by Ellyn, Court
Approaching the inner gatehouse, he saw that its portcullis was lowered as well. Damn it, why? This wasn’t caution; this was paranoia. What had happened? Had ogres gotten in after all? Had there been mutiny? What had happened to shake Kelyn’s trust so?
“Well, well, what have we here?” called a voice from the battlements. The man’s hair was thinner, his jowly jaw was flabbier, but Laral recognized the garrison captain.
“Reynal? Ruthan told me you’d been promoted to castellan. I’ve come to see my sister.”
“Have you now? Maybe Lady Tírandon doesn’t want to see you.” No courtesies at all? Not even the pretense?
“She will decide that, not you. Open the gate.”
A wad of spit landed beside his horse’s hoof, then Reynal disappeared from the crenels. He appeared moments later on ground level. Someone turned the winch, and the gate rumbled up. Laral rode into the shadow of the tunnel and reined in to glare down at the castellan. “Careful, Reynal, there are Fierans all around you. Would be a shame if one of them took offense.”
He rode across the busy courtyard, urging his horse to what he hoped was a commanding trot rather than a gutless retreat. Squires, dwarves, and servants scattered from his path. The windows of the keep held only dark glass, no prying faces.
His horse smelled the water at the well, veered to the trough, and dictated an end of the journey. Laral was dismounting when he heard someone shrieking his name. Ruthan came bounding down the steps of the keep, running with the enthusiasm of a little girl, and threw her arms about him. She sobbed and laughed, and Laral wanted to sob, too, for all laughter seemed to have died inside him.
Ruthan released him, and her face was a storm of kenneled sorrow. “I’m so sorry…” Her gaze penetrated, full of meaning.
“You know about Andy?” Laral had written no letters, sent no couriers. But of course Ruthie knew. She had foreseen so many horrible things.
“I tried not to.” Her hands squeezed his. “Laral, about … about your children…” Some unwanted vision fought to express itself, but she bit it back. “There’s still hope.”
Laral breathed to steady his voice. “I’m beyond relying on hope. Hope is dead. What happens happens.”
She touched his face as if to lift the burden of pain she saw there, but what magic words could accomplish such a feat? She wrestled, then finally said nothing.
Laral’s companions caught up. Drys groaned as he slid down from a horse too tall. “I’m so hungry I could eat a whole goose. Mind if I chase one down?”
Kalla kissed Ruthan’s cheek. Her otherworldliness had never troubled Laral’s friends, though the time they spent together at Brengarra had come but once a year.
The stranger accompanying them caught Ruthan’s eye.
“Sister, may I present our ally, the avedra Lord Daryon?”
Her eyes widened. “Dragon,” she blurted.
“No, Daryon.”
Ruthan ignored her brother and bowed her head. “You are welcome in Tírandon, my lord.” With that, she about-faced and fled into the keep.
Daryon watched her go, looking a little startled himself. “Perceptive. Avedra?”
“She … sees things,” Laral explained. “Do not harass her about it.”
“The very idea. I am not so tactless as that.”
Drys snorted, and Kalla choked down heated remarks.
Daryon raised his nose at their mockery. “It’s a wonder the Exiled has not stolen her away with the others.”
“Ruthan was always the family’s best kept secret,” Laral said. “Perhaps Lothiar does not know she exists.”
“He knows. He will have spied us all out. Perhaps he fears her.”
The idea that anyone should fear his timid little sister was ludicrous to Laral. And yet, only fools desired to know the future.
They followed Ruthan up the steps and into the keep. After mourning the ruins of Ilswythe, Brengarra, and Tánysmar, it was good to see Tírandon’s halls bustling with staff, with squires and messengers, to be swept up in the energy of a normally functioning house, even if the energy carried the urgency inherent only in times of war.
“I’ve put the War Commander in Father’s rooms,” Ruthan said as she climbed the stairs. “He’s holding council there.”
Yes, Father dead too. The reminder of the broader scope of his sorrow struck Laral like a fist to the gut. No second chances, no forgiveness, no restoration.
Lander’s rooms still smelled of him, of vetiver and leather and discipline. It was a scent Laral had not encountered anywhere else in nearly two decades, and it filled him with regret. He should have made more an effort.
The commanders were gathered around Father’s big andyr desk. “…weren’t expecting Bramoran to unleash its hidden horde on us,” said Lord Haezeldale. How different he looked from the last time Laral saw him. He’d grown wiry and brown since the assembly at Brynduvh last year. “Lothiar has been holding onto those ogres like they were made of gold. Banner was a bird’s talon, a dragon’s talon.”
“Ah,” Kelyn said, nodding, “same ogres who attacked Ilswythe. The day you arrived, Falconeye.”
“They’re digging in here.” Lady Drona pointed at a map of Tírandon’s domain.
“More trenches?”
“Aye.”
“We shouldn’t let them get too comfortable,” said Laniel. “This close to Tírandon, I wouldn’t be surprised if they try tunneling.”
“Lady Carah can put an end to that,” said Lord Gyfan. His fire-ravaged face was turned in profile to Laral. The commanders laughed at his comment, but Laral didn’t understand why Carah should be the butt of a joke.
Ruthan cleared her throat. “M’ Lord Commander?”
Kelyn glanced up from the desk, saw Laral, and smiled.
Eliad rushed forward and embraced Laral like a brother.
Gyfan took Kalla aside and whispered, “I have news. Of your aunt.” They headed out into the corridor.
In a corner beside the windows, Thorn Kingshield leveled a glare on Daryon.
Slowly, stiffly, Kelyn rose from the desk chair.
“What happened to you?” Laral asked, gripping his hand.
The War Commander barked bitter laughter. “Ogres carry big hammers. You’d think I didn’t need to learn that the hard way. Were you successful?”
Laral clenched his jaw. Don’t think of Andy. “I brought you four companies, sir. Outstanding warriors. Under Lord Daryon.”
“Indeed?” Kelyn turned to the stranger.
Daryon did not bow, any more than Thorn bowed before lords and kings. “The Mother-Father orchestrates strange events. I would not have come to the aid of duinóvion, but her messenger is most persuasive.”
“Rashén?”
“You know his name?” The lens construct spun toward Kelyn inquisitively, but for once Daryon reserved his judgments.
A commotion stirred in the corridor. “Clear the way!” a