by Janny Wurts
He disliked very little underneath Ath's wide sky, but the affairs of Koriani were as thorns set under his skin.
Althain's Warden shrugged off the tatters of ominous dreams. Another sigh; then a prankish smile skewed his lips as he bent back to the task at hand, not, as Kharadmon had presumed, the retuning of the Fellowship's wardspells. Instead, he sought to strike a bargain with an older, darker power that stood sentinel beneath the tower's foundation. Its awareness had stayed quiescent through the centuries since the departed Paravians had bequeathed him his tenancy. If Sethvir gained the permission he sought, he intended to appoint his own style of ambassador to speak in his behalf when the Koriani circle came to call.
* * *
Night lay like dusky velvet over the torchlit spires and steep, shingled roofs of Southshire. Lysaer s'Ilessid stood with his hands on the alabaster railing of the Supreme Mayor's south-facing balcony. The distant dance of flames spat an imprint like sparks over his chased royal circlet. The nap of his state velvets swallowed his outline, deep indigo as midnight, pricked only at cuff and collar with the glint of fine jewels and seed pearls. This evening's banquet with the obliging southcoast guild ministers had raised the prince to gnawing discontent.
He sighed, stirred, and restlessly buffed his sapphire signet ring against the sheened silk of his sleeve. His affairs were in line, the cold in the northlands was breaking. The past week's couriers sent in relays through the posthouses had passed their dispatches without delays from late-season snowfall. The trained, elite core of his war host would rejoin him in fine time for Alestron's galleys under command of Mearn s'Brydion to smoke out Arithon's refuge. Every carefully winnowed scrap of hearsay and evidence, and several quiet rumours out of Innish pointed toward a site in the Cascain Isles.
A supremely frustrating target to attack; and a fiendish turn of strategy for an enemy hunted as a fugitive. The broken, rocky channels off the Vastmark coastline presented a mariner's nightmare. That reef-ridden shore was no place to risk a war fleet under threat of attack by sorcery and shadows.
The strike force sent to flush Arithon s'Ffalenn must be prepared to face the ugliest contingencies. Given any loophole, left even one unguarded cove, and their quarry would slip through their fingers again and make clean escape out to sea. The headland itself offered no less ready a haven, riddled as it was with scarps and ravines, and a thousand cliff-walled, hidden corries.
Lysaer massaged the creases from his forehead, disquieted each time he recalled the temptations which had besieged him inside Ath's hostel. The adept with her insidious web of illusions had nearly swayed him off course. Nagging, leftover doubts still dogged him, fuelled his unease to rank urgency, until staff meetings became an unsubtle battle of diplomacy against fawning city guild ministers who sought to profit from keeping his army in residence, and recalcitrant officers impatient to embark on campaign.
Unwilling to retire into sleep that would bring him fretful nightmares, Lysaer weighed the unpleasant, creeping facts. Only a fool could believe the delay would not work against him. Even as his trackers scoured bolt-holes, for each day his troops spent on the march to take their stand on the battlefield, his enemy would be busy weaving his unconscionable plots.
The encounter at Minderl Bay had taught a brutal lesson in caution. Lysaer would not let himself be baited into bloodshed until Arithon's demise could be undertaken with the least degree of risk.
Patience became an unsubtle form of torment. His elbow braced against the marble finial of the balustrade, the Prince of the West laced aching fingers through his hair. He took no joy from the mild, southland climate while his warhost wrestled the mud and the thaws on roads unsuitable for travel. His thoughts could but drift, and wonder how they fared, while around him, hanging smoke hazed the rooftops, tanged from the vats in the craft quarter sheds where resins were rendered into turpentine.
The raucous ebullience of the quayside pothouses never troubled the upper city, where the wealthy kept galleried mansions. Yet Southshire by night was never quiet. A gallant's carriage clattered through the cobbled lane behind the palace, iron-rimmed wheels throwing off yellow sparks. Its clamour roused a peacock's cry from a gilt-hooped cage in a matron's ornamental garden. The open-sided chamber adjoining the balcony wore the scent of stale incense, blended with citrus oils used to burnish the marquetry furnishings. A back stair creaked to a servant's staid tread, as the mayor's aged aunt sent for wine. On a floor lower down, a colicky baby wailed through the strains of a wet nurse's lullaby.
