The Mirror Prince

by Malan, Violette

  “As always, Daughter of Dragons, thou speak’st truly, and thy words are as a sword.”

  “I will be guided by you in this as in other things.” Max bowed, spreading his arms wide. “It is not our intention to intrude on your spaces for long.”

  “It is well. Your father awaits you.”

  The Natural’s words died away into a silence so still that for a moment Cassandra thought she had once again lost the ability to process sound, as she had when standing next to the Tarn of Souls. Then she realized that she could hear her heartbeat, her breath as she drew it in.

  It was Trere’if which had fallen silent. The Great Wood was poised between one breath and the next, listening.

  “Go, Guardian,” the Natural said. “Take your friends and go. Now. The Hunt comes. It enters my Sunward borders. The Hunt comes.”

  Cassandra drew her sword and motioned to Moon to stand on her left side. It felt strange not to automatically protect Max, but even out of practice he was armed and in gra’if and better able to defend himself than Moon could ever be.

  “Go,” Trere’if said again. “The Hunt will not stay within my borders if you are not here.”

  “Will you be safe from it?” Max said, his sword still in his hand.

  “Nothing is safe from the Hunt,” the Natural said. “But then, the same may be said of the Great Wood. Leave us, take the paths we show you. We will deal with this old enemy in our own way.”

  “Is he very angry?” Moon kept her voice down as they passed through the Wood.

  Cassandra looked up but suppressed her amused response when she saw her sister’s face. “He’s worried about his friends,” she said. “And he’s wondering what to do next.”

  Moon nodded, but she didn’t look convinced. There were very few noises now in the Great Wood, but even the wind in the branches was enough to make Moon start and look around her, to the annoyance of her mount. She kept twisting the fingers of one hand in the other, as if her hands were cold and she was trying to warm them.

  Cassandra looked ahead to where Max led them along the paths that formed before them as they rode.

  “If I thought you would believe me,” she said to her sister, “I would tell you that all will be well.”

  “His goal is death,” Moon whispered.

  Cassandra leaned over and squeezed her sister’s hands. “ ‘The way of the warrior is death,’ ” she quoted. “That doesn’t mean that the warrior seeks death out.”

  “Then what does it mean?”

  “It means that the warrior is not motivated by the fear of death. Death comes for everyone, and the warrior neither runs toward it nor flees from it. You cannot turn him from his path, nor make him break his oaths by threatening to kill him. You can kill a warrior, but you cannot make him afraid to die.”

  “And will he let his friends die? Will he let his beloved die?”

  Cassandra looked at her sister with sadness. “Each must choose his own path,” she said. “We are not all warriors.” And that, unsatisfactory as it might be, was the only answer she had.

  Chapter Seventeen

  THEY RODE OUT FROM the sunshine under the last of the Trees of Trere’if into a cold fall day, overcast and gloomy, a chill wind blowing old dried leaves across their path. Max looked behind him and the Wood was gone, lost in mist. Well, that was one way to deal with the Hunt, he supposed.

  “We greet you, Prince Guardian.”

  Two Moonward Riders—Wild by their battered leather clothing—appeared from behind a rocky outcrop, on foot, armed with bows and short swords, with daggers at their belts. They pushed back their hoods with identical graceful motions and revealed gra’if helms with the shapes of Unicorns.

  “You are known to me,” Max said, a smile forming on his face. “Wings of Cloud and Bird in Flight, sons of the same mother.”

  The twin Riders looked at each other and grinned.

  “Trere’if gave us word of your coming. If you would attend upon us, my lord Prince,” they said in unison, “we will bring you to Blood on the Snow.”

  Max nodded, gesturing the twins forward. He remembered meeting with his father at the Turquoise Ring, remembered how the older Rider’s look of shadowy disappointment had been quickly covered by the impassive mask of the soldier. Max no longer needed Lightborn to tell him the story of his life, but he thought about that telling now, and the feelings that the human Max Ravenhill had felt. As Dawntreader, he had long forgiven his father—in fact, it had never occurred to him that there had been anything to forgive. His mother’s death was no one’s fault, and as for his early life . . . he glanced at Cassandra, listening to the chatter of one of the twins who walked beside her Cloud Horse, and pretending that she couldn’t tell them apart. He’d meant it when he’d said that he couldn’t complain about anything that had brought him to this moment. There had been darkness, and struggles, but he had come through them, and he was content with where he was now. Who he was now. He grinned at the irony in that thought. That’s exactly the point that Max Ravenhill had arrived at in his life.

  But having lived his human lives, Max thought, he now had a different basis for comparison, and he thought he knew what the problem with Blood on the Snow really was. It wasn’t his son’s forgiveness Blood needed, but his own. He had never forgiven himself for his wife’s death, and that grief had created a gulf between them. As a young Rider, Dawntreader had sensed this gulf, but not understanding its source, his attempts to bridge it had been clumsy, and ultimately futile. Max understood it very well, and shook his head over lost time. Perhaps, having no fara’ips, no natural intuitive bonds with each other, humans learned the whys and where-fores of relationships in a way that Riders never could.

