Tainted (Lisen of Solsta Book 2)

by D. Hart St. Martin

  “What is it?” he asked, finding her uncharacteristic silence awkward. “What’s wrong?”

  She sniffed once and allowed her body to settle a bit on the couch. “I’m sorry. I’m acting like a child, I know. But I’m worried about Father, and sometimes….”

  “What? What’s happened?” When Nalin had seen Elsba yesterday, the man had seemed a little tired and more than frustrated, but he hadn’t appeared unwell at all.

  “He tries to hide it, but I know he’s worked up about Aunt Eloise. He wants to see her for himself so badly, but that little tyrant won’t allow Father or me to see him, much less my aunt. I don’t know what to do.”

  “Well, first,” Nalin began, knowing that he didn’t want to lie to Bala, trying to find some reassuring truth. “First, I suspect Hermit Eloise would never allow imprisonment to harm her. From all I can tell, she allowed herself to be arrested, and she must have had good reason to do so.”

  “But Father’s worrying himself ill.”

  Nalin touched her hand. “I know. I know. If anyone understands worry, it’s me.” He paused. Should he make a promise he might not be able to keep? He had to try, didn’t he? “Bala, leave this to me. Let me try to get in to see Ariel. He sometimes accommodates me when he might not do so for you because he suspects I know things.”

  “Would you, Nalin? Any little thing would make Father feel so much better.”

  “I’ll do it now and fill you both in as soon as I can, all right?”

  The shine in her brown eyes transformed from tears to the sparkle he admired. “Yes. Thank you, Nalin. What would we do without you?”

  You’d be better off, he thought. Without him, Jozan wouldn’t have gone to the Isle and wouldn’t have been placed in the danger that eventually claimed her life. Without him, they wouldn’t know that Ariel had arrested Elsba’s sister and they might not be here now. Without him, they would have stayed in Seffa, celebrated Evennight with Jozan and remained ignorant of anything going wrong besides Ariel’s ascension. But to Bala he only said, “You would figure something out, I’m sure. Now go and I’ll take a walk to the Keep.”

  Bala stood up, Nalin rising to follow her out, and at the bottom of the stairs, Bala headed back to the Tuane suite while Nalin stepped outside, squinting in the sun. A year ago, he and Flandari had wandered the park behind the Keep together, marveling at the groundskeeper’s artistic scattering of every color of flower they could imagine coming to bloom in the bounty that was spring. This year, no Flandari, not even a rightful Heir in place, just Ariel whom Nalin must confront on behalf of an old man with a caring heart and his distraught daughter.

  He took the steps up to the great doors two at a time and arrived at the top a bit heavy of breath but invigorated.

  “State your business, my lord,” one of the guards, their captain, challenged him.

  “I’m here to see the Empir,” Nalin replied and then waited for the usual refusal. Instead, the captain nodded to one of her sergeants, who entered the Keep, closing the door behind him.

  “Our Liege might be open to visitors today. If you would be willing to wait a moment….”

  “Of course, Captain,” Nalin replied. Typical of Ariel, he thought, to force even noble guests to wait outside rather than invite them in to await word of a welcome or not. He looked out across the square, to the reverse view he’d observed just moments ago. What an accomplishment. Not only had Flandari completed the Keep that her father, Empir Paxiflan, had begun, but she’d also managed to renovate the old palace as a permanent residence for the Council. Of course, the Ilazers had always been great builders.

  “My lord?”

  Nalin turned from his reveries to the sergeant who had emerged from inside. “Yes?”

  “The Empir will see you. He is in the garden and asks that you join him there.”

  “Thank you,” Nalin replied and stepped through the door the guard had left open. Once inside, he waited a moment for his eyes to adjust. It was darker in here than he remembered. Why would Ariel keep it so dark?

  Once he could see well enough to navigate without tripping over himself, he moved past the entrance to the Council chamber on his left and turned right, into the grand hall. From there he stepped through the wide opening at the back of the hall onto the covered portico where several more guards stood. They ignored him, and Nalin trotted down the steps that led to the park.

