by Lou Hoffmann
Likewise, he’d been completely unaware that Han had sat with Lucky through the rest of the day and all night, together with Thurlock and Henry in turns, watching for signs of a return to Lucky’s black dreams—undreams—which thankfully hadn’t happened. Han stayed with him even after morning came and Tahlina, who’d given up her sleep to care for Lucky too, finally declared Lucky out of danger and resting well.
After Han told him about those things and quite a lot more, Lucky stopped asking questions, and Han stopped talking.
In the quiet, sipping his honeyed tea, Lucky began sifting through his various memories of the previous day, eventually alighting on his astonishment when the shifters had burst forth, seemingly from nothingness, and entered the battle. From what Han had told him, they’d come from Earth with Henry. Lucky supposed he should be surprised that shifters existed in such numbers in Earth when everybody thought they were only in stories, but he wasn’t.
I guess once you’ve seen so much that isn’t normal, it stops being hard to believe.
But… “Where are all the shifters now, Han? Besides Henry, I mean.”
Han raised his eyebrows and smiled wryly. “They are safe and well and staying at the garrison in some barracks that weren’t being used, believe it or not.”
“Why ‘believe it or not’?”
“They don’t trust us, since we attacked them when they came through. Our soldiers and their families don’t trust the shifters, because they’re still not convinced they aren’t the enemy—they did a fair amount of damage in the battle. People got hurt on both sides during that fight, though thank all the gods nobody died as a result. For the time being, we’re keeping the peace by keeping them apart.”
Lucky snorted. “Like children.”
Han shook his head. “No. They’re afraid—both our people and theirs. Fear makes people stupid, and it turns all too easily into hate. If the shifters want to stay, Thurlock has a plan queued up to start things mending so we can all live well together. Might take some time, but it can be done.”
But when Lucky had said the word “children,” it had reminded him of those innocents he’d seen abused and even killed by the Terrathians. A spasm of pain clenched his heart, and it was a moment before he could breathe to ask about them.
“We did find some children alive,” Han said. “They are being cared for by Rose and Shehrice and some other volunteers. Thurlock and some other wizards have done what they could to heal their minds, and the healers’ arts seem sufficient for the wounds to their bodies. When they’re well enough, I suppose we’ll have to find their homes, or else find families who’ll take them.”
That news wasn’t bad, of itself, but Lucky understood the pained look that crossed Han’s features as he spoke. No child should have to endure such things. And Lucky knew what it felt like to be a child without a home and a family to belong to. He decided he’d make it his business to make sure they felt, at the very least, welcome in his country.
Lucky sighed, letting his thoughts move on. He’d been reviewing his memories of yesterday’s battle more or less in order of what happened when, so now thoughts of his final encounter with his mother flooded his mind and threatened to stop his heart altogether.
“My mom,” he choked out.
Thurlock entered the room just as he spoke, and he finished the sentence for Lucky. “Was grateful for her release.” The big wizard sat on the end of Lucky’s bed, let his comforting hand rest on Lucky’s ankle, and firmly held his gaze.
Lucky fell down into the calm depths of the wizard’s sea-gray eyes, and somehow he gathered there a sense of rightness. That didn’t change the grief—he suspected he’d be dealing with that for a long time—but it quelled the guilt and let him think of other things for now. For just a moment, he let his mind hold on to the memory of something he hadn’t known he’d seen, his own tear-streaked face reflected in his mother’s wide green eyes. His sense of the moment returned more honestly, and he felt a wave of gratitude because he hadn’t been alone, there in Liliana’s last moments. His friends had been with him.
Han, Thurlock, K’ormahk….
“Where’s Rio?”
Han and Thurlock exchanged a look but stayed silent for a long moment.
Finally Han spoke, his tone casual in a studied way. “He had to leave, nephew. He wrote you a message—it’s on your night table, there—and he said he’d be back. It seems he hadn’t told Morrow he was leaving when he hopped a ride on K’ormahk’s back.”
