A Sorcerer’s Treason

by Sarah Zettel

  “The river rose in a flood of water and blood, washing away the boats of the Tuukosov. It did not touch the city of Isavalta, which was cradled by Vyshko’s bones. Once the Tuukosov had all been drowned, the river spread itself flat, turning into a salt sea to act forever as barrier and reminder between Tuukos and Isavalta.”

  I have special permission from the protectors of this place to be here, Momma had said. Did she mean these two? Did they truly oversee this place? Bridget felt the small hairs on the back of her neck rise and she felt suddenly she was being watched.

  “And so you may see why there is some little animosity still between Tuukos and Isavalta, even though we submitted to the heirs of Vyshko and Vyshemir over a hundred years ago.”

  Bridget jumped. Kalami stood framed by a pair of gilded doors. Bridget swallowed and had to keep from shrinking back as the lord sorcerer strode up to the statues’ red and black pedestal. Without hesitation he kissed the hems of both garments before straightening up to acknowledge Keeper Bakhar and Bridget.

  “I must thank you, good keeper, for finding my lost charge and seeing that she received her proper devotional instruction.”

  If Keeper Bakhar caught the sarcasm behind Kalami’s words, he did not let it ruffle his calm expression. “It was she who found me, being awake early, as is so commendable, and further being desirous to know more of the saviors of Eternal Isavalta.” Despite being outwardly peaceable, Bridget heard steel in the keeper’s voice now. Her mind flashed to her first day in Isavalta and seeing Kalami stand ready to strike a soldier over the carter who had been knocked into the snow.

  “I know I should not be up and about,” said Bridget to break the building cold between the two men. “I grew restless last night and I could not sit still. I’m sorry if I caused any trouble.” It hurt her throat to speak the conciliatory words so smoothly. This man had lied to her from the beginning, had risked her life to bring her here, all for a lie. But she could not let him know what she knew. If he decided he truly could not trust her … Bridget did not even want to consider what might happen.

  “I’m not surprised to hear it.” Kalami turned from Keeper Bakhar. “There was a great deal of restlessness last night. If you’re ready” — he paused to turn one eye toward the keeper — “and if I have the permission of the good keeper, I will return you to your rooms.”

  “Of course.” Bridget reverenced to Keeper Bakhar. “Thank you very much for the lesson, sir.”

  “You are most welcome in this house at any time, mistress.” It was impossible to miss the emphasis he placed on “you.”

  Indeed, Kalami seemed to want very much to remark on that emphasis, but evidently he thought the better of it. Instead, he took Bridget’s elbow to steer her out the doors through which he had come in.

  The doors led to an empty chamber that seemed to be all doors interspersed with mural-painted walls. Bridget recognized the library doors on her left. Another pair of doors leading to the courtyard stood in front of her. Kalami urged her, however, to the right, retracing the path she had taken in the night. She did not remember the painted walls, or any of the ornamentation, but the patterns on the floor looked familiar.

  Kalami marched silently beside her, forcing her to hurry to keep up with him. Her throat constricted at the sight of his grim expression. This is no time to keep yourself in ignorance, Bridget. “Valin, what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing that could not be fixed if the empty heads which pretend to serve the throne would attend to their duty,” he snapped. Then he pulled up short, closing his eyes for a moment.

  “I’m sorry, Bridget,” he said as he opened them. “We were attacked last night.”

  “Attacked?” Bridget’s hand went automatically to her throat. “But I heard nothing.”

  “This was not a military attack, but a magical one,” said Kalami grimly. “And while the defenses here are strong, doors were opened and I find myself today having to deal with consequences.”

  Help me. Bridget’s mind brought back the whisper of the Firebird’s voice. Which defenses were breached? Those around its cage? Or were there others? Did one of those breaches allow Momma to enter? If this was divine intervention, the gods had neglected to inform Kalami of the fact, which spoke well of the gods.

  “It was the Vixen,” said Kalami, as if reading her thoughts. “So you may understand if I am unnerved. She has shown undue interest in you.”

