by Janny Wurts
He lunged and caught the wingchair full in the chest. Though Elienne was small, long days spent in the saddle in Trathmere ensured she was not weak as her size suggested. As the man recovered his balance, she ran through the door into the sitting room. He followed, gasping for breath.
Elienne said boldly, “I know you for an impostor, and I can even guess your name. It is Nairgen, is it not?” She positioned herself behind an ungainly potted fruit tree.
The man swerved in pursuit, smashed his shin on a footstool. “Demons!” The room was arranged like a maze.
“You drugged the true Prince,” Elienne accused as he approached.
A spiky cross-weave of branches effectively prevented him from reaching around to catch her.
Elienne spoke again, galling him intentionally. “Taroith and Kennaird have surely found him. They will rouse him from the drug.”
“None of that will matter in a few minutes,” the man responded, and he thrust his arm through the bush to grab.
Elienne dropped down and threw her weight against the pot above the wedge of kindling left positioned beneath. The plant overbalanced, bearing the man with it. He back-stepped, tried desperately to save his footing. But a diabolically placed chest tripped him up. He fell heavily. His head struck a marble statue of a fish. The tree crashed awkwardly over, jabbing him with twigs and a shower of loose fruit.
Elienne approached him carefully. Her knees shook. Knife held ready, she snapped off a bough and prodded the prone body on the carpet. But the man remained limp.
Elienne uttered a rude epithet and discarded the stick. She would have to bind the man, and the room was dark. She fetched the candle from the dresser. As an afterthought, she also included the nail scissors.
Her attacker lay as she had left him, but light revealed a changed face. Elienne started, despite her certainty that the man had been shape-changed. In place of Darion’s image, she saw sallow cheeks, peaked brows, and a narrow, hooked nose. Iron-gray hair trailed in a growing scarlet puddle. But hawking after small game in Trathmere had accustomed Elienne to blood. Pragmatic out of necessity, she knelt and dipped the nail scissors in the gore and threw them on the carpet. Then she wiped the knife clean and sheathed the blade beneath her sleeve. She might have further need of a weapon.
Elienne rolled the tree aside and tied the man at wrist and ankle with drapery cord. The fall had only stunned him. She worked quickly lest he rouse before she finished. Though the wound on his head was shallow, it bled fiercely. Elienne stanched the mess with a pillow cover. Then she flung open the main door and beckoned Aisa and Denji inside.
If the sight of a middle-aged man prone on her floor and dressed in the Prince’s device startled them, their faces showed nothing. Unsettled by their cold expressions, Elienne pantomimed explanation as best she could. A rapid exchange of sign language passed between the guardswomen. Then the taller, Denji, motioned Elienne back with her spear. Aisa left the room, weapons ringing in time to her step. She vanished down the stair as Denji positioned herself like a sentinel over the man’s still form.
Badly shaken and in need of quiet, Elienne returned to the bedroom. She straightened her clothing and hair; a maid’s assistance would be required to even out the gap in her curls were she had cut herself loose, but there was no time to fuss with appearances now. Elienne combed out the tangles. She had just finished tying her hair into a knot when Aisa returned, accompanied by Garend and Faisix.
Still puffing from his ascent of the keep stair, the elderly councilman sank into the nearest chair. Garend’s red-rimmed eyes passed distastefully over the prostrate impostor and fixed upon Elienne as she came through the adjoining door. “A pity,” he said, between wheezes. Whether he referred to the man’s misfortune, or her own, was unclear.
Faisix accepted the incident without immediate comment. After the briefest glance at the unconscious man, he dug a flint striker from a nearby drawer and set about lighting the wall sconces. Elienne watched him progress from sitting room to bedchamber, aware that his eyes missed little. The distant crash of the surf masked his graceful step, lending an eerie quality of pantomime to the scene. The glare of multiple candles made Elienne feel helplessly exposed to his dispassionate gaze.
Faisix set his boot against the chest lid by Nairgen’s foot and leaned forward on crossed wrists. “Lady, what passed here?” The gold trim on his doublet glittered as he drew breath. “Aisa informs me you claim to have been assaulted.”
