The Grand Design

by John Marco

  Dyana Vantran was barely twenty years old, but she had seen a lot in her brief lifetime. The daughter of wealthy Triin parents, she had been bred as an aristocrat, had learned the tongue of the Naren Empire, and had been married to a man who slew her father. She had been a refugee, a prostitute, a symbol of derision, and the object of more than one man's madness. She had survived two devastating wars. Yet in all the roles she had played, she was only happy in her current incarnation--the wife of Richius and the mother of their small daughter, Shani. She was satisfied in Falindar, and despite her best attempts to understand her husband's moods, she could not understand why Richius wasn't.

  Dyana remembered empty stomachs, and her bitter past made her grateful for the bounty of Falindar. No one in the citadel ever hungered--especially not Shani--and they were sheltered here from the violent whims of the warlords. Lucyler had done an admirable job as Falindar's master, and because of his friendship with Richius, he had made sure they wanted for nothing. And they enjoyed the respect of the people in the region; Richius was a hero here. But he never saw it that way, and it irritated Dyana. In the last few months he had grown distant and moody, his eyes always drifting toward the sea, where Dyana knew he searched for Lissen ships. He was still a good father and attentive to their child, but something had changed. She had fallen in love with a man with boyish charm, and she missed his eagerness, his innocence. He was somehow diminished. These days, Richius was quiet. He shared precious little with her, leaving her to wonder what went on in his head. When they had first married, she could read his expressions easily, but no longer. He had erected a wall around himself that even she couldn't scale. They made love in perfect silence.

  That night, Dyana was asleep when Richius finally returned to the citadel. It was very late, and she had gone to bed alone, as had become her custom. Shani was in a nearby room, also sleeping. Dyana heard the door to her bed chamber open. She cracked one eye to glimpse Richius in the threshold, moving furtively in the moonlight. He peered at her through the darkness, checking to see if he had awoken her. Dyana didn't move. She listened as Richius stripped off his clothes, then washed quietly from the basin by the window. After pulling on a nightshirt, he very carefully slid into bed next to her.

  "I was worried," said Dyana.

  There was a long pause before she heard Richius sigh.

  "I'm sorry," he offered.

  "It is late." She stole a glance out the window. The moon was dim. "Almost morning. Where have you been?"

  "Out. Thinking."

  "Thinking? You have been gone all day." When he did not answer she rolled over to touch his shoulder. He seemed reluctant to face her. "Richius," she whispered. "Tell me what is wrong."

  "Nothing that you can help, Dyana. Go back to sleep. I'm sorry I woke you."

  "I cannot sleep. Not now." She gave his shoulder a shake. "Please . . ."

  At last he rolled over to look at her, his face grim and exhausted. He stank of the fields.

  "I know you are unhappy here," Dyana said. "I know you want revenge. But I cannot let you, Richius."

  Richius' voice was barely a whisper. "Dyana, I love you. And I love Shani. You're everything to me. So why am I so restless?"

  "Bad memories," she said. She stroked his head, hoping to soothe those burning recollections. "War does this to a man. It will pass. I know you cannot believe that now, but it will. You need time to heal."

  "Every night I think of going back to Nar," he said. "Back to Aramoor. I've abandoned them all, Dyana. I let them die. And I hear them screaming at me, accusing me. Even Sabrina."

  Sabrina. Dyana glanced away. She had never told Richius how she shared his guilt over her death, though she had never even met the girl. But he had abandoned Sabrina and Nar for her, and for that his wife had been murdered. Dyana's hand trembled a little and she pulled it from his brow.

  "Sabrina is dead," she said coldly. "You cannot bring her back."

  Richius stared at her. "I know that. But there are crimes to answer for. Someone has to pay."

  "Someone is paying, my love," said Dyana. "You."

  "Dyana . . ."

  "No," snapped Dyana. "Stop and listen to me. Sabrina is dead. And Aramoor is gone. You live here now, Richius. You live among the Triin because you cannot go home again. This is all there is for you." She looked away. "I am all there is for you."

  A lumbering guilt assailed her. She had said it. And it had felt good. But now, in its aftermath, came a terrible silence. Richius was staring at her. She could feel his eyes through the blackness. He resented her and she knew it.

