by Melanie Rawn
The boy said nothing. Idalian put away pen and ink, avoiding Yarin’s eyes. The new regent shrugged to himself and left the room.
“How could you!” Idalian hissed as soon as the outer door had closed.
“I couldn’t do anything else! What if I refused? He’d lock me up anyway, and you, too, and probably kill us the way he killed poor Arpali!” Tirel’s voice broke and he flung himself onto his bed.
Ashamed of himself, Idalian sat beside the young prince and patted his shoulder awkwardly. “I’m sorry. You did the right thing. I’ve heard tales of wicked uncles before, but Yarin is a snake!”
“He’s worse than a snake,” Tirel mumbled into his pillow. “He’s so horrible I can’t think what to call him.”
Idalian had a much larger vocabulary, but didn’t contribute any of the choice characterizations Yarin embodied. Instead he told the prince, “At least when they decide it’s safe, we’ll be able to move about the castle.”
“Idalian, I’m scared.”
“I know. It shouldn’t be too long—you made sure Yarin thinks he’s in complete control. He’ll get overconfident and make a mistake somewhere.”
“I hope he lets me out for my birthday,” he said forlornly.
Idalian froze. “What? Say that again.”
“My birthday? It’s the thirty-fifth.”
“And you’ll be seven. Glorious great Goddess, Tirel, you’re going to be seven!” Idalian picked him up and hugged him.
“Put me down!” He squirmed away. “What are you talking about?”
The young man grinned. “You know how the High Prince keeps changing things? Your father has me read the law books out loud. He says it helps him think and it also teaches me. Well, there’s a law that didn’t get changed last Rialla, that goes back to when people used to make children sign apprenticeships and betrothals, that kind of thing. Prince Rohan wanted to raise the age limit. But the crafters couldn’t agree on an age, so it didn’t get changed. The point,” he finished as Tirel made an impatient face, “is that you have to be ten to sign anything and have it be legally binding!”
“So Uncle Yarin’s document is meaningless?”
“Exactly! Once we’re free, we can figure out some way to stop him.”
Tirel brightened, tears and panic forgotten. Idalian kept his smile steady and his worries to himself. He knew how feeble the hope was, but the child had to have something to live on.
But the little face took on an adult grimness. “There’s one thing I will sign, Idalian, and make it legal. Uncle Yarin’s death warrant.”
• • •
At New Raetia, Rohannon came back from a morning patrol and was surprised to find Prince Arlis waiting for him.
“I know—you thought me still at Port Adni,” said the ruler of Kierst-Isel. “But the ships will stay in harbor for quite some time yet. There’s a storm coming—again. So I thought I’d spend a few days here.”
They climbed the broad, polished stone staircase to what had been Volog’s private retreat, a cozy room lined with tapestries. A fire blazed in the huge hearth and a fenath stood in one corner. Arlis went to it, stroked a finger over the inlaid wood patterned with birds.
“Nobody in my family has the slightest sense of music,” he remarked, plucking a string. The note quivered for a long time. “Except for my aunt Birani. I heard her play when I was a little boy. Aunt Alasen says she lost her music when Obram died—the way Ostvel did, until Alasen brought it back to him.” Glancing around the chamber, his Kierstian green eyes filled with sudden pain. “They’re all gone now, except Alasen. I can’t even feel their presence here anymore.”
Rohannon said nothing. A young page peeked in the door and Rohannon motioned him away.
“I love this room almost as much as Grandsir did,” Arlis went on softly. “Of them all, it’s hardest to believe he’s dead. Part of me wants to keep this room just as it is . . . the way they kept Birani’s fenath. But Rohan told me once that when I became prince of Kierst and Isel, everything would change—everything must change. That’s what I was trained to do.” He smiled bitterly. “I doubt even Rohan in all his wisdom could have guessed that this island that tore itself apart with wars for so long would one day be united by a war.”
“United by you, your grace,” Rohannon said firmly, and Arlis gave him the sharp, assessing look familiar to him from seeing it in Sioned’s green eyes.
