by Ellyn, Court
Mother was always telling him the same thing, but he didn’t care about that. He just wanted to not be ignored. Everyone seemed more concerned about his destiny than about Valryk himself.
He circled the woman slowly, found the warmest patch of sunlight and turned his back to it. All the while Lasharia watched him, her curiosity blatant, as if he were some kind of creature she’d never seen before. “I like the color of your hair,” she said. “It’s like autumn and fire.”
“No, it’s just red. I hate it, but thank you. Did you see the ball of light? It led me here. I suppose I was stupid to chase it. It might’ve stolen me away.”
She just sat there smiling at him.
“You believe me, don’t you? I really saw it!”
“I believe you, Highness. It’s not like you to lie, I think. Not yet, anyway.” She seemed saddened by this.
“Lying is dishonorable,” he exclaimed. “I’m not a liar.”
“Which means you’ll tell the others you’ve seen me.”
“I won’t!” Valryk bit his lip, glanced down at his feet. “Oh. I see.”
“Yes, sometimes it’s better to lie, Highness. I’m sorry for that.”
“But keeping you safe is honorable, isn’t it, even if I have to lie?”
Her lilac eyes sparkled as if she adored him. “What do you think?”
He crouched down in the snow, considering this conundrum, and watched the sunlight ignite tiny sparks of color in the flakes of snow, just like he’d seen in the star. “Who will listen or care anyway?” he muttered at last.
Lasharia’s hand escaped the muff and reached for the harp. “Shall I play for you again?”
He wanted nothing more than to hear that song floating around him, making him dizzy, but he’d been away long enough. “They’ll come looking. I should go. My horse is probably freezing to death. And it’s getting late.” The sun drooped low, a milky silver circle through the trees.
Lasharia’s shoulders sagged a bit. “Very well.”
“We’re coming back tomorrow, Eliad and me. Will you be here?”
“I don’t know. A storm is coming.”
Was it? How could she tell? The sky was unblemished blue. “Will I see you ever again?”
“Only if you keep me a secret. Never tell a soul about me, and I’ll play for you again. Just for you. One day. But if you betray me and tell, the magic unravels and this is all for nothing.”
What was all for nothing? Whatever she meant by it, he’d feel terrible if she got into trouble because of him. “I swear it! I swear to never tell a soul. On my honor.”
Her hand rose and touched his cheek. It was hot as flame against his frozen skin. “Then I have no choice but to trust you, Highness. Here, let me show you how to call for me. It … it involves … magic. Do you mind?”
“Real magic? Not like the tricks the players do on stage?”
“Real magic.”
“Are you avedra? Is that why you’d be in trouble? But the king doesn’t mind avedras. Thorn Kingshield is an avedra and he saved my father’s life. I’m sure he’d welcome you—”
“I’m not avedra, Highness. But avedrin aren’t the only ones capable of using magic. Let’s see you try this.” She stood at last and faced the lowering sun. How tall she was. Taller even than Father. With her forefinger she drew a curious design on the air. Strands of sunlight gathered to her finger, and the design, shaped like a four-pointed star, hovered above the clearing. “Trace this design seven times. Either sunlight or moonlight will do. Once it’s done, speak my name, and I’ll hear you. Try it.”
“I can’t do that,” he cried.
“Nonsense. Kings outlawed magic centuries ago, as if the very essence of the universe can be evil or illegal. Pah! It wasn’t long before men forgot what they can do. It helps to have natural skill, but if you practice enough, who knows? Think of this as sending a letter to someone who is of Magic. It’s a summoning, really, and it’s the energies doing the work, not you.”
The design she’d drawn was fading. Valryk raised his finger. Outlawed? Was he breaking one of Father’s laws? Lasharia smiled encouragement at him, so beautiful. Gnawing his lip, Valryk traced the design. It shined little brighter than candle-glow, but it was working! He was doing magic, real magic.
“Look to the sun, Highness, draw with confidence, don’t stop.”
By the end of seventh circuit, the star burned the air it was so bright. He stepped back and gazed upon it.