  "You came back here for me," she said glumly. "But that was your choice, Richius. I never asked you to. You thought it would make you happy, but nothing makes you happy. And now you blame me for your misery."

  Richius sat up. "I don't," he insisted. "Don't say that."

  "You do. I see it when you look at me. You want to go off and fight Nar with the Lissens, but you do not care what will happen to us. And you do not see the danger, because you are blind with hate. Nar is pulling itself to pieces, and you want to be part of that."

  "Aramoor is my land, Dyana. I'm the king."

  "You are not," said Dyana. "Not anymore. And no matter what you do to Nar, even if you kill your Count Biagio, you will never get Aramoor back." Her shoulders slumped. "Why do you make me be so cruel? Why do I have to tell you this, when it should be so plain to you?"

  Richius' bravado melted away. "I just want to do what's right," he said weakly. "But I don't know what that is."

  Dyana shrugged. "Nor do I. But I want you to be whole. I want my husband back."

  Gentle as a breeze, he slipped an arm around her. Dyana shuddered at the touch. He put her head down against him and stroked her white hair, and she was like a child in his embrace, frail and adored. She didn't want him to see her cry. She wanted to be strong for him.

  "The Triin have an expression," he said. "Talking to the sky. That's what I have to do, I think."

  "What?"

  "I have to talk to the sky. You don't know that expression?"

  "Where did you hear that?"

  "From Karlaz. He says it's what Triin men do when they're troubled. They go off and be with nature for a time. They look for answers."

  "In Chandakkar, maybe. I have never heard that before." She pulled herself free of him. "Is that what you want to do? Leave Falindar?"

  "Yes," he said.

  "Alone?"

  "It wouldn't be much good if I weren't alone, Dyana. I need to think. I need to get away from here for a little while. I have a lot inside I need to sort out. Is that all right?"

  "I cannot stop you."

  He tried to smile. "You're angry."

  "Yes," said Dyana. "You are always telling me what danger I am in, and now you say you want to leave. What about Biagio? Are you not worried about him?"

  "Lucyler will look after you," said Richius. "And if you do as I say, stay inside while I'm gone, nothing will happen to you." He gave her an imploring look. "Please, don't fight me on this. Let me go with a clear conscience. I'll be back to you."

  Dyana sighed. She didn't need him to swear it. She knew how much he loved her and Shani.

  "How long will you be gone for?" she asked.

  "I don't know. A week or so, I suppose. Not much longer."

  "Where will you go?"

  "I don't know that either, really. I thought of going to Chandakkar with Karlaz. He's leaving Falindar soon. But he said I should be alone. . . ." Richius laughed. "It's probably all some spiritual nonsense. But I want to try. I just want to--"

  "Be alone. Yes, I know." Dyana went back to him and curled against him. It was warm in his embrace, wonderfully safe. It always had been. "Go," she said to him. "Go and talk to the sky. See what it has to say."

  "Ah, now you mock me. . . ."

  "I do not," she said. "People are very different, Richius. Some find their way in the company of family. Others need to be alone. You are one of those. You always hav
e been, I think."

  SIX

  The Twin Dukes

  Lorla didn't know her last name. She didn't know if she had siblings, and she didn't know who her parents were or why they had given her into the care of the labs. She had vague memories of them, and that was all. Her mother, whom she could only recall with the opaque quality of a dream, had been a short woman and not very attractive. Her father had been stout, with dark hair. More than that she simply couldn't recall, and it bothered her sometimes--usually when she was feeling lonely, which of late had been happening to her more and more. On the road to Dragon's Beak, it seemed her fractured memories were all she had.

  An ever-darkening sky had dogged them for days. Daevn, her tight-lipped guide, had kept their pace brisk to out-distance the storm, but a cold rain had fallen on them anyway, and Lorla blew onto her hands often to keep them from freezing. She had fled Goth with a wool cloak and a fat pair of mittens, but they were travelling north and winter was coming. Soon it would be too cold to go on, and Lorla craved hot food and a warm place to sleep. They had not bedded in any of the villages they'd passed. She supposed her mission was too grave to risk being seen by anyone, so she had stayed to the forests while Daevn bartered for provisions, and together they had camped each night beneath the starless sky, keeping their fires small so as not to attract attention. Lorla was tired of the tiny fires. She wanted a blaze.

