Crown of Vengeance (Dragon Prophecy)

by James Mallory Mercedes Lackey

  Oronviel did not share much border with Araphant—a score of leagues, no more—and Vieliessar’s border lords had little to do, for Araphant’s manors and farms lay in that domain’s southern quadrant. Its northern reaches had been left to the stag and the wolf, for Araphant had long been a limp rag chewed by Caerthalien and Aramenthiali, helplessly ceding territory to each. When War Prince Luthilion died, his House might simply vanish, for Luthilion had lived far beyond his allotted years; fate and chance had taken brothers, sisters, children, and greatchildren all before him.

  “My lord, someone comes,” Komen Bethaerian said.

  “They ride one of our horses, whether they are ours or not,” Vieliessar said, peering at the mounted figure in the distance. “Peace, Betharian,” she added, “we are nearly two score.”

  “If this is no scout for one of your enemies,” Farathon of Ivrithir said.

  “If an enemy comes in force from Araphant, I will hold myself surprised,” Vieliessar said dryly. “But even if Luthilion rides at Bolecthindial’s order, he would head west and come at us over Caerthalien’s border rather than try to bring an army through this forest.” On their own side of the border the trees had been kept thinned by landbond families driven from their homes and forced to labor. On Araphant’s side, they had grown unchecked for centuries.

  “That is so, Lord Vieliessar,” Farathon said with a smile, for his meisne had been riding this stretch of border for the past fortnight and had spent much of that time in Araphant’s forest. “Yet no good word ever came swiftly.”

  The horseman had closed the distance to them as they spoke. Neither horse nor rider was encumbered by a single ounce they did not need to bear: the animal’s saddle was a thin pad of leather, the stirrups mere flattened rings. And the rider, who was little more than a child, wore no armor. He barely checked the horse’s mad gallop before he flung himself from its saddle and ran forward. His mount, freed of direction, cantered in a wide circle around Vieliessar and her knights, so filled with the excitement of the run that it hardly noticed its exhaustion.

  “The War Prince—komentai’a, I must speak with her—my lord of Greenstone Tower said I would find her near—it is urgent—” the boy gasped.

  “I am here,” Vieliessar said, nudging Sorodiarn forward. “Let him pass,” she said, for when she spoke, the boy had started toward her and Farathon had moved automatically to block him.

  “Lord Vieliessar—” the boy began. He was as winded as his mount, but determined to deliver his message at once. “A meisne—from Araphant—my lord Peramarth did not know their intent until today—through the wood—”

  “How many?” Bethaerian demanded, but the boy only shook his head.

  “Why did your lord not use the sun-signal to warn us?” Farathon demanded, for each of the border towers were equipped with sheets of silvered glass that could be used to flash simple messages to watchers many miles distant. At least during bright, clear days.

  “Said—not to warn them,” the boy gasped.

  “You have done well,” Vieliessar said, putting warmth into her voice. “Come. You will ride with me. Sorodiarn is a gentle beast and your own steed deserves a rest. We will go to Greenstone Tower and see what there is to see. But first, someone must catch your horse. We are lucky he is tired.”

  “My lord, you cannot mean to ride toward this peril, after Lord Peramarth has sent to warn you against it?” Bethaerian said. “We must retreat to a place of safety.”

  “Better to ride to than from,” Vieliessar answered. “If knights come through the woods of Araphant, I do not think their number can be a force much larger than our own. Peramarth will be glad of extra swords if it is an attack.”

  And I shall be glad to be there if it is not, Vieliessar thought. A party of knights crossing from Araphant to Oronviel was so unusual she did not wish to gain information of it second hand, and asking her people to discover whether something unusual was a threat before attacking it was a thing most of them thought was sheer moonstruck madness. Attack and be safe, Vieliessar thought. They do as their greatsires did, and so grudge is heaped upon injury until they breed war. She knew that asking her people to stop, to talk, to think would someday generate a tragedy. And I can only say that if I meant to rule as all the War Princes have ruled before me, it would be better if I had never ruled at all.

  “Now come,” she said to the messenger. “Give me your name and your hand.”

