“What a way to find out your dad’s not your dad.” Sala shook her head in disgust. “Did you see the boy’s face? He had no idea.”
Ker licked her lips. Refocus. Regardless of how she might feel, Tel was not their priority at the moment. “That’s because it’s not true.”
Wynn stared with wide eyes. “You touched him, just at the end there, you touched him.”
“You’re sure?” Sala tilted her head to one side.
“It’s a simple question,” Ker said. “And I’m better at Flashing people since the griffin.” But she wouldn’t tell them what she’d seen in the boy’s aura. Seven colors, more than Talents or Feelers—six was the most she’d seen in anyone except Weimerk himself. Keep your mouth shut, she told herself. One problem at a time. “Anyway, he’s definitely Dern’s son.”
“So maybe—” Wynn sounded hopeful. “Maybe the dad’s being forced, and he knows he can’t save himself, but he wants his boy to be safe from the . . . from them.”
Ker and Sala exchanged looks. “Sure, maybe,” the older woman said.
“Because don’t you see?” Wynn held up a finger, frowned at it, and lowered it again. “This changes everything.”
Ker nodded, answering the other girl’s grin with one of her own. “We don’t need Dern Firoxi,” she said. “Not if we have Jerek Brightwing. We get him to the Wings, they acclaim him as Luqs, and the fight against the Halians can begin.”
Ker looked at Sala, and the Far-thinker winked at her and nodded. Clearly, the news had been passed along to the Mines and Tunnels, and from there it would reach the Faro of Bears. “All we have to do now is get out of this room, persuade the boy to come with us, find Tel, and get back to the Serpents Teeth,” she said.
“Is that all?”
“Sit down. Make yourself comfortable.”
“That’s likely.” Tel glanced around. From the quality of the furniture, this was a much nicer guest room than they’d been given.
Jak finished lighting the lamp and turned, smiling. “Let’s find out, shall we?” A flaw in the wick made the flame flicker, sending shadows dancing across his face. Jak turned his smile to the guard at Tel’s elbow. “That’s fine, Pella, thank you.”
The thickset man lifted bristling eyebrows. Though he seemed slow, Tel had met lots like him, and wasn’t fooled. “You sure, sir? He’s on the big side.”
“I’m sure.” Jak nodded, still smiling. “You think Cursar’s going to knock me on the head and go out the window?” He tilted his head to one side and peered at Tel through his lashes. “That’s not very likely, though I suppose it’s possible. If it makes you feel better . . .” Jak circled the centrally placed table to reach a settee against the window wall of the room. He rummaged through several packs and saddlebags, and finally pulled a sword out of a hard leather sheath. It was an officer’s weapon, longer than the regular soldier’s blade.
“Put him there,” Jak said, indicating with the point of his sword a low stool close to the fireplace. “With his long legs, it will cost him considerable effort to stand up from there, giving me ample chance to stick him with this.”
The guard’s grin widened. “You know your business best, sir. Still, we won’t be far.” He hauled Tel’s arm up a little more, sheer bulk and strength making up for the leverage he lost due to Tel’s height, and moved him into position near the stool. Off balance, and unable to twist out of the way, Tel had no choice but to sit down. The stool would have been a good height for Kerida to sit comfortably, which meant that Tel’s knees reached somewhere around his armpits. It was true, by the time he could lever himself to his feet, Jak would have plenty of time to kill him.
The guard executed a crisp and proper salute, gave Tel a surprisingly friendly grin, and left the room.
“I’m happy to have this chance to speak to you again, away from your friend Kerida Nast.”
“You’re not going to call her a witch this time?”
Jak leaned back against the edge of the table, tapping his foot with the sword. “I’ll tell you something. It doesn’t matter what I call her. We have the prince of the blood. Such as he is.” Jak’s teeth flashed again in the flickering light of the oil lamp. “Soldiers are quite practical, as you’ll have noticed yourself. Now that we have Firoxi, the other Wings will fall into line.”
“After you kill all the female officers and ranks, you mean.”
Jak sobered. “Those who refuse to be retired, or retrained, yes, most likely. I won’t lie to you. The Halians don’t believe in arming women.” He shrugged. “You can see for yourself what it led to here. Though that was more the witches’ doing than anything else, you know. Our women would have been perfectly normal if it hadn’t been for the Halls.”
All Tel could do was shake his head. This wasn’t the Jak Gulder who’d been leading them until they reached the mines. “You really believe that?” he said finally.
“I do, in fact.” Jak shrugged again. “But does that matter? Now? You think our friend Pella cares one way or another? He’s a practical man, and his practical sense is telling him he should stand with the winning side.”
Tel pressed his lips together against the sneer he could feel coming. He knew lots of practical men like this Pella. For soldiers like him, the military was a job like any other, where the smart ones followed the rules and did what the officers told them to do—and kept a sharp eye out for opportunities. No mage would be needed to change them.
“What about you, Tel Cursar? What does your practical sense tell you?”
“Kerida isn’t a witch,” Tel said before he knew he meant to.
Jak nodded. “That’s a shame, it really is. Poor kid gets caught up and warped by the witches until she’s in too far to save. That’s a real shame. But hers isn’t the only life that’s been ruined by the witches. What about all the others they’ve wronged?”
