Crown of Vengeance dpt-1

by Mercedes Lackey

  She stroked Phadullu’s silken neck, willing herself to feel the calm and serenity she had learned to summon before setting a great work of Magery, but could not manage it. Her fingers touched the knife on her belt and she hesitated. This was not the simple vigil with which every Lightborn ended training. To call upon Them was to Summon Them—and they might take the summoner as the victory-sacrifice. It was a fearful thing to make petition for victory and risk being taken to ride the star-roads forever.

  You made up your mind to do this before you came! she told herself fiercely. She patted Phadullu on the shoulder once more. Obedient to her Magery, the young stallion knelt and she drew her knife.

  “Heed me, You Who ride the night winds, who grant triumph in battle and victory in war. I, Vieliessar Farcarinon, Knight and Mage, daughter of Serenthon War Prince and Nataranweiya Ladyholder, come before You here, where the breath of first creation still warms my skin, where You must hear and heed when I call. Take my gift, and give me victory!”

  She drew her blade across Phadullu’s throat. Hot blood spattered the standing stones, pooled on the rock between them, and soaked into the earth beyond, but the bespelled animal did not move until his body went lax with death. All around her, Vieliessar could Sense the roar of power roused, assaulting her senses as savagely as an autumn storm might batter her body. It seemed to her she must slit her eyes tightly against a raging wind, but she forced them to open and focus. She felt someone watching her. For one terrible moment she thought the Hunt Lord had come after all, and all her sacrifices had been for nothing.

  But it was not He.

  At the far edge of the clearing, a little way inside the trees, stood a pale shape that seemed to glow with its own inward radiance. Sending, she thought first, then, deer, since the shape was too small to be a horse and it was undeniably alive.

  Then it took a slow step forward and a ray of morning light fell directly on its horn.

  A single, sword-straight spike jutting from the center of its forehead, it shone as brightly as if some Lightborn had cast Silverlight upon it—if Silverlight could be whitely radiant and iridescent as a dove’s throat at the same time. It was neither horse nor deer. It had a long, slender neck like a deer’s, but also a mane—not long and flowing like a destrier’s, but roached and bristling like a plowhorse’s. Its white coat did not gleam with the glossy slickness of horse or hound, but seemed as if it must be as thick and soft as a cat’s.

  Komen blazoned their shields with them, noble ladies wove tapestries depicting them, craftworkers adorned a thousand different objects with them, from infants’ cradles to shin’zuruf cups to the luck-charms braided into the manes of destriers. The luck-token baked into Midwinter cakes held their image—she had won five of them at the Sanctuary before she had realized it would always come to her and refused to participate any longer. She had sworn to reclaim the throne Amrethion had named for them.

  But they are only a legend … Vieliessar thought, stunned.

  The Unicorn was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen.

  She did not know how long she stood motionless, held in place by no spell other than the creature’s beauty, but suddenly the Unicorn turned its head, wheeled, and sprang back into the forest.

  “No!” Vieliessar shouted. “Wait!”

  She did not know why she called out as if it would come to her summons. She only knew she could not bear to lose sight of it. And so she ran. As she entered the trees, she saw it vanish in the distance. She ran faster, dodging recklessly between tree trunks, no thought in her mind but to draw near to that shining shape, to reach it, to touch it …

  Even when she could no longer see it among the trees, she ran on in the direction it had fled. When she knew it had gone beyond her reach, she sent out a spell of Summoning—to no avail. It was nearly a candlemark before she could bear to give up the hunt. The thought she had seen it and would never see it again made her want to weep.

  It was real, she insisted to herself. I saw the sunlight on its horn, its coat—I heard it crash through the brush as it fled. It was a thing alive, and no Seeming sent by the powers nor an evil illusion of Beastling shamans.

  But no matter how hard she tried, she could not fit the sight of it into the world she lived in, the world whose rules she thought she knew.

  “The Unicorn is the symbol of the High Kingship.”

  This was no lesson from her days at the Sanctuary. Scrolls that spoke of the High Kingship had probably been destroyed, since none of the contenders for the throne would wish to provide arguments their enemies could use to disparage a rival claim and elevate their own.