  * * *

  The distance young Randir had covered in less than a candlemark took the troop of heavy warhorses three to retrace, and when they were near to Greenstone Tower, they were met by a troop of its defenders led by Lord Peramarth himself.

  “My lord prince,” Peramarth said. When he pushed back the visor of his helm, his entire face was exposed, for the Border Lords might have to fight in any weather. “I did not expect you.”

  Here so soon or here at all? Vieliessar wondered, for Peramarth’s thoughts were a flurry that could not be quickly untangled by True Speech.

  “I had thought—” Peramarth began, then broke off. “No matter. Greenstone has stood since the days Araphant was a power in the land, and her walls have never been forced. Permit me to offer you my hospitality until we have repulsed our invaders.”

  “It seems a strange way to invade anything,” Vieliessar commented a few minutes later, from atop Greenstone Tower. It was no taller than the watchtowers in her own keep, but it seemed as if it were, as there was nothing else for miles around and even the tops of the great trees were below them. Standing in this place, she could imagine she stood among the clouds themselves, and by spreading her arms, could join the hawks in the sky.

  “I still cannot make the count,” Angeleb said, sounding unhappy. He was one of Peramarth’s sentries, chosen for his keen vision.

  “We saw movement in the forest two days since,” Peramarth said, pointing out and down. The area near the border was thick with greenneedle trees; Vieliessar had been watching since they’d climbed out onto the roof of the watchtower and had yet to see more than an occasional bright flash. “At first I thought Old Luthilion might have come hunting, though he has not been since before the Long Peace. But see—there?” Peramarth pointed to a gap in the forest cover. “Blight and storm has killed the old trees, and the new ones are not yet grown. They rode across that place just this morning. Two tailles of knights, a Green Robe—and someone with the right to ride beneath the princely standard of Araphant.”

  Peramarth—she knew—had delayed sending his warning until he was certain the party beneath the trees rode bowshot-straight, and not in the erratic circles of a hunting party. To the Border Lords, giving false warning was as shameful as giving no warning at all.

  “Why does he come?” she wondered aloud. “He cannot expect to conquer Oronviel with twenty-four knights and one Lightborn.” Gunedwaen had not wasted his efforts spying on Araphant—he had too few people and too many places they needed to be—so she knew nothing more of it than she had learned at the Sanctuary, and that was little indeed.

  “Perhaps he comes to offer you a marriage alliance,” Bethaerian said dryly. “It would be a brief marriage, at least. Old Luthilion has seen a dozen Astromancers tend the Shrine.”

  “There is some luck in surviving so long,” Vieliessar said, still thinking aloud. “And perhaps wisdom, too. You say he will cross our border, Peramarth?”

  “By midday, if they do not stop.”

  “Then we will greet him and see why he has come.”

  * * *

  Peramarth disliked her plan—a mark of his loyalty, inconvenient though it was—and he liked it even less when Vieliessar said she meant to meet Araphant herself. In the end she prevailed, and sat her destrier before a taille of sixty knights: her own meisne and three tailles from Greenstone.

  As the approaching party became visible, Vieliessar could see that tied to Araphant’s pennion was a bough of the greenneedle tree, the traditional symbol that the party riding beneath it requested
a parley-truce. Beside the knight carrying the princely standard—a leaping green stag upon a sable field—rode another in armor the iridescent green-black of a beetle’s wing, and upon his left rode a Lightborn, his hair silvered with great age. When they reached the border stones, they stopped, and the standard-bearer and the Lightborn rode on alone.

  The wind blew through Vieliessar’s hair, blowing its strands ticklingly over her cheek. She did not wear her helmet; the envoy must be able to know he spoke with the War Prince of Oronviel, not some faceless messenger.

  Lord Peramarth’s knights were explicitly under her command, and she had given them unambiguous orders. Nonetheless, Vieliessar was proud of their discipline and that of the Ivrithir knights, for she had bidden them all stand still and silent, and not one armored figure moved, even when she rode forward, Bethaerian at her side, to meet the Araphant messengers.

  “Oronviel gives you good greeting,” she said when she and the two from Araphant had stopped facing one another. “I would know how it is you come to us beneath the branch of truce, for there is no war between us.”