Elienne received his inquiry with alarmed apprehension. Whatever she said, certainly Faisix already knew why a man had sought entrance to her chambers. She related in bald terms what had occurred, but the knife was exchanged for the nail scissors in her account, and she omitted mention of Nairgen’s actions against Darion.
Faisix regarded her narrowly when she finished. After brief hesitation, he said, “How did you know this man to be other than the Prince, whom you have yet to meet?”
Elienne chose not to reveal the mirrowstone. “Excellency, my Lord Garend insisted his Grace was incapable. Drunken and senseless, I believe he said. This man didn’t smell of spirits, nor did he act in the least unfit. Truthread, if you doubt me.”
“That won’t be necessary.” Faisix straightened decisively. “I’d rather see what the man who molested you has on his mind. That might be more informative.”
Wary of soiling the impeccable black and gold silk that clothed his lean height, the Regent knelt on a clean patch of carpet. Tapered white hands fastidiously clasped the unconscious man’s head at either temple. Under his touch, the eyes soon flickered open. But Elienne barely noticed Nairgen’s unfocused stare. She chose instead to observe the Regent.
“What is your name?” Faisix tempered his words with sorcery. The command touched Elienne’s own throat with the desire to answer. But since the truth call was not directed at her, she was able to keep her silence.
“I am called Nairgen, Dar’s son,” said her attacker in an inflectionless tone.
“Nairgen,” Faisix repeated. He bent lower. “What are you?”
The reply followed mechanically. “I am a healer by profession.”
“A healer. I understand.” Faisix glanced quickly at Garend. “Listen carefully, my Lord. I’ll require your word as witness.”
He addressed Nairgen once more. “And did you, in Darion’s image, enter this room with the intention of forcing the Royal Consort?”
“I did,” Nairgen intoned.
Light glanced off the trim on Faisix’s cuffs as he shifted his grip. “Were you successful?”
Elienne stiffened, but managed to concel her outrage. If the Regent had not broached that question, Garend surely would have in his stead.
Nairgen dutifully admitted failure. Faisix swiftly delivered his next demand, words sharpened with a keen edge of threat. “Who sent you to undertake such an act?”
Elienne felt the words pierce her singly. She shrank in acute discomfort, as though live bees crawled across her skin. The command certainly held more than simple truth sorcery. Nairgen thrashed weakly in Faisix’s hold. His eyes bulged like marbles, and spittle dripped from quivering lips. Without warning, he screamed. The sound made Elienne’s hair prickle, and even Garend flinched in his chair.
Only the Regent remained calm. Implacably he repeated his question. “Who? Tell me.”
Nairgen groaned and drew a rattling breath. His body arched against the grip that clamped his head. Faisix’s knuckles whitened with stress, and the tendons bulged beneath his immaculate sleeves.
“Speak!” The corners of Faisix’s eyes wrinkled with concentration. “Who sent you?”
A terrible spasm shook Nairgen, leaving his body limp as wet cloth. A breathy stream of unintelligible words poured from his lips. Garend bent intently forward in his chair. “Who sent you?” The Regent stooped lower, impatient, and the intensity of his expression touched Elienne with dread
.
“Taroith,” murmured Nairgen, softly but with unmistakable clarity. “Taroith sent ...” The words trailed off into stillness like death.
Elienne felt as though she had swallowed ice. The testimony was false. She was certain.
The Regent sighed. Pale with weariness, he looked up at Garend. “Did you hear that?”
“A pity.” The elder’s forehead puckered into a frown as he sank back. “Who would have guessed? Master Taroith is not a Sorcerer one would associate with treason by conspiracy. Those are base charges, for a League Master.”
“I greatly regret this.” Faisix blotted sweat from his temple. “League Master or not, he’ll have to be detained until the Grand Justice can be convened.” Regretfully he regarded the bloody head in his hands. “This one will be needed as evidence. Best we get him healed at once.”
The Regent closed his eyes. Sunny golden light appeared above his fingers, and at the sight of what must be a soulfocus, Elienne knew fear. Nairgen must surely have condemned Taroith under a mindbender’s influence. Faisix had that capability. If he had used it, Nairgen would never be permitted to recover, lest he contradict a forced confession. But Elienne dared not intervene. Her own peril was too great.