  Flandari had doted on the park. It had been a wild place on the top of the tallest hill in Avaret until she’d designed one small garden near the Keep. That quiet area had turned out so well that she had decided to do another, one with a bit more color. Another had followed, this one with a fountain. And on she had gone, as though she were designing them in her sleep. Nalin believed at least three designs yet remained on paper but not completed, and there would have been even more had she survived.

  Enough, he told himself. The Empir has passed. Long life to the Empir. He took a deep breath and headed out. He found Ariel in what Flandari had called the “sitter’s place”—a garden sealed off from the world by tall shrubs, furnished with several marble benches, some shaded by trees, others set at the ends of paths through beds of flowers. The presumed Empir sat under one of the trees, and he looked up as Nalin stepped into the quiet, private space.

  “Ah, Nalin.”

  “My Liege.”

  “My mother’s only passion, the one thing she could love.” Ariel spread his arms out in a gesture encompassing the beauty of the landscaping.

  “She had a gift, my Liege,” Nalin replied.

  “So, Nalin, why are you here?” Ariel asked in his usual abrupt manner.

  Nalin took a deep breath and dove into risk’s stinging ice water. “My Liege, I’ve come on behalf of Holder Tuane. He has no idea I’m here, but I know how anxious he is about the health and wellbeing of his sister.”

  “No.”

  “My Liege, forgive me, but I haven’t asked anything yet.”

  “But I know what you’re going to ask, and for now, it’s out of the question. The sooth is to receive no visitors. In a few days or weeks, maybe, but not now.”

  Not until you’ve broken her, you mean, but Nalin kept that thought to himself.

  “But,” Ariel continued before Nalin could speak, “I can assure you that she is well, and her spirits remain strong.”

  In other words, everything you’ve brought to bear thus far has failed to make her talk. But to Ariel he simply said, “Then I will convey that to the holder.”

  Now he should leave. Now he should thank his Empir for the nothing he’d given Nalin and then, with a nod, back out of Flandari’s “sitter’s place” and be gone. But instead, he stayed and said, “My Liege, please think on this. Unlike his sister, the holder is not well, and this is putting a great strain on him.”

  “And,” Ariel replied, glaring, “lacking the information I seek puts a great strain on me. Be grateful the woman still lives.”

  And leaving Ariel with his glare still fresh on his face, Nalin backed out quickly without a word and made his hasty retreat through the park, this time taking the outside route around the Keep. He passed the stables at the south side of the Keep’s grounds, following the path that finally brought him to the square. I should have thanked him. I let him manipulate me into that exit, and my disrespect will only fire him up.

  Nalin strode across the square and into the old palace, the bitterness of the encounter still burning in his mind. He couldn’t go to Elsba with this, not right away, not until his anger at Ariel and at himself had subsided. So many lives in his hands, so many lives awaiting a day that might never come. From the beginning he had acted on the assumption that the true Heir would come forward, make her claim and be prepared to defend it. Now? He couldn’t know.

  As he arrived at the door to his chambers, he paused, his thoughts thrown into a jumble. How is she? What is happening out there? Is she still sane? Will she be ready? For the briefest of moments, all thinking ceased. A thought-stopping thou
ght had ripped through his mind. What if she never comes back?

  He opened the door, stepped through it, then slammed it shut on both the world and his last question. He couldn’t allow himself to think of that now. He couldn’t allow the despair to devour him. He couldn’t…he couldn’t…. No, he just…couldn’t.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  THE SPARK BEFORE THE FIRE

  She sat in the infirmary and waited. She’d sat here before, waiting for the end, and here she sat again, Empir Flandari lying on the cot before her. Dying on the cot before her.

  “Lisen, it’s time.”

  Time for what? she wondered, looking up and around the room.

  “Lisen?”