  “The Vixen?” Bridget repeated. She remembered the rank scent of foxes, green eyes and laughing jaws. She remembered sewing foxes into men’s skins and the joy, the incomparable joy …

  Her stomach turned over at that memory, even as her hands itched to try their skill again.

  “Yes. We must get you back to your rooms, and you must promise me on the blood of your parents that you will not open another door until I come for you. Do you promise?”

  The Vixen. She had been wandering blithely about the halls last night and the Vixen had been out there somewhere.

  Or in here somewhere.

  Bridget pressed her hand against her mouth, against the realization that she had much more to fear than Kalami in this place. “I promise,” she said between her fingers. “Of course I promise.”

  “Good.” Kalami nodded curtly. He strode forward again. “Let’s get you back then. I have already had words with your woman …”

  “Richikha?” No. Leave her out of this. Bridget hurried to catch up. “It wasn’t her fault. I lied to get her to leave me alone.”

  Kalami was not looking at her. “It is her fault. She was your attendant.”

  The final room opened up into the lobby with its great doors on the left and granite stairs rising to the right. “You must take into account that I am unused to such attentions, Valin.”

  “Then you must become used to them!” he roared. Bridget stopped in her tracks, facing him squarely. Whatever danger might threaten, whatever he might be or do, she would not be shouted at and the stony look she gave him said so plainly.

  Within a heartbeat, her right eye saw him subside, but her left eye saw him snarling still.

  “Forgive me, Bridget,” he said with a sigh that at least sounded genuine. “I am afraid for you.”

  And you still need me, or we would not be bothering with this game. Bridget decided this was a moment to change the subject, and give herself a chance to reassert herself in his graces. “And you did not care to hear the tale Keeper Bakhar was telling me.”

  Kalami’s smile grew bitter, and Bridget saw it plainly with both eyes. “No. It is not my favorite piece of Isavaltan lore, I must admit.”

  Bridget gathered up her hems so she could climb the stairs beside him. “I imagine they tell a very different version of it where you come from.”

  “Not where Isavaltan ears can hear,” murmured Kalami, as if afraid some such might be listening now. He glanced sideways at Bridget. “You sound as if you know of such things.”

  “A little.” They topped the steep stairs and Bridget let out as long a sigh as her laces would permit. “When my …” Say father. He does not know what you know yet. “… father was a young man, he fought in a civil war that divided our country. He assured me that both sides told very different stories of how it started and who was to blame for which horror.”

  “Then you do understand.” Kalami’s smile was tight as he turned her down the broad balcony that narrowed into a tapestry-hung corridor. “I should not be bitter. Our conquest was our own fault and we pay for our weakness and mistakes. This is as it must be.”

  “I thought you said it was all over long ago,” asked Bridget with as much innocence as she could muster.

  “Yes, I did, didn’t I?” Kalami sighed, stopping in front of a small, single door that Bridget decided must be hers. There was something new, however. Her left eye saw the faint glow that she had come to associate with magic shining around its threshold. “Perhaps that was wishful thinking on my part.”

  Or another lie. Bridget kept that thought si
lent.

  “There is so much you don’t know, Bridget,” said Kalami softly. “Winter holds us in the witch’s hand and traps us within stone walls. You cannot see the people of this land, the expanses of it, the treatment of it, the squabbles and compromises and petty feuds that tear at its heart.” He waved a hand back over her shoulder. “You see only what goes on in this fanciful pile of masonry, and I fear it is not enough to let you understand the full complexity of this land and its history.”

  What goes on here has taught me plenty, thank you. “Well.” Bridget fixed a smile on her face. “Come spring, you will have to show me, won’t you?”

  “Yes.” Kalami answered her smile with one of his own, but only her right eye saw it. Her left saw his mouth spread wider, into a grin, a sly and triumphant grin. “I suppose I will,” he said, and Bridget had to suppress a shudder.

