with Rohan or north to Tiglath or to escort Sorin and Andry to Remagev. Solitude was a fact of life in Stronghold.

  Neither did she seek the grotto to indulge herself in memories. The paradox was that empty as the keep always seemed to her when her husband was gone, his presence filled the place. The delicate balance between the ache of missing him and the ache of sensing him everywhere perfectly matched her equally precarious juggling of serenity and rage. Most of the time she preserved her equilibrium. When she could not, she went to the grotto and counted off each day of Ianthe’s bearing, numbering the days left until midwinter when she would return to Feruche.

  She had lost count of how many times she had felt the touch of Andrade’s colors on the sunlight. She had rejected each assault with defenses Urival had taught her—not because she feared Andrade would sway her, but because of her jealous guardianship of hard-won balance. The Lady’s arguments and prohibitions would have loosed Sioned’s rage, and she could not afford it. Not until midwinter, when she could face its object.

  It was after yet another attempted contact one day, an insidious weaving of great skill that very nearly worked, that Sioned left the sunlit inner court where she had been currying her horse and made her way through the half-dead gardens to the grotto. A few paces from its sheltering trees she stopped, transfixed by sudden music. Ostvel’s lute sang so rarely that its notes brought tears to her eyes. It was said that the Storm God rarely gifted Sunrunners with the music that was his voice in the wind and water; Mardeem’s talent had been an anomaly. But Ostvel, for all that he had served most of his life at Goddess Keep and was now steward to a faradhi princess, had been gifted with the sensitive fingers and soul of a bard.

  It was Camigwen’s favorite song he played. A sprightly ballad when she had been alive, since her death it had slowed to a stately tune that slipped every so often into a minor key. Sioned was filled with tender, painful memories of her friend’s dark face and lustrous eyes, her scolding and smiles, the warmth of her colors. Though Sioned had walled herself off to all other faradh’im and Tobin was the one who received messages on the sunlight, at this moment she was filled with recollections of that first joyous weaving of sunlight, lessons learned and practiced with Cami. How young they had been, how eager to discover their gifts, how excited by the wonders to be seen and felt on the light, how entranced by this incredible thing they could do. Sioned remembered what it had been like, and instinct opened her mind and heart to the sunlight around her.

  She felt the colors of the music—sapphire and diamond and topaz and amethyst, all shot through with pulsing silvery shadows. Tilting her head back, she presented her face to the sun, eyes closed, watching her own colors form the distinctive pattern she used to weave the thread of light. Yet the lute colors were strangely insistent, swirling in momentary chaos before resolving into a coherent pattern—as if they belonged to a living being instead of wire and wood.

  Help me!

  Sioned could not help but respond to that cry. Master Sunrunner’s training took over and swiftly she meshed the hues together, perceiving the unique design of a clever, even devious mind, unfamiliar to her but carrying something oddly familiar in its undertones.

  Goddess blessing, Sunrunner—I’ve been trying for days to find you. Your colors are well-known, but you haven’t wanted to be found—and I can well understand why. Please—don’t withdraw from me—please!

  Sioned did not withdraw, but neither did she venture down the sunlight to discover who had called to her thus. Tense and wary, she examined the pattern and found little to reassure her. There were shadows here, and flickers of diamond-white that was the color of cunning.

  I’ve only three rings—I’m no danger to you! Listen to me, please! I know things your prince will need if he’s to defeat Roelstra. Prince Jastri is angry and hot-headed, and instead of being chastened by his losses in battle he chafes for vengeance. He commands over three hundred. He will not obey Roelstra if temptation enough is provided him. Give him a reason!

  The deeper colors burned, outlined in Fire now, hatred clear. Sioned drew back, uncertain where that hate was directed.

  Believe me! Would I dare this if I was not sincere? I want to help you!
>
  “Sioned?”

  Startled, she lost the pattern, and a faint cry echoed away into the sunlight. She opened her eyes and saw Ostvel, lute in one hand, staring at her.

  “I was just thinking,” she managed in a fairly natural voice. “Forgive me, Ostvel, I didn’t mean to intrude on your music.”

  “You didn’t. I’d finished.” He glanced away. “Sioned, I have to talk to you. Tobin heard from Kleve in Tiglath this morning.”

  “What does he say?”

  “No change. Minor skirmishes, but the siege continues. Walvis is worried and impatient, and that’s a dangerous combination. They need a battle to lift their spirits.” He smiled ruefully at the irony.

  “Death to make them more hopeful of life.” She shook her head. “What are we doing to these children, Ostvel? Walvis should still be practicing with his sword, not using it in earnest. And Maarken—he should be learning the arts of a gentleman, not a warrior.”

  “At, least they’re doing something.” Ostvel shrugged irritably. “I feel like one of Roelstra’s daughters caged up in Castle Crag.”

  Sioned gaped at him for a moment, then threw her arms around him, laughing. “Roelstra’s daughters! Ostvel, you’re brilliant!” Not giving him the chance to voice any of his bewilderment, she ran for the keep, shouting for Tobin.

  Rohan knew very well that the option of playing idiot was no longer open to him. Between his first Rialla and this campaign to save his princedom had come six years of capable government and ample demonstration that he was no fool. Yet his experts at war were taken aback when, on the twentieth morning after his arrival, he ordered them to break camp and move back from the Faolain. He smiled slightly, glad that the notion of retreat was abhorrent to them, and waited for them to understand.

  Chay’s captain, Gryden, saw it first. “Draw them into the Long Sand, your grace?”

  “Exactly. I want the troops spread out as thinly as we dare, always keeping some in sight of the sea. You’ll all leave at different times and by different routes. Confusion is the idea here, with the hint that some of you are thinking about going home. Three days from now I want this area clean, and by this I mean that Roelstra’s troops will find nothing to live on here. Strip the trees and fields bare.” Shock widened their eyes, and Rohan shrugged. “Lord Baisal’s unhappiness would be the greater if the High Prince ended by ruling the Desert. We’ll lead them as far from his holding as we can. He’s had orders to stuff and garnish his own keep, so he’ll survive. Besides, it’s not him they want. It’s me. Any questions?”