“You’re growing some wisdom of your own, Rohannon,” the prince replied, then smiled more easily. “As well as a handspan in height. I didn’t ask you here to listen to me feel sorry for myself. How good are you at Sunrunning?”
“Not very, my lord,” he apologized. “My father’s been teaching me—but at such a distance, it’s hard.”
Arlis frowned. “What about the court Sunrunner here? Why isn’t she—?”
Rohannon hesitated a long moment, then shrugged and told the truth. “She’s very loyal to my Uncle Andry, who says that all Sunrunners must be taught at Goddess Keep.”
“Or not at all,” Arlis finished in disgust. “Another of his stupid opinions.”
“Begging your pardon, my lord, but it’s always been that way. Until Pol.”
The prince cleared his throat. “Forgive me, Rohannon. My own loyalty to Pol makes me cast Andry in a darker light than he perhaps deserves. And I often forget he’s your father’s brother. Well, if you can’t speak on sunlight yet without someone steadying you, then can you go looking as you like?”
“If the sun’s strong enough. I’ve been keeping track of our patrols when I can, but I’m not practiced enough to do things like guess the weather.”
“I have someone else to do that for me. I want to know some very selfish things, Rohannon.”
The youth understood at once. “As it happens, my lord, I had a look in at Zaldivar just this morning.” He smiled, both at the remembered scene and for the laugh it would give Arlis. “Roric and Hanella were swiping the new baby off with a feather duster, for all the world as if he was a table decoration!”
Laughter belonged in this room. Arlis told him how Roric, two winters Hanella’s senior, once asked his nurse why she didn’t just send his little sister down to be washed with the rest of the dirty laundry. Rohannon countered with the time he and Chayla had attempted the exploding fish bladder trick that was practically a family tradition by now, having been tried by their father and Pol, and learned, it was hinted, from the redoubtable Lord Chaynal of Radzyn himself.
“My brother had a knack with citrins rather like that—he punctured the rinds with needles and dripped in Goddess alone knew what. He hid them while they fermented, slipped them into his tutor’s closets, and after another day or two—” He laughed. “Saumer never did confess to that one.”
“I might be able to find him, if there’s enough sun over the Catha Hills,” Rohannon offered.
“Could you?” Arlis sounded almost wistful, and Rohannon heard the echo of his words about keeping things as they had been.
“I’ll try, my lord.” He went to windows overlooking a forested cliff, the sea beyond, and the graceful curve of the harbor. The fleet was at Port Adni, a crown holding since Lord Narat’s death at Waes this autumn, and it was odd not to see at least fifty ships at the docks. Rohannon opened the window and felt the sun on his face, and carefully wove the brilliant threads of light.
Across Brochwell Bay, so wide that he almost lost sight of land; over the farmlands of Grib and the dark rippling waters of Lake Kadar, white-capped in the wind; a moment’s pause to find Athmyr and use it as a directional guide. He wasn’t as good at this as he ought to be; he strayed too far south, to the tangled estuaries where the Catha River emptied into the sea. Backtracking upriver, he stopped in shock at Catha Heights.
A pyre was burning outside the walls—the large, tragic kind used in war or pestilence, when dozens were honored at once. Warriors wearing Syrene turquoise and common folk in mourning gray stood watch. What startled Rohannon was that what he at first
took for one pyre was in fact five—and that there were so many dead that flames lit last night were still burning at midday.
There must have been a battle. After a moment of panic he realized that the Syrenes had won, or Kostas’ people would not be standing guard over the pyres. Rohannon searched for Kostas and his squires, but couldn’t find them.
Catching his breath—only figuratively, for his body back at New Raetia did not react—he moved to the castle itself. Relief sparkled through his colors as he recognized the two squires in the main square. Saumer, distinguished by the yellow and scarlet belt that signified his homeland, had one arm in a sling but otherwise looked unharmed. Rihani’s leg was tightly bandaged, and his blue eyes looked stunned as he limped forward to consult with Saumer.
