by Helen Lowe
“It is necessary.” The priestess was unyielding. “I am not asking, Nhairin. By the Blood, I bid you go!” She did not wait for a reply but put up her hood and turned, stalking back into the concealing shadows. Nhairin cursed under her breath, but she too swung away.
It took her some time, after a terse conversation with Asantir, to find the Earl, and then she dared not disturb him. He was in the Hall of Silence, walking the long lines of their dead, his black armor hacked and dented and the pressure line from his helmet still livid across his forehead. His expression, as he walked the silent rows, was forbidding. Lannorth, the lieutenant of the Honor Guard, paced a careful distance behind him. Otherwise even Teron, the senior squire, hung back by the door, clutching the Earl’s visored helm and black shield.
Nhairin surveyed those present with a fleeting but comprehensive look from beneath lowered lids. Jiron, the Earl’s scribe, stood beside Teron, but both Haimyr and the Winter woman were absent. Nhairin shrugged inwardly. One could expect no better of outsiders: They were not Derai, after all. She moved to stand at Jiron’s shoulder and he turned his head with a quick, unhappy smile.
“Not good?” she murmured, and he shook his head.
“Very bad,” he replied, equally softly. “We have won the battle it seems, but at a bitter cost—and he knows now that the Heir is missing. There’s to be a council of war as soon as he’s paid his respects here.”
“Unfortunately, it’s going to get worse,” Nhairin muttered. Jiron looked reproving, and Teron scowled. She shrugged and folded her arms, wondering how to deliver what she knew would be a far from welcome message. Another thought intruded and she leaned closer to Jiron’s ear. “Where is the Winter woman? Surely she’s not been …?”
Jiron shook his head. “No. She was with the Earl throughout the fighting and did considerable damage with her bow and her beasts.” He shuddered, dropping his voice lower still. “Apparently there was a were-hunt with the attackers and her beasts took them on. Four hounds were slain and a wildcat badly wounded. She tends to it now but will join us for the council.”
Nhairin frowned sharply at Jiron’s mention of a were-hunt, but the Earl had turned and was striding toward them before she could ask more. She shot one quick look at his face and decided that her unwelcome message could wait; there was nothing worse than being the bearer of unwanted news. She limped in the Earl’s wake instead, trying to catch his conversation with Lannorth.
“I want Asantir here. Now! With Gerenth gone, we must have the Honor Captain at council.”
“I’m not sure—” Lannorth began, but the Earl cut him off.
“Find her, Lieutenant. And get her here. That’s all.”
Nhairin caught Lannorth’s eye as he summoned a runner. “She’s in the halls above the Heir’s wing, or gone on to the Temple quarter. They were hit hard there,” she added, watching for the Earl’s reaction, but his expression did not change although he lengthened his stride. Nhairin cursed silently, struggling to keep up.
The Earl’s private council chamber, like the larger and more formal Great Chamber that had once hosted conclaves of the nine Houses, adjoined the High Hall. The Great Chamber glittered with inlaid metal and precious gems, and gleamed with rare woods. The Little Chamber was plain by comparison, with a long table scarred by centuries of use and chairs that were worn and comfortable. It was also one of the few places in the keep with glazing, long skylights that looked directly onto the iron skies of the Wall. They were veined with metal and protected from the Wall’s blasting winds—and whatever rode them—by elaborate steel grilles, but still let in more natural light than was usual in the keep. Now a pallid daylight illuminated the faces of the Earl and his companions, showing up lines that had been graven overnight and the shadows left by too much horror and death.
The table was strewn with plans of both the New Keep and the Old and the Earl leaned both fists on the tabletop, studying them with a deep frown between his brows. There was a fire on the hearth and food set out on a side table, but nobody ate. Instead they gathered round the table, their frowns matching the Earl’s. Nhairin was the only one who went to warm herself by the fire, studying the room as guards came and went and the councilors gathered.