Nairgen quieted under the Regent’s touch. His mouth gaped open, and his eyes glared, sightlessly spiked with spearheads of reflection as the focus slowly lowered and touched his forehead. Faisix knelt motionless as a velvet-clothed statue in his trance. Sweat shone fine as gilt on his brow, and his pale eyes fell closed. His breathing slowed and almost seemed to stop.
Suddenly his soulfocus guttered like a blown candle, and went out. The Regent started. He glanced up, but his handsome features remained woodenly still as he set Nairgen’s head gently down and steadily faced Elienne.
“You appear to have broken the unfortunate man’s neck.” He blotted stained fingers on the rug. “What a shame. He is dead.”
Murdered, Elienne thought. Hostility rose within her, heated and restless as fire. Nairgen had suffered cuts and a bruise at her hand, nothing more. But she held her protest. How easily Taroith had been framed with responsibility for an act against her. If she denounced Nairgen’s testimony, she might force Faisix to silence her as well, and where better than in a keep surrounded by his own allies.
“I was frightened.” Without difficulty, Elienne allowed tremulous uncertainty to color her voice. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to kill him.”
Faisix rose and stood over the corpse. “You spared him the unpleasant process of trial and execution. And you would be of little use to Darion if the fellow had had his way with you.”
His appalling attempt at sympathy offended Elienne. She looked away as the Regent made a fluid sequence of signs with his fingers. Aisa stooped and shouldered the body. Faisix grimaced in distaste as she carried it out. Then he turned back and studied Elienne closely.
“You’re untidy,” he remarked at last. “I’ll send you a maid for your hair and clothes. A drudge will be along to mop up and straighten your rooms again.”
“Thank you, Excellency.” As the Regent moved to depart, Elienne curtsied, alert to the fact he would never again underestimate her resourcefulness. His sharp gaze had not missed the altered array of furnishings, and she had seen him note the kindling she had used to wedge the pot. It had been a mistake not to remove that. Faisix certainly knew she had anticipated an assault, and prepared well for it.
The moment Garend’s shuffling step carried him beyond the door, Elienne reached for the mirrowstone. Taroith would have to be warned of his impending arrest. She prayed he was still in the Prince’s presence, within reach of the jewel’s interface. She could then call the Prince, and hope the Sorcerer would overhear.
The stone’s image showed Darion slung across Kennaird’s shoulders like a barley sack. The apprentice walked down a flagstone path bordered by topiary and flowering trees, similar to those Elienne had seen in the palace gardens. Though full night had fallen, the scene was illuminated by cold, silver light, as though by a full moon.
Elienne knew relief. She had seen the moon set earlier, in crescent phase. Such light could be shed only by a soulfocus. Taroith surely followed just behind Kennaird. Elienne called his name through the mirrowstone. There came no response. Kennaird’s feet rose and fell in regular strides; the click of his boot heels against the flags carried faintly over a background chorus of crickets. Elienne tried again, urgently.
Kennaird turned a corner. Darion’s dangling arm brushed a stand of snapdragons, and dew fell, sparkling like cut gems in the soulfocus light. Either the apprentice heard nothing, or he ignored her call deliberately.
Elienne jammed her thumb over the stone’s image and shouted an epithet pungent enough to make a fishwife blush. She ended with a demand that Kennaird stop still in his tracks. Nothing happened. Elienne cursed and blinked back tears of frustration. Perhaps the mirrowstone’s interface worked only on a mental level, and Darion alone could have heard her. Whatever the reason, Elienne could get no message through. Taroith would face arrest unwarned.
Sudden sounds disturbed her from thought. Voices echoed in the stairwell. Apprehensively, Elienne slipped the mirrowstone beneath her collar. She faced the doorway just as the heavy, oaken panel opened, and servants invaded her suite.
