At the bottom of the stairs, they followed a rough-hewn tunnel lit by torches on the stone walls. The head guardsman took a hexagon-shaped ring of keys off a peg and led them to a cell. The guard unlocked its heavy door and Jarid waited, stiff and distant. Muller felt his anger. How would the king react, seeing for the first time one of the men who had destroyed everything he valued? Unbent may have spent years atoning for his crime, but nothing could give Jarid back what he had lost, neither his parents nor his childhood.
With a grunt, the guardsman heaved open the door. Then he stepped aside, letting two soldiers enter the cell. Metal rang on metal as they drew their swords. Instead of following them, Jarid turned to the people in the hallway, his violet gaze startling in its intensity. The last time Muller had seen his eyes, at the ceremony last night, they had been unfocused.
The king held out his hand to his wife. It was the only time he had acknowledged any of them since that moment on the stairs when he had spoken for the first time in fourteen years. Less than an hour had passed, yet it seemed like ages to Muller.
Surprise flickered on Iris’s face. She took his hand and they entered the cell together. Muller followed with Brant and the guards, going into a room with stone walls even rougher than in the hallway. Clean but bare, it had nothing but a chamber pot in one corner. The cell was in the outer wall of the castle, in the slope behind Suncroft, so it wasn’t all underground. A barred window across the room let in sunlight.
A man was sitting on the cracked ledge cut from the wall. He watched them with weary eyes, his posture that of someone who awaited his execution. A ragged mane of hair the color of granite swept down his neck, and bushy gray eyebrows arched over his gray eyes. Stone. Except his true name was Unbent.
When Unbent saw Jarid, his face transformed into joy. Jarid was impossible to read as he went to stand before the highwayman, his profile to Muller now. Unbent looked up at his foster son, his expression dimming, his hands clenched on the bench. Muller waited for Jarid to condemn the monster who had helped murder his parents.
And then the king of Aronsdale went down on one knee and bowed his head before the prisoner in his dungeon.
At first Unbent seemed unable to respond. Finally he spoke, but in such a low voice, Muller barely heard. “What is this? You kneel to me? Surely not.” He was talking to himself; he obviously expected no response.
Jarid lifted his head. “Surely yes.”
Unbent froze. “Dani?”
“Dani?” Emotion roughened Jarid’s voice. “Is that what you named me?”
“I—yes, yes, I did.” Unbent started to reach for him, then shook his head. “What miracle is this, son?”
Brant Firestoke spoke harshly. “Do not presume to call His Majesty your ‘son.’”
Unbent jerked up his head. “His Majesty?”
Muller froze. Surely Unbent knew Jarid was the Dawnfield heir?
And yet…Muller had seen the desolate range where Unbent and Jarid made their home. They had lived in one of the few places so remote that they could have been cut off even from news as big as the death of a king or his heir.
Muller spoke coldly to Unbent. “Yes. His Majesty. That night you murdered the heir to Aronsdale.”
Turning to Muller, Jarid tried to speak, then stopped. Everyone remained silent, waiting while Jarid struggled to do what most people took for granted—talk. He finally answered in a rough voice. “Stone did not kill my parents. Murk was the one who drove us off the road.”
“But I was there.” Unbent rose to his feet, his knees creaking. “I, too, am responsible.”
Jarid raised his hand to touch Unbent’s face, the man who had been his guardian all these years, twice as long as his parents. “Any sin you committed, even that Murk committed, was far less than mine.”
Unbent answered in a low voice. “No.”
Muller felt currents of emotion swirling here, his awareness intensified by the imperfect shape of the cell. But he could barely read the spell. He sensed only that Jarid condemned himself and that it agonized Unbent.
“Stone—” Jarid’s voice caught.
“Stone?” Unbent’s voice caught. “Is that how you thought of me?”
“For strength.” Jarid’s voice turned bleak. “A contrast to Murk.”
“I don’t understand,” Muller said. “Who is Murk?”
