Lhind the Spy

by Sherwood Smith

  That meant no time for the music room. The chiming bells forced me back to bathe and get into formal silk robes. I knew I would never be able to convince anyone that I was not ignorant, and I supposed many saw me as emotionally stunted. In fact, I knew that myself: I’d never had the kind of relationships everyone else grows up with.

  But as I shook out my hair and tail, one thing I was convinced of. I knew that Jardis Dhes-Andis did not believe he was lying, and yet what he said was not the truth.

  When I arrived at the chamber for the evening’s frivolities, the Most Noble Venar of Seaforth Pennon gave me an imperial welcome, but I was conducted to the second most important cushion.

  That was all the warning I had before he appeared, resplendent in midnight blue and gold.

  I had to sit next to him as a long play unfolded full of stylized gesture and innuendo that everyone but me laughed at, and historical reference that elicited the Ah! of approval from all except me.

  Through it I sat trying not to give in to the nearly overmastering wish to tear that horrible weight from my throat. A hundred eternities dragged by before that play finally drew to a close, with me no more enlightened about its point than I’d been at the beginning.

  He bent his head and said in a low voice audible only to me, though on the periphery I could see covert glances our way, “You were entirely lost.”

  I copied their courtly gesture, turning my forefingers out in assent.

  He said, “I will send a scroll for you to study. You ought to know the principal events in our history.”

  He rose. The rest of us rose. The courtiers’ silks rustled like a breeze through ferns as all bowed low until he had left the room. When his imperial guards closed the door, I took my leave, the bows for me not as deep, but the silence as profound.

  My shoulder blades crawled until the doors shut behind me, and I forced myself to keep from running to the music room. It was late. I’d be noticed. Inside my mental wall I howled at the injustice; I resolved to go first thing in the morning.

  My dreams that night were all about trying to fly, but hard as I flapped my wings I could not get off the ground because I was moored by a golden rope to a collar round my neck.

  I woke to a stormy morning. As soon as I’d swallowed my breakfast I made my way to the music room. And oh, she was there the moment I touched the strings; my fingers began to pluck out melodies I scarcely heard as I opened my memory to her.

  Sorrow and comfort flooded back in a tide of sweetness and balm, then she said, I have much to say and we know there’s little time to say it. First, you must not believe ill of Ndai. I have been there, and witnessed councils that are noisy, people coming and going as they wish because they all understand that negotiation and compromise are of primary importance. Laws and justice are reached by consensus.

  I knew it, I thought in triumph. His truth is not everyone’s truth.

  I salute you for comprehending that, my dearest. Reaching consensus is a long process, and not everyone comes away entirely content with the decision, but do you see the underlying freedom there? The principal is choice rather than constraint.

  I shaped words in my mind. The fais forces compliance. And yet nobody seems to see it that way.

  She said, They grow up used to the fais, which are very useful in so many other ways. And the surface life of Sveran Djur does seem quiet and civilized, a matter of great pride. Finally, when you know no other way, you accept as normal what you see around you.

  And that led me to the question that had been bothering me ever since I had begun to accept that she might be my mother: How did you end up here anyway? Were you a prisoner, too?

  Empress Lison wanted better relations with other lands, and Crown Prince Ifan paid lip service to her desires, though he had different goals. His son Danis was sent on a tour, the idea being to contract a royal marriage that would bring peace and alliance. We met in Ndai, and became friends, and then more than friends. The Empress encouraged him to bring me back even though I have no political importance. Ifan again had his own reason for hailing this idea.

  With the words flowed images: the empress, a tall, smiling figure with a high, thoughtful brow and slanted amber eyes; an older court of mostly unfamiliar faces; the imperial heir, Ifan, who looked a lot like Jardis but also like Darus in his chiseled handsomeness, his mask marble-hard.

  Yes, you see what I did not at first. I had so little experience of courts, and none of Djurans. I was so very young! Ifan, who Lison believed was a model son, was teaching his Cadre of Princes in secret, which on the surface was presented as a model for future world peace and cooperation, but was truly intended for one purpose: the gaining of power.

  Images flowed of dances, float parties, tours, everyone beautiful and smiling, but central of all Danis, my father. His smile, especially when my mother met him face to face, was real, very much like his imperial grandmother’s.

  Danis’s mother had been a fair-haired princess from another land, one where the royal family were reputed to hand down certain gifts such as mind-talk and an affinity for magic. She could not adjust to life in Sveran Djur, and so it was said that she returned home after Danis’s birth, but there were whispers that Ifan made her vanish.

  Jardis’s mother was a very ambitious courtier of impressive degree, also chosen for inherited gifts. In addition Ifan consorted with carefully chosen women from among those who serve, again selecting for possible inherited talents.

  I thought of Kal, and his resemblance to the emperor. Was he one of those?

  Yes. Those with gifts were sent to the mage training, and those without stayed to become part of the imperial household.

  So Kal really is my uncle?

  The imperial family would be aghast at the idea. He might even be made to vanish if you so much as hint. Place is rigid in Sveran Djur. They see that as order.

  Oh, you don’t need to warn me, I thought swallowing convulsively, my throat moving under the hated fais. Does Kal know who he is?

