Voices of Blaze

by H. O. Charles

  The light from the fire swelled suddenly, and Celysane found herself pacing in Lisearon’s offices. “Lissy, please – just one favour. That is all I ask. After all those years of dedicated service.”

  He arched an eyebrow. “I have paid you enough favours, girl. You were a poor investment for me. How many years did you spend with that… ah, I forget her name – Zindal, Zindar-”

  “Zandra.”

  “Ah, yes. That was it. You disappeared off to your school of cobwebs and… women and furry chalices and whatnot – gone for seven years or more, and then you give me only forty years of spying back for it!”

  Celysane was so close to telling him her reason for asking, but it could so easily have been used against her. If Lisearon ever did find out how she had worked against Acher, he would have had the power to end her, her parents and the rest of the Forllan family in half a heartbeat. “What do you want of me?” she asked, hating herself for it.

  “Complete the last errand I sent you on.”

  “My husband? But there’s nothing-”

  A thin smile spread across his lips as he said, “You know his deepest secrets, Celysane. Tell me them, and I shall help you in return.”

  She thumped her fist on his desk. “He has none! I told you. Everything with him is exactly what you see. Through and through.” And that was precisely why she had fallen in love with him. Celysane had found it unfathomable at first, but Rafhiad hid nothing and spoke only the truth. He simply did not believe in false pretences or saving face; he would have made the worst spy imaginable.

  “Then give me a copy of the Forllan Estate accounts covering the past two winters.”

  She shook her head. “Out of the question.”

  Lisearon shrugged. “Fine. You’ll receive no help from me! Dismissed.”

  Celysane made sure to scowl at him before she left. She was no longer a minion of his to be dismissed! It did not matter, she reassured herself. She knew enough people to bring Oslond down without Lisearon’s help. It would just take a little longer this way.

  The light from the wall lamp turned brilliant white suddenly, and Celysane was curled up in a tavern bed. She knew she would not be disturbed here for the next two days, and that Silar was safe in the care of House-Captain Berayn, but she also knew that those days would be difficult to explain away. She had told Berayn that she had special duties to attend to, which he understood to mean some very dedicated eavesdropping, but even he had raised his eyebrows at the length of time she would be leaving her youngest son for.

  It is important, she had reassured him, but the lie had burned her tongue the moment she had uttered it. Though she had told a hundred-thousand untruths in her lifetime, that one had felt the grubbiest of them all. Her guards were good men, and Berayn had trusted her too much to deserve deception. Celysane closed her eyes as the next pang of nalka came, glad to know that this represented the end of her detestable bond with Oslond.

  “I don’t care! I know she’s in there! The whore! Let me past!”

  “My lady, I—”

  The door opened, and in strode Lady Erali di Certa. “I knew it!” she declared. “I knew it the moment you put your dirty little toes on the threshold of that castle! You… harlot! Can’t even keep your legs closed for half the husbands in Calidell, can you?! And with your son in the next room. You are disgusting – as disgusting as your mother!” She threw one of Celysane’s damp towels to punctuate her point. “And I tell you this, whore, if you come near my husband again, I will kill you.”

  “I did not-” The pain that had hold of her bones was so powerful that she struggled to speak. “I didn’t seduce-”

  “Lies! I always knew you were a liar! All that blonde hair and pale eyes to make fools of men who believe in the pure spirits of Achellon! Hah! Well…” Erali wagged a long-nailed finger at Celysane. “…Lord Forllan won’t think you’re so pure when he hears of this. And trust me, everyone will hear of it!”

  “Please-” She swallowed against the throbbing ache. “For my son’s sake – he is innocent.”

  “Oh no,” Erali said, shaking her head. “You should have thought of that before you spread your legs and bedded my husband!” With that, she stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her and causing the entire building to shake on its foundations.

  Celysane scrambled to haul herself from the bed, but her muscles were no good to her. She was trapped here for the next two days, unable to do anything while her reputation was ruined, and her marriage, and everything else she had ever worked for. Oslond would be at exactly the same point of nalka as she was, and no doubt that was what had confirmed his wife’s suspicions. Celysane had probably been the only lady absent from the castle without a good reason for being so. But how had Erali known to find her here?

  Before she could think of a reasonable answer to her question, she slipped into unconsciousness.

  “Celysane,” a woman with a sharp nose and dark skin said. She was stood beside a taller, blonde one, who was next to a very peculiar-looking woman with a thousand lines in her face. They seemed familiar somehow.

  “Who are you?” she asked.

  “It does not matter,” the blonde one said. “What matters is that boy we have entrusted to your care.”

  Celysane took a step closer to them. There was nothing around her, she realised. No floor, no ceiling and no furniture. Just… light. “Boy you have entrusted?”

  “You call him Silar. It’s as good a name as any, I suppose,” the folded-face woman said.

  “My son? He was not given to me, he is-”

  “He has enough of your blood to look like you, child, but I assure you, we conjured him first.”

  Celysane gawped at them. “I carried him. He has my husband’s eyes! This is nons-”

  “He is still your son, Lady Forllan, but he is also ours.”

  Was this… was this Achellon? “But… how, why?”