Unbent turned to him. “Murk planned the robbery. He was the other highwayman.”
“And you only now reveal this?” The man’s deceptions so angered Muller, he barely kept his voice even. “Better to protect your own, eh?”
Unbent’s gaze never wavered. “Aye.”
“Nay,” Iris murmured to Unbent. “You did it for Jarid. You remained silent all these years to protect him.”
Unbent hesitated. “Jarid?”
“My husband.” Iris inclined her head to the king.
Stone’s weathered face gentled as he turned to his former ward. “You have married this lovely young lady?” When the king nodded, Unbent smiled. “It is good.” He hesitated, his smile fading. “Jarid—this is your name?”
“It is,” Jarid said.
“I am sorry. I never knew.”
Jarid touched his arm. “Do not be sorry.”
Bewildered by Jarid’s obvious love for this man who had ruined so many lives, Muller struggled to contain his emotions. “What does she mean, you remained silent about Murk to protect Jarid?” he asked Unbent. “What lies have you told my cousin?”
“Told?” Pain suffused Unbent’s voice. “I have told him nothing and everything. I spoke to him for fourteen years, Gracious Lord, and he heard nothing. What did I tell him? That the boy punished himself for something not his fault? Yes, I told him. He never heard.”
Jarid spoke in a rasp. “I am no boy.”
“Enough of this, highwayman.” That came from Brant. “Where is this Murk?”
“Gone,” Jarid whispered.
“Gone?” Muller asked. “Where?”
Jarid didn’t answer. Instead he walked to the window and gazed past its bars to the hills. His need for separation surrounded him like a shield, almost tangible.
“I cannot take you to Murk,” Unbent said. “I am sorry.”
Muller clenched his fist. “You will tell us where your partner has hidden.”
“I cannot.”
Brant’s voice came like the wind that scoured the land in winter. “We have been patient with you, highwayman. That is done now. You will talk.”
Unbent paled, but he said nothing.
Brant motioned to the soldiers. “Take him to the interrogation room.”
“No!” Jarid turned from the window. “You will not.”
“Why?” Muller asked. “Why, cousin?”
Jarid’s voice had jagged edges. “You know the legend of indigo mages?”
“I have heard them,” Muller said.
Brant spoke. “No indigo mage has ever been known.”
“My mother,” Jarid answered.
“That cannot be,” Brant said. “We have no records.”
A voice came from behind them. “No. But I recognized the signs in her.”
Muller swung around. Della stood in the doorway, her silver hair disarrayed around her face, her cheeks red as if she had run here through the wind. She wasn’t breathing hard, though, which made him think she had been standing there for a while, listening.
“It is the legend of the indigos.” Della came forward. “A mage’s power is limited by the strength of her life. She can soothe, yes, but no more than she could soothe herself. She can heal only those injuries she could recover from herself and feel only emotions she can recognize and endure.” Quietly she added, “An indigo mage would have the greatest power of all.”
“The power of a life,” Jarid said, his gaze hooded.
Iris spoke slowly, watching her husband. “To save a life—but only one, for she has only one life.”
“Yes.” Della’s voice gentled as she spoke to Jarid. “You
r mother saved your life in the crash, yes?”
His voice rasped. “She died so I could live.”
Iris spoke with dismay. “Nay, Jarid, it is’n your fault.”
“You must not punish yourself for their deaths,” Della told him.
Muller struggled with his anger. To Unbent, he said, “You should have brought him home. How could you keep him in that hovel?”
“He didn’t know who I was,” Jarid said.
Brant narrowed his gaze at Unbent. “You could have made inquiries. You chose to protect yourself.”
“Yes.” Unbent met his gaze. “I did.”
“Liar.” Pain etched Jarid’s face. “Liar.”
“Son, don’t,” Unbent said. “Let it go.”
“Why?” Jarid’s voice grated as if it could tear his throat. “They should know the truth.”
“What truth?” Muller asked.