“That’s when you speak my name.”
Valryk’s cheeks flushed. “Lasharia.”
She smiled. “Well done. I won’t always be able to answer immediately. But be patient and I’ll find you as soon as I can.”
“Find me? Even if I’m in the castle?”
“It’s magic, silly. It lets me go wherever my friends are.” Friends? Were they? Valryk hoped so. He considered only Kethlyn a friend and he didn’t count because he was family. Lasharia brushed his cheek again. Her fingers lingered under his chin as she gazed upon his face. “As long as you’re in a safe place where no one will see me, I’ll come to you.”
“And you’ll sing?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes I’ll just whisper. But most times I will listen.” Her fingers disappeared inside the muff again, and Valryk felt as if she took something vital from him, something that mattered more than crowns and armies and elk hunts. “You should go.”
Yes. Father. He’d come searching for his missing heir. “I … until later, then?” As he turned to go, that sickly stink surrounded him, and he remembered where he first smelled it. Last winter, his own suite had been full of it. His bodyguards dug around, sniffing and gagging, and finally surrounded his bureau. It had taken three of them to move the heavy furniture, while a fourth extricated the dead mouse. Valryk had demanded to see the squishy carcass, unable to believe that something so small had caused such a ruckus. Why should such a reek surround Lady Lasharia?
He backed from the clearing, unable to tear his eyes from her face. The pine boughs swept between them, hiding her from sight.
Voices called in the distance. Valryk turned and ran up the hill, afraid the others would find her and his promise would be broken before the sun set.
The party had backtracked and now surrounded his half-buried pony. They stopped shouting when they saw him top the hill. The king looked more scared than angry, at least at first. “Where in all the Abyss—? Your mother would have me flayed if I lost you.”
“My tracks are right there, sir,” Valryk said, pointing at the trail he’d left in the snow. But the trail was gone. Magic. He’d seen it twice now in a day. The tip of his finger burned deliciously with the kiss of sunlight.
The relief on Eliad’s face was obvious. Kelyn looked stony and objective and kept his eyes on the snow at his feet. Father’s grip was tight enough to bruise Valryk’s shoulders. “What got into your head? There are bear and cat out here. They’d think nothing of—”
“I had to see for myself. The dead tree, sir. You were all so sure. I just wanted to see. And then …” Memory of the music muddled his head. “An elk. I really did see one. But it was far away. Over there. It saw me and ran off.”
Father let him go, turned red-faced and tight-lipped. “We’re heading back. Now. You and Eliad can set up your blind tomorrow.”
“You mean, you’re willing to let me out of your sight? I might run off again.”
“Don’t get cheeky, young man. And if you do run off, you’ll answer to your mother. Let that scare the shit out of you. Mount up.”
Scare you, you mean. How badly he wanted to say it out loud, but he kept his mouth shut. All the way back to the lodge, he said not one word, despite Eliad’s reassurance that tomorrow would be better. All he wanted to think about were Lasharia’s fingers flying over the harp strings, warming his cheek.
That night he laid in bed with an exquisite ache in his belly. Part of him had a hard time believing she’d been real, yet her song swirled in his head. When he cl
osed his eyes, her face was all he saw. He tossed and turned for three hours before he flung aside the quilts, wrapped himself in a fur robe and hurried to the window. He had to see if the magic star still worked. He needed to practice; she had said so herself.
He opened the window and a frigid wind gusted into the room. Heavy clouds blanketed the sky. Neither star nor moon shined this night. It would likely snow before dawn. Valryk traced the design anyway. Nothing happened.
He crawled back into bed, feeling sick and lonely and angry.
~~~~
A blizzard buried the bottom floor of the lodge. Valryk spent the next three days wandering from room to room while snow swirled past the windows. ‘Lodge’ was a humble name for the sprawling, luxurious villa that Eliad had built for himself. The suites to the rear looked out upon the Drakhan Mountains and Mount Drenéleth’s lower tree-shrouded slope. The front suites boasted sweeping vistas of the Avidan River valley. There was not a single room without a stunning view, and the windows were no arrow loops or milky diamonds of stained glass. Valryk had never seen such large panes of glass, and these so well-crafted that they barely distorted the view at all.