“What others?” Even as he spoke, Tel knew it was a mistake to engage with the other man. Not that Jak needed any encouragement to talk.
“Though not everyone feels this way, I think the witches could have been wonderfully useful tools, if they’d only submitted themselves. I don’t know how far back the turning point was, when they started their campaign against men. How did they become so powerful? They’re useful, but so are horses and dogs, and we don’t put them in charge. We don’t put them in the best tents and give them better food than the men who are doing the dangerous work, do we? Haven’t you ever wondered why the Talented should get better treatment than the rest of us?”
Again, Tel pressed his lips together. This wasn’t the first time he’d heard opinions of this kind—though not usually expressed so bluntly. Mother! He’d made a few remarks that way himself. But many of those who made this kind of complaint were women. It had always been soldiers against Talents. They were something to complain about, like over-strict officers or late pay.
“Why should I care about this?” he finally asked. “Why am I here?”
“You’re here because I like you.”
“You like me?” Tel couldn’t have been more astonished if a dog had spoken to him.
The other man tilted his head to one side again, smiling, swinging his sword. “I don’t expect you to understand. You see, you have something I always wanted.”
“I do? And that would make you like me?”
“I know.” Jak nodded. “Seems contrary to human nature, doesn’t it?” He shrugged. “But there it is. I’ve always wanted a real military career—maybe be a Faro one day—something for which my family made me unsuited, and for which your family made you perfect. I’m well aware that I could easily dislike you for that. I’ve disliked others, if it comes to it. But I like you.” He spread his hands.
“And that’s why I’m here?” Tel shifted his feet, but the new position was no better than the old. He still couldn’t stand up quickly.
“Here in this
room, yes. Right now, yes. I wanted to give you an opportunity.”
Tel shook his head. This was unbelievable. “I’m just a soldier.”
“And so will I be, now.” Jak’s sword stopped swinging, and he leaned forward. “With a soldier’s future. I can be a Faro now, and you could be my Laxtor. What do you think of that?”
Tel bit down on the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing aloud. Only a rich man’s son thought you could become a Faro just by wanting it. For a minute he considered going along with Jak, telling him that, yes, he’d been persuaded. A dead hero did no one any good. He could fight from within, maybe learn something valuable and then escape. But if he could think of it, they could. And it would mean standing by and letting Kerida Nast die. To say nothing of Sala.
“Your face changed just then.”
“What does it matter what I think,” Tel said. “Can’t they just change me the way they’ve changed you?” Jak’s smile faded. “I’m not important enough, am I? After all, you’re Jak Gulder, son of an important family, a political family. I’m nobody, a third officer of a mid-level Company. No special Halian magic’s going to be wasted on me, no matter how much you like me.” Now Tel did laugh. With nothing to tempt him, his choice was easier. “No,” he said, and then cleared his throat. “No. I won’t join you. No, I won’t betray my friends. Just . . . no.”
“She really has a hold on you, that witch, doesn’t she?” Jak’s tone was flat. He got to his feet, smoothly avoiding Tel on his way to the door. “Pella? You can take him away. But put him in a kitchen storeroom or somewhere, would you? Keep him away from the others.” He turned back to Tel. “I’ll give you some time away from her to think. You know what will happen to her. Maybe you’ll feel differently then. I urge you to come to your senses. I hope you do.”
It wasn’t so much that everyone was asleep, as it was that Jerek knew all the secret and quiet ways to move through the house he’d grown up in. Even the two soldiers on watch in the dining hall never noticed him as he crept around the shadowy corners, hugging walls until he could let himself into the central courtyard through one of the large windows that was supposed to be locked at this time of year. Jerek knew every loose tile and floorboard, where to place his feet to make the least possible noise.
Not that experience in moving soundlessly through the house was the only thing keeping him from being caught. Jerek’s ears burned at the thought of how readily everyone believed that he was satisfied with the turn of events. Content to let people be imprisoned, so long as he was left to enjoy his property in peace. But that all worked to his advantage now. They’d allowed him back in his own rooms, and once settled there, no one paid any further attention to him. Even now, if he was caught sneaking into the tower, he was planning to say he needed to talk to his father.
For that reason, once he entered the tower itself, he ran up the stairs as he usually would, without trying for stealth. The only thing he wouldn’t be able to explain was the key to the winepress room, weighing heavily in his tunic pocket. Jerek was reasonably sure that he was the only one left in the household who knew this same key would open great-grandmother’s study. He knew for a fact that his father was unaware of it.
When he reached the heavy door of the old study, he knelt and put his eye to the keyhole.
• • •
“Kerida.”
At Sala’s whisper, Ker lifted her head up off her folded arms. The Feeler tilted her head toward the door. Ker held her finger to her lips and got to her feet, circling around the table and approaching the door from the side. Wynn rolled off the bed onto her feet, and she and Sala both came closer. Ker lifted her left hand to hold them in place, and reaching over to set the palm of her right hand on the door. This was no different from Flashing where the enemy soldiers were from the mine entrance. Paraste.