“About Murk.” Jarid’s voice rasped. “About me.”
“Dani, stop,” Unbent whispered.
Brant considered the older man. “Whatever you’re hiding, we will discover it.”
“Stop.” Jarid faced them, his body dark against the patch of light from the barred window at his back. He lifted his arms until his hands were at waist level, his palms cupped upward.
Then he began a spell.
Light filled his hands, as if he held a glowing red orb in each. He had a haunted expression, his face stark, lit from below. The rest of the cell darkened around him.
Della moved next to Iris. “A red mage?” she murmured.
Iris swallowed. “I think more. Much more.”
Jarid continued to stare at Brant. The cell was growing hot, as if he held flames rather than light.
The spheres of light changed.
They turned gold—and Muller’s exhaustion receded. As they shifted into yellow, his anguish over the flaws that scarred his life eased. The spheres turned green—and Muller knew, with devastating clarity, the self-loathing that filled Jarid. Why did the king hate himself? The orbs turned sky-blue, then sapphire. The ache of a sword wound Muller had taken many years ago vanished.
The spheres turned indigo.
Tears welled in Muller’s eyes. Incredibly, impossibly, Jarid could heal even grief. Muller struggled not to respond; he had to deal with his doubts himself. But for the first time in his life, he believed hope existed, that he might someday control his mage gifts.
The spheres in Jarid’s hands changed again.
Violet.
“Saints above,” Della whispered.
“The power of a life,” Jarid grated. “The power to give life—or take it away.” He extended his arm toward Brant, his hand filled with violet light. “I took Murk.”
Brant stared at him. “I don’t understand.”
Jarid’s words dropped into the air like stones. “That night when he murdered my parents, I reached out with my mind—and I killed him.”
19
The Imperfect Mage
Muller stood on a bluff and gazed at Croft’s Vale, but instead of the picturesque cottages, he kept seeing Jarid’s anguished face as he revealed what he had held in silence for so long. In his terror, six years old but with a blazing will to live, the grief-shocked boy had fought back and reversed the greatest spell any mage could make.
Mages brought light. They soothed pain. They healed. Ultimately, the most powerful could save a life. To reverse their spells, to injure others, violated the essence of their lives. No matter how justified their actions, no matter how the circumstances might warrant it, they couldn’t endure using their spells for dark instead of light. Muller knew it well. He had spent his life struggling with his broken gifts.
Jarid’s desperate act of self-defense had shattered him. It had broken the circle of his life. With an unrelenting remorse, the boy had finished what Murk tried to begin, taking his own sight, hearing, and speech.
Muller felt as if his heart were tearing apart. So much grief: so many losses. He remembered the night King Daron had died; Muller mourned as much today as he had then. His uncle would have rejoiced at Jarid’s return. Muller knew he should find comfort in knowing it would have gladdened Daron and perhaps helped to heal Jarid, but he felt only pain. Part of him would always believe his uncle loved him only because Daron had lost his son and grandson. Muller would never know otherwise; death had taken Daron before life could reveal the answers to Muller’s unasked questions.
A rustle came from behind him, the wind playing with leaves on the ground. When it grew louder, he turned. Instead of leaves, Iris waited a few steps away.
Muller bowed. “Good morn, Your Majesty.”
She flushed at the title. “Good morn, Your Highness.” Breezes tossed her hair around her body. She indicated the rolling slopes and village below. “A lovely view.”
“Like our royal family.” The words were sour fruit in his mouth. “Beautiful on the outside, rotted from within.”
Her voice gentled. “That is’n true, Muller.”
“Isn’t it? You heard Jarid—a shape-mage who can kill.” He could hardly comprehend it. Had it been him instead of Jarid in that carriage, Muller dreaded to think what his mage “gifts” would have done. Destroyed his parents’ bodies? Killed Unbent? Himself?
He feared Jarid because he feared himself.
“Jarid had provocation,” Iris said.
“And if he feels he has provocation again?”