  I know not, Mother replied. Time ebbs, and this communication is difficult to sustain, my darling. Let me finish swiftly before you are interrupted again, for your danger is far greater than mine.

  She continued. The year we gained the empress’s consent to marry, two of the Cadre of Princes died under mysterious circumstances, and another pair of the princes went home wielding dark magic to disastrous effect. We scarcely ever saw Jardis. He was very much under his father’s control, which was reputed to be strict and unrelenting.

  No one saw the confrontation between Lison and Ifan. All we know is that she either cast herself or was cast from the window in her Chamber of Contemplation, after which Ifan emerged with her diamond fais, and had the diamonds transferred to his own. They are reputed to contain enormous power.

  The images flowed fast: Danis’s shock at his mother’s death, people walking in fear as Ifan’s enemies at court vanished. Jardis seemed to be the model son as he reached his middle teens, obedient to his father in all things, but Mother sensed the same dark wings I did.

  Ifan agreed to our wedding, with the proviso that if any children revealed magical potential, he would train them.

  Who trained him, if he was so different from the empress? I asked.

  I know not that answer. The Djuran mages are so secretive! We could not determine whether Ifan controlled them or they him. Danis would once have consented without a thought, as that is the Djuran way, but he shared my fears. He was forced to agree, but we promised one another that if our child displayed the least talent we would find a way to hide it—or we would leave the empire altogether.

  And that is what came to pass. Your talents were there almost at birth; you cast illusions of the palace kittens in your crib before you crawled. We did our best to hide you from Ifan, who was busy with his wars, but a servant betrayed us.

  We discovered it when Ifan suddenly invited us to a fais ceremony, not only for you but for myself. This was entirely against tradition, yet all cour
t was to be there. You see I wore no fais, as I had been an honored guest of the empress, with my own magic; I had adopted a golden necklet to appear in harmony with court. As for you, children were never given their fais until they could walk and talk. You had scarcely begun sitting upright.

  He wanted to get a yoke on us, I thought with morose satisfaction.

  So we feared. We also knew Ifan never brooked defiance. Danis managed to slip to the lower levels to get us servants’ robes. I spent a night and a day laying the enchantment upon this harp, keyed upon you. For the only thing that kept you quiet and smiling through teething and other complaints of infancy was music, in particular, harp music. And I was deathly afraid he would prevail.

  Then came the memory images: my father’s harrowed looks as his fingers pressed to his fais. My mother’s blue hands spreading gently over his head as she reversed the spell that made his hair fashionably black.

  My mother had shrouded herself and me in illusion, so that all anyone saw was a blonde servant with another nondescript one, and they used the servants’ byways to get to the stable annex where they stored the floats.

  And there my mother called birds to her—ordinary birds willing to help. Under rainy night skies she and my father climbed into a float, and activated its magic that kept it in the air. That made it easy for a flock of small birds to draw it unseen from the palace, whose lights were soon doused by the curtain of rain.

  Their absence was not noticed until the next morning. They knew because Ifan struck through Danis’s fais.

  For three days and nights, as a succession of birds drew the float across the ocean toward the Kherval and eventually the mountains far north, my mother had to stay awake, her hands pressed to my father’s fais to keep that “correction” spell from killing him. Three days and nights without sleep, as my father did his best to care for me in the float. They had only the food he had been able to glean hidden in a basket, rain water to drink, and no clothes to change to, but at least it was summer.

  My mother knew when Ifan went away to rest because Jardis took his place. Young as he was, he had been well taught in fais “correction”—which came as no surprise to me.

  Our goal was to reach the heights far north of the Kherval where my people dwelt, but he commenced magic attacks that I had to ward. I could not call for help as my strength was failing, but the aidlars who found us flew to get aid.

  Finally Ifan found a way to strike through a binding enchantment. I tried to ward it, but I was too weak, and fell unconscious; the float tangled in trees as the birds had fled. I lay as one stunned, and Danis was nearly killed. You vanished completely.

  When I woke my kin had arrived, and had been forced to change Danis to a bird to confound the binding. They admitted in sorrow that you were nowhere to be found. We had to assume he had either taken you or killed you. I do not know to this day what happened to you.

  I don’t remember, either, I responded. So my father is a bird? Can he transform back?

  He cannot transform at all. It is not in his nature. Elenn, you must remember that even those with dual natures must spend time in both, or gradually the other is lost. By the time we figured out how to break Ifan’s ward, your father had been too long in the bird shape. He is a prince among aidlars, but he is forever aidlar.

  Does he know one named Tir?

  Yes! Tir is the one who discovered you, though it took time to put you together with my missing daughter.

  Is Tir all right? Geric said he used a stone spell.

  Again came the wordless warmth and comfort, along with the words, Tir recovered, and flew north to us.

  And so I was alone until I did an illusion before the wrong person. And stole from another wrong person, I thought bitterly. You don’t have to pretend. I had already figured out that the Hrethan rejected me and the Mage Council didn’t trust me. That in fact I was next thing to a prisoner at the court of Erev-li-Erval, though I didn’t know it.

