by Carol Berg
Dassine dropped his voice, and I had to lean closer to hear him over the flames. “Six weeks ago events caught us up. Avonar was nearing its end. D’Natheil raged at the wards that bound him to my house. Given his freedom, he would not fail to be in the thick of battle. So I released the boy to his war. I stayed close, watched, and knew I was right. He stood tall and beautiful and soulless, and he slew fifty Zhid without thought, risking death without care. He turned the tide of that night’s battle, but not until he met a crafty Zhid who used a mind-destroying poison on his knife and left D’Natheil among the dying. I knew that poison . . . as I knew the Zhid who wielded it.”
“You murdered him!”
Dassine did not flinch at the word. “Some would say it. But I would not change the choice I made. Karon could refuse me no longer. Had he known what I’d done . . . well, I didn’t tell him. At the moment D’Natheil breathed his last, I brought Karon back in his place, erasing every memory of both minds at the same moment. Then did I receive due retribution for my sin. On that same morning of new hope, a Dulcé named Bendal came to me with the story of the traitors’ bargain with the Lords of Zhev’Na—to trade the Heir for D’Arnath’s lost weapons. They had decided that your world was not worth saving, and that ours could survive even without the Bridge, if we but had a royal talisman to protect Avonar. Traitorous fools.”
“So you sent him onto the Bridge before he was ready, before he even knew who he was.”
“I had to send him. Not to do so was to concede defeat. The Zhid were on the verge of closing the Gates, and I had no assurance we would ever be able to open them again. I could not accompany him, for if he failed, the last battle would be fought in Avonar, and my duty lay there. But I did not believe he would fail. You still lived. Karon taught me that the gift of the Dar’Nethi . . . the power for sorcery that lives in us . . . is life itself. He said that you were . . . are . . . and ever will be . . . the very essence of his magic.”
“That’s why you said the answer was in him.”
“That had to be it. How else could he have opened the Gates as he did? We needed a Healer to restore the Bridge, one who would give everything. Look at what he’s done. . . .” He waved at the three Zhid sleeping quietly on the floor beside the curtain of white fire. “These three have souls again.”
“Why didn’t you tell us what you’d done and why? If I’d known it was Karon—”
“What would you have done differently? I know you better than anyone in the two worlds, better even than Karon who is blinded by his affection for you. Though I trusted you to do all you could do, you had parted from him in bitterness—yes, I recognized it in his story. And Karon’s tasks were difficult enough without knowing he had two missing lives instead of only one and an angry wife he couldn’t remember.”
“Will he ever remember all of it?”
Dassine stood, picked up his stool, and, with a twist of his wrist, transformed it into his walking stick again. “It’s why he must come back with me now. I will take him back to the beginning again and help him open the doors to his missing lives. He must understand that D’Natheil will always be a part of him and what that might mean. He must know that he was dead and that the longing he feels for L’Tiere is natural and not some morbid perversion. And, too, he is truly the Heir of D’Arnath, as well as the man you know. He must learn his place in both worlds. Zhid have crossed D’Arnath’s Bridge for the first time in a thousand years. Our battles are not over, and whatever life he chooses, he must be a part of our struggle. We have no one else to walk the Bridge.”
Dassine brushed the fair hair from Karon’s forehead and unbuckled the sword belt from his waist.
“How long?”
“A few months, a year . . . I cannot say. But he will come back to you, my lady, and he will know everything of the life you shared. I promised him.”
“I don’t know whether to bless you or curse you, Dassine.”
“He lives. You will bless me.” He handed me Rowan’s sword belt.
“Can I come with you?”
Dassine shook his head. “Impossible. Even in the presence of the Heir, the passage of the Bridge is fraught with peril. To protect Karon as he is now will take everything I can muster, and once we are in Avonar, I’ll not dare leave him.” The old man paused for a moment, looking at Karon with sympathy. “And too . . . these coming days will be difficult. I must lay him open like a gutted fish as I give him back himself. He will have no defenses, and I’ll not expose him so completely to anyone, not even you. But from time to time when I think he’s able, I’ll bring him to you. If you follow my instructions, I think you could be of some assistance in his recovery.”
