The nature priest’s face took on a look of alarm. She put her arm around Melisande again.
“Sent by whom, Melisande? Who would send a child to the Invoker of the Filids? Do you understand what it is you are asking? Gavin is the leader of an entire faith of more than three million adherents. It would be like presenting yourself at the basilica in Sepulvarta and asking to see the Patriarch, or going up to the palace and demanding to speak with the Lord and Lady Cymrian.”
The little girl put her head down on her arms. “Well, the Lord and Lady Cymrian sent me to him in the first place,” she said miserably. “So I didn’t think it would be this difficult.”
“The—what?” Elara lapsed into speechlessness. She pushed the cider and bread closer, and watched in silence as Melisande ate and drank.
The carved door to the building opened again, and the man in the brown robe returned, his eyes wide. He nodded to Elara. The Filidic priest looked down at the little girl and smiled.
“Well, your request is about to be fulfilled. Come; I’ll take you to Gavin.”
18
The two Filidic priests waited until Melisande had finished the cheese and cider. She stuffed the bread in the pocket of her cape, gaining smiles from both of them, and then was led back out to the winter garden, past many more people in robes tending the sleeping beds and hardy shrubs, all the way to the circle of trees surrounding the Great White Tree.
The sun had gone beyond the horizon, leaving nothing but inky black clouds in a remnant of blue at the edge of the world. The moon was just rising, hanging low in the sky and spilling cold light across the meadow. A pathway from the building to the circle of trees was lit with lanterns hanging from wooden posts, all the way to the other side of the meadow.
The closer they got to the gigantic tree, the warmer Melisande felt. There was something entrancing about it that reached down into her heart. Rhapsody had told her of her time in this odd place of natural magic, of the foresters like the man who led her to the Circle, who plied the woodland trails, escorting pilgrims to sites sacred to those who followed the faith practices of the Filids, of the vast herbal gardens where medicines and herbs used in rituals were carefully tended; of the healers who could cure the wounds and illnesses of both men and animals, and especially of the Tree, which she said sang an ancient song that was indescribable in its beauty. Melisande did not hear the song, but still could feel its power.
She tried to remember what the Lady Cymrian had said about Gavin himself. Rhapsody had studied with him, had wandered a good deal of the forest in his presence, and seemed fond of him, but had said little more about him, mostly because it seemed that no one knew him very well, even the foresters who he trained. He had been the Chief Forester when Rhapsody met him, and was chosen to take over as Invoker when Ashe’s father, Llauron, had given up his human body to take on dragon form. All of this was very jumbled in Melisande’s mind; she had been very small when it all took place, and so it seemed like little more than a fairy tale to her—a fairy tale in which she knew the players.
As they crossed the dark meadow she began to see what she thought were signs of recent fire again. Many of the trees in the circle around the Great White Tree were newly planted or had been badly burned, including the great copse of ancient trees, vastly tall and broad, in and around which the house they were heading toward was built.
Unlike the house that Llauron had lived in, which she had seen drawings of in her father’s museum, this was little more than a large cabin, with a high hip roof and walls of fragrant cedar. Llauron’s house had been built by his father, Gwylliam the Visionary, and set within the trees and built around them at many odd angles, with sections placed high in the forest canopy and a tower in the center that was tall enough to look above it, and surrounded by many beautiful and cozy gardens. She had been fascinated by the drawings of it, and her father had described to her the great inventions that Gwylliam had installed to allow fragile plants to grow inside glass rooms in winter, tubes through which people spoke to people in other rooms, and a tower aviary in which the messenger birds lived in beautiful bamboo cages intricately designed to match the destination buildings to which they were trained to carry their missives. He and Ashe had spent many happy hours there as boys; the memory of his face, recalling those times, stung even as the surroundings entranced her.