Crafters were busy building what looked like another pyre. But this one had carrying poles attached, as if the body was to be taken somewhere else. A woman knelt by one end, her paintbox beside her—and the pot she dipped into again and again as she decorated the carved handles was filled with Syrene turquoise.
Rohannon felt cold dread darken his own colors. It was confirmed by the turquoise velvet another woman shook out for inspection. Saumer and Rihani both felt the fabric, and then Rihani beckoned someone else over to give the woman a battle flag bearing Syr’s silver apple, obviously to be copied in embroidery on the shroud.
Saumer glanced up suddenly, frowning. It seemed that he looked directly into Rohannon’s eyes. Traces of Arlis were in that face—the lines of brow and jaw were almost identical—but instead of green his eyes were dark brown, like their father Latham’s. All at once it was like seeing the dead prince all over again in his son. But there was something else in that face—or, rather of it.
Rohannon glided back to the window of Prince Volog’s favorite room.
“My lord, did you know your brother is a Sunrunner?”
• • •
Tallain surveyed what was to have been his troops’ rations and couldn’t think of a single reason to keep his temper in check. The town baker, whose responsibility it was to provision Tiglath in times of war, was already apoplectic that the loaves had been botched. Tallain now favored him with his blistering views on masters who left such vital work to inexperienced apprentices while he downed a few sociable cups of wine at a nearby inn.
“And Goddess help you if I discover those boys used weeviled flour on your order, thinking no one would notice until we were halfway to Cunaxa! You’ll mix the next batch yourself, Master Baker, and use the finest, softest, most expensive Ossetian grind in your barrels—or I’ll stoke your ovens with you!”
Swinging around in the hot, narrow confines of the bakery, he gestured his cousin forward. “Lady Lyela will supervise your work. By dusk I want the loaves delivered to me, and they’d damned well better be perfect!”
Lyela fixed the man with her large, fine dark eyes, smiling with uncharacteristic fierceness. “He understands you, my lord—doesn’t he?” The baker gulped and nodded. Lyela spread her skirts elegantly and sat on a stool near the door. “I’ll just stay here where it’s cool, and you carry on as if you were baking for the High Prince’s own table.”
Seething, Tallain left the shop. No one dared so much as nod respect to him as he stalked back to the residence. Once inside the main doors, he bellowed his wife’s name. When she did not reply instantly, he shouted again. “Goddess damn it all—Sionell! Get down here! Sionell!”
He should have known better. His lady would not cower like the baker, nor follow orders like Lyela. She gave as good as she got.
“Put a bridle on that foul-mouthed stallion before I make him a gelding!”
Tallain strode to the bottom steps and gripped the carved wooden bouquet of the finial. “You heard me! Move! I won’t be gainsaid in my own holding!”
She appeared on the upper landing, hands on hips, sweaty from a day of backbreaking preparations for war. “Take your temper outside and soak it in a horse trough! Drown in it for all I care!”
He took the stairs three at a time. But once within arm’s reach of her, his fury drained away. Sionell possessed all the fire usually accompanying a head of red hair, but suddenly all the bright, vivid colors of her seemed—not tarnished, for that could never happen, but as if weariness had faded them beneath the flush of her anger. Tallain stood before her, tongue-tied, abashed, and wondering how he’d been such a fool as to take his frustrations out on her.
She was not so quick to relinquish her wrath. “If you can’t speak like a civilized person, then get out of my sight! How dare you come roaring in here?”
“I’m sorry.”
She’d flinched at his first shout, wondering what new disaster was upon them. His second had snapped her already overstrained nerves. But hearing those two words reminded her that Tallain was surely unique among men: he never hesitated to admit when he’d been wrong.
She struggled with lingering annoyance, then gave it over with a shrug. If he could be magnanimous, so could she. Besides, now that he wasn’t shouting at her, she saw how tired he was and her heart twisted. “I’m sorry, too. What happened?”
“Weeviled flour. Every damned loaf. We can’t march out with nothing to eat. What about you?”
“Rabisa hasn’t said a word in two days and Siona’s sickening for something, I’m not sure what.”
“And?” he prompted.
“And what?”
“You’re exhausted.” Tallain caressed her cheek with one finger.
