The Crown

by Deborah Chester

  He had not dreamed about being back in his old room. This was his bedchamber, the furnishings unchanged since he left to join the army. Only the clutter of his possessions was absent, his old collection of weapons and hunting gear, the ragged pile of cloth his favorite dog had used for a bed, his boots and game boards and hawking jesses and maps were all cleared away. Nothing remained except the large bed, a chair, a clothing chest, and a fine old, sun-faded carpet.

  Shadrael frowned, refusing to let memories engulf him. Perhaps Vordachai had meant to be kind in lodging him here like a favored houseguest, like a member of the . . . family. The past, however, meant nothing to Shadrael now except a prickle of thorns he wished to avoid. He found clothing in the chest and put it on, feeling lost without his weapons.

  His bruises from the stoning had faded. The wound he’d taken from that last fight with the Crimsons had healed to a small scar and was no longer sore. Estimating that he’d lain here for several days at least, he knew he should be hungry, but his lean, concave belly felt no pangs of emptiness. The lingering effect of severance, he thought. It had not entirely worn off.

  He felt baffled and lost, like a ghost no longer part of this world, no longer belonging anywhere. Not dead yet, but not wholly living either.

  Experimentally he rubbed his chest, wondering if the damage inside was mending or permanent. Where his reserves of magic had been, there now remained only a hollow emptiness . . . except for a tiny amount. Like the last drop of liquid in a bowl that eludes a spoon. Not even enough to reassure him.

  The magic might, he told himself, serve briefly as a puny kind of weapon. He certainly had nothing else for protection, not even a sleeve knife.

  A click of the door latch was his only warning when the healer entered his room. They stared at each other in surprise, Shadrael stiff and defensive, the healer astonished.

  “A good way to eat a dagger,” Shadrael said gruffly.

  The healer’s brows shot up. “What need of violence, my lord, when you are sheltered within these safe walls? I did not mean to startle you.”

  Shadrael gestured dismissal, but the healer approached him instead.

  “You should not be up, my lord. Are you in pain?”

  “No.”

  The man blinked, his frown deepening. “Still severed? And you are able to stand and converse? I—” He broke off, muttering to himself, then sent Shadrael a wary look. “Donare! Of course. I should have realized.”

  “Now you have,” Shadrael said curtly. “You may go.”

  Instead, the healer held up a flask. “I have brought you more nutrition. There is no need to go seeking food within the kitchens today, if that’s your aim.”

  Shadrael scowled. “I want none of your vile brew.”

  “Not vile, my lord. Its taste is pleasant and soothing. Surely you’ve swallowed far worse concoctions while participating in the rites of Alcua.”

  “What know you of those?”

  The healer shrugged, appearing unconcerned by Shadrael’s hostility. “You are not interested in my past,” he said. “Will you not return to bed now, and partake of this?”

  “I’ve slept long enough.”

  “Whatever you feel at the moment, you are far from well, my lord.”

  “Well enough to do what’s necessary.”

  “Which is what?”

  Thin lipped, Shadrael glared at him. “I don’t answer to you!”

  “My lord misunderstands. I do not ask from idle curiosity. Please,” the healer said, making a conciliatory gesture at the chair. “At least sit down for a short time. You should not be this active so soon.”

  Shadrael headed for the door, only to find his path blocked by the healer. Angered, he stopped, his nostrils flaring. “How dare you hinder me? Step aside!”

  “No occasion requires you to hurry, my lord. Must I remind you that you are still in a healing severance, and not yourself?”

  “I’ve been in the care of a healer before. I know what it’s about.”

  “Then you know that you should not exert yourself. Please sit down and drink some of this—”

  “No,” Shadrael said curtly, thrusting aside the proffered flask. “I want to talk to my brother.”

  “Tomorrow will do for that. In the meantime, why not rest?”

  “To what purpose?” Shadrael glared at him. “What’s happening to me cannot be cured.”

  Regret settled over the healer’s weathered face. His eyes held sympathy, but he did not contradict what Shadrael had said.

