She carried on as normal, which annoyed Jaxyn no end.
It would have been nice to think he had something on Arkady. Even better to think he might have found some leverage over Cayal. Has he dug himself out of that cave-in yet, I wonder? Was he on his way to Herino, even now, looking to even the score, or would he give up the fight and look for greener pastures elsewhere, now the Tide was turning and he realised Jaxyn already had his claim staked on Glaeba?
And the Tide was coming back. Fast.
Jaxyn could feel it swelling a little more every day. Already he had the ability to affect the elements around him, although he was a long way from commanding them yet. That sort of power only happened with the Tide at its peak. But it was rising and rising rapidly. It wouldn’t be long now…a few months until they could risk revealing themselves fully, and maybe a year or two before their power was really something to inspire awe.
Trouble was, the same thing was happening to all the Tide Lords. Somewhere out there, Syrolee and Engarhod—and their dreadful offspring with them—were on the move. Brynden would be stirring out of his torpor.
And Lukys…he might reappear too, which was something even Jaxyn had reason to be wary of…
But that was in the future. Right now, Jaxyn was more interested in Arkady Desean and what might have transpired between her and the Immortal Prince.
Somewhat to his surprise, she had kept her end of the bargain, saying nothing to Stellan. Or if she had broken their confidence, he didn’t believe her. The posting to Herino worried Jaxyn a little, but then he thought about it and decided she was probably trying to get him away from the Lebec Crasii and thought sending him to Herino was the safest way to do it.
Fool woman. She had unwittingly played right into his hands. With Stellan in Torlenia, Lebec—and her duke—were of no interest to Jaxyn any longer. Jaxyn needed to be here. Needed to be close to Kylia.
Allies they might be, but he didn’t trust Diala as far as he could throw her.
Jaxyn still hadn’t quite got over the shock of Diala arriving unannounced at the Lebec Palace several months ago, posing as Stellan’s niece. The real Kylia was dead, of course, just as the real Jaxyn Aranville was rotting in a ditch alongside a hunting trail around Darra. Neither Jaxyn nor Diala could risk their namesakes turning up at an awkward time to expose the impostors and ruin their plans.
Diala had been just as shocked to find Jaxyn in residence and after ordering the Crasii to keep their secret and several heated, albeit very guarded, exchanges late at night or on the rare occasions they could manage a moment alone, they’d eventually agreed to become allies. They’d hammered out the final details the day Arkady agreed to let them go boating alone on the lake.
You’d better make sure she comes back a virgin, Arkady had warned him that day.
Jaxyn had almost choked. A virgin? Tides, this was the Minion Maker. She’d seduced more men than Arkady could count. She might be able to pass for seventeen—Diala was only nineteen, after all, when she stepped into the Eternal Flame with her sister, Arryl—but she’d been alive for the better part of nine thousand years and spent a sizeable portion of that time sleeping with anything that took her fancy.
Diala had no morals at all. Not a one. Jaxyn knew that for a fact. He was one of the first men she’d coaxed into the flames.
Poor Mathu really hadn’t stood a chance.
Their agreement was simple. One of them would find a way to take the Glaeban throne, and share it with the other. Jaxyn’s plan had been to remove the other contenders standing between the throne and Stellan Desean, but then Mathu arrived in Lebec and all Diala had to do was smile and flutter those long dark lashes at the boy and he was done for.
While Jaxyn admired Diala’s skill, he’d known from the moment Mathu Debree stepped into the Lebec Palace dining room that Diala was going to seduce him. Getting him to marry her was a refinement that had taken Jaxyn by surprise, but he’d countered that with his unexpected posting to Herino, where he could keep an eye on her.
He smiled, remembering how annoyed she was when he informed her Stellan had appointed him Lebec’s ambassador and that he would be staying here at court, after all.
If Diala thinks I’m going to let her loose in Herino as the wife of the crown prince without me there, she is sadly mistaken.
“What’s so amusing?”
Jaxyn looked up to find Stellan walking toward him on the balcony, carrying a glass of wine, no doubt looking for some relief—as Jaxyn was—from the crush of people in the ballroom below them. Being in Herino had forced the cessation of any overt exchanges of affection between them, but Stellan was still convinced the two of them were lovers and that Jaxyn intended to wait here in Herino for his return from Torlenia. He’d probably have to spend the night with Stellan again before they left, just to ease the duke’s mind about leaving his companion, but then he was done with Stellan Desean. Jaxyn’s only interest in the Duke of Lebec now was what his impostor niece could do for him.
And what his wife had got up to with the Immortal Prince.
“I wasn’t aware that I was laughing.”
“You were smirking,” Stellan informed him with a smile.
Above them, the dull rumble of thunder announced yet another storm breaking over the city. Stellan’s trip down to the coast is going to prove eventful, Jaxyn thought idly, if this weather doesn’t let up.