Views failed to entertain a boy for long. He tried playing chess with Kelyn, but one does not win against the strategic mind of the War Commander. Eliad tried distracting him with tales of past hunts with Lord Whosit and Lady Whatsit. During the day, the king disappeared behind the stack of papers he’d trundled north; at night, he disappeared behind locked doors with a bottle and the next servant girl who pleased his eye.
Eliad was more discreet with his mistresses. They were merely rumor; Valryk never saw them. This piqued his suspicion. The mere thought that Lasharia might belong to his bastard half-brother brought a raging fire into his face.
He feared he’d go crazy waiting for the sky to clear again. First thing every morning and last thing before turning in, he stood at his window hoping for the smallest glimpse of sun or moons. At long last, he woke to voices outside his window and sunlight glaring through his drapes. He sprang out of bed, shoved aside the pane. Three stories below, Eliad and his stable hands shoveled snow from the veranda.
His half-brother heard the windowpane bang open, looked up, and waved. “There’ll be fresh tracks, Highness. We’re riding out in an hour.”
The snow was too deep now even for ponies. Big drays with wide, tufted hooves could manage it though, so Valryk and Eliad took a sleigh as far as the elk valley and after making the animals comfortable with a bale of hay, they strapped snowshoes to their boots and trekked into the foothills, following the same path as before. Valryk looked for Dragon Eyes and forgot to look for elk. When they reached the place where he’d seen the darting Eye, he used the excuse that he had to piss and slipped away. Eliad waited on the trail for him, so he had to hurry. Would she be there?
Silence pervaded the trees, cloaked the snow, beat inside his ears. High drifts surrounded the circle of evergreens. He beat a path into the clearing, knowing before he saw it that Lasharia wasn’t there.
An elk bugled. The ululating cry echoed across the treetops. Valryk ran back and found Eliad with the curled horn in hand. “Was that you?”
Eliad shook his head, motioned Valryk to follow him and stay quiet. The trail led them to the head of the elk valley, and there they were. A herd of thirty cows labored to scrape aside the snow to find the streambed or nibbled at tufts of yellow grass sticking out of the drifts. Two bulls fought over them. The clash of their antlers sounded like dead branches smashing together. The tines locked, and the bulls pushed against each other, muscles knotted tight under their shimmering white coats.
It was too late to set up a blind without being seen; Eliad led Valryk to a pile of deadfall at the head of the valley and they crouched down and peered through the twigs. “Will they see us?”
“They’re too busy with each other,” Eliad said, moving slowly, watching the elk as he strung Valryk’s bow for him. “It’s the cows we need to worry about.”
The females were vigilant, raising their heads to inspect the fight. Snow coated their noses; their ears perked toward the display.
Eliad extended the bow. Valryk freed an arrow from the quiver on his hip. He put it back again. “Can I just watch them?” Truth was, he was afraid he was skilled enough only to injure such a great beast, and he didn’t want to spoil the fight.
“Whatever you want, Highness.”
The bulls struggled for half an hour before one gave up and fled across the valley and over the far ridge. The victor strode around in slow, majestic circles, bugling and rounding up his harem.
“Next year,” Valryk said. “Next year I’ll be ready, and he’s mine. And I’m not inviting my father.”
As soon as the sleigh returned them to the lodge, Valryk ordered supper to be brought to his suite. “I’m tired, and I’m not to be disturbed until morning.” There was no sneaking downstairs tonight. He had his own secrets now. He waited until the corridors grew quiet, then he opened his window to let in the icy night air and the ruddy moonlight. Forath reigned alone. Nearly full, his scar-streaked face frowned grimly. Seven times Valryk traced the four-pronged star. Bloody light gathered to his finger and stained the air.
“Lasharia,” he whispered. The name and the breath upon which it rode seemed to tumble into some dark void. He heard the word echo, and then it was gone.