Lucky’s spirits fell down to basement level, and stayed there, but he tried to fake calm acceptance until his worried elders left him alone to get dressed. Then, he picked up the folded square of parchment off his table and read Rio’s note, which he’d written out in the sloppy but unrushed script that always seemed just right for Rio’s personality. The sight of it made Lucky smile, and the words, once he read them, kept that smile plastered on his face, despite everything, for at least an hour.
Dear Lucky,
I have to go and try to stop my father from imprisoning the triplets for not keeping a close enough eye on me to prevent me leaving. When you called K’ormahk, I was brushing him down. He pranced for a moment, which he does sometimes before flying, and I just knew he was going to fly out to help you. I got a chill—I was suddenly so afraid for you. I went over to K’ormahk and he knelt for me (!) so I figured he wanted me to go to. I’m glad I was with you—I hope it helped when things were so awful—but I’m sorry we didn’t get to talk at all. Don’t worry, though. I’ll come back—hopefully with Papa’s permission so I can stay longer. Until then, please don’t forget me, Lucky. And here’s a secret I can’t keep to myself—I’m all the way in love with you, Lucky. In love, really.
Hope I’ll see you soon.
Rio
THE COUNCIL met that afternoon, and though Lucky dragged his feet on his way across to the manor house, he attended. He had admittedly let out a groan when Thurlock told him about it before leaving Lucky’s room that morning.
“You don’t have to go,” Thurlock had said, in response. “Council meetings will still be my domain for a while yet.”
The idea of skipping out tempted Lucky. He cursed whatever perverse notion he’d had a few days ago when he’d acted all put out about not getting invited to the meeting in Thurlock’s tower room. Two meetings had been plenty to figure out such things were at best boring, and at times far more uncomfortable. But he went anyway. There was nothing like watching death surround you in the middle of a battlefield shortly before helping your mother to cease existing to drive home one important fact: how much you know about what’s going on can make a real difference.
As he climbed the stairs to the library meeting room, he physically felt surprisingly good after his long sleep and whatever restoratives Tahlina had administered. His spirits had soared momentarily when he read Rio’s note, and even now, thinking about it, his heart felt floaty. Still, he couldn’t pretend to feel happy, and he definitely didn’t feel optimistic. He missed Maizie and worried about her. He missed Rio, love letter notwithstanding. And the thought that was on his mind as he crossed the antechamber toward the council room door? He felt like an orphan—because he was an orphan, now that his mother was gone.
On the heels of calling Liliana into his thoughts, he heard her voice, remembering something he’d forgotten until that moment.
“This will not end it…. Prepare for war…. Horrors you cannot imagine…. Gather every ally….”
Lucky stopped walking so suddenly Khoralie ran into him.
“S-Sorry, ma’am,” Lucky said, then bent to retrieve the staff she’d dropped.
“Don’t touch that!” she warned.
Lucky stopped just in time, and Khoralie laboriously bent over and picked it up herself.
She stood back up, smiling at him, and righted her blue spectacles. “It’s warded, you see,” she said, then pinched his cheek and moved on.
It didn’t help him feel any more like he belonged in
a room full of wizards, witches, politicians, and bureaucrats—mostly well into middle age—but it did clear away the choking dread that had risen when he’d remembered his mother’s final warning. Common sense came rushing in on his heels, and he made quick work of blocking his thoughts. He didn’t know if the council meeting would ever be the right place to share such intelligence, but he knew he wasn’t about to do it today, not before he could talk to the people he knew he could trust.
On reflection he realized that was another lesson he’d learned on his way to becoming a leader—he had to be sure of who he could trust. It made him sad to think it.
Thurlock opened the meeting less authoritatively than the last time. He looked at the scroll that lay opened and weighted on the table before him, then cleared his throat and looked over the top of his spectacles, casting his sharp glance around the room. That was apparently enough to catch the attention of everyone present—or maybe it was the varicolored sparks that hissed from the top of his staff as he fidgeted with it that quieted them.