Nothing amid such ordinary sounds explained the odd suspicion that someone stood watching his back.
Lysaer raised his head, half-convinced the next second would bring a finger-light touch between his shoulder blades. Instinct before reason made him straighten and face about.
The figure that lurked in silhouette against the doorway gave him a violent start. Lysaer dropped to a crouch, his hand on his sword. Despite the late hour, there should have been a page and two guards on duty outside his suite to challenge visitors. The prince drew blade from sheath in a scrolled ring of sound, then stabbed to cut down what had to be an assassin.
His steel pierced the cloaked form at chest height and passed through with no resistance. The shape might have been an illusion wrought of shadow, except for the voice, which snapped in astringent irritation, 'I'm no fetch of your half brother's, and bare steel won't solve anything. My flesh perished five hundred years ago.'
But wild reflex overcame reason; Lysaer already called upon the power of his inborn gift.
Light flared in a blaze from his outspread hand. In a sheeting coruscation that carved up searing wind, he lit the narrow balcony until darkness lay banished, and the rose velvet hangings in the bedchamber cracked from their rods like burst sails.
Exposed for what he was in that white, actinic glare - unbanished and gloriously amused - the projected image of the Sorcerer Kharadmon advanced with a duellist's adroit step. Slim, fox-featured, and roguishly attired in a slashed and belted green doublet, he flicked narrow fingers over his spade black beard like a barrister served dubious evidence. 'If I were a bat or a mole, I'd be most impressively blinded. Since I'm not, you can desist. If the Mayor of Southshire's palace has cockroaches, they're certainly all scared to ground.'
Lysaer recovered his wits and quelled the outpouring brilliance of his talent. Too self-possessed for embarrassment, too annoyed to apologize, he showed the diplomacy of his ancestry and refused to let baiting raise his temper. 'You're certainly fond of dramatic appearances. I trust you've brought news of importance?' His sword filled the pause with a sullen ring as he slid it back in his scabbard.
Kharadmon pounced as the hilt snicked home. 'Your landing at Merior was restrained?'
'No one died,' Lysaer said, silkenly civil. 'For a village that harboured the works of a criminal, some would applaud my restraint. If you're sent here as a Fellowship messenger, I'll thank you to attend your proper office.'
Impervious to insult as a carp in a pool, Kharadmon raised an elegant, straight eyebrow. 'You've been tallying an impressive train of allegiances while your city goes to seed in your absence.'
'Go on.' Dense blue, Lysaer's eyes followed the image of the Sorcerer. The hand left curled on his weapon steadied in a vice grip of restraint, while against the winnowed glimmer of the indoor candles, the wheaten highlights in his hair scarcely shifted. 'You accuse me of neglect in Tysan?'
'Convict,' Kharadmon corrected crisply. 'While you raise your hound pack to run down the leopard, your quarry's played havoc in the henyard.'
'That is news.' Lysaer backed a half step, released hold on his sword hilt and arranged his palms behind him on the balustrade. The tailored breast of his doublet stayed firm, and yet, his pose held the violence of a lava flow masked under ice. 'The last message by post included nothing untoward.'
Kharadmon rebutted, 'The one which matters has yet to come through.' He paused to test a poise as contained in appearance as any shown by Halduin
, founding father of the s'Ilessid royal line.
Lysaer stayed his grief. The sapphire collar laid over his shoulders flashed only once, the sparkle of his gemstones like frost against velvets rendered starlessly deep by the shadows.
He received the news in arrested silence as Kharadmon dealt the crowning blow. 'Arithon s'Ffalenn captured a merchant ship called the Aiiow, engaged to bear your wife south. Evidently the princess grew bored with your absence. Your letters made your affairs in Alland sound tranquil enough that she believed a surprise visit would be safe.'
A flush scalded over Lysaer's cheekbones. His chest moved and restarted the interrupted rhythm of his breathing. The living moment when his royal gift of justice became fire and shield for the workings of Desh-thiere's geas stood clear as transparent glass to the watching eye of the Sorcerer.