  She opened her eyes and, with a sigh, realized it had only been a dream and that she had awakened to one of those headaches again, the kind that pushed her a little closer to her sanity’s last straw. Dangerous, she thought, her stomach churning at the thought of slipping into that place again. She suspected she knew why the headaches hit her as they did. The watcher was watching. The watcher seemed to always be watching, but Lisen did wish that the watcher, whoever he or she was, would stop watching. She could combat the interloper, but the headaches were more difficult to handle.

  She smiled up at Korin who knelt beside her on the pallet. She wished she could bow out of training for the night but knew she didn’t dare. After nearly two weeks of working with Hozia, discipline had proven essential to her progress. So, if she couldn’t train through a bit of pain in her head and a bit of madness in her soul, what good would she be when the time came to prove herself?

  “I’m awake,” she said, making it true by sitting up. She regretted it immediately. A wave of nausea hit her like no need to puke ever had before. She reached out for the small chamber pot and had barely risen to her knees before she brought up the meager contents of her stomach in one great heave. A second heave brought up nothing, and then she shifted from her knees to her behind and looked up at Korin, mortified. She wiped her mouth with the back of her sleeve, a vague queasiness still twisting her stomach, and took a deep breath. “Sorry.”

  “You’re ill. We should cancel tonight’s training session.”

  “No. No, we can’t do that. I’m fine. I have a headache. It must have upset my stomach. It’ll pass.” She forced herself to her feet, turned her back to him as she slipped from her nightshift and into a tunic, her head pounding, her balance uncertain at best.

  “Are you sure?”

  She sat back down on the floor to pull on her boots. “Yes, I’m sure.” She managed to regain her feet, hid a brief surge of lightheadedness and then smiled at him. “See. Fine.”

  He studied her. She hated it when he did that. He distrusted hermit powers, but denials to the contrary, he could read another’s state of mind—hers at least—with the best of them. Like most non-hermits, he believed there were secrets to be found in a hermit’s life, that the powers ascribed to hermits were the exclusive property of the initiated, but he was wrong. From what little she knew, the key to a hermit’s powers lay not in the possession of those powers but in the disciplining of them. Nearly everyone was born with some gift or another, and Korin Rosarel’s was an innate ability to know without words or actions the inner thoughts of others. It was this strength that had made him such a good soldier and helped him now as a teacher, but she could never tell him that. It would frighten him to hear it, just as it had frightened her to hear…. No, don’t go there. But his gift was there, and he used it well.

  “All right,” he said at last, but still he scrutinized her.

  She willed herself to a firm stance, to the appearance of stability on her feet. She must have picked up the flu or something, nothing more. She’d be fine. With a sigh, he finally relented, turned and stepped from the chamber. She breathed deeply, held on to her balance with a firm grip and followed him out the doorway. The discipline of Hozia’s demands in training had begun to seep into the fibers of her muscles and to permeate her being. She would not—could not—allow an inconsequential turning of her stomach and a freakin’ psychic pain in her head to deter her from another night of work.

  Then, as they made their way down into the deep recesses of the mesa, she made another decision. She would hide all moments of weakness from him in the future. She felt a bit queasy, that was all. He didn’t need to know every little detail of her life. Some details—maybe—some day. But it only freaked him out when he thought she was sick. He didn’t need to know all that.

  Time hung suspended from the rafters of Eloise’s mind, and she couldn’t calculate how far from Evenday she’d come. She knew it was late in the day as the air in her prison cell had begun to cool ever so slightly, but she had trouble keeping track of how many nights and days had passed. Two weeks? No, more like three. Somewhere in there. And did it really matter? She was here and would be here until the world changed.

  She meditated, constantly, and had decided by the time the end came, she would have grown so calm, so filled with acceptance that nothing would matter anymore. Not likely, she thought with a sardonic smile. It all matters. It matters a great deal. Every little step, every moment in the present leading from the past into the future she’d foreseen—it all mattered. She’d never move beyond that.

  She breathed deeply of the dank air. For some reason, everything distracted her today. The smell of her uneaten breakfast was particularly pungent. Some days she ate, some days she couldn’t. The only one who seemed to care was one guard, a captain by his insignia. He always lingered a bit before depositing her meal on the floor.