“I suppose I must entrust him to you, then.”
“As I entrusted him—and everything—to you.” Dassine took my hand in his, and when he let it go again, I held a polished bit of rose quartz about the size and shape of a robin’s egg. The stone was unnaturally cold. “Keep this with you. When it grows warm and glows of its own light, we will come with the next day’s sunrise to whatever place you are. You will make sure the place is secure. If it’s not, throw the stone into a fire, and I’ll be warned.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
“I have no doubt of it.” He gestured toward my lap and held out his hand, and I relinquished the Heir’s dagger that still lay in the folds of my skirt. Sticking the weapon in his own belt, he turned back to Karon who still knelt on the cold stone paving, unmoving and unseeing. “Come, my friend. It’s time we took you home.” Dassine placed his hand under Karon’s arm, lifting him easily. Karon towered over the sorcerer, but any observer could see which one supported the other. “Farewell, Lady Seriana. You’ve done well.”
“Take care of him.”
Dassine nodded and led Karon through the veil of fire.
“J’den encour, my love,” I whispered as the dark outlines faded into the white flame. I fingered the cold, pale stone. I would wait and be ready.
CHAPTER 38
As Karon and Dassine disappeared beyond the curtain of fire, I felt as if I had fallen into a well of solitude. The wall of flame still rumbled, but no other sound intruded. It was a time suspended, a time between worlds, between lives. For that moment, I had no past and no future, no place to go, no puzzle to decipher, no question to ask, no thought, no memory, no joy, no pain, nothing to hear but the quiet pulse of life that remains when the world’s tide has fallen beyond its lowest ebb.
“Madam, if you please,” whispered a man’s voice. The tide roared back again with the hesitant pluck of my sleeve.
My heart shriveled when I turned to see the narrow face, thin lips, and gray eyes so close behind me. Though Giano’s face now displayed confusion, fear, and unending curiosity instead of inhuman malice, I stepped backward. My hand slipped through my pocket and fumbled at my empty knife sheath. Dassine would not have left me in danger. He’d said these people were no longer Zhid. But that was very difficult to comprehend.
“I profoundly apologize for your discomforting, madam.” His voice was soft and tentative. “These other two and I—What place is this? And what season? I cannot remember past seedling time, and the others say they lost their way in high summer, but our skin tells us that winter rules here.”
“The story is very complicated”—revulsion left my tones frosty—“and I don’t know how long is your part of it. It’s unlikely the seasons are quite the same in our countries. You’re a long way from home.”
The man’s long face drooped mournfully. “We guessed as much.”
Had Karon truly returned this man’s soul? “What is your true name?”
“Marcus. Swordmaster and Thane of Sillimar.” My skin crawled as the long fingers that had murdered so deftly twisted themselves together in agitation. “Can you tell us then, madam . . . what has happened to us?”
I could summon no delicacy of feeling. “Marcus, do you know of the Zhid?”
“Aye. Of course, we all know of the Lords’ demon warriors.
They slaughtered my cousin and my wife’s brother and left my own dear mother a madwoman, she who guarded all of Sillimar with her weavings.”
“You were taken by the Zhid, Marcus. You and the others. Only in this hour has the Heir of D’Arnath freed you from your enslavement.”
“Taken . . . freed . . . You mean I have been Zhid? Soulless?” I thought the man was going to be sick. I tried not to feel pleasure at his shock and horror. Pale as ivory, he reached to his right ear and felt the gold earring and then stretched his thin hands in front of him as if to judge for himself the evidence of their works. “By the stars, can it be true? No one ever returns to themselves after being Zhid, yet truly I feel myself, though strangely confused. To be freed, restored by our Prince . . . such unimportant ones as we: a swordwoman, a blacksmith, and a thane of such a small hold as Sillimar. Such a blessing and a marvel. Surely it means we’ve done no lasting evil.” His gray eyes looked up at me, asking . . . begging . . .