“I was just thinking how happy Kylia looks.”
Stellan smiled and came to lean on the balcony next to Jaxyn, looking down over the crowded reception. “You will watch over her for me, won’t you?”
“Like she was my own,” he promised.
“And don’t let Mathu lead you astray. Or worse…you lead him astray.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“We might only be away a few months, you know,” Stellan suggested.
Jaxyn was amused. He knew what Stellan was trying to say. Wait for me. I won’t be gone long. The Duke of Lebec didn’t understand that ship had already sailed. Any future Stellan Desean might have imagined he had with Jaxyn Aranville vanished with the first glimmerings of the returning Tide.
“How do you think Arkady will like it?”
Stellan’s smile faded. “I think you already know the answer to that.”
“She may find it very interesting, you know,” Jaxyn suggested with a nasty little smile. “I hear the Imperator’s Consort is always looking for fascinating companions. Perhaps your lovely wife can befriend the lady and make your job a little easier once she has her ear.”
“Arkady will do what is required of her.”
“Doesn’t she always?”
Stellan frowned at him. “You owe her as much as I do, Jaxyn. She keeps your secret along with mine.”
Ah, Stellan, if only you knew how true that was.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I suppose I’m just a little peeved, that’s all. I still think I should be allowed to go with you.”
“I thought you were quite pleased to be staying here in Herino as my ambassador?”
“Only as a consolation prize,” he replied, and then added softly, “I’d rather be with you.”
Stellan kept his eyes fixed on the crowd, as aware as Jaxyn was that anybody looking up would see them. To the casual observer they appeared no more than two guests surveying the festivities from afar.
“I’ll be back for you, Jaxyn,” he promised. “As soon as I can sort this business out in Torlenia. I swear.”
“I’ll be here,” Jaxyn assured him.
Diala and I have a throne to take and an entire country along with it, after all.
The Tide is coming in.
Epilogue
The Immortal Prince stood on one of the high bluffs overlooking the Whitewater Narrows, wondering at the foolishness of mortals. Through the rain, he could just make out the shape of Arkady’s ship as the amphibians towed it toward the rapids. The rain had swelled the rushing waters, making them cloudy and perilous to navigate. A hum
an sailor standing on the deck of a ship had no hope of navigating the dangerous narrows and surviving. It was only the presence of the amphibians, swimming ahead of the craft, towing it in their wake, which made the journey through the Whitewater Narrows possible at all.
What had possessed Arkady—or perhaps her husband—to set sail in this weather?
As the waves tossed it closer and closer to the gap in the rocks, Cayal pondered the wisdom of letting the ship go. Although it was weeks since he’d last seen Arkady in Maralyce’s cabin, on board that ship was the only woman who’d managed to get under his skin since Gabriella.
Perhaps she was even more dangerous, because she had made no promises she didn’t intend to keep, had offered Cayal nothing she wasn’t willing to give.
Nor had she asked for anything in return, which made her the most remarkable woman he had ever met.
Even before he was immortal, Cayal had been plagued by the fear that people—women in particular—were interested only in the political advantage his friendship might bring them, a fear cruelly realised when Gabriella revealed her true colours the day he was exiled by his sister. For a Tide Lord, the problem was infinitely worse. Despite the incredible magic he could command at High Tide, there was no power in the universe able to truly know the heart of a woman, no magical ability to peer into the mind of a man.
Cayal had been alive too long to believe in love as a pure and unsullied force, able to triumph over all adversity. There were no happily-ever-afters in his world. His view of love and all its attendant baggage was much darker, far more cynical. Love was at best an excuse for stupidity, at worst a destructive, dangerous emotion that drove men to acts of annihilation which defied logic. It was a twisted, insidious sentiment used to justify everything from spoiling a child to destroying entire civilisations.
That’s what made Arkady truly dangerous to him, he knew. He recognised the feeling in himself, the constriction in his chest at the thought of losing her. The horror of watching her wither and die while he remained unchanged…
The fear of never seeing her again…
Worse, the fear that he might actually be able to find a way to have her—the Tide was on the way back, after all. It wouldn’t be long now before he could compel the world to do as he commanded if the mood took him, Arkady along with it.
Cayal shook his head at his own pathetic predictability. Already he was contemplating world domination just for the sake of having one woman.
That’s love for you.
And what if she’d changed her mind? It was more than a month since she’d left Maralyce’s mine with Jaxyn. What if she didn’t still want him the way Cayal wanted her? What if the memory of Maralyce’s cabin had faded to an embarrassing interlude she’d rather forget?
Arkady was a duchess, after all, hugely conscious of her husband’s position. And protective of it. That she’d kept his secret while they were married, even to the point of putting up with Jaxyn under her roof, was proof of her loyalty. And she certainly went back to her husband quickly enough when she thought Cayal was defeated…
Tides, it’s enough to make a man crazy just thinking about it.