By contrast, the new house was clean of line and simple, barely larger than the carriage house at Haguefort, which was itself a small keep. The windows were round with carved shutters, with simple boxes affixed beneath them, wrapped for winter’s sleep. The house was all on one level except for a small lookout tower with an enclosed stairway that reached high above the forest canopy. Two lampposts flanked the cabin, the flame within them glowing brightly, if not warmly.
The only remarkable thing about the place was the door. In the lantern shadows it appeared to be marred by soot but unburned, it was arched, made of wood that Melisande did not recognize, and scarred by salt. The minuscule remnants of an image were barely visible, flaked leaves of gilding still able to be seen, evoking a mythical beast, a dragon or griffin of some sort.
A great stone wall, lined with sleeping gardens, led up a pathway to the heavy wooden door, which was guarded by foresters.
“This is where Gavin lives,” Elara said. She walked up to the guardians and spoke to them in a tongue Melisande did not understand, to which they replied in kind. Elara nodded and turned back to the little girl.
“Gavin is at the Tree,” she said. She nodded back across the meadow, where a number of Filids and foresters were milling about, some tending the guardian circle of trees, some conferring, others in ritual prayer. “Come.”
Melisande followed her back up the path and beyond the circle of guardian trees, to a spot beneath an enormous white limb glimmering in the light of the ascendant moon.
Several bearded men in simple green and brown clothing were talking quietly among themselves. The one with his back to her gestured off toward the north, and the rest of them bowed and left. The remaining man stood for a moment, as if listening to something only he could hear, then turned and looked down into her face.
It was the forester who had brought her to the Circle.
“Gavin, this is the girl we told you of,” said Elara. “Her name is Melisande.”
The forester nodded, then hid a smile at the look of thunderous shock on the young girl’s face. “Hello, Lady Melisande Navarne.”
“You are Gavin?” Melisande exploded.
“I am.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
The somber man looked even more directly at her. “You didn’t ask,” he said. “You merely told me who you were.” He signaled to Elara, and the Filidic priest bowed to him, smiled at Melisande, and withdrew, gesturing to the others within the circle to follow her.
Gavin waited until they were alone beneath the Great White Tree, then returned his attention to the girl. “In the future, I respectfully suggest you consider asking the names of those in your presence, and being less forthcoming with your own, m’lady. A brave spirit can’t always overcome a foolish head.”
Melisande’s face flushed hot in the light of the lanterns. The Invoker saw her embarrassment, and gestured for her to walk closer to the Great White Tree with him.
“We are now outside of the wind, and within the protection of the Tree,” he said when they came to a stop beneath its outstretched limbs overhead. “This is the safest place in the forest to speak, without fear of being overheard, Tell me, then, Lady Melisande Navarne, why did the Lady Cymrian send you to me?” His dark eyes twinkled. “Aside from your rare brave spirit and even rarer ability for survival for one your age.”
Melisande took a deep breath, concentrating and trying to remember Rhapsody’s words exactly as she had spoken them.
“The Lady Cymrian bids me ask you to take me, along with a full contingent of your top foresters and your most accomplished healer, to the greenwood north-northeast of
the Tar’afel River, where the holly grows thickest. She said that you will know where this is.” The Invoker nodded thoughtfully. “I am to ask you to have your foresters fan out at that point, keeping to a distance of half a league each, and form a barrier that extends northwest all the way to the sea, setting whatever snares and traps they need to protect that barrier. They are to remain there, allowing no living soul to enter.”
The Invoker inhaled, watching her sharply, his eyes gleaming intensely in the dark.
“When this is accomplished, she asks that you yourself take me from this point onward. A sweet-water creek flows south into the Tar’ afel; we are to follow it northward until we come to Mirror Lake.”
The Invoker shook his head. “Those are sacred lands, where I have never trod. That is the realm of the dragon Elynsynos. I know of no such lake.”
“She said that we will know this body of water because its name describes it perfectly. At the lake I am to leave you and travel on alone. She asks you to wait for me there for no more than three days. If I have not returned by then, you are to return to the Circle and go about your business.”