  “Better, in fact,” Shadrael continued bitterly, “if you had used a pillow to smother me while I slept. Then it would be over.”

  “My purpose is to restore health, not take life,” the healer replied, and smiled briefly. “Besides, despite your present discomfort, is it not better to endure withdrawal? Are you so tied to the shadow god that you cannot accept freedom?”

  “What if I am?” Shadrael snapped, thinking the man a fool. “What does it matter?”

  “Of course it matters! You must not give up hope, my lord. There is a period of severe shock and suffering, naturally, but with time and expert care—”

  “Don’t lie to me. My ability to sever, is it permanently damaged?”

  “I cannot answer that question unless I know what caused the injury.”

  “Element magic struck me, just as I was about to snap someone’s threads of life.”

  Looking shocked, the healer blinked, and had nothing to say.

  Dour amusement spread through Shadrael. So much for provincial sophistication, he thought. This healer was evidently accustomed to splinting broken bones and smearing salve on kitchen burns, not coping with confessions of attempted murder gone awry.

  “Normally element magic is too mild to harm me,” Shadrael went on casually, as though it meant nothing to use the dark forces. “I’ve suffered minor injuries before, but nothing like this.”

  “When you attempt to sever, where does the pain occur?” The healer gently touched his chest. “Here?”

  Shadrael flinched, and the healer drew back swiftly.

  “Ah yes, I noticed that. I have mitigated the pain there all I can. Time must do the rest.”

  “Time,” Shadrael said grimly, “is my enemy, not my friend.”

  “Time,” the healer replied, meeting his gaze steadily, “is all someone in your condition can hope for. Even a donare such as yourself will end up diminished, as undoubtedly you know. I have found much scarring from your heavy reliance on shadow. Like this.” As he spoke, he laced his fingers together. “All built upon a web of very old damage from a severe injury that was never tended properly. Frankly, my lord, I’m surprised you lived through it, given the botched mess done to you.”

  Shadrael scowled. He was not going to discuss what he’d gone through to survive losing his soul.

  “You see,” the healer continued, “no matter what you’ve been told, the potions of Alcua cannot go on mitigating a progressive course of repeated damage and injury forever. Every deferment means less true healing, until it becomes too much for your body to handle. How long have you been severing to endure withdrawal shock?”

  Shadrael’s opinion of this man began to change. He found himself answering honestly. “Since the Terrors.”

  “Three years . . . nearly four,” the healer said thoughtfully. “Very few could last that long. Your, um, strength has been your undoing.”

  “You mean—”

  “The effects of transition can only be worse than usual.”

  Shadrael barked a short laugh. “Honesty over reassurance. Is that your dogma?”

  “Lies will not help you, my lord.”

  “Then answer what I’ve asked you. Will I be able to sever again?”

  “If you rest and allow yourself a chance to heal properly, perhaps. You will never regain the full ability you had before.”

  “How soon?”

  “You must learn to govern yourself, as you are perhaps not used to. That means getting suf
ficient rest and not forcing yourself to unnatural extremes of exhaustion.” The healer paused. “The way you are doing now.”

  “When can I sever?”

  “Weeks, perhaps not even then.” The healer gave him a very serious look. “If you ignore my advice and sever too soon, the damage could be permanent, or even fatal.”

  Shadrael shrugged. “I’m dying anyway—”

  “Everyone thinks so in the first and second stages of shadow withdrawal. It’s a common reaction, but not always a correct one.”

  “I’ve seen men die by the hundreds. I’ve seen donares go rogue,” Shadrael said angrily.

  “Cared for by Vindicants?” The healer sniffed, his expression eloquent. “Had you sought a properly trained healer from the beginning, you could have avoided much of this suffering now.”

  “Are you a properly trained healer?”

  The man said with quiet dignity, “I trained in Trau, and I am descended from nameids on my mother’s side. I may have not been to the Imperial Court, my lord, but yes, I know what I’m doing.”