  My darling child, the Hrethan have very little influence in lowland governments. They did share the Magic Council’s determination to discover if you were truly the missing Elenderi. There are many dual-natured people in the world. And secondly, they wanted to learn how much influence the Djurans had over you, because the news of your possible identity was coupled with the report that your powers were awakening as a result of contact over the mental realm with Jardis.

  I wanted—needed—time to think about that, but we both felt the pressure of time. They didn’t let you come to Erev-li-Erval? Because they weren’t sure who I was?

  By the time I found out, you were already gone. We are very isolated in our mountain reaches and your father and I had been away.

  Can I learn to ward a fais? I thought to her, but any answer splintered into ice shards at the interruption of a voice of a servant, anxiously begging pardon, but His Imperial Serenity awaited me.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  I was late!

  I stared witlessly at the servant, my lips moving but no sound coming forth. Everything I’d just learned—it all had to be hidden. Anxiously I fought to recover my Princess Elenderi mask.

  As we walked along the silent, gleaming marble halls, I struggled to separate out all the roiling emotions of discovery, grief, and longing, and steady myself. I am me, I thought. My father, once human, was now a bird. My mother had risked her life to save me. I could be as strong. I would be as strong. Princess Elenderi is a role, and I’m secretly a Hrethan spy.

  When we reached the Garden Chamber, and I saw those silent cats running about, it was anger that finally steadied me. No, the cats did not appear to be hurt—they were sleek, well fed, and content. But it still seemed wrong to force them to give up their voices merely because cats’ noises are unmelodic.

  Despite all my efforts to bolster myself my heartbeat galloped against my ribs when I saw the emperor. I had kept him waiting. This could only be bad.

  And yet he greeted me with that benign voice I so distrusted, and bade me sit down. “It appears,” he said, “you have an affinity for music?”

  “It is the only thing I’m good at, Your Imperial Serenity,” I said, making an effort to keep my voice steady. “I beg pardon for keeping you waiting. I got lost in playing ballads.”

  “So I am told. You may address me as Jardis,” he said suddenly. “When we are alone. My father always required the extremity of formality, as if either of us ever forgot who held the power. I want for us to study magic together for the benefit of Sveran Djur.”

  My mouth had fallen open. I shut it. I bowed again, because it enabled me to hide my face. Something had changed after that dance when the beasts sang. I could sense that he was hiding his reasons, but I had no idea what they might be.

  “If you are that enamored of harp playing,” he said, “we shall have a harp specially made for you. And any other instrument you desire. Do you want more music? Perhaps a tutor?”

  A tutor would know how badly I play! To hide my dismay I said quickly, “Perhaps later, when I haven’t so much to learn?”

  “A wise decision. Your education must come first. I said I would send suitable records from the archive for you to study.”

  “I don’t have your alphabet.”

  “Kal will write it out for you. Our language is written as it sounds. You will master it quickly enough, and really, you ought to be literate. See to it after we are finished here. We shall begin with transfer magic. . . .”

  If I’d had any doubt that he wanted something specific from me, it would have ended when he dropped the subject of transfer magic as soon as it became clear that I had no inborn skill. After all that talk about educating me, he had no interest in coaching me through the very complicated, precise magic of transfer.

  So then it was time for the scry stone. I shut my mental wall so hard that when I looked into the thing I only saw myself staring back, except strangely, not mirror image, but opposite: if I reached my left hand, in the stone, the crosswise hand lifted, not the one opposite my
left in the way of mirrors. Trying to blink the image into clarity made me so dizzy that I had to clutch at the chair arms to keep myself from falling.

  I suspect my complexion turned convincingly green, because he watched narrow-eyed, then sat back with an irritated expression. But no question.

  “I suspect I have gone about this the wrong way,” he said. “Your ability with the fire spell before we even met gave me hopes that your talents would be equally easily discovered and trained. We need to find a way for you to break that mental lock. It is not natural, and it closes you off from so much potential.”

  I swallowed convulsively, unable to breathe.

  “We shall begin with the fundamentals. But first I want an exact accounting of all your magical knowledge. How you discovered it, when, and what you did. Take a day to think back so that when next we meet you can give me a detailed, coherent summary.”

  The bell rang, which eased the immediate threat: he had somewhere else to be, so he sent me away. I escaped, but with an intensifying sense of impending doom.

  I wanted so badly to escape to the music room, but I didn’t dare. I loathed the need to be so very careful in everything I did—and yet it never quite seemed to be enough.

  One thing for certain: I must not draw attention to the harp. My mother would not communicate with him if he touched it, but surely he would know that a great deal of magic had been overlaid on it. Maybe he could even determine by whom, I didn’t know.

  I had a free hour. Hating the place, the situation, and my own profound ignorance of magic, I prowled around in a circle, then made my way outside. The blizzard was too strong even for me. Yet I so resisted the idea of going back inside, though I knew I should, I wandered to the other end of the balcony perch and found my way to the aviary where the birds were housed.

  The mild air inside the aviary and the complexities of scent were strange and yet comforting. I snuffed them in as aviary servants looked at me in surprise, then bowed and backed out of my way.