The chamberlain looked like he had not slept in a month, and the Master of Night’s messenger corps was staring woodenly at the tabletop. Khorion, the Lieutenant of the Gate, simply looked bleak. It must be hard, Nhairin supposed, when one expected to bear the brunt of any attack, to be tied to the main gate while a major battle was being fought inside the keep itself. She shrugged, turning away from the faces around the table and holding out her hands to the flames, which danced rose and orange in the grate.
“They are beautiful, are they not?” The voice that spoke was low, but very clear, and Nhairin looked around into Rowan Birchmoon’s face. The Winter woman’s expression was calm as a winter’s morning, but Nhairin noticed that she still carried her bow over one shoulder. A hound stood in her shadow, gazing at Nhairin with dark, warning eyes.
Nhairin shrugged again, a little sourly, because she had not noticed either the woman or the hound come in. “Very beautiful,” she said mechanically, although inwardly she did not think it mattered whether the flames were beautiful or not. Her own voice sounded harsh as a crow’s and seemed to distract those around the table.
The Earl looked up, but his gaze went straight to Rowan Birchmoon, its dark austerity softening into something close to warmth. “How is your beast?” he asked.
Rowan Birchmoon shook her head. “She may live, if the gods are kind.”
“Ay.” His voice was somber. “It has been a night for the Silent God. We must trust that the day will belong to Meraun, the Healer.” His dark gaze thrust past her. “Nhairin,” he said, a recognition but also a question, as if wondering why she alone had nothing to report.
Now, thought Nhairin, would be the time for me to speak up, deliver Korriya’s message. She began to marshal her words, but before she could speak there was a sudden clamor from the hall outside. A moment later the doors swung wide to admit Asantir, her helm tucked under one arm and blood staining the rough wadding on her shoulder. Haimyr the Golden slipped through in her wake as the Earl’s dark, measuring gaze swung to meet his Honor Captain. “At last!” the Earl said.
The chamberlain leaned forward. “Ay, your report is vital, Captain. There’s so much we need to know. Is the keep yet secure? And the Heir—has she been found?”
“The New Keep,” Asantir said, speaking to the Earl, “is secure. The invaders were cleared from the Heir’s quarter by dawn and we’ve now been right through the Temple precinct and the surrounding areas as well. Only a handful of the attackers survived to flee into the Old Keep, but what reinforcements they may have there, I cannot say.” She made to shrug, then stopped as fresh blood seeped through the wadded bandage. “We have secured every portal between the two keeps, but our losses have been heavy. There are just no troops to spare for the Old Keep yet.” She paused, her eyes steady as they met the Earl’s. “You received my dispatch regarding Commander Gerenth’s death?’
The Earl nodded. “I did. And I endorse your decision to take command of the keep garrison.” His fingers rapped on the tabletop. “We have much to thank you for, it seems, not least that you had the Honor Guard out on special maneuvers last night.”
Nhairin’s brows rose, for she had not known this, but Asantir shook her head as though disclaiming any special merit. “It helped, my lord, that we were on the ramparts, rather than in the barracks asleep. But the ramparts are too far from where the invasion occurred. If the alarm had not been given, the fact that we were armed and wakeful up there would not have mattered until it was too late.” She paused again. “Given that we were the first to respond, the toll on the Honor Guard has been heavy. In the short term, we may have to augment your guard with troops from the keep garrison.”
The Earl nodded. “Do whatever you think necessary, Captain.” His gaze grew hard again, sea
rching hers. “But you have not mentioned the Heir. Does no one have any idea where she is, or might be?”
Not “Malian,” thought Nhairin, or “my daughter,” but “the Heir.” She bent to rub her aching leg, concealing her expression.
“We have scoured the New Keep, hunting out enemies and searching for Lady Malian.” Asantir’s gaze never left the Earl’s. “She is not here, my lord. I believe she is in the Old Keep, that she fled there during the attack.”
“Under the circumstances,” Haimyr murmured, “not good news.” He was standing with one golden shoulder propped against the wall and the Earl shot him a brief, cold glance before swinging back to Asantir.
“Fled, or been taken forcibly,” he demanded, “since all reports suggest that the intruders came via the Old Keep?”
“My lord, I don’t believe she has been taken prisoner.” Carefully, the captain repeated the arguments she had advanced to Nhairin amidst the wreckage of the invaders’ last stand, but the Earl’s frown did not lift.