“Before we get to a report about yesterday’s hostilities,” he said, “and discuss how things stand in that respect, I gather some of you have objections to raise. Let’s get those out of the way, shall we?” He acknowledged a thin, bookish gentleman who sat in one corner clutching a handkerchief. “Jehnseth?”
“Yes, thank you, sir,” Jehnseth said in a nasal voice. “Reports have reached my ears that, well, that the young man sitting on your left, Henry George, I believe you said? He, well, he is apparently the leader of the, well, the shapeshifters who fought in the Battle of Hoenholm Ruins just yesterday—fought against our troops! Those shapeshifters have been sequestered as, well, as is only right, so that they will not bring more harm to us. I must ask, well, I must ask that we vote upon whether he should be removed from this meeting and, well, and held with the other captive, er… sequestered ones of his, well, his kind.”
Thurlock sighed. “No. That would be a waste of time. Anyone else?”
A general clamor followed with lots of muttering in certain corners, most of it seeming to be about Thurlock being high-handed, more than about Henry or taking a vote.
Thurlock sighed again, stood, and struck the polished hardwood floor with the heel of his staff, which made an odd ringing sound and sent up a momentary flame. “Fine,” he said. “If you feel you must vote, go ahead. However before you waste your time on that, I will remind you that in matters concerning the Suth Chiell and related prophecies, etc., I—as Premier Wizard and a very grouchy old man—will have the final say. My vote, which I predict will be “no,” will override any number of “yes” votes. With that in mind, does anyone truly want to waste the council’s time by proposing the vote?”
Predictably, Jehnseth did, but nobody volunteered a second, so it went no further. Khoralie, however, raised a hand, and in her chirpy but very polite manner asked if Thurlock might explain why Henry was related to the prophecies. Henry’s expression told Lucky he was hoping Thurlock would answer.
Thurlock said, “Han, most of the people here have seen the Mark of the Sun, but would you mind showing it as a reminder?”
Han looked a trifle embarrassed—actually he looked a lot embarrassed, a dark blush rising up his neck, but he stood and pulled his shirt off his shoulder, then turned this way and that so everyone could see.
“Thank you,” Thurlock said. “Henry, your turn, young man. Please show the people the Mark of the Others.”
Henry drew in a sharp breath, and then choked, but when he got control of the resulting cough, he stood and did as Han had done, showing the council his mark, which was identical except on the opposite shoulder and dark where Han’s was light.
“Thank you, Henry. You may sit down now. Enough said, I think. Let’s move on to Han’s report.”
For the next twenty minutes or so, Lucky listened with only half an ear while Han and Thurlock reported on the Battle of Hoenholm. Lucky fell back into an old habit that had always served him well—watching people. He was glad he’d done that when, a few short minutes later, Thurlock told the council the tale of Lucky and Liliana at the Behlvale Stones. Distracted for a second because he hadn’t known that’s what those stones were named—or even that they had a name—his attention soon returned to Thurlock’s very brief telling.
“Our Suth Chiell resolved a major threat by removing the Lady Grace Liliana, or the creature into which she had devolved, from this plane of existence. I’ll not ask him to talk about that, because as you may guess, some emotional pain is involved. Suffice it to say, he earned our thanks, and I ask that you accord him the proper respect in the matter.”
In the murmur that arose in the following moment, Lucky heard sounds of sympathy. Amid the a-a-aws, and oh mys, though, came some less kindly remarks, like, “killed his own mother, did he?” These comments issued from the lips of exactly those people he would have expected them from, giving what he’d deduced from his people-watching. And that cemented his resolve to keep some information to himself until he could talk to Thurlock or Han—or preferably both of them.
The meeting droned for a short time after that, with little being discussed that seemed urgent to Lucky. Honestly, he spent most of the time until it was adjourned trying to curb his own resentment about people who, apparently, just couldn’t bring themselves to think well of him, no matter the circumstance. He’d watch out for bad juju they might send his way, but it just didn’t seem a good idea to let himself become like them.