“It’s the boy,” she said. His aura was visible even through the door. As she spoke, the key clicked into the lock. The mechanism tumbled smoothly, with very little noise. Of course, if the boy had been confined here for any length of time, someone would have oiled the lock. The door swung open just as quietly, and Jerek slipped in.
“How did you know it was me?”
“The same way I know that your father’s lying, and that you really are his son.”
Suddenly pale, the boy flicked his eyes at the others before returning them to her. “You’re a Talent?”
“And you’re quick, that’s good.”
“Do they know?” His struck his forehead with his palm. “Of course, they do. Then you’ve got to get out of here; they’ll kill you.”
Ker tried to keep her face impassive. “Jerek, you know we came looking for the prince. We need the prince, desperately, to unite the Battle Wings.”
“So they’ll fight the Halians and not argue among themselves as to which Faro should take the throne. I’ve read my history,” he said. A little color had returned to his face, but his eyes were in constant motion, flicking from Ker to Sala to Wynn and back again.
“You’re a prince yourself, and next to your father, the most important person to the Polity . . .” Ker let her voice die away. How to put it? That the only reason Dern could have for claiming the boy wasn’t his son was to raise his own value.
But Jerek guessed what she was so reluctant to say.
“That’s what that man was saying, Lord Gulder. If I were only a stepson, I could be left behind. With a son, my father would be only half as important. They might use me, if they found him stubborn. That’s why I have to go with you. To make sure the Halians can’t use me.” He looked at each of them again, but this time his eyes were steady. “You have to take me with you.”
“Exactly what we were hoping to do. Can we get out the way you got in?” Ker went to the door.
The boy shook his head. “The house is full of soldiers. You wouldn’t make it. I thought we’d use the window. The bars are on hinges. They’re meant to open to let in big pieces of furniture.”
Ker turned to Sala, but the older woman was shaking her head. “There’s no rope on the pulley, and from what I could see in daylight, you’d have to be a monkey to find good enough finger- and toeholds in that wall.”
“I was thinking of making a rope out of all these stored sheets and things.” Jerek’s tone was diffident, as if unsure how grown-ups would receive his suggestions.
“I’ll do it while you plan,” Wynn said, turning toward the chests standing against the inner wall next to the entry door. “I’ve got no head for strategy.”
Ker turned back to Sala, who was still at the window, gauging the distance. “What do you think?”
“Might work,” the older woman said. “None of us is any great heavyweight.”
“Too bad we don’t have Ganni here,” Ker said. Somehow the tower looked taller than it had a moment before.
“Right now I’d settle for Ennick,” Sala said. “He could probably climb down with all four of us on his back.”
Ker nodded, frowning. “Assuming we get out, we’ve got blankets and even some extra clothing among the stores here, but what will we do for food and weapons?”
Jerek looked up from where he was helping Wynn look through chests. “As for food, the cook sleeps next to the kitchen, and he’s a light sleeper. I’m afraid your packs and weapons have been taken by the soldiers, but there are tools and such in the stable storeroom. And Folet the stableman keeps his old sword and his hunting bows there as well. I can shoot,” he added.
Sala nodded. “If we see a chance to take them, we should, though food might be a larger problem. Best if we don’t split up.”
“Agreed. Nothing is as important as getting away before the Shekayrin gets here.” Again, Sala nodded, but not as if she were in complete agreement. “Remember the jewel Luca showed us?” Ker said. “Sala, you haven’t seen what they can do. Wynn and I have.”
“Then I’ll
take it seriously.”
“Jerek, come show us the layout of the buildings.”
Using items on the small table, Jerek created a model of the outbuildings, showing where the stables and other sheds were in relationship to the main house.
“We could go this way.” He drew a line on the tabletop with his finger. “Once we’re past the grapevines, we’re into the trees that border the mill brook.” He looked up. “It’s not a lot of cover, but it’s something.”
“Well thought out.” Sala patted the boy on the shoulder. “Tell us, young one, are there horses enough for the four of us?”
“Five of us,” Ker said. “We can’t leave without Tel.”
“Wherever he is,” Wynn said. Ker looked at Jerek, but the boy shook his head.
“I can Flash where he is, and there’s no Shekayrin here,” Ker pointed out. “We know that he’s not changed.”
“Perhaps so,” Sala said. “But breaking him out? If it was just ourselves, I’d say let’s chance it, but . . .”
“I know, I know.” Ker rubbed at the tightness around her eyes. “We’ve got the prince to think of.” She looked up at the older woman.
Sala grimaced. “We can’t go looking for him. Agreed?”
Ker flexed her fingers; even her skin felt tight. “Agreed,” she said finally. She turned her face away and went back to studying the model that Jerek had made them. Of course, she agreed. She had to. There were more important things at stake than one person. Tel would be the first to say so. She stuck her trembling hands into her armpits. Let them think she was cold.
“We need at least three horses, and even then, traveling across country, horses may not be the smart way to go.”
Jerek frowned. “Wouldn’t they be faster?”
“Hear, hear.” Wynn looked up from her knotting. “Anything rather than another seven charming days cross-country at marching pace.”
Halls of Law Page 34