The prince spoke at length, his words like sheared quartz, uncoloured by grief or compassion. 'She's lightheaded as a dove, of course. When did this happen? I should know when to toast the bastard litter.'
Kharadmon's image intensified at the edges until he seemed a form etched in air by spilled acid. 'You're an ungenerous husband.'
'I have ungenerous enemies,' Lysaer cracked back. 'You forget. Begetting bastards on s'Ilessid wives is a time proven s'Ffalenn tradition.'
'There has been no congress between your lady and his Grace of Rathain!' As Lysaer surged off of the balustrade, Kharadmon's freezing anger snapped him short. 'Princess Talith has suffered great loss of pride at Arithon's hand. Nothing more.'
Dangerous in adversity as a wounded lion, Lysaer sidestepped the well of cold that bounded the Sorcerer's presence. He crossed the mahogany runner that braced the sliding doorframe and hurled a pretty, carved chair from his path. The wrathful beat of his footfalls fell muffled by the mayor's rich carpet. 'Let the blame fall where it's due. My wife was a victim.' He spun on his heel before the black lacquer clothespress, his features clamped still in a control unnerving to witness. 'What does he want?'
His venom left Kharadmon unscathed. 'Indeed, let's place rightful blame where it's due. For the year you've been away, you may as well have sent your half-brother a written invitation to exploit what he could from your absence!'
'What does he want?' Lysaer repeated, a snap to his tone few men would dare in the presence of a Fellowship Sorcerer.
Kharadmon blinked, every inch the disinterested courtier. 'Gold, five hundred thousand coin weight.'
'How very wise.' Lysaer matched him back in royal blandness.
'Had Arithon the effrontery to hold her as hostage to force my warhost to draw off, I should have picked apart the earth to spill his blood. No one life can absolve the hundreds of thousands set at risk by his threat to society.'
A cruel pause followed. While a stray cat yowled in the lane beneath the balcony, the Fellowship Sorcerer lent his silence to the quandary spurred by the Mist-wraith's meddling. Spirit though he was, and irreverent toward sentiment, he could not but ache for the raw courage of this prince, who stanched his pain with the rags of his honour, and held firm in flawed mercy and conviction.
The entrapment tore the heart, that between Deshthiere's forced directive to kill, and the unrelenting coils of s'Ilessid justice, the life of Lady Talith of Avenor should ever come to be measured against the death of Arithon s'Ffalenn.
A gilt line of sweat streaked over his jawbone, Lysaer framed his reply. 'If coin is the sum of my enemy's demand, I will bargain for my princess's return.'
'Very well,' said the Sorcerer. 'Our Fellowship has been appointed to stand surety for the exchange. There are certain formalities both parties must observe. I'll require your royal word of honour.'
'Name the conditions to be met.'
'No act of bloodshed, on land or sea, and no violence on neutral ground. Neither shall your armies invade or strike camp with intent to pursue feud or warfare. Arithon has sworn to the same. His brigantine Khetienn shall hold to peaceful trade for the time Lady Talith stays in his charge.'
Lysaer locked stares with the Sorcerer. Too bitterly well he understood that he owned no grounds on which to argue. The insufferable delay being demanded of his warhost could not be avoided, not without straining the loyalty of Talith's brother, who served as his Lord Commander at Arms. Diegan's heart-tied devotion to the cause against the Shadow Master could only lead to unbearable conflict, were his sister to be abandoned as a sacrifice.
One brief second, Lysaer shut his eyes in anguish for the lapse that had let him forge vulnerable ties. Ever and always, his s'Ffalenn enemy would seize on the chance to wring painful advantage out of sentiment.
The prince managed to sound steady as he answered. 'My word as given. No hostilities shall be opened against the Master of Shadow until Lady Talith is redeemed. But tell your pirate protege this when you bring him news of my bond.' Dangerous, straight, a sheen like blued steel to his glance, Lysaer rounded off his ultimatum. 'Say I will exact from him, measure for measure, my personal retaliation for his action against my lady wife.'
'That's unworthy,' Kharadmon rebuked in dire warning. 'Send your own courier on matters of feud. When the ransom is raised, the exchange will occur at Ostermere under the hospitality of King Eldir of Havish. The peace will be kept under seal by our Fellowship, and be very sure, prince, that your conduct then befits your claim to royal ancestry.'