  Then, a few days ago, he’d risked it all and whispered hastily that he had been in Halorin at the time of her niece’s murder. He’d said nothing more than that and nothing before or since, but that had been enough. Clearly he, too, understood the importance of keeping silent, but she no longer felt quite so alone.

  She looked up as the lock turned. Good. They’d be retrieving the dish of slop she’d left untouched for them. A guard—not the captain this time—stepped in, picked up the plate, then looked around and, deeming the room safe, gestured to whoever waited outside. And, for the first time since Evenday two weeks ago, or maybe three, Ariel Ilazer strode in looking smug. When he entered, she rose, quietly enduring the screaming of every aching joint.

  “My Liege,” she said, her voice coarse from the enforced silence of her incarceration. He didn’t settle. Instead, he paced as the watcher stepped in behind him. “Ah,” Eloise muttered in recognition, then sat back down.

  “I did not give you permission to sit,” Ariel snarled. Eloise shrugged but made no move to stand again, and for some reason, the boy did not pursue it. “You’ve met my spiritual advisor, haven’t you?” he asked, pausing in front of the rogue.

  “Opseth, yes,” Eloise replied.

  “You know what I want, Hermit,” Ariel said as he resumed his pacing, glaring at Eloise every time he turned.

  “It’s not mine to give,” Eloise replied softly.

  He stopped abruptly to stand right in front of her, looking down on her, fists on hips, his brown eyes ablaze with rage. “Where’s the necropath?” he demanded.

  “I’ve told you, my Liege—”

  “You’ve told me nothing, Hermit.” He turned to leave but paused at the door. “And remember what I said.” This last he directed at the rogue.

  “I don’t know how you can expect me to extract anything without causing some damage, my Liege,” Opseth objected.

  “I want her sane and fully aware when I finally bring her precious little necropath to ground.” With that, Ariel left them there, alone together, and Eloise prepared herself for another difficult encounter.

  Ariel drummed his fingers—small digit to first—over and over again on the conference table. He’d set Opseth on the sooth hours ago and still nothing. He couldn’t believe how he was allowing this…this…watcher to determine his actions. She had suggested keeping the sooth off balance. She had recommended that in order to do so,
they vary the time of day or night when she would step into the sooth’s cell to work her ways with the woman. She had deemed it not only practical but necessary to do so. And if Ariel truly wanted the information he’d asked her to get for him, he’d best do as she said. The damn watcher thought she could order an Empir around?

  He jumped up from the table and paced between it and his desk, back and forth, several times, then finally settled behind his desk again. It was a maneuver—this exchanging of seating from desk to table and back again—that he’d accomplished multiple times since this damn waiting had begun before the sun had set.

  When the two of them had met in the dungeon, Opseth had assured him that no one had seen her. No one, that is, except the guard whom Ariel had summoned to join them. Ariel suspected that despite all their precautions over the last two months or so, the entire contingent of the Guard in the Keep was fully aware of the woman who visited the sooth on an unannounced, irregular basis. Secrets had a way of unraveling in a house filled with hundreds of servants and personal protectors. They all talked; what one knew, they all knew. And Ariel began the impatient drumming of his fingers again.

  The image of Nalin backing away from him after he’d once again denied Elsba Tuane access to his sister rose up amidst the turmoil of his thoughts. For a week he’d managed to keep the memory of that encounter buried deep within his mind, but the man’s insubordination as he’d left Ariel there in the garden had vexed him. He couldn’t keep the image down. He never apologized, never thanked me for my time. Who does he think…?

  He jumped at the creaking of the closet door, the access to the secret passageway in the corner of his office to his right. He turned in his chair and waited for it to open. He’d ordered that no one disturb him. He’d told Lorain he’d be unavailable until dinner, and, although she’d glowered at him briefly for the tone with which he’d delivered this declaration, in the end, she had nodded sweetly and left him to his task.