Faisix had kept his word, in quantity. No fewer than ten maids arrived in answer to his summons. Only three were drudges. Elienne frowned. The remainder no doubt were intended to forestall activities that did not involve personal appearance; the wedge of firewood and the maneuvered array of furnishing had plainly shown the Regent she was warned against treachery. If he saw fit to distract her, there would be a cause.
Moved by an unpleasant prickle of intuition, Elienne turned her back on seven obsequious curtsies and chased the drudge with the broom and dustbin who marched through the bedroom door. The woman moved with the purposeful effiiciency of one who sought something specific.
Elienne quickened step. By the time she crossed the threshold, the drudge’s quick hands already brushed the blood-soiled scrap of hair Nairgen had cast aside. The woman bent to tip the dustbin into a sack that hung from her apron.
Fears confirmed, Elienne acted at once. She tipped and slammed with feigned clumsiness into the drudge’s stout back. The woman staggered, grunting with surprise, and the contents of her bin tipped onto the floor.
Elienne recovered first. “Oh! I’m sorry! Here, let me make amends.” She snatched the brush and dustbin with what she hoped would pass for contrite embarrassment and recovered the spilled hair.
The woman was not fooled. “The Lady needn’t trouble herself.” She tried to regain her implements, but Elienne had anticipated the move. She smiled brightly and flung the lock into the fire. The drudge glared as flames leaped, fizzling, to consume it. Dark smoke trailed upward, noisome with the reek of charred hair.
Elienne stepped back and felt the dustpan jerked angrily from her grasp. Though chilled by the vehemence of the drudge’s reaction, she removed the candle from the nightstand and thoroughly examined the bedspread, carpet, and floor, until she satisfied herself no strands remained. If hair bound Darion’s image to the mirrowstone, she dared not leave herself vulnerable to the possibility an enemy Sorcerer might weave a similar enchantment for use against her. The drudge’s annoyance confirmed her suspicion. Faisix had issued orders to retrieve that lock.
Elienne returned the broom to the glowering woman. Then she pitched herself to the task of dealing with seven maidservants, not one of whom could be trusted.
* * *
Washed, groomed, and poised despite the multiple concerns that preoccupied her, Elienne paused above the stair overlooking the vast banquet hall where the court of Pendaire gathered in her honor as Prince’s Consort. The decor matched the grandeur of the council chamber, aglitter beneath chandeliers expensively tiered with thousands of wax candles. Clean, smokeless flames
illuminated a scene colorful as a flower bed, dusty with the glimmer of gems and gold-thread embroidery. Pendaire’s courtiers dressed with costly extravagance. Elienne wondered again how one kingdom could support such vast wealth.
A stern voice interrupted her thought. “My little Lady.” A tall, lanky man with a harried face and balding, frizzled hair loomed over her. Peach brocade went poorly with his sallow complexion. “You must not make an appearance before you’ve been properly announced.”
The comment identified him as Master of the Revels. Elienne gestured at the elegantly spread tables which seated the crowd at the foot of the stair. “Were you responsible for preparing all this in the space of a single aftemoon?”
The Master of Revels sketched a self-conscious bow. “I did my best.”
“Do you always conjure miracles?” Elienne smiled warmly. The man must have worked himself half to death. Never had she seen such an array, and at a glance, it seemed the entire Grand Council, along with every living relative, had attended.
The Master of Revels grinned with awkward pleasure, as though unaccustomed to praise. He took her hand and bellowed over the heads of his guests. “Our Lady Elienne, official Consort of Prince Darion, fourteenth heir of Halgarid’s line.”
Elienne descended the steps to the sound of polite applause. Aisa and Denji followed, the cold steel glint of mail and weaponry jarring in contrast with the finery of Pendaire’s courtiers. The crowd stood. As she passed between the ranks of tables, Elienne endured row after row of faces marked by aristocratic appraisal. Pendaire’s ranking ladies exhibited great curiosity over the foreigner Ielond had seen fit to import for their Prince. Elienne walked the gamut of their scrutiny, and felt clumsy. Under other circumstances, the escort clanking noisily at her heels might have amused her. But with one attempt of treachery against her already, anxiety clogged her sense of humor. She searched the packed room, unable to locate Kennaird.