  Trying to keep the wind from her face, Lorla pulled the hood of her cloak around her mouth and nose. She hated the cold. She had been warned by her teachers that her body was delicate, and particularly susceptible to the winter. She wondered if Daevn was not aware of the temperature, or if her strange body had simply conjured up the frost of its own imagining.

  The pony she had named Phantom was warm, and Lorla clung to it, crouching low against its neck. Phantom was a good companion, and Lorla hoped she could keep the beast when they got to Dragon's Beak. In the lab she had been allowed precious little, but Lokken had been good to her, treating her like one of his own daughters. But the duke was dead now, certainly. Duchess Kareena, too. They had heard no news of Goth, not even in the villages where Daevn had stopped. At least that's what Daevn had claimed. Lorla's eyes narrowed on Daevn. He had been suspiciously quiet since coming from the last village. Lorla thought to question him, then stopped herself. Daevn had been given orders to escort her, nothing more, and had made no effort to comfort her or even speak to her. She supposed this was best for her mission.

  Whatever her mission was.

  I will get to Dragon's Beak and be warm there, she told herself. And the duke there will take care of me. Lokken said he would.

  She wondered if Duke Enli was anything like Lokken, and if Dragon's Beak was anything like Goth. She had adored Goth. The Walled City had been a wondrous place to spend a year, like being on holiday. So much better than the war labs and the atrocious women who had raised her. But it had all been for a purpose, Lorla knew. She was something very special. In the labs they were fond of the word destiny. Lorla had destiny, they had told her, and the memory made the girl sit up straighter in her saddle. Whatever the Master had planned for her, she would not disappoint him.

  Even so, her mind wandered. In Goth there had been other children for companionship, and though she had been much their elder mentally, she missed them. She wondered if Dragon's Beak had children. Perhaps a boy her own age . . .

  Lorla stopped daydreaming, admonishing herself for the thought. Her own age. What was that, really? She could count up the years easily enough, but that didn't seem to make sense, not when she looked down at her stunted body.

  Stop it! she ordered herself. She needed to focus, the way they had taught her to. The cold was getting to her; they had warned her it might. She struggled out of her fantasy and blew into her hands. She wanted to stop and build a fire, but it was early in the afternoon and a long road awaited them. Daevn had said they might reach Dragon's Beak by nightfall.

  "Hot tea," she murmured. "Hot with honey. And bread." She laughed. Might as well throw that on the table. She imagined a feast spread out before her, in a dining room of warm wood with a fire blazing in a hearth. Lorla sighed softly, enjoying the game. Despite her years, she still had a child's imagination, though she was aware of the awakenings of her mind and body, at this age where most girls had their blood cycles. Lorla's body was too underdeveloped to bleed like a woman's, but it had its own curiosities. The words from the labs came back to her again--she was something very special.

  To Lorla's dismay, they did not reach Dragon's Beak that night. The sun had disappeared behind a swathe of clouds, quickening the arrival of night, so at dusk they found a place at the roadside to break. Daevn used his hatchet to clear a place for them in the brush, then let the horses trample down the tall, dead grass. He lit a fire--a big one, at Lorla's insistence--and made them a meal of bread and dried sausages, a delicacy he had acquired in the last town. Because they would soon be in Dragon's Beak, they did not pick at their rations but instead ate their fill, and Lorla slept soundly until morning.

  A dreadful gale blew from the north as they set out. The sun glowed without warmth, impossibly pallid on the gray horizon. Lorla clung close to Phantom's neck, gleaning what comfort she could from the animal. The road soon became desolate. This far north, winter had already stripped the trees naked so that they seemed burnt and barren. A little sense of dread grew in Lorla. No one had told her about Dragon's Beak, but the mystical name had conjured up a different image in her mind, and she didn't like the reality. Lokken had told her only that Dragon's Beak was very far north and often full of snow, and that it was shaped like a dragon's long snout protruding into the sea. It was a single kingdom ruled by two dukes, the twins Enli and Eneas. Each duke had a castle of their own. Duke Enli's was on the dragon's lower jaw. His brother's was on the upper. Lorla had pictured fairy-tale spires and stained glass, but the dreariness around her reminded her more of spider webs and decay.