  The Wild Riders had set up their camp where a fall of rock and a grouping of old pines created a sheltered area under the shoulder of a hill. From between the rocks ran a trickle of fresh water that had formed into a small pool. Max smiled to see a Water Sprite, all pale greens, splashing in the water and laughing with a young Rider dressed haphazardly in the colors of a Singer who knelt close to the pool’s edge. Max had seen dozens of such temporary encampments before he became Guardian, on those occasions when his father had taken him Riding from Honor of Souls’ house. There was little more than a fire pit dug and lined with found stone, a few skin tents pitched for privacy under the trees. Wild Riders were the nomads of the Lands, carrying little with them, and never staying more than a few nights in one place. They were always on the Move.

  As they rode closer in, Max saw other Riders mixed in with the Wild troop, many whose worn leathers were mixed with clothing in scarlet and saffron. Windwatcher’s men, he realized. It was several of these Riders who rushed forward, smiling and saluting, to take the bridles of their horses. Max grinned and returned their salutes with a wave of his hand, finding himself a little embarrassed. Many of the faces around him were familiar, but his eyes searched until they found the figure of Blood on the Snow, tall, rail thin, in the rough and dusty leathers which were the only clothing Max had ever seen him in. Blood turned from the small group of Riders he was speaking to and looked toward them. He did not smile, but Max thought he saw a lessening of tension in the way the older Rider stood. Max swung off his horse before his father could move, determined to meet him when they were both on foot, and therefore on equal ground. He had to do this just right, or the coolness between them that even Lightborn remembered would never be defeated.

  As Max neared him, Blood’s lips parted, but before he could speak the formal words of welcome, Max took his father in his arms. His grip was harsher, more sudden than he intended, and the gra’if of both Riders hardened for a moment, as if at a blow. But they were of the same blood, and the same mind, and their gra’if finally softened and relaxed as Blood’s arms came up around his son, and they held each other, heart to heart, until their trembling stopped.

  It took Cassandra a second to recognize Windwatcher in the tough old leathers of a Wild Rider, his gra’if—a mail shi
rt, a dagger, a single gauntlet and vambrace covering his right arm—an obvious and gleaming contrast. The older Rider made his way to her side through the Wild Riders who were very studiously not watching their leader greet his son. “He is restored, then?”

  Cassandra turned more fully toward him. At this moment, she, too, was glad to look away from the father and son.

  “He is,” she said.

  “Has he the Talismans? There is precious little time.”

  “Of course, you have not heard?”

  The older Rider grimaced, and Cassandra saw with concern his tired face grow grayer, and the shadows under his eyes darken.

  “I have heard news I never thought to hear,” he rumbled. “There is more?”

  Cassandra told Windwatcher the whereabouts of the Talismans with a hesitant voice, reluctant to burden him further, but to her surprise he started to laugh.

  “So what the Basilisk seeks has been under his hand all this while.” He shook his head. “By the Wards, we are the toys of chance, that is certain.” He looked at her from under lowered brows. “What is the Guardian’s plan? Is there still time, before the Sun’s turning, to find the Talismans? Find them and bring them away?”

  “If he cannot . . .”

  “Yes. Then the end has come, Sword of Truth. We win or we die. If we die, the Lands die with us.”

  “I fear I have other news,” Cassandra said. “Is Honor of Souls also among the company? I must tell her what it will grieve her greatly to hear.”

  At that the older Rider drew himself upright. “Grieve her, you say? More than the loss of Griffinhome? Yes, it is gone. The Hunt was loosed there, and finding little prey, for Honor of Souls and much of her household had fled, put the fortress to the fire, and cleansed the Land.”

  Cassandra gripped Windwatcher’s arm, his gra’if gauntlet stiff and hard under her own metalled hand.

  “Does Lightborn know where she hides?”

  “She waits with a company of my soldiers, but—”

  “Windwatcher!” Cassandra could barely keep herself from shaking the man. “Lightborn has gone to the Basilisk!”

  This was the news that made the old Rider stagger. Cassandra had him around the waist, his arm across her shoulders before he could go down.

  “It cannot be,” he growled, halfway to tears. “And you thought this news would merely grieve her?”

  “Some warning must be sent,” Cassandra said, feeling in the squaring of his shoulders how her words gave Windwatcher purpose.

  “There is little time,” he said, his gruff voice strong again. “I will send one of my own guard, but we must hope that Lightborn does not know.”

  After she had seen Windwatcher safe with his own men, Cassandra joined Max where he crouched beside Blood on the Snow, both men looking over the map that Max had drawn from Blood’s description on a smooth patch of dirt. Riders had no need for maps, but the older man caught at the idea quickly, fascinated by the concept. They were much alike, father and son, Cassandra thought, both raven-haired, fine-boned, long-faced, and both with the same thin, slightly hooked nose. Max must have his mother’s jade-green eyes, for his father’s were gray as ash, and her full, mobile mouth, but the thing that really set them apart was Blood’s evident age. His health was good, Cassandra saw, but in this light his hair was more silver than black, there were visible lines on his face, and his skin was the color of old bone.