“Leaving you to whatever fate you have met?” the Invoker demanded.
Melisande exhaled. “I suppose so, yes.”
“And you agreed to this, Lady Melisande Navarne?”
The little girl squared her shoulders and drew herself up to her full height, which reached its summit at a little above the man’s waist.
“I did. And I fully understand the implications.”
“And is that all? You merely need me to provide escort into the forbidden lands and to abandon you to Fate there?”
“No,” Melisande said quickly, remembering the rest of her instructions. “Within that time I expect to return to you with one of two requests—either to come back with me along with the healer, or with the intention of sealing the dragon’s cave.”
The Invoker stood suddenly straighter.
“What has happened to Elynsynos?” he asked, stricken.
“I don’t know,” Melisande said plainly. “But Rhapsody fears the worst.”
“This is dire news indeed,” said the Invoker, turning away toward the silver trunk of the Great White Tree. He was silent for some time, then turned back to the little girl.
“If you are willing to undertake such a task, it would be my honor to escort you in it,” he said finally. “I have but two last questions for you, Lady Melisande Navarne.”
“Yes?”
“How old are you?”
“Nine,” the little girl replied. “But I’ll be ten on the first day of spring, which is very soon.”
The Invoker nodded. “And how old do you feel today?”
Melisande’s brows drew together in confusion, then in thought.
“Much older than that,” she said. “At least twelve.”
“Very good,” the Invoker said.
“And may I ask you something now?”
“Indeed.”
“How did you come to find me in the forest? Do you know if my chamberlain and soldiers are alive?”
The Invoker smiled. It was an unusual expression, one that he did not seem to wear very often.
“The second question first: your chamberlain is indeed alive, and two of your soldiers. They were found by my woods guides and returned under escort to Haguefort.
“As for how I came upon you—the woods told me there was a brave young woman who had fought off attackers and was lost within them. I came to find you, for such a person cannot be left to the vagaries of misfortune and fate. And so I will again, Lady Melisande Navarne. Take heed and believe this—no matter what comes to pass, I will come for you.”
PART TWO
The Eve of a Building Storm
19
The palace of Jierna Tal, Jierna’sid, Sorbold
Dangerous as it would be to admit it, Talquist hated seers.
As he paced the heavy carpet that adorned the marble floors of the imperial palace, he muttered extravagant curses under his breath, vile but amusing obscenities he had learned from the sailors during his days in the Mercantile, where his first fortune had been made. For all that the power of the crown was heady, in secret Talquist missed those days, wandering the wide world with little more than sand in his pockets and a scheme in his head. He missed the sight of ships coming into port flying colors from around the world, the smell of burlap sacks bulging with spices and seeds, the sounds of laughter in dark taverns and the groans of longshoremen off-loading goods into the night in misty rain. In particular he missed the sea, for the sea had always been good to him, had given him everything of value he owned.
Most especially, it had given him the power he now sought to expand to the water’s edge on the other side of the Known World.
The regent emperor paused as he passed the enormous looking glass in his bedchamber. An ordinary man stared back at him, heavyset and muscular of body, swarthy of skin, dark of complexion, hair, and eye. A man no different in appearance than any other man in this realm of endless sun, sand, and mountains except that he was bejeweled in gold and clad in robes of finest linen, the product for which Sorbold was best known in the trading world. An ordinary man on the outside, perhaps.
But within that ordinary man, Talquist mused, was a vision that was anything but ordinary.
For all that he was a visionary, however, Talquist was not a seer. The regent emperor began to pace again, his breath coming out in grunts of building frustration. He had been planning for a long time, biding his time, acting his part, putting all the pieces in place as meticulously as the artisans of Keltar who carved intricate representations of the world in gemstones smaller than a thumbnail. But while he could envision his dreams, and knew how to position his resources to achieve them, his sight failed at that point He could not monitor whether or not it was coming to fruition.