His poignant hope pried open a corner of my heart. Nothing could witness more clearly to his Dar’Nethi heritage. “It is indeed a blessing and a wonder, Marcus. Unfortunately, I don’t know what we’re to do with you now. The Prince cannot help you for a while, and I’ve no idea how to get you home.” Why hadn’t I asked Dassine what to do with them?
“Aye. That would be a boon. To go home, that is. My wife must be a pot fearful, left for who knows how long. If she thinks me Zhid . . . ah, Vasrin, guide me on this path. . . .” The man closed his eyes and buried his face in his hands for one moment. When he had composed himself, he dropped his hands to his sides and bowed respectfully. “If it please, madam, I must tell my companions of your words.”
I watched the same range of emotions play out on the faces of the bewildered man and woman as Marcus spoke to them. A short time later Marcus returned, his face gray and his fingers knotted again. His speech stumbled and faltered. “One more question, madam, if you please. The Heir—we think we must be confused. Please to tell me what is the name and lineage of the Heir who has saved us?”
“D’Natheil, third son of D’Marte, sixty-third Heir of D’Arnath.”
Marcus expelled a sharp breath, then ducked his head and returned to his companions. A moment later, they all came to me.
“These are Nemyra and T’Sero,” said Marcus, a thin layer of composure regained, as he presented the tall angular woman and the broad-shouldered man. “Is there aught we can do for you, madam? If your facts be true, then the matter of our return to our homes is not important. Those who would welcome us have long ago made their way to L’Tiere. I was taken in the time of Z’Ander, the twenty-seventh Heir, and these two in the time of Nikasto, the thirty-fourth Heir. Our time is long past. But if we could aid you in some way, or some other who serves our blessed prince . . .”
What to do with them? Their lives were irretrievable. But I, of all people, should understand their need to give their loss some meaning. “I suppose . . . you must learn the ways of this world, so you can be ready to serve the Prince when he’s able to return. I await him, also. I can teach you what you need to know. But, for now . . . I’ve things to do. Come along. You might want to look around the place. See a part of your history.”
As I smoothed Tomas’s covering, the three removed their gold earrings and threw them into the fire, each small missile causing an eruption of gold flame as it vanished beyond the Gate. Then they helped me carry my brother out of the chamber of the Gate. The wooden doors swung shut behind us and vanished into the stone.
I broke the news of Tomas’s death to his three anxious soldiers, telling them that, because of the intervention of the mysterious prisoner and the strange conversion of the three priests, the challenge to Leire and King Evard had been successfully countered anyway. Thanks to my family resemblance to Tomas, they accepted what I said. Or perhaps they would have accepted anything to remove themselves from the haunting quiet of the cavern. But they were kind and offered Marcus and the others a share in their provisions. Then I enlisted their help in the sad duties that remained.
While the soldiers set to digging at the place I selected by the lake, I sought out Kellea, Paulo, and Graeme Rowan. The sheriff was awake with easy breath and good color, and no sign of his wounds save his bloody clothing. Even the scar from D’Natheil’s ill-judged blow to his head had vanished.
At sunset we laid Tomas in the frozen tundra by the lake. Before we covered him over, I took his signet ring and a lock of his hair, and I replaced his sword with a lesser one, wrapping the Champion’s sword in a cloth so it could be returned to its proper owner. Tomas’s soldiers built a cairn over the shallow grave so that wolves could not disturb it. At his feet we buried Baglos, face down as was the custom for traitors. In a small third grave, I placed the dark-stained burlap bag that had been tossed aside by the Zhid. The soldiers were curious, but I had used the last of my strength to bring the grisly bundle and lay it in the ground. I wept for my dear old friend, but I could not speak of him.
On the next morning we set out on the long journey home. I was the last to leave the cavern. The enchanted torches faded behind me, and when I reached the far side of the lake and turned for a final look, only a bare cliff face stood where the doorway had been. I followed the others past Tomas’s resting place and down the sloping tundra.