Lines of strain showed on her face. “Saints, Muller, look at what it did to him.” She came forward so he could hear her better. “What if we hadna found him? Would he have spent the rest of his life atoning for being a terrified little boy who defended himself from the monster who murdered his parents and meant to kill him? He’s suffered enough.”
Muller answered in a low voice. “Before we knew anything about him, I had been so certain it would be best if I stepped aside. Then we discovered he was unfit to rule. Even that was all right for Aronsdale—you would do well in his place. And a child might come who had Jared’s spirit. But he began to recover and suddenly we had a king who would rule, but imperfectly.”
“Surely a flawed king is better than none at all.”
His voice cracked. “Even then I didn’t know the worst. He is an abomination. A mage who kills.”
She spoke with that compassion of hers that seemed to have no limit. “We are all flawed, Muller. Just look at me.”
He wondered if she had any idea how vital she appeared to others. “Iris, it may not seem so now, but you will come into your own as a mage, at least a sapphire, maybe an indigo, greater than Della, greater than Chime, perhaps even greater than Jarid’s mother.”
She started to speak, then stopped. He feared she would pursue this matter of kings and mages. What more could he say? In seeing Jarid, he saw himself. But no spell of healing could fix his soul-deep failings.
When she finally spoke, she said only, “In the past, Della said emerald was my limit.”
“She was wrong. I told her so.”
“You believed I had such power and you never told me?”
He pushed back his hair, moving with the grace he had never wanted rather than the warrior’s power he longed to command. “Della didn’t want me interfering. And she thinks I have no mage power.” He tried to shrug, to show her estimation made no matter to him, but he doubted he fooled Iris. “She wouldn’t listen.”
“You should have told me.” Iris could have condemned him. As queen she could have ordered him away, had him shunned, even imprisoned him. Instead she spoke with sympathy. “Except then you and I would have had to wed. And you want Chime.”
He nodded awkwardly. “Yes.”
“If I really am that strong of a mage, surely you knew it would come out.”
“Once Chime and I were married, it wouldn’t have mattered. We couldn’t undo the union.” He looked toward the castle, high on its bluff. “Then you found Jarid.”
“That is why you sent me to get him.”
“In part.” He swept his arm out, indicating the countryside, castle and village. “What I said before is true. Aronsdale needs you. I would only bring sorrow to our people.”
“How can you give up so easily?”
“You think I gave up?” She had no idea. Bending down, he dug up a rock and showed it to her. “What shape is this?”
She hesitated. “An oval.”
“An imperfect shape.”
“Very.”
Muller offered it to her. “Can you use it for spells?”
She took the rock and concentrated on it, her forehead furrowed. Her power eddied around the edges of his mind. Instead of focusing her gift, the broken stone dispersed it like a jagged seashore breaking up waves.
“Nay, Muller.” She gave him the rock. “It ruins the spell.”
“As it would for any normal mage.” Cupping his palm around the rock, he focused.
“Muller?”
He didn’t answer, just continued to concentrate on the rock. His power swelled—and the rock suddenly turned red, glowing like a hot coal. Even knowing what to expect, he grunted and dropped it. When the stone hit the ground, the grass sizzled.
Iris gaped at him. “What did you do?”
“That,” he said harshly, “is my mage power.”
“But you have no—”
“No power?” He didn’t know whether to laugh or weep. “Aye, so Della believes. Why? Because she can’t feel a ‘gift’ as imperfect as mine. I can only use flawed shapes.” He pushed the cooling rock with his boot. “You want me to create light? That was the best I could do. My spells always come out twisted. Wrong.” He had to make her see; a realm that kept its freedom only because of its mages couldn’t survive such a distortion of power from its highest authority. “But I have the Dawnfield mage strength, green at least, maybe blue. It would destroy Aronsdale to have me at its helm.”
Iris’s gaze turned luminous with moisture. “Hai, Muller.”
The Charmed Sphere Page 16