  Oh yes, Shadrael thought resentfully, he knew what he was doing. A true member of his profession, the healer obviously believed he possessed all the answers. A patient was expected to shut up, swallow what was given, and be blindly obedient so that everything would come right. Typical of all healers, Shadrael thought, to examine a new patient, criticize what had been done by a predecessor, and offer a new, far more wondrous line of treatment. Vindicant or otherwise, urban or provincial, they were all the same.

  Shadrael had no intention of being gullible enough to swallow any reassurance this healer offered. Without a soul, he knew there was nothing that could be done for him, absolutely nothing. To his mind, this conversation was a meaningless waste of time. Except that now he knew he possessed the means to sever his own threads of life.

  Thanks to the healer’s efforts, he was strong enough to at least do that. He knew, from the kind of care he’d been given and from being installed in his old bedchamber inside the palace, that already Vordachai had decided not to execute him as threatened. But then, his brother could never be relied on.

  “The more rest you get now, the longer the healing severance I’ve given you will last,” the healer said, breaking the silence. “I don’t need to tell you why that’s to your advantage.”

  “You mean,” Shadrael said harshly, wanting to be rid of him, “as long as I lie here trapped in this room and drinking your potions, I can pretend I’m not going mad.”

  “That is not quite how I would put it, my lord. The effects of shadow dependency vary and are difficult to gauge, much less treat. However, I heal hurts of the body, not the spirit. Madness and afflictions of the mind are not my specialty.”

  “So unless I begin to rave and drool spittle, you won’t know whether I’m crazed or not?”

  The healer permitted himself a slight smile. “You joke, my lord, but lunacy is to be pitied, not ridiculed.”

  Anger flowed hot through Shadrael, momentarily thawing the effect of severance. At once he felt the strength leaking from his body. Instead of striking the healer, his hand shot out desperately to brace himself against the wall. His breath came unsteady and fast.

  The healer took his arm. “Let me help you back to bed, where you belong.”

  Shadrael shook him off, although the effort nearly made him dizzy. “Get away from me! Do you think I want your kind of healing, where I am left a cripple, locked in my brother’s turret to spend my days beating my skull against the walls? Get out!”

  Although shorter and older than Shadrael, the healer was sturdy enough to hold him fast in an expert grip. “Were you truly out of your mind, my lord, raving and hurling about wild, destructive spells of magic, you would now be restrained in the strongest possible bonds of kwaibe, with Reformant priests and holy men standing watch over you. Instead, you are a free agent, are you not? However ill advised it might be, you are at liberty to go where you please.”

  Shadrael stared at him in consternation, his temper collapsing. The healer touched his forehead, and severance flowed back into place, steadying him. Even so, he felt very tired now.

  “It’s you who have cut off the voices, the hallucinations,” Shadrael said, his voice dull. “Thank you, but they will come back.”

  “Then I am sorry for you, but if necessary that can be treated. Humanely. And kindly. You will be made comfortable. There is nothing, my lord, noble about suffering.”

  A cold chill sank through Shadrael. “You mean, take my mind away. Take away memory. Take away everything.”

  “If necessary. But I think we should focus on a more hopeful outcome.”

  From outside came the low wail of a mesderah horn, followed by glad shouts of merriment and laughter and the jingling of Mrishadal bells.

  “Happy sounds, aren’t they?” the healer said. “People are going to the feast. Tomorrow is the last day of celebration.”

  Still horrified by what he’d said, Shadrael refused to be distracted by thoughts of revelry. He took a step back, pulling free of the healer’s touch. “You are an evil man,” he said softly. “An evil, cold man to offer me that. Can you believe it will comfort me? I would rather go out of here to my death than sit about, drinking your filthy potions and believing your lies, until my reason is taken from me.”

  “You insist on dwelling on the worst possible outcomes,” the healer replied calmly. “That, too, is an effect of withdrawal. You need to rest, and let your family come in here to visit you. Surround yourself with what is positive and good, rather than morbid thoughts of madness and death.”

  “I am death,” Shadrael replied harshly. “I have brought it to others many times. I am darkness. I wear it as my mantle, and I will not don another.”

  The healer flinched, as Shadrael had meant for him to, but he did not back down. “I have not lied to you,” the man said. “Can you not deal truthfully with me in return? Do you think I do not understand the hopelessness in your questions? You intend to gather yourself for one last try at severing your own threads of life.”

  Shadrael started to speak, but the healer held up his hand. “Don’t deny it. You babbled enough in your feverish moments for me to understand your fears.”

  “That’s not—”

  “Your circumstances are terrible,” the healer went on, his mild voice containing no sympathy now. “But what of it? We all bear our burdens. You have been a coward long enough.”

  Shadrael curled his fists. “I’m no coward!”

  “Aren’t you? Pitying yourself. Clinging to shadow customs and charlatan cures, harming yourself repeatedly by misuse of severance instead of finding a decent healer to help you through transition. When you hide behind such lies and shams, then you are a coward.”

  “If you were not protected by your calling, I would see you dead,” Shadrael said hoarsely.

  “If you wish to destroy yourself from some sense of guilt, admit it as such, but do not claim despair as your excuse.”

  They glared at each other, but it was Shadrael who was the first to look away.

  “This conflict is not good for you,” the healer said. “Truth can be hard to swallow, even painful to receive. But I have given you my professional opinion. I hope you will think hard and long about what I’ve said.”

  “Be damned.”

  “No, my lord,” the man said firmly. “If you do not change soon, if you do not make the effort to save yourself, however difficult, then it is you who are damned.”

  “Why should that matter to you?”

  “Because I have served the lords of Natalloh all my life. Strive to make your peace with Gault, my lord. Accept harmony. Otherwise . . .”

  Shadrael’s mouth tightened. He did not want to discuss his damnation with this man, with anyone. He turned in silence, pushing the healer aside, and strode out.

  Chapter 13

  In her tiny cell, Lea sat hunched and shivering against the stone wall, gazing upward at the narrow ribbon of sky t
hat was her only view. She had been lowered into this hole at dawn, and thus far she had no inkling of what was to befall her. Whether it was a dry well or a shaft that had once led into a now-collapsed mine, she could not tell. All she knew was that her only way out was if someone lowered a rope to her.

  It was bitterly cold, and her tattered cloak was not enough protection. She was thirsty and hungry, but no food—not even a cup of water—had been given to her. At some point she’d dared call the earth spirits, hoping to escape into between with their guidance, but none had obeyed her summons.

  She did not blame them. The place crawled with a filthy type of magic, something foul and raw, too primitive to call shadow. It was oppressive, wearing on her nerves, taking advantage of her fatigue and hunger to gnaw at her emotional defenses.

  Without warning something fell on her, bounced, and hit the ground with a soft thud. She picked up a piece of fruit, now squished on one side, and sniffed it cautiously. Something else dropped on her, pieces of flat bread, stale and dry. She gripped the food gratefully, peering up in hopes of getting water.

  “Please,” she called. “I am so very thirsty.”

  A face looked down at her from the top of the shaft, blurred and gone before she could tell much about it. Moments later, a water skin was lowered to her by a thin piece of rope. She untied it, and at once the rope was jerked out.

  “Thank you!” Lea called.

  No answer came, but she hardly cared. Crouching on the ground, she brushed dirt off the bread and fruit and ate rapidly, drinking deep of the tepid water until it occurred to her that she might not be given more through the day.

  She was right. No one came back. No one spoke to her. No one brought more food and drink. It grew dark and colder than ever. She sipped her dwindling ration of water, reminding herself that she’d gone hungry before and survived. Huddling beneath her cloak, unable to stretch out flat, she curled herself in a shivering ball and tried to sleep.

  In the morning, she was sitting quietly, fighting the distraction of ravenous hunger and tracing triangles on the ground to keep up her hopes, when a stout rope came snaking down and fell across her shoulder.