How long did he have to wait? She didn’t dare come in by the front door. How would she know his suite was safe from intruders? What if she decided it wasn’t safe and declined to come at all?
He paced before the hearth, added logs to the fire, poked the embers to make ashes fly, and all the while kept watch on the door, listened for footsteps in the corridor. Had she really heard his call, or was this a vast joke?
Dank, moist air ruffled his hair against his face. The dead-mouse stink wafted through the suite, and he heard, “It’s late, Highness.”
He whirled. Lasharia stood in the middle of the rug. Neither the door nor the window had opened to admit her. Valryk glimpsed a hewn-stone wall flickering with torchlight behind her, but some kind of curtain closed and the vision vanished, and there was only Lasharia. She wore a simple woolen gown the same blush color as the moonlight. Her silver-gold hair was braided heavily over one shoulder, and her skin shimmered like a pearl in the firelight. She looked neither pleased nor displeased that he’d summoned her, but she had come! She was here, somehow, and that’s all that mattered.
“I know. I’m sorry,” he said, scrambling up from the hearthrug.
“Princes apologize?” Her imposing stance, raised chin, and peaked eyebrow demanded deference. She was queenly, indeed, and for a moment Valryk feared she was just another grown-up come to mother him and order him to get back in bed and leave her be.
“I was practicing,” he said, justifying the hour. “And I … I had to see you. I was going mad trying to decide if I’d dreamed you up.”
She sighed, and the resentment ebbed from her. Her shoulders relaxed, and her face softened. She stooped toward him and her fingers cupped his cheek, brushed that tender place behind his ear. He slipped, heart and soul, into those attentive lilac eyes. “I had begun to miss you, too, Highness. Now, tell me your troubles.”
So he did.
~~~~
11
Carry your heart-ripper close,
My son, my son,
For darkness rises, my son,
From Stone’s deep veins.
—Songs of Stone
Early in the year 995, the two dwarves disappeared. The sentry who reported the incident was stationed at the tower that stood like a lone eye where Ilswythe’s lands abutted those of Thyrvael. Once, the tower had kept the peace between the two families, for Ilswythe and Thyrvael hadn’t always agreed to be friendly, but during the last two hundred years, the soldiers stationed there had seen little action other than highwaymen and stranded travelers.
Excitement over the change of pace brightened the young sentry’s fac
e. Spattered with mud, he stepped carefully over Lord Ilswythe’s fine rug. “I came to you, m’ lord, because, well, technically, it happened on your side of the hill.”
“Tell me everything you know.” Kelyn beckoned the youth to follow him from the keep and into the stable yard, where he set the grooms to saddling his horse.
“Well, sir, we saw the dwarves pass the tower about a week ago. They were headed east with a cartload of iron ore.”
“Bound for the Drakhans like the others?”
“We assumed so, sir. That’s why we gave the dwarves no more thought, until two days ago. A rider from Drenéleth brought a message from Lord Eliad asking if the dwarves had passed our way yet. Captain Haest sent out a search party immediately.”
“Damned highwaymen. It’s been a while, I’ll give them that, and my dungeon has an empty belly.” Which was usually the state of things when harvest had been bountiful and winter mild. Men had less compulsion to rob merchant caravans and wealthy travelers when they had food on the table. Turning toward the gatehouse he called, “Captain Maegeth! Choose six men and saddle up.” Of the sentry, he asked, “You found no sign of the dwarves?”
The soldier hesitated. “Signs, yes, but … we found their cart and, well, the captain wanted you to see for yourself.”
Kelyn led his party from Ilswythe’s gates at a canter. Until late afternoon, they stayed on the broad, smooth path of the King’s Highway. When the stone turret of the watchtower rose into view, the sentry took the lead and guided Kelyn and the garrison soldiers onto a narrow, rutted cart lane that cut a path between sheep pastures and fallow fields. In a forested hollow among the gentle hills curled plumes of chimney smoke.
“Did the dwarves make it as far as that village?” asked Captain Maegeth.
“No, ma’am.”
“Or maybe they did and no one’s talking,” she persisted. “Did your captain question the cottars?”