“Nevertheless,” he said finally, “we must find out for certain what the facts are, whether the Heir has fled or been taken prisoner—” He paused. “Whether she is alive or dead. We must locate her—and quickly. I am relying on you, Asantir!”
The Honor Captain nodded. “I have already sent to Storm Hold for wyr hounds,” she replied. “But it will be days before they arrive. Malian cannot wait that long, not if she is in the Old Keep with what’s left of the attackers. And we cannot leave you and the New Keep unprotected.” She frowned. “In the end, we may not have the numbers to do more than scout out the Old Keep. We also risk losing those scouts, if the enemy has anything in reserve.”
The Earl studied her, his black eyes unreadable. Nhairin cleared her throat. “What I don’t understand,” she said, her voice harsh again as all the faces around the table turned in her direction, “is how they could have gotten into the Old Keep in the first place? It’s supposed to be the very heart, the most unassailable source, of Night’s power. Yet these intruders came through it unscathed. No alarm was sounded until everyone in the Heir’s quarter, and a great many in the Temple precinct, were already dead. But who were, or are, these intruders? How could this possibly have happened? And who did finally activate the alarms?”
“All good questions,” said Asantir, “but we, it seems, have too few answers.”
“I cannot answer your questions either, Nhairin,” Haimyr put in lazily. “But I can tell you all that Malian is not in the Old Keep’s High Hall, or in the Hall of Mirrors above it. They have been her favorite hideaways of late, but there is no sign of her in either place.”
The Earl’s brows had drawn together while Haimyr spoke. “Of late?” he inquired ominously. “What do you mean, ‘of late’?” His terrible stare shifted to include everyone in the room. “Am I to understand that my daughter has been going into the Old Keep, which is forbidden, and that some or all of you knew yet did nothing about it?”
Only Haimyr and the Honor Captain seemed unperturbed by his wrath. The minstrel was concentrating on brushing dust from his golden cuff, but Asantir met the Earl’s stare, her gauntleted hands resting quietly on the buckle of her sword belt. “I think we all knew it, myself included,” she replied gravely. “Yet every keep child and new recruit has to go there at least once as a rite of passage—and Malian is your daughter, after all.”
Nhairin shook her head, watching the Earl and remembering how they had run wild in the Old Keep when they were children, laughing at the rumors of ghosts.
The Earl drew a deep breath and the hard-won control closed down over his face again. “It seems,” he said, his voice devoid of expression, “that there is much I do not know, even in my own keep.” He studied the minstrel again. “So you went in there alone, with the attack barely over and the garrison still standing to arms?”
The chamberlain clicked his tongue. “Individual heroics!” he said, only half beneath his breath.
The minstrel glanced at him, a sideways look that was hard to read. “It seemed like a good idea at the time,” he said, with the faintest of shrugs.
Asantir shook her head. “It was bravely done, but not wise. Those intruders showed no mercy to anyone else; they would not have spared you.”
The minstrel smiled at her. “But they did not find me, my careful Captain, so all is well. And now I have reduced your search area, if only by a little.”
“So you have,” she agreed, turning back to the Earl. “But not, alas, by much. My lord, we will do all that we can, and more. But the Old Keep is a vast place and a thorough search will require numbers, which we do not have.”
The Earl looked bleak and the room was silent except for the fire’s hiss and the moan of the wind outside.
“What we need,” Jiron murmured, “is a seeker.” He looked up from the scroll he was unrolling, then rerolling again, to find them all staring at him. “Well,” he said, half shamefaced, half defiant, “it is what we need. You can’t deny it.”
“Well, we don’t have one,” the Earl said shortly. “We haven’t had any seekers for generations.”
“Besides,” said Khorion, speaking for the first time, “half the Temple quarter is dead now anyway, from what I hear, and the rest in no condition to use whatever old powers they still have.”
Silence fell again. Everyone in the room had heard the stories from the Temple quarter and now they avoided looking at each other. Although there would be some, Nhairin knew, who secretly considered what had happened there a good thing. She looked up and met the Earl’s eyes.