At least not yet.
All of that is about to change, he reminded himself.
His calm restored somewhat, Talquist turned and walked back up the winding stone staircase at the southwestern corner of his bedchamber to the tower room at its top.
Every corner of his chambers had such a parapet, the three others each housing crossbowmen of superior skill, as did the wide central balcony on the main level. The balcony and two of the towers stared west, into the red sunset, over the mountains that ringed the capital city of Jierna’sid, to the grassy steppes and the wide Krevensfield Plain beyond, all the way to the sea, a thousand miles away. The other two towers faced the southeast and northeast, where the lookouts scanned the mountains at their back in the glare of the rising sun.
But only this one bore the signs of fresh mortar and brick, recent repairs to what had been a gargantuan hole.
As Talquist reached the top step, he asked himself if by not having archers he was wasting space in this tower that would leave him vulnerable, but discarded the thought a moment later in the recollection of the forty thousand troops quartered in this city alone, all of whom had naught but his continued safety and security foremost in mind.
The room at the top of the stairs was small and spare, with no decoration except a map of the continent adhered to the wall. The southern and western walls were open to the wind to facilitate bow shots and other defensive projectiles; the corners of the map flapped in the stiff breeze. The opening looked out on the courtyard on the western side and a chasm on the southern one.
In a small cane rocking chair facing out the western tower window a woman was sitting with her back to him, her head tilted toward the sun, her eyes closed in the glow of its radiance on her face.
Talquist inhaled slowly, attempting to measure his breathing, so that he would remain calm. He stepped onto the stone floor and slowly came up behind her.
The woman did not move or seem to notice.
“Good day, Rhonwyn,” he said as pleasantly as he could.
The woman did not open her eyes, but her smooth forehead wrinkled into furrows at the sound of his voice.
Talquist inhaled more deeply this time. This was the fourth attempt this day he had made to communicate with the Seer of the Present, and each time he had been angered more than the last. Her mythic status as one of the three Seers of Time and, more importantly, his acute need of her unique abilities demanded a patience of him that he normally did not possess.
“Good day, Rhonwyn,” he repeated.
This time the woman opened her eyes and turned slowly in her chair to face him. Despite her age her face was smooth in the bloom of youth, her hair red-gold at the crown of her head, but as it tapered down in a long braid bound in leather thongs it passed into dimmer stages, darkening and turning gray until it reached the snow-white tip.
Her eyes, blank scleras without irises, reflected distorted images of himself back to him.
“No,” Rhonwyn said. “I think not.”
Acid filled the back of Talquist’s mouth; while the woman’s tone was fragile and dreamlike, nevertheless, the words stung of insult. He swallowed his sour rage and came to her side, looking out the window at the distant courtyard below.
Jierna Tal was one of the modern architectural marvels of the world, a smooth stone palace perched on jagged crags above an almost bottomless chasm, rising in clean angles skyward to unseen heights, its corners finished in spiraling minarets and bell towers that occasionally were shrouded in low-hanging clouds. The tremendous distance from the cobblestones of the streets to the top of the towers served frequently as a metaphor to remind Talquist how far he had risen from the gutter to his now-exalted position. Just past the courtyard the chasm, part of the palace’s defenses, descended another thousand feet as if to accentuate the point.
A long shadow lay across the courtyard, twisting occasionally and glinting in the amber light of the sun. Talquist glanced to the city square on a hill above the palace.
Towering there in the afternoon haze was another reminder of how far he had come, and to what he owed his elevation. The great Scales loomed high above Jierna Tal, an immense and ancient artifact brought from the old world by the Cymrian refugees whose descendants now held power in the Middle Continent. Gigantic beams balanced two plates of burnished gold wide enough for a cart and oxen to rest within; Talquist smiled. He himself had stood in one of those weighing plates and had been lifted aloft, to the stunned response of the crowd below, who, after recovering, had declared him Emperor Presumptive.
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