  “Araphant greets Oronviel,” the aged Lightborn answered. His voice was thin, but in it Vieliessar could still hear the echo of the resonance and power it must have held in his youth. “I am Celeharth Lightbrother, Chief Lightborn to War Prince Luthilion Araphant. We ride beneath the branch of truce out of desire to speak with you, Lord Vieliessar Oronviel, honestly and in peace.”

  “Your lord might have done so many moonturns since,” Vieliessar said, nodding in the direction of the green-armored figure who still waited on the far side of the border. She could skim the surface of Celeharth’s thoughts easily: he knew Luthilion had come to make an alliance with Oronviel, but what terms he would offer or accept, Celeharth did not know.

  He smiled faintly at her mild gibe. “When one reaches my master’s years, one does not hasten. Yet he would speak now.”

  “Events do not always wait upon the desire for reflection. Yet I am eager to hear Araphant’s word to me. Say to your lord that I and all with me here accept Araphant’s truce, and I offer my own body as surety for his life.” She unbuckled her swordbelt and held it out to Bethaerian. Slowly, her thoughts a roil of worry for her liege’s safety, Bethaerian took the weapon.

  Celeharth inclined his head. “I bring him to your side.” He turned and rode back to the Araphant knights. The lone knight-herald holding the pennion of truce sat as motionless as if he were carved from stone.

  Vieliessar could feel the tension of the komen behind her as if it were a wind she must set herself against. It seemed an eternity before Celeharth Lightborn reached his master’s side. His voice did not carry, but his thoughts did.

  It is as we hoped, old friend. Oronviel’s new War Prince, Vieliessar once-Lightborn, offers us the truce of the body.

  Then come, Celeharth. Let us see what we may do to dismay the dogs that bark at our heels.

  Slowly the knights of Araphant rode toward their standard-bearer. When they were still a little distance away, Luthilion raised his hand and the knights behind him stopped. Araphant’s War Prince removed his helm and unbelted his swordbelt, handing both helm and sword to one of his knights before continuing forward, accompanied only by Celeharth.

  If Luthilion’s Chief Lightborn was full of years, the War Prince himself was truly ancient. His hair, though still proudly worn in the elaborate braids of a knight, was colorless with age. His face was printed with the lines of all the joys and sorrows he had known in the long centuries of his life, but if his body beneath the bright armor was frail with age, his will was as unyielding as star-forged adamantine.

  “I give you good greeting, Oronviel,” he said, when his destrier stopped beside his standard-bearer.

  “And I you, Araphant,” Vieliessar answered.

  “I would speak with you regarding matters of interest to us both, yet I would do so in more comfort. It is not seemly for two princes to shout at each other from their destriers as if they were maiden knights hot to win their spurs.”

  “I listen,” Vieliessar answered. Lord Luthilion’s speech was slow and measured, couched in the courtly and careful phrasing of centuries past.

  “Celeharth tells me you were a great scholar in your time at the Sanctuary. Granting this truth, you will know how many days’ travel it is from Araphant’s Great Keep to where you find me now. And I am far too old to delight in sleeping on the ground rolled in my cloak. I ask your leave to summon my servants to erect my pavilion, so we may be comfortable together.”

  “I shall be most grateful for your care,” Vieliessar said, doing her best to match the mode in which the War Prince of Araphant spoke. “I ask only to send Komen Bethaerian with whom you will, so your meisne and mine know we may be easy together.”

  “This thought is both wise and cordial,” Luthilion answered. He raised a hand and beckoned, and one of his knights urged his destrier forward. Vieliessar heard Farathon draw breath with a hiss, and saw Luthilion’s eyes flicker with amusement—The child prays none of her hot-blooded young swords seeks to protect her, and that is a good sign. The knight reached for the pennion.

  “I commend to you and your komen’tai’a Komen Diorthiel, who serves me far more faithfully than I deserve. Diorthiel, here is Komen Bethaerian, who will accompany you as you give your word to my servants to bring my pavilion here to me.”

  Diorthiel looked very much as if he wished to argue. Instead, he simply bowed to Lord Luthilion and rode away with Bethaerian at his side.