The rain was falling harder now, as the ship moved closer to the dangerous narrows. He hadn’t caused this storm. Although he could affect its course, his power had yet to reach the point where he could harness this much energy out of thin air and force it to do his bidding.
Arkady might die in the next hour, he thought, through no fault of mine.
Which would solve his problem rather neatly.
And Arkady was his problem. She had made him hope. She made him want to live again, even if only for the length of her tragically short life span.
Cayal was in no mood to be hopeful. He was done with immortality and determined to find a way to end it.
How dare you come into my life and threaten my resolve, Arkady Desean.
The ship was in the clutches of the current now, the efforts of the harnessed amphibians having little effect. Lightning streaked overhead as the storm moved closer, the thunder prickling along Cayal’s forearms as the Tide magic returning to him responded to the elemental display. They were close enough now that he could just make out the cries of the crew as they desperately fought to bring the ship under control. Their efforts were futile. The cumbersome vessel had been swept up by the pull of the white water and was heading far too quickly into the narrows.
There will be no hope, no pain, once you’re dead, Arkady.
Over the years he had come to understand Pellys’s fascination with killing things. The guilty pleasure of watching something expire, the envy, the almost sensual delight of witnessing a life go where an immortal had no hope of following.
I’d be doing you a favour, letting you die, my love.
That was the logic Cayal’s endless existence had forced him to adopt. He lived in a world where life was pain and death was a welcome release for some…a door locked to him and his kind forever.
Are you frightened aboard your silly, dangerously top-heavy ship, Arkady? Are you clinging to the railing, blood racing through your veins as your heart pounds in anticipation of death, certain this is the end?
Thunder rumbled overhead. Below him in the raging straits, the amphibian harness became tangled as one of the outriders was thrown against the rocks. It was too late to turn back. The vessel had no choice but to move on.
Is your life flashing before your eyes, Arkady?
Are you thinking of me?
Another amphibian was torn from their harness by the rocks, its scream drowned out by the storm. If the ship lost any more of them, that would be the end of it.
When you’re gone, there will be no more uncertainty.
I can go back to being sure I want to die.
The ship would break up on the rocks. Arkady would drown, more than likely, which as deaths went was probably one of the better ways to go…
How I envy you, my love.
Another crack of lightning, the rain falling so hard he was all but blinded by it, the rumble of thunder making the ground shake…
And then it stopped abruptly as Cayal lost his nerve. Cursing his own cowardice, he waved his arm across the water, stilling it instantly.
The storm seemed to hold its breath as it halted on his command.
On the ship below him, the shouts of panic turned to shouts of astonishment, carried clearly now across the still water, echoing off the sheer cliff walls enclosing the Whitewater Narrows. The rain stopped, the raging white water calmed to a gentle flow.
Hastily, the remaining amphibians pulled the ship into the centre of the waterway and towed it forward. They could probably feel his presence. At the very least, unlike the humans on the barge, the Crasii would know there was magic at work.
The barge sailed past the dangerous entrance and through to the wider, deeper waters farther downstream, heading for the coast.
Cayal stood on the edge of the cliff, watching the ship sail past, knowing he was a fool but unable to find it in himself to regret saving Arkady.
Perhaps it was a good idea, not an act of rank stupidity, he consoled himself. She was smart. Intelligent. Resourceful. Maybe, if he sought her out again, she could help him find a way to die…
Cayal smiled sourly at his own foolishness. What a pathetic justification to go looking for her. And as if any mortal could even understand, let alone be a willing accomplice to, such an endeavour.
But then another thought occurred to him. What if she feared him? If she felt threatened, perhaps, or believed humanity was threatened?
Would that be enough to enlist her cooperation?
Is that what I have to do?
The thought made a twisted sort of logic.
If you won’t help me die, my love, then perhaps I’ll have to make you want to kill me.
Tor Books by Jennifer Fallon
The Hythrun Chronicles
THE DEMON CHILD TRILOGY
Medalon (Book One)
Trea
son Keep (Book Two)
Harshini (Book Three)
THE WOLFBLADE TRILOGY
Wolfblade (Book One)
Warrior (Book Two)
Warlord (Book Three)
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
THE IMMORTAL PRINCE
Copyright © 2007 by Jennifer Fallon
Originally published in 2007 by Voyager, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, Australia.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form.
Maps by Russell Kirkpatrick
A Tor Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10010
www.tor-forge.com
Tor® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Fallon, Jennifer.
The immortal prince / Jennifer Fallon.—1st ed
p. cm.—(Tide Lords; bk. 1)
“A Tom Doherty Associates book.”
ISBN: 978-1-4299-3628-6
I. Title.
PR9619.4.F35I66 2008
823'.92—dc22
2008005174
The Immortal Prince Page 59