She didn’t particularly want to tell him right now that some of the Dorvali who’d elected to stay at Tiglath had given her a hellish morning with their complaints. Or that the section of wall Tallain had ordered rebuilt would not be finished before he left. She’d worked on it herself after ordering the Dorvali to help or get out, but instead of exhausting her anger in physical labor, she’d only exhausted her body.
She closed her eyes, knowing the action was a mistake. As long as she kept going, she would be able to keep going. She suspected it was the same for her husband. But she also knew that he would have no chance to rest once he left Tiglath. So she gave in to weariness and leaned against him. “I’m about to fall over, if you want the truth.”
It worked; he drew her along beside him to their chambers and settled her on the bed. Very little effort was required to coax him down across the quilt with her, and that worried her anew. Still, if the provisions weren’t ready until this evening, Tallain would have to leave tomorrow instead of this afternoon. She could tell their Sunrunner to tell Riyan the Tiglathi forces would be a little late getting started for the assembly point.
To this end she suggested, “Tallain, why don’t you stay the night?”
He laughed so hard that tears came to his eyes. Gasping in enough breath to whoop, “Mistresses ask that, not wives!”, he collapsed and laughed some more. Sionell discovered that a good case of the giggles was a remedy much superior to hauling bricks around. When Tallain showed signs of recovery, she demanded, “And how would you know what mistresses ask?” Which set them both off again.
The inevitable had barely gotten started when three children came bounding into the chamber, attracted by sounds of laughter, and swarmed onto their parents’ bed. Sionell regarded her brood with pride mixed with exasperation.
Antalya would be eleven on the last day of winter; Jahnev, eldest son and heir, was seven; Meig had turned four that summer. They were as dissimilar in looks as full siblings could be, as if traits from two preceding generations had been purposely parceled out to make them as unalike as possible. Talya, a redhead like Sionell, resembled the paternal grandmother for whom she had been Named. Jahnev’s eyes were the exact shade of Feylin’s—gray and luminous as cloudy moonlight—but his features and gold-brown hair had come from Tallain’s father, Eltanin. As for Meig—his blond hair and brown eyes were Tallain’s, but the shape of his face was already taking on the distinct triangle of Sionell’s. It was one of the mysteries of heredity that even though they looked abso
lutely nothing alike, no one ever mistook them for anything but brothers and sister.
Meig landed on Sionell and gave a battle cry. Talya attacked her sire’s ribs; Jahnev paused to take stock of the situation, then grabbed his sister’s bare feet to tickle. A brief, chaotic time later, parents subdued offspring and met each other’s laughing, rueful eyes over their helplessly giggling prey.
Tallain growled, “Now we can do as we like with these hatchlings—we’ve got their wings pinned. How about having them for dinner?”
“I don’t know any good dragon recipes. Besides, there’s not enough meat on their bones,” she answered, pretending to take a bite out of Meig.
“Skin them and make saddles from their hides?”
“You wouldn’t get even a decent-sized purse out of these runts.”
Tallain sighed. “I’m out of ideas. I guess we’ll just have to keep them.”
They let go and the trio scrambled all over them again, going for revenge. Sionell exclaimed, “Enough! Get off me, you monsters!”—open invitation for husband and children to gang up on her.
Suddenly there was another child in the room. Sionell rolled away from merciless tickling hands to see a pair of big brown eyes in a pale little face. Jeren stood beside the bed, wistful and curious. Sionell’s heart turned over and she pushed the others away, holding out her arms to her brother’s son.
“Help! Come defend me, Jeren! I’m getting trounced!”
The boy smiled shyly and climbed up. The game was renewed—this time with Tallain stalking the children across the huge bed from beneath the quilt, to the sounds of much hilarity and shrieking.
The nurse had only to follow the noise to catch up with her charges. She scurried them from the room after a disapproving glance for the Lord of Tiglath. Sionell thought the woman an idiot; Tallain looked delicious, all rumple-haired and flushed with laughter. But as he fell back onto the pillows to catch his breath, his smile faded too quickly.