  Where others might have filled the wait with inconsequential observations on the weather or the hunting, or even with some talk of horses, Luthilion simply sat, as silent and composed as a Lightborn in meditation. So Vieliessar sat quietly as well, wondering with faint curiosity how Luthilion had managed to bring baggage wagons through the dense northern forest. The waiting was broken once by a messenger riding out from Greenstone Tower to ask what was happening—for of course Lord Peramarth was watching all that went on—and being sent back with a curt reply: War Prince Luthilion and I discuss a treaty under truce-bough.

  When the pavilion arrived, Vieliessar discovered Luthilion had not, after all, found some new way of getting large and unwieldy sumpter wagons through a dense forest. Instead, Luthilion’s pavilion was bound to the back of mules. Each mule wore a sturdy saddle with wooden legs atop it—much as if someone had taken a common chair and turned it upside down—and this odd device held heavy packs easily and securely. Vieliessar filed away the information for later use: mules could go where heavy wagons could not, and they moved faster.

  The servants worked with quick efficiency. They did not care whether they worked in Araphant, Oronviel, or the Vale of Celenthodiel: servants were invisible, and even in battle were rarely an enemy’s target.

  “All is ready, Lord Luthilion,” Celeharth said at last. Diorthiel stepped to Luthilion’s side, managing to give the impression he attended his lord out of courtesy, and not because Lord Luthilion required aid to dismount. Vieliessar allowed Bethaerian to do the same for her, then beckoned to Farathon to join them.

  “Come,” she said quietly. “If you attend, you may say to Lord Atholfol you know all that took place here today.”

  Farathon’s face went blank with surprise at being so trusted—and perhaps also because she spoke so frankly of mistrust. “Ivrithir is loyal,” he answered.

  “I trust Lord Atholfol,” Vieliessar answered simply. “And was there ever a War Prince who did not wish half his great lords would conveniently die in battle?”

  Farathon gave a muffled cough of laughter, and Vieliessar turned away, following Lord Luthilion into the pavilion, seeing that it was much like her own: two rooms, the outer one dominated by a sizable table. There were scrolls in a wooden rack at one side of the table and a tea brazier on the other side; a shin’zuruf pot and cups waited beside the steaming kettle. There were two chairs, precisely equal in ornamentation, set so that neither of the lords would sit with their back t
o the door. Nearby was another seat: a padded stool without a back. Vieliessar could feel that the pavilion had been bespelled to keep sound from passing its walls.

  “My Healer tells me wine is not good for me any longer,” Lord Luthilion said, lowering himself heavily into a chair and gesturing toward the brazier. Now that he was afoot, the frailties of age seemed more pronounced.

  “Three things the Light cannot Heal: age, death, and fate,” Celeharth answered. It had the air of a well-loved and long-familiar argument.

  “As you know, Lord Luthilion, I was many years in the Sanctuary,” Vieliessar replied. “We did not drink wine there.” She took the second chair and Celeharth settled himself upon the padded stool. Once they were seated, one of the servants came forward to pour the boiling water into the pot.

  “And then you left,” Luthilion said, surprising her with his directness. “And next we heard of a challenge in Oronviel, unwisely accepted, and now you say you will be High King.”

  “Yes,” Vieliessar said simply.

  “We also hear that you do not promise favors to those who aid you. Nor wealth. That you open Oronviel to outlaws and offer to raise up any Landbonds who come to you to the estate of nobles and great knights.”

  “I do not promise favors to those who fight for me. Neither do I promise vengeance on those who do not. I offer sanctuary to any who will pledge true fealty to me.”

  “And the Landbond? Who will till your fields if you fill their heads with dreams of knighthood?” Luthilion demanded, his black eyes sharp. Before she could answer, he raised a hand. “Celeharth, oblige me if you would.”

  The Lightbrother rose to his feet, and poured tea into three delicate cups. “In my youth,” Luthilion said, “a heart for war was measured by the graces of peace. It was not enough to ride well and fight well—one had to dance gracefully, play harp or flute or cithern, compose poetry and copy it out in a fair hand, or craft tea. That art is lost, I fear. Today they rip some weeds from the kitchen garden, boil them into an undrinkable mess, and call it the heritage of Mosirinde Peacemaker.”