Three days after leaving Vittoir Eirit, we camped at the ruined castle south of Yennet. On that night Dirk, the older man who commanded Tomas’s soldiers, said that he and his men would leave us on the next morning. They planned to report the tragic result of the “chieftain’s” challenge to the duke’s aide, Captain Darzid, and give him the Champion’s sword so it could be returned to King Evard.
In the quiet travel of the preceding days, I had thought a great deal about Darzid, the mysterious spider lurking at the edge of my life’s web. Was he a pawn like Maceron, a victim like Jacopo, or some vile transformation more like these three poor Dar’Nethi had been? Was he pursuing sorcerers to rid our lands of them, as Maceron claimed, or was he an ally of the Zhid? None of those things seemed to fit. My instincts told me he was something different yet.
“I’ll return my brother’s sword to the king myself,” I told Dirk. “Your duty is at Comigor. The young duke must be protected when word goes out of his father’s death, and it is the faithful Comigor retainers like you, not the . . . outsiders . . . who must see to his safety. Inform the Lady Philomena that I shall come to pay my respects to her and her son as soon as I’ve spoken to King Evard.”
The old soldier touched his forelock, approving my concern for Tomas’s son. When I awoke the next morning, he and his men were gone.
At Fensbridge, Graeme Rowan, Kellea, and Paulo turned south, accompanied by Marcus, T’Sero, and Nemyra. The three Dar’Nethi would stay in my cottage until someone came to take them back across the Bridge to Avonar. Rowan and Kellea promised to see to their welfare.
Graeme Rowan hung back for a moment as the others rode away. “You’re not coming back to Dunfarrie, are you?”
“I don’t belong there.”
“For ten years you did. You made a place for yourself.”
“That wasn’t me.”
“Where then?”
“I’m not sure. It depends on the pardon. If it’s real, there are several possibilities. I once had dreams of the University. I might be able to live better on my knowledge of history, philosophy, and languages than I ever could on my skills at farming.”
Rowan laughed with me, but we soon fell silent, thinking of Jacopo, who had made it possible for me to live in Dunfarrie.
“I’ll send word of my plans,” I said, then clasped his hand briefly and rode north toward Montevial.
A fortnight after the opening of the Gate, I sat in the royal palace in Montevial, awaiting word that the king would see me. My hair was clean, my fingernails free of dirt, and I was dressed in a new gown of dark green, simple but well made, bought with silver from Baglos’s purse. I felt more myself than I had in ten years. The gu
ards had demanded to see what was wrapped in the long bundle of red silk I carried, but I told them it belonged to His Majesty, and none could look on it without his leave. The king would either give his permission for me to enter with the wrapped bundle, or I would await a time when he would.
Eventually a footman escorted me into a gaudy little sitting room. Evard sat by a blazing fire despite the warmth of the late summer day. On a footstool beside him perched a dainty, fair-haired girl of eleven or twelve in a heavily embroidered red satin gown with a white ruff about the neck. As I made my curtsy, she looked up at Evard and closed her book. But he laid a hand on the child’s shoulder. “This won’t take long, my treasure.” His eyes rested on me. “Lady Seriana, my daughter, the Princess Roxanne.”
I understood the trace of gloating in the introduction. His daughter was a princess, and she could have been mine. Yet of far more importance to me was the fact that he had a living daughter, whereas I had no living son. Perhaps he understood that, too, and that’s why his eyes darted away so quickly. I curtsied to the girl, who condescended to tip her head.
“Now what is it that my guards are not allowed to view? You would not slay me before my child, I think.” His laugh had a decidedly anxious edge.
“I’ve brought you that which properly belongs to the King of Leire. Since there is no other king, it must be returned to you. I trust you will find meaning beyond the artifact itself.” I laid the bundle on a polished table and unwrapped the red silk. With reverence and care, I lifted the sword in my hands and presented it to Evard.