Kharadmon departed on a whirlwind of air that snuffed out his image like a flame.
Left to the night solitude of his bedchamber, impelled by a daunting, deep hurt that had no outlet but targetless anger, Lysaer pushed off from the clothespress. He grasped the delicate cane chair in his path and let fly in a fury he no longer tried to contain. The furnishing struck the panelled door to the corridor and cracked into an explosion of splinters.
Lysaer waited, each drawn breath half-forced from his chest. He coldly counted off seconds. When the bodyguards outside failed to stir back to duty, he raised a blistering shout and demanded their instant attendance.
The door clicked open, belatedly. Two mail-clad men-at-arms presented themselves for inspection, blinking off recent sleep. Since Lysaer could not fault them for a lapse more than likely the result of Kharadmon's meddling, he settled for running them like errand boys. 'Get me Lord Commander Diegan. If he's with a wench, I don't care. Just drag him out and tell his valet where to follow with appropriate clothing.'
Caught alone in his bed, less than pleased to be rousted, Lord Diegan found himself met by stinging reprimand the instant he crossed the royal threshold.
'Which of your officers would dare to allow my lady to leave the security of Avenor? She's the most priceless jewel in the kingdom, and she sailed from port with inadequate escort aboard a common merchant ship! The most slipshod trader takes more precautions. Find the men who are at fault. For this grievous lapse in service, let them suffer public flogging and dishonour.'
Hastily clad, the trailing ends of his shirttails all that spared him from stares for the fact that his breeches were unlaced, Lord Diegan clenched his stubbled jaw. If the inference from this outburst meant that Talith was abducted, regardless, he was Etarran enough keep his reason. 'I'll flog no one before I've spoken to my sister.'
Lysaer stalked the breadth of the carpet, his eyes like sparks chipped off flint. 'How dare you gainsay me. She's in Arithon's hands. What in Athera could be worse?'
Lord Diegan hauled in a long-suffering breath, not about to defend his sister's inclination to ignore good sense and sound counsel. While he marshalled his thoughts for the tact to intercede for the fates of his hapless officers, Lysaer spun away toward the rumpled hangings on the bed.
His words came back low and fixed, as if he spoke through his hands. 'Say nothing on behalf of the men! She's your sister. You know her stubborn nature. You're also well-versed with her illogical belief she's invincible and immune to all mishap. I'll not have her reputation sullied over this. The men who are punished for her sake must be made to understand. Try, if you can, to find willing volun
teers to bear official blame in her stead.'
'Ath have mercy!' Lord Diegan stepped back and bashed his hip against a marquetry table. As small ornaments scattered and threatened to topple, he scooped with broad hands, then straightened, his rescued clutch of bric-a-brac cradled to his chest as if they were pricelessly sacred. 'You'd shield her from shame, that the subjects you tax to free her won't come to hold her at fault?'
'I must.' His hand on the knurled fitting that hooked the silk bed hangings, Lysaer shut his eyes. The wobble of failing candlelight cast deep brackets at the sides of his mouth. 'She'll be crowned one day as my queen. Tysan's people must respect her.' But the words rang hollow in the close, warm night, even to his best friend's ear.
Lysaer bent his head. A quiver rippled through him and roused a running shimmer over the rich fabric of his doublet.
Since the disaster to the fleet at Minderl Bay, Lord Diegan was unlikely to miss the details that sketched his prince's state of anguish. 'You truly love her, don't you?' He sidled, juggling glassware, and unburdened the collection on the seat of the overstuffed divan.
'Yes, Ath help me.' Through the fraught, high jangle of discarded crystal, the admission sounded torn through the prince's teeth. The jewels on his collar yoke jerked once, twice, then shivered as he moved to collapse in a chair. Reduced at long last as the grief chased through him and shivered edged sparks in his rings, he admitted, 'I love her well enough to tear my own heart out. But Daelion make me strong, not over this. She cannot and must not weaken me now. I'd be no prince at all unless defence of my people came first. My cause against the Master of Shadow must take precedence, even before her life and safety.'