  They rode on for an hour more, until at last Lorla could smell the sea. The road ahead forked. Daevn stopped his horse. The road was thick with trees and both directions looked equally unappealing. He looked over his shoulder at Lorla.

  "Dragon's Beak," he said.

  Lorla grimaced. "Which way?"

  "Either way. We're taking the south fork, to Enli. The north fork leads to Eneas."

  Lorla had a thousand questions. "Do you know Enli, Daevn? What is he like?"

  Daevn was typically unhelpful. "I have never met the duke," he said. "I have never been to Dragon's Beak."

  "It's quiet here," said Lorla. She looked ahead and saw only a canopy of dead branches closing over the road. "Where is everyone?"

  "Smart enough to get in from the cold. Now stop talking so we can do the same."

  Without waiting for her, Daevn sped his horse down the road. Phantom kept pace, and soon they were on their way to Enli. The trees grew tall, reaching high into the sky, a tangled home for wide-eyed mammals and enormous, black-feathered grackles. Lorla stared skyward, marveling at the maze of branches above her head. The wind had abated some, slowed by the thickness of trees, and brown leaves tumbled toward them, dry and dead and held aloft by the breeze's breath. The air was brackish, moist with sea water. Lorla licked her lips and tasted salt. When the canopy thinned to reveal the sky, she saw a great blanket of storm clouds waiting.

  "Daevn?" she asked nervously. "How far are we from the castle?"

  Daevn shrugged. "Dunno."

  "It's going to rain. Hard."

  A moment later the sky exploded with rain. The road quickly filled with water, turning to mud beneath the horses' hooves. Lorla peered through the downpour for Daevn.

  "Come on," he shouted. "It can't be much farther."

  Lorla shivered beneath her garments, already soaked through. The fingers in her mittens had turned to icicles. Phantom moved sure-footed through the storm, following Daevn's horse. A flash of lightning cracked the sky, followed by a rumbling detonation of thunder. Lo
rla closed her eyes and wished the storm away, but only got another bolt of lightning for her troubles. She hurried Phantom to Daevn's side.

  "Should we stop?" she asked.

  The big man shook his head. "It won't last." He glanced at her through the rain and smiled. "Don't worry. It's only thunder."

  "I'm not afraid," she lied, not wanting him to think her a coward. "I'm just wet. And cold, and tired of this ride. Find the castle, Daevn."

  Daevn bowed sarcastically at her. "Oh, yes, my lady. What do you think I'm trying to do?"

  They rode on in silence, sloshing down the narrow lane, until at last the rain slackened.

  "There," Daevn declared. "Look."

  Lorla followed Daevn's finger toward the horizon. Atop a hill and shrouded in mist was a castle of red stone. Lorla peered through the rain. It was tall and dark and it frightened her, and she knew from her melancholy feeling that the dismal sight was Enli's home. The Duke of Dragon's Beak did not dwell in the fairytale house she had imagined, but rather in a dreary nightmare of cold brick and dark windows, a single, monolithic tower jutting from the earth. Even against the beauty of the sea it was a cruel vision, as if it meant to mock the ocean with its own vast ugliness. Lorla bit her lower lip, then noticed the flag flying atop the castle.

  "Daevn, look. He flies the Light of God. Do you see?"

  Daevn was circumspect. "I see it," he said. Clearly he had expected the Black Flag to be waving in Dragon's Beak. "But I trust Lokken even now, girl. If this is where he wants you, then it's no mistake."

  "But--"

  "Trust him, Lorla," he said. Then he laughed and added, "You'll be warm again soon. And tonight I might sleep with a real woman!"

  The insult struck Lorla like an icy slap. A real woman? What did that mean? She scowled at the soldier but he seemed not to take her meaning. Instead Daevn rode off, his horse trotting through the mud toward the castle on the hill. When he noticed Lorla wasn't following, he turned around and waved to her.

  "Coming? Or do you want to drown out here?"

  "Drown," she mumbled. Suddenly anything seemed better than the castle. But she was frozen and exhausted, and that made her snap the reins. Phantom jumped forward at her command. The little pony seemed as eager as Daevn to be out of the damp. The road widened some as they approached, and they passed by small houses and storefronts, all quiet and shuttered. A few candles burned dimly in the windows. Lorla felt invisible eyes staring at her, but each time she turned to face them they had vanished.