  Kalami kissed the first two fingers on his right hand and touched the lock below the doorknob. At this gesture, the door swung open to reveal Bridget’s apartments. All three of her ladies had been clustered on their stools by the firepit and now they sprang to their feet. With a flurry of exclamations, they hustled her inside.

  “No open doors, Bridget,” said Kalami from the threshold. “No more solitary journeys.”

  “I promise,” she said, and the words hung so heavily in the air, she regretted having spoken them. They had changed something, she could feel it, but she didn’t know what it was.

  Kalami, however, seemed satisfied. He reached out and pulled the door shut between them.

  So, sir, you have me secure, thought Bridget toward the portal, as her ladies clucked and twittered, and herded her toward the bed. What do you mean to do with me now?

  But no answer came.

  • • •

  Morning arrived cold, late and grey, and with it came the snow. Fat white flakes dropped randomly, each alone at first. Then, they began to cluster together with two or three linked into a white dollop. Then, the wind caught them and they began to swirl and that same wind seemed to pull them down eagerly from the clouds like a child mischievously reaching into a bag and throwing its contents out around the room to see the pretty patterns it made. The palace servants and serfs whose duties would not permit them to remain indoors strung lifelines from building to building as the air grew ever more opaque with snow. It hissed as it fell against the precious glass windows. It settled itself into every nook and cranny until they were full and smooth. It wrapped the palace in a great white blanket of cold.

  Medeoan blessed the snow. The pervasive cold subdued the Firebird, weakening its voice. Today she would be able to think clearly, even if she never could again. Today she needed to be certain of herself and all that she did. Tomorrow, she would free Isavalta, and her son, from the predations of Ananda and Hastinapura.

  But there was one unpleasant thing that had to be done first.

  Her ladies laid the breakfast out in the dining room off her private chamber — bread, mutton and candied quince, pork and jelly, eggs, both pickled and deviled, small beer, and a delicate ewer of thick, sweet coffee for digestion afterward. She had ordered the curtains pulled back from the windows and the balcony doors so the cold might have free access to the room, but also ordered two braziers to flank the guest chair. She had no desire for Peshek to be uncomfortable.

  Even as she thought his name, the page girl on duty outside threw open the door and knelt. “Lord Master Peshek Pachalkasyn Ursulvin,” she announced, leaping to her feet and backing away.

  “Grand Majesty.” Medeoan felt her throat tighten convulsively as Peshek swept into the room to kneel at her feet.

  “My Lord Master Peshek.” She forced his name out with some semblance at least of good humor. “Let me give you welcome.” She touched his left cheek, then his right, and then took both hands to raise him up. “Come, sit and eat with me.”

  Peshek accepted the chair between the braziers, and settled himself while the footmen laid out his napkin, filled his glasses and raised the covers on the dishes that he might inspect their contents. Medeoan found herself unusually hungry this morning and saw that a helping of each dish was laid on the plate before her. Peshek, on the other hand, took only some bread and a trifle of the pork.

  “You have already dined this morning, Peshek?” she inquired, gesturing at his meager portion.

  “No, Grand Majesty.” Peshek’s grin was as small as it was false. He scooped up some of the jelly with his bread. “It was the journey, I think. It left me with but little stomach.”

  “I am sorry to hear it. Shall I summon you a physic?” She lifted her hand, ready to gesture for one of the footmen.

  Peshek lifted his own hand to stop her. “There is no need, Grand Majesty. It will pass.”

  “As must all things,” murmured Medeoan, slicing into a pickled egg with more force than she had intended.

  They sat in silence for a moment, each attending to the food, each working to delay what must come next.

  But this cannot go on. Medeoan drank her small beer. He has done what he has done, and now you must do as you must. “It has been a long time, Peshek, since we were able to take counsel together.”

  “It has, Grand Majesty,” he agreed, pushing aside his plate. He had not eaten half of what he had taken.

  Medeoan pretended not to notice. “Indeed,” she went on, examining the dregs of her beer. “I believe we have not spoken alone together since you left my court.”