  In a way, this man was now her father-in-law, Cassandra realized, doubly part of her fara’ip. At that moment, he looked up and smiled, and there again Cassandra saw his resemblance to Max.

  “Greetings to you, Sword of Truth.” Blood on the Snow took her hand and held it to his forehead in the old way of showing obligation. “My thanks for the restoration of my son and Prince.”

  “It was my task,” she said, the old formal response coming to mind just in time. She bowed her head over their still-joined hands. When she straightened, it was to see Blood’s eyes wide, focused on the Phoenix torque around her throat. It wasn’t until he smiled that she was aware how tense she had become.

  “You became my fara’ip when the Troll Hearth of the Wind joined you to us,” the old Rider said. “Have you now become my daughter?”

  Cassandra cleared her throat. “I have.”

  “I am old, my days at court are long behind me, else I would have words pretty enough to tell you how much I am pleased.”

  Cassandra blinked, breathing carefully and tilting back her head a little to prevent her tears from falling.

  “And your sister? I am sure she rejoices also.”

  She looked around her now and saw that Moon was being entertained by the Moonward twins, who had managed between them to make Moon smile. She still wasn’t sure what Moon felt. They had not been alone since they arrived at Max’s tower, and Cassandra hadn’t found the right moment to speak to her.

  “Give her time, Truthsheart,” Blood said, interpreting her silence easily. “Her whole world changes.”

  Cassandra nodded and forced a smile. She knew that what Blood said was true, but she wasn’t very comforted by it. She was glad to let Blood’s voice draw her attention back to the map.

  “Let me call one who has been most recently in the Citadel,” Blood was saying as he signaled to one of the Wild Riders hovering near them, who quickly returned with a young Starward Rider. She wore Singer’s colors, Cassandra saw, but they were made up of bits and pieces of clothing, some very clearly belonging to other, larger Riders. The leggings beneath her tunic were the magenta Cassandra knew to be the Basilisk Prince’s color.

  “This is Twilight Falls Softly,” Blood said, drawing the young Singer closer to the map with a beckoning hand. “She came to us from the Basilisk’s Citadel only a short time ago, and can tell us what we need to know.”

  The Singer frowned over the map as it was explained to her, looking up finally with a smile that brought color to her pale cheeks and brightened the turquoise of her eyes.

  “This is like the thing they call ‘writing,’ yes? Have you—no.” She held up her hands. “I have too many questions, and all must await a better time and place.” She studied what Max had drawn for a few minutes before speaking.

  “The whole of the Vale,” she said finally, “except for these sections, here and here,” she pointed with the tip of a dagger, “has been transformed, either into the Citadel itself, or into part of the Garden that surrounds it.”

  “So the walls of the Citadel are here, here, and here?” Max frowned. “The Vale itself has not changed shape?”

  “Not if you have drawn truly,” agreed Twilight. “But the Talismans need not be within the Citadel proper in order to be behind walls.” She rested back on her heels. “The Garden is made up of miniature versions of the Lands. The Walls were not yet in place when I escaped, but they may be now—the Basilisk would not say when exactly, nor for what he waited, only ‘soon’—and it was said that once in place, only the Basilisk himself can cross these walls without Moving, and it is only from his tower study,” Twilight touched her upper lip with the tip of her tongue before bringing her dagger point down again, “this point here, that all the Garden can be seen.”

  “A frontal assault is therefore out of the question,” Blood said.

  “Moving into the Garden is a waste of time,” Cassandra said. “Even if we knew the place well enough to Move, if these Walls are up, we’d have to keep jumping from section to section . . .” she shook her head and turned to Twilight Falls Softly. “How did you get away?”

  “It was my plan to walk,” the younger Rider said, with an embarrassed half smile on her lips. “I had no idea of the real distance. Fortunately, I found a Water Sprite who also wanted to leave, and she brought me with her through the ways of the Naturals.”

  “There is more to her story than she tells you,” Blood said, smiling broadly, “but that, too, must wait a better time and place.”

  “Are they together? The Talismans?” Cassandra looked across the map a
t Max. “Maybe we won’t need to Move much.”

  “I put them in the Cave of Sighs, but,” Max shook his head, his raven hair falling into his eyes. “I can’t see where it should be.”

  “Don’t think the Rider way,” Cassandra told him, “think the human way. If you had a map of the old Vale, and you superimposed it over this one . . .”

  Max looked at her with raised eyebrows and the beginnings of a smile. Without even looking at the map scratched in the dirt, he brought his index finger down on a spot left of center.

  “Here.”

  “Within the Citadel itself, then,” Blood said.

  “Allowing for windage,” Max said smiling. “They may have drifted a bit, but that is more or less where they’ll be.”