“Nhairin?” he asked, for the second time that morning.
There could be no more delaying. Nhairin relayed Korriya’s demand, without trying to soften the words, then waited for the Earl’s explosion of wrath. She was more than surprised when it did not come. The Earl merely sat down, looking thoughtful. “Korriya, eh?” he said eventually, in a tone that matched his expression. Teron, standing a few paces behind him, looked outraged, and the councilors around the table disapproving.
“Right of Kin and Blood,” the Earl said, as though thinking aloud. “If she has gone that far, it must be important. I cannot refuse, in any case.”
“My lord Earl!” the chamberlain protested, “surely you will not let her come here. The Blood Oath, the law!” He shook his head in dismay.
“The gate,” the Earl said dryly, “is already broken, from what I hear, and I am certainly not going there so that my First Kinswoman can shout at me across its ruin. It is my decision,” he added softly, “and does not breach the Oath, that I can recall.”
“But tradition—” the chamberlain began, then fell silent at the look in his Earl’s eye.
“She has claimed Right of Kin and Blood,” the Earl repeated, “and that lies at the heart of both our law and our traditions.”
“First and oldest,” Asantir murmured, into their silence. Everyone stared at her and she shrugged, wincing slightly at the movement. “Well, it’s true, is it not?” She turned to the Earl. “I was going to the Temple quarter anyway, so after Nhairin spoke with me I took the liberty of escorting your kinswoman here. It seemed to me,” she added deliberately, “that if the matter was that important it should be expedited, and if you did not wish to see her, well then”—she gave another, very small shrug—“the priestess could be escorted back again just as easily. She is waiting outside now.”
So the clamor in the hall had not just been for Asantir’s arrival, after all. Nhairin shook her head as the councilors gaped at the Honor Captain. Even the Earl’s face was a mask as he studied her, but finally he gave a short nod. “You are bold, Asantir,” he said, “but that, after all, is one of the reasons I made you Honor Captain.” His fingers drummed briefly on the table. “You had better show her in, then.” He spoke calmly, as if it was an everyday occurrence and not the first time such a thing had happened in five hundred years.
As if, thought Nhairin, the world hasn’t been turned upside down enough! She felt the a
che in her leg again, sharp and bitter, as she looked around the room. The chamberlain still looked outraged, Khorion was frowning, and Teron stared glumly at his feet as Asantir went to the door. Jiron looked down at the table, and Antiron at the wall. Haimyr lifted his brows in delicate inquiry but otherwise looked unperturbed—as he would, being an outsider. Nhairin did not even bother looking at Rowan Birchmoon, knowing that the Winter woman would distance herself from such events, as she always did.
The door reopened to admit Asantir and Korriya’s tall, robed figure. The priestess lifted her hood back as she entered, her exhaustion and grief plain for all to see. Nhairin could not entirely repress a flicker of admiration for her straightness and calm in that circle of hostile eyes, and the austere dignity of her bow as she greeted the Earl of Night.
“Korriya,” said the Earl of Night, although he did not return her bow. He paused, then added, “It has been a long time.”
The priestess inclined her head. “I would not impose on you now,” she replied, “except that necessity demands it.”
The Earl’s eyes narrowed. “Claiming Right of Kin and Blood generally suggests necessity. Anything less would be unacceptable given the circumstances.” The flick of danger was there beneath the quiet tone, but Korriya remained calm.
“It is also,” she said, “a Matter of Blood.”
There was an instant outcry but the Earl made a sharp gesture, quelling the raised voices. “Those you see here, Priestess Korriya, are my household and my councilors. It is their right to advise me.”
“I speak of a Matter of Blood,” Korriya repeated, “and that is the first and oldest right amongst the Derai.”
When the Earl spoke his voice was reflective. “And who will uphold any other law or right if I, who am Earl of the first and oldest House, will not uphold you now?” But his look, measuring her, was not friendly. “You were always clever, Korriya. I remember it well. But do not push me too far.”
She said nothing, simply waited, and after a moment he nodded. “So be it. I accept your Matter of Blood.”