  The dark-skinned woman spoke first. “The how is not for you to know, even if your fireless brain could understand it.” She shrugged. “It involves a lot of falling leaves if you must know. Anyway, as for the why…”

  “The why is the future of your little world of shadows, and of this one, and of all worlds: light and dark,” the tall woman said. “You have already noticed his talents. They will grow. It will take decades, but they will give him the most powerful insight into the futures of men and women that anyone has ever known. He will be able to see what no one else can see, and predict what is yet to come.”

  “He is the key to keeping us safe,” the wrinkled woman finished.

  Celysane finally nodded in understanding. “So that is it. You plan to take him from me before I ruin him.”

  “We plan to advise you,” the dark woman said. “You must not leave Cadra, and you must not cease your lessons with him. No matter the encumbrance, or the losses you face. His education is more important than any of your sufferings.”

  “His father will disown me if I do not tell him the truth – he may want Silar away from me, and if I do tell him, we cannot stay in Cadra,” Celysane said.

  “That is your problem to solve, girl. The boy’s a gift. Off you go now.”

  The women disappeared into the white nothingness, and in an instant Celysane was standing before the door to her chambers.

  Berayn had thunderclouds in his dark eyes, and worse than that: hurt.

  “I must be with my son,” Celysane said to him.

  The House-Captain paused momentarily, appeared to decide that she should be admitted to her own rooms, and then had another change of heart. “Wait,” he said to her, and then to the other guard at the door, “Iryan, go and stand over there a moment.”

  Iryan obeyed, though the disgust he had for his mistress was plain in his eyes too.

  “My lady,” Berayn whispered, “If what I have heard… I can only think that it happened when you gave us leave, but… I find it hard to believe. Be honest with me – did he force you? It is the only thing that make
s sense to me. If so, you must say, and we will right this wrong for you.”

  “He-” Oh, it would have been a beautiful thing to see Berayn tear Oslond’s gullet open and spit down his throat! To see him writhe and scream in terror…

  “Did he force you?” Berayn repeated.

  “No.” This was for Silar, she reminded herself. “No, I invited him to my chambers. It is not a mistake I shall be making again. Now, if you will excuse me, I must be with my son.”

  Berayn looked at her with such opprobrium then that she could have sworn his eyes burned two holes in her heart. But Celysane bore it, and soon she had her arms wrapped tightly around her youngest boy. “I’ve missed you,” she said when they finished hugging.

  “It’s only been two bloody days, mother,” he replied with a grin.

  Her mouth very nearly fell open, and she quite forgot that she ought to have been relieved he had not heard about her indiscretions. “I did not teach you to speak that way.”

  Silar shrugged. “Iryan and the other men say it all the time and the girls like them.”

  “Swearing will not make girls like you, Si.”

  He pulled a face, but it soon morphed into one of his charming smiles. “Is it time for one of my lessons again? I like my lessons with you.”

  She sighed. He knew exactly how to work her, and he was only ten years old. “Have you read those chapters in The Secret Way like I told you?”

  Silar shook his head, blond hair flopping across his blue eyes. His father’s eyes. “I read the first page and I knew what was going to happen, so I didn’t bother with the rest. It was really boring.”

  “If you knew what was going to happen, then you can tell me now. Whom did Kahr Tenerant ask to aid him in getting information about the orphanage?”

  “Master Bronzefinger,” Silar answered.

  “Good, and what did he tell the kahr?”

  Her son folded his arms as if annoyed. “They were selling the children as slaves and using the money to buy themselves more orphanages. Kahr Tenerant sent his spies to find all the people who had bought the children and then he punished the bad men and put new people in charge of the orphanages. The book left a part of the story out though. It should have said Kahr Tenerant took some of the money for himself afterward. But it didn’t.”

  Celysane was dumbfounded. There was no manner by which he could have found that story out from anyone else, since it had been written by her great uncle and she possessed the only copy still in existence. Berayn and his men never bothered with books; they could hardly read. What those women had said was right. Her son was truly gifted with something unique.

  The light that poured in from the window flared suddenly, and Celysane found herself seated before her desk. A letter lay before her, though already the words upon it were distorting beneath droplets of water.

  I fear I have not been a good enough husband to you… Please return home to me… Though it cut me deeply to hear of it, I will forgive you the moment I hold you in my arms again… I have thought about what you said, and I agree it is best that Silar should stay with you no matter what. Even so, I hope with every beat of my heart that you will come back.

  Yours always,

  Rafa

  Celysane would have wanted nothing more at that moment than to return to him and explain that her love had never wavered for an instant. But for Silar… she looked across at the door to his chamber… but for Silar, she could not leave. The light grew bright again, and more time had passed – a great deal of time. Another letter lay before her on the desk, though it was more of a note.

  Cel, please come home. Do I have to come there and get you?

  Rafa

  Celysane pushed it aside, hid it amongst her pile of un-coded correspondence and left the room to take some fresh air. Well, she thought of it as fresh air, though such a thing was hard to come by in the catacombs of Cadra’s castle. Two of the Forllan guards fell into step behind her as she walked, but where they might once have conversed with her, they now remained entirely silent. They would not forgive her soon for her actions, and probably not for as long as she remained apart from Rafhiad. But she could not go back. Not yet.