AFTER THE meeting ended, dinner at the manor house proved delicious and noisy. That done, Lucky walked with Thurlock back toward his house. Thurlock seemed preoccupied, but Lucky thought he should tell the old man about Liliana’s warning as soon as possible, so he spoke up.
“Thurlock, sir?”
“Mm.”
“My mother warned me about the Terrathians. They’ll be back. War. She said, ‘Horrors you cannot imagine.’”
“Yes,” Thurlock said, scratching at his beard. “Well, perhaps you can’t. I think I can imagine them just fine.”
Apparently the warning didn’t feel like news to Thurlock at all. “So, no big deal, then, what she said?”
Perhaps Thurlock heard the sudden peevishness in Lucky’s tone, because he finally looked over at him. “I wouldn’t say that, Luccan. We’ll talk more about it later. Here comes Han.”
Lucky didn’t need to read Han’s thoughts to know he was wasn’t happy when he fell in step beside them.
Thurlock said, “So I take it you weren’t successful.”
“No,” Han said stiffly. “Henry is going to stay with the rest of the shifters that came through with him.”
“And you were hoping he’d stay with you?” Lucky asked.
“Yes, I was. And?”
“And probably that would be unwise at the moment, given sentiment on all sides,” Thurlock said. Now he was annoyed too.
Han said nothing. Very loudly.
They’d arrived at Thurlock’s house, and as they started up the steps to the porch, the wizard sighed. “I’m sorry, Han. I didn’t mean to sound heartless. Just… give it a day or two. And I’ll be honest, we do have things to work out on our own right now, and—” The wizard stopped talking, hand on the doorknob ready to open it and usher them into his house. He turned to Han, his eyes narrowed and a look of surprise on his face as if he’d just then remembered something very important.
“You know, Han,” he said—now speaking in his Premier-Wizard voice. “You won’t lose him. He will be part of your life for a very long time. We haven’t talked about it, but you should be aware that you have a destiny beyond your current duties to me and the Sunlands. Things prophesied have moved into position; I see that now. The time for you to meet that destiny is coming, perhaps sooner than any of us might have expected.”
It was quite clear to Lucky that Han had heard nothing of this before. Perplexity was written clearly in his wide-eyed look. But he said nothing at all, eventually just turning toward the
door, waiting to get inside as if nothing had happened.
Lucky’s curiosity had been piqued, though. He hadn’t thought about what prophecies, other than things he’d seen or heard very recently, might say about the future. But if there were all these old prophecies Thurlock and Han were always talking about, shouldn’t they have some information about what was going on right now? “Thurlock,” he asked as they stepped inside, “do the prophecies talk about all this stuff going on—the Terrathians, the battle… the children?”
“Possibly.”
Lucky waited for more, but as happened quite often not another word was spoken until he gave in and asked another question—the obvious one.
“What do they say about it?”
“Oh, prophecy-schmophecy.” The wizardly tone had completely fled his voice, and he sounded like he looked—like an irritable old man. “Who can ever really know what they say?”
Chapter Thirty-Four: To a Good End
THE BATTLE of Hoenholm and the coming of the shifters delayed Thurlock’s plan to take Lucky to Nedhra City, but it didn’t change it. Two days after the battle, in Thurlock’s tower, the wizard laid out his plans.
Lucky wasn’t surprised that Han still objected to being left in charge of the Sisterhold—he did, after all, have a heavy load to carry to fulfill his military duties at the moment. But Thurlock insisted, and ultimately, he was the boss. He reminded Han he wouldn’t be all alone. Rosishan and Lem would be there, and some of the council members could be trusted and useful.
“That doesn’t cheer me up,” Han said.
“Olana’s coming back,” Thurlock said. “Certainly that might ease your mind. Luccan and I will be leaving this afternoon.”
“Why not wait until morning?”
“Because this afternoon seems like a fine time to leave, and we’ll be ready. Stop arguing, Han.”