  Peshek nodded with feigned thoughtfulness. “I think that must be the case.”

  “Why did you leave me, Peshek?”

  He looked up, mute, surprised by the question.

  How surprised can you possibly be? You knew what you did. Did you think me blind to this too? Medeoan set the mug down with a thump against the table cloth. “I did not ask you at the time, but I have wondered ever since,” she said, keeping her voice pleasant. “Why did you leave me?”

  He met her gaze, so guileless, so familiar that her heart contracted. A treacherous voice from the back of her own mind whispered to her to disregard all Oulo’s words. “I felt I could best serve Your Grand Majesty by keeping your oblast in good order,” he said.

  “Of course.” She ate another slice of pickled egg. “And in that, I cannot fault you. I read your letters with great attention, and have been most pleased with the expanding revenues which you have contributed to the treasury.”

  Peshek bowed his head, accepting the compliment with all appropriate humility. “Thank you, Grand Majesty.”

  Medeoan shoved her plate aside. Her appetite had also vanished. Ladies and footmen clustered around the table in an efficient swarm, removing plates and pouring coffee. “Now that we have this moment, is there any matter you wish to discuss?” said Medeoan as the swarm separated back to their waiting posts. “Any disquiet you have seen? Any troubles you predict?”

  Peshek toyed with the delicate porcelain cup in front of him. “There will need to be repairs to the seawall in the harbor come spring,” he said. “Lord Veresh has died without an heir, meaning there will be a question regarding the disposition of his lands, but that can be taken up in an official session.” He sipped a little coffee. “The auguries show a good spring for planting and I think this harsh winter will do us some good in keeping down the summer fevers.” He looked into the cup for a moment, as if hoping to see yet more favorable auguries there. “So, I would say all is well, Grand Majesty.”

  “Would you?” Medeoan raised her eyebrows. “Then there is nothing you wish to tell me, here, and now, while we are alone? You have no worries? You have had no meeting or conversation that has left you uneasy in your mind?”

  Peshek’s fair gaze met hers. Ah, when had he grown old? Wrinkles surrounded his bright blue eyes now, and his fair skin was spotted by sun and age. His hair had been iron grey for so many years, but now it was brightening to white. His cheeks had long since sagged into jowls. But his eyes, his eyes were clear, and as young as ever as he opened his old mouth and l
ied to her.

  “No, Grand Majesty.”

  Medeoan sighed and looked away. “Oh, Peshek. I am so sorry.”

  “Majesty?”

  “What did she use to reach you?” Medeoan looked at the brazier, at her cup, at the tablecloth. She could not look at his eyes. She did not want to see how well he lied with those clear, familiar eyes. “Did she tell you I am mad? That Isavalta is threatened by my weakness?”

  “Majesty …”

  Medeoan’s throat closed. She drank some coffee and found only bitterness on her tongue despite all the sugar syrups that had been poured into it. “Did she perhaps tell you I was the cause of Mikkel’s illness of spirit?”

  “No one has told me that, Grand Majesty,” replied Peshek softly. “Excepting yourself.”

  All strength left Medeoan’s hand. The cup skittered from her fingers, splashing muddy liquid against the white cloth, teetering on the edge of the table, and falling to smash into fragments against the floor. The servants again sprang into action, silently clearing away the mess and bringing a fresh cup to be filled with fresh coffee. In a moment, except for the stain on the cloth, it was as if nothing had happened.

  Medeoan watched all this without seeing any of it. She could only see Peshek sitting across the table from her where he had been so many times before. He had left her years ago, and she had not known how far he had gone. “What was it, Peshek? Why did you betray me?”

  His eyes shone brightly in the light of the braziers flanking his chair. Tears? “If I truly had a choice, Grand Majesty, I would never betray you.”

  Medeoan slammed her hand against the tabletop. “And what removes this choice, Peshek?” She flung both arms out wide to encompass the whole world. “What enchantment or malady so overcomes your soul that you cannot choose between Hastinapura and Isavalta?”