  She wandered the damp corridors for a while, her appearance purposeless to any watcher, but her mind working fiercely. Oslond was close to paying the price for what he had done to her. Celysane’s little crickets had chirruped about his gambling habits and the debts he had accrued. More importantly, they had told her of the deal he had made to pay them off. Oslond had himself a lucrative venture in smuggling stolen jewels, and it had taken the smallest of leaps to establish on whose lands these thefts were taking place.

  Celysane would reveal to all the merchants and nobles the identity of the man who had paid thieves to tear necklaces from their necks or gold from their pockets. But that was not enough for Celysane. Oslond could expect a lifetime in prison for such a crime, and she had no doubt that he would simper and use his father’s friendship with the king to have that sentence shortened. No, she had been forced use more creative methods in manufacturing his end.

  Calidell would soon learn that Oslond’s money was being channelled into funding for a Hirrahan attack – an attack intended to overthrow King Acher himself. Of course, the penalties for such treason were very, very harsh indeed. Inevitably, the whole di Certa clan would be named traitors, but Celysane did not feel terribly guilty about that. Erali had never been a woman deserving of sympathy, and no doubt she knew all about the jewel smuggling. As for the Oslond’s father, Gadlond, he could burn alive in a cess pit for all she cared!

  Celysane smiled to herself as she strolled into the fountain courtyard. Her vengeance would go some small way to healing her hurt, and once it was all done with, she could write to Rafhiad and tell him the truth. Then, with good fortune, their marriage would be strong as tempered steel once more.

  “Hello,” she said to a silk-haired girl by the fountain.

  The young girl looked at her, and then away. At Celysane’s best guess, she could have been no older than eighteen.

  “I’ve always wondered how this fountain works,” Celysane said. “It is a curious thing, don’t you think, that a man can build his own spring and carve fish about it.”

  The girl frowned at her. “I know who you are.”

  “Oh?” Celysane did not have to be an expert in behaviour and manner to know how this would go.

  “You bedded my father when he was drunk and didn’t know you weren’t my mother,” she said, biting her lip as she paused. “Why did you do it?”

  Celysane knew this girl’s name: Aval di Certa. Her chestnut-coloured hair ought to have been a clear sign of her identity, but Celysane had not noticed it until now. Her mind had been too taken with other things. “I made a mistake, Aval, and I am sorry for it.”

  “All my mother and father do now is argue because of you.”

  “I – I will try and set it right.” Celysane felt something turn over in her guts.

  “My father never did anything wrong before now. He is a good man. You made him bad.”

  As difficult as it was to hear those words, she could not help but see that this girl was innocent – as innocent as Silar or any other child. Her father would soon be tortured and executed for treason – the only father she had. She would watch her whole family fall from favour, lose their lands and have their heads placed on spikes. And what had this child done to deserve any of it?

  The reflections on the water began to merge, grow brighter, and Celysane found herself seated before another letter.

  If this is how our marriage is to be, then so be it.

  Rafhiad.

  There was more light, and more time had passed. Celysane regarded her son as he paced the room. He had grown so very tall in those short years, so tall that she had to crane her neck to look up at him when he was close. He had also grown strong from his time spent with the sword, but his body was not where his true strength lay.

  “Do you want to come ho
me with me? Just for a few months? Your father misses you deeply.”

  Silar folded his arms. “I need to stay here. There are… things.”

  Celysane smiled. “You mean, there are women.”

  His arms immediately unfolded. “No… yes. I - are you ready to go yet?”

  All of her things had been packed for travelling, and she already wore her warmest cloak about her shoulders. She did not expect a rapturous welcome from her husband, especially not after she had refused to return home so many times, but already her heart burned with anticipation at the thought of seeing him again. “I am ready, and you are ready to go your own way too, my son.” She reached up to place a hand on his chin, which was still too smooth to grow a beard. “You must find a purpose for yourself, or a great king to serve. You have a talent that can change the world for the better.”

  “But Acher is a great king, mother!” he replied, his voice muffled by the way she held his jaw.

  “He is powerful, but you must come to your own conclusions about him. I cannot tell you whom to serve, so for now you must serve yourself until it is time to choose. Listen to your network. Explore the truth.” Celysane hugged him goodbye, and stepped into the darkness of the Cadran tunnels.

  Silar’s head pounded when he awoke, as if a thousand Oslonds marched around in it with shoes made of stone. But as his mind cleared, the throbbing moved down to his heart and deep into his belly.

  Oslond was still alive.

  Oslond had never paid his price.

  Silar picked up the empty flagon, and with the power of his mind, he made it shatter into a million tiny pieces. He would have his revenge.

  Another boom rocked the walls of the cavern and made the air inside it pulse. Artemi felt dizzy, but not too dizzy to keep flapping her new wings. Flying may have been a wondrous thing, but she could never have anticipated how exhausting a blazed business it was! “They’re throwing grappling hooks onto the roof!” cried a mraki male above her, and the light in the cave flickered as a hundred minds tried to manipulate the sight of all eyes in it.