  No, this was a memory of a time so ancient Vieliessar did not know how to number the years.

  Lady Indinathiel gazed out the window at the forests of Tildorangelor, beyond the walls of the city that bore both its own name and that of the forest: Celephriandullias-Tildorangelor. “We take the Unicorn as the symbol of the High Kingship,” she said idly, “for the single horn upon its brow symbolizes the High King. There are hundreds of great lords and thousands of knights, but only one to rule over them all. As the horn of the Unicorn is its greatest ornament, so the High King is the greatest jewel of the land.…”

  The memory-of-a-dream faded. Lady Indinathiel had spoken of the Unicorn as if she were familiar with it as more than a symbol.…

  I don’t understand. Surely the storysingers would have handed down the truth, just as they teach us about all the kinds of Beastling there are in the world, even though—if we are lucky—we will not see most of them.

  It was the sort of puzzle she would once have delighted in, following its twists and turns through half-sentences scattered across a thousand different scrolls, questioning other scholars, other students, other lovers of history and truth and knowledge. Now—heartsore at the loss of the beauty she had glimpsed so briefly—Vieliessar told herself it did not matter. The creature was not a danger, nor could a beast of the forest be either enemy or ally. She would take its appearance as an omen from the Silver Hooves that her petition had been heard.

  Victory for her cause. Survival for her people.

  * * *

  “Lord Thoromarth’s anger was great,” Ambrant murmured, his gaze fixed upon the carpet. “He swore you were a most treacherous prince, and that he would cause you to feel the shame you ought to feel for using him in such a deceitful way.”

  It was Rain Moon before the party Vieliessar had sent to the Sanctuary returned, and within the candlemark of its arrival, Ambrant Lightbrother had come to give her his report. They’d returned six days earlier than expected—unencumbered by Candidates on the outward journey, Thoromarth had simply pushed his company of knights as hard as if they were riding to war. Since the baggage carts that accompanied them were drawn by sturdy draft horses, not the slower and more massive oxen, the entire group had moved at a breakneck speed.

  “Indeed?” Vieliessar answered meaninglessly. While she was certain Thoromarth had been furious, he was … considerably more direct in his speech than this.

  “But Thoromarth of Oronviel is your loyal servant, Lord Vieliessar,” Ambrant said grudgingly. “Even before his temper had run its course, he made provision for those whom I placed in his care, and we hastened to return here.”

  Thoromarth had left the Sanctuary with eighteen from Ivrithir and Oronviel who had finished their Service Year without being Called to the Light, and twelve more who had just taken the Green Robe. When Ambrant rejoined him, he brought forty-three who belonged to Oronviel, from children who had just completed their first year as Postulants to those who were nearly ready to dare the Shrine.

  If the company had not been almost entirely Lightborn, the journey would have been far harsher than it was, for Thoromarth had brought provisions for the thirty returning Candidates and new Lightborn he had expected. Instead, he found he must make provision for seventy-three, many of them children. But even the newest Green Robe could Call game to the slaughter, and most had some facility wit
h spells of misdirection and concealment.

  “I thank you for your care of your brethren and the care you have taken to discharge my commands,” Vieliessar said, indicating the interview was at an end.

  But: “My lord?” Ambrant said, and now he seemed—for the first time—troubled and uncertain. She waited politely.

  “The Astromancer swears that since the days of Mosirinde Peacemaker it has only been the Vilya in the Sanctuary gardens whose fruiting must be taken into account to calculate a reign. And it may be that the Vilya there is of such great age that it fruited in those ancient days, for we speak of them as “ever-living” for good reason. But as I waited to discharge my duty to you, I chanced to walk in the gardens, for I was curious to understand why this tree, of all the Vilya in the Fortunate Lands, should be barren of fruit.” Ambrant looked away, gazing out the window of Vieliessar’s chamber, looking as though he wished he’d never said anything. “It was bespelled,” he blurted out at last, turning back to gaze at her. “I think. I don’t— A subtle spell, my lord—had it been a spell of preservation it would have been easily noted. I did not mean to speak of it, for I know that you and the Astromancer are enemies. But I am troubled.”

  “Ambrant,” Vieliessar said, oddly moved by his stammering confession, “I believe you have sensed what is indeed there. I shall tell you why I believe it to be so, and it is a thing I have told few of my people. Yet you have earned my trust.”

  “I hope I shall always deserve it, Lord Vieliessar,” Ambrant said, and what might have been pomposity on any other day came out raw and honest.

  “You were at the Sanctuary under Celelioniel Astromancer, were you not?” she asked, and when he nodded, she continued. “Celelioniel left her great work unfinished when the Vilya called her home. She entrusted its completion to Hamphuliadiel, who had been her student for many years. But Hamphuliadiel told Celelioniel what she wished to hear, not what he meant to do. He broke every vow he made to her once he had what he desired.”

  What she had said was truth, but she would not tell Ambrant the whole. Not yet. It was a heavy weight, and she would place it upon as few as she could. Hamphuliadiel believes in the Prophecy and for that reason he acts out of fear and arrogance.

  “That— It is an ill thing to hear of the Guardian of the Shrine, but it comforts me,” Ambrant answered. “Only let his madness be overthrown.”

  “It will be,” Vieliessar said with grim honesty.

  * * *

  The road to peace would be long and edged with swords, and led as readily to death and failure as it did to the glorious end Oronviel’s new War Prince dreamed of. Half her plans were utter madness; the other half, so cunning they chilled the marrow. Thoromarth had known since the day she spared his life that the game she played was deep and secret. He had not known how deep until he rode to the Sanctuary of the Star.

  But once he was alone in his own rooms in Oronviel Keep, fed and bathed and wrapped in a chamber robe, his armor taken away to be cleaned, Thoromarth was too restless to sleep. He summoned a servant to bear away the debris of the meal and bring wine, and sat, cup in hand, gazing into the flames dancing upon the coals of the stove.

  What did he want? Not now, nor even a moonturn from now, but before he went to ride the night winds? He did not want power—at least, not in the way Bolecthindial or Manderechiel did. His new rooms were spacious enough, he could throw his boots at his servants and be certain his wishes would be followed, and he could go from his morning meal to the stables unhindered to spend a day with his beloved horses. What more could a lord of the Fortunate Lands desire? It had been his duty to rule Oronviel, and so he had, just as it had been his duty to marry Daustifalal.

  Thoromarth set down his cup, got to his feet, and began to pace. You’ve taken an illness from all that time wallowing in the mud. Send for a Lightborn to clear your head. You are going to war, and you will die in battle, and you will ride with the Hunt until the stars grow cold.

  When he turned about at the end of the room, Vieliessar was standing in the doorway.

  The overtunic and undertunic and underskirts she wore—each layer slashed and parted to show the contrasting fabric beneath—were as decorous and correct as anything his wife or mother might have worn. She was decked with the jewels of her rank and those of a War Prince, heavy rings, bracelets, and linked collar. The veil upon her hair, held in place by a thin band of gold, hung to her waist; the heavy silk swaying with her movements. But somehow no amount of finery could erase his clearest image of her: muddy and bruised and dangerous as a drawn sword, standing before him and demanding he yield everything he was to her.

  “My lord,” he said, “your message must have gone astray—” He could only imagine he’d been bidden to attend her, and when he had not appeared, she’d come looking for him.

  “I sent no message,” she answered. “May I enter? I wished to see you before you slept. You must be weary. Ambrant looked as if he might collapse at any moment.”

  “It was a hard journey,” Thoromarth said curtly, gesturing for her to enter.

  “And you do not know—still—what prompted me to such foolishness. Did Ambrant tell you of the Astromancer’s decision?”

  “That he will not step down and that I must ask you for the rest. My lord, the plots of the Hundred Houses are enough—I do not wish to know the intrigues the Green Robes may have.”

  “And yet you must,” Lord Vieliessar answered, seating herself, “for it concerns Oronviel most of all. Sit.”

  He would have been happier, Thoromarth decided when she had finished the tale, never to know these things at all, though in the end it was as simple a matter as a border war between Ullilion and Caerthalien. The Chief Astromancer intrigued to make himself a power in the land. Lord Vieliessar feared Oronviel would become culpable for his deeds in the eyes of the Hundred Houses. She had taken steps to make it seem she and the Astromancer plotted together, and so avert attack upon Oronviel before she was ready to move.

  “I thank you for this word to me,” Thoromarth said.

  Unexpectedly, she laughed. It was neither bitter nor mocking, but full, and bright, and joyous.

  “No you do not, Lord Thoromarth! You wish I had never come to trouble you and fill your head with a thousand unthinkable things you must think about! Now you wonder what I will do next, and hope you do not know. But I have troubled your rest enough. And so I leave you in peace.”

  She got to her feet in a swish of silk, and before he could rise in deference, was out the door and gone. And suddenly Thoromarth hoped the Silver Hooves would grant him years enough to see Lord Vieliessar upon the Unicorn Throne, for he yearned to hear the squalls and protests of his fellow princes as she made a Code of Peace like the Code of Battle and held every soul in the land to its observance, whether they were of high birth or low

  Peace! Your reign brings a thousand gifts, Lord Vieliessar, but peace is not among them.

  * * *

  Lord Bolecthindial unrolled the map Lengiathion Warlord had prepared and spread it flat against the surface of his table. The drawing was so careful and detailed it might almost have been the thing itself, seen as a hawk upon the wing would see it. The map showed Caerthalien and the western lands as far as the Sanctuary. Ullilion’s defenses were painted in purple and saffron, Caerthalien’s in gold and green, Cirandeiron’s in blue and silver. The ruins of Farcarinon’s border keeps were sketched in a dull grey.

  In War Season, Caerthalien rode to war. Other Houses might refrain from sending challenges with their Midwinter envoys, might spend the summer moonturns battling the Beastlings—as did Daroldan or the domains of the East—or in hunting outlaws or putting down rebellion among their own lords, seeking to grow wealthy and strong by avoiding battle.

  Not Caerthalien. Caerthalien rode to war. Even last year, when Runacarendalur had led Caerthalien’s meisne against the Free Companies, Bolecthindial and his other sons had taken the field against their enemies. Each successful campaign brought wealt
h, and sometimes land, and often surrender-pledges from its defeated enemies. Among the twelve High Houses, only three had ever rivaled Caerthalien in wealth and power: Aramenthiali, Cirandeiron, and Farcarinon.

  Farcarinon was gone, and this season Lord Bolecthindial meant to take Ullilion from Cirandeiron. War Prince Dendinirchiel Ullilion held the southern border of Farcarinon, and Dendinirchiel looked to Cirandeiron. But between Ullilion and Cirandeiron lay the vast wilderness of Farcarinon. To come to Ullilion’s aid, Lord Girelrian would have to cross the whole of Farcarinon. It would give Caerthalien the advantage.

  And why should it not give us more than that? Farcarinon has lain fallow for a century. It is time for the true spoils of victory to be apportioned.

  If Caerthalien could force Ullilion to cede enough territory, Ullilion’s only recourse would be to expand her borders west and claim Farcarinon land. Censure for the act of claiming a part of Lost Farcarinon would fall on Dendinirchiel’s head, not Bolecthindial’s—and each season he could force Ullilion farther west, claiming always that he seized Ullilion lands, and not Farcarinon’s.

  And if the sight of Ullilion’s example made High Houses agree it was a ruinous danger to leave so great an area of land unclaimed, Caerthalien would benefit twice over, for by the agreement the Grand Alliance had made in Serenthon’s time, Caerthalien could claim the third part of Farcarinon if it were claimed at all.

  He turned to the report Elrinonion Swordmaster had prepared for him. Bolecthindial had little patience with sneaking about in the kitchens of his enemies, hoping someone would drop a word of their plans, but as Glorthiachiel was overfond of reminding him, if the enemy came to the field armored and weaponed, one did not bear away the victory by meeting them unarmed.

  He prepared to unroll Elrinonion’s scroll, then reached for his wine instead. Inevitably it would be more of what he had heard at the beginning of Storm, and at the middle of Storm, and at the beginning of Rain. It was further inevitable that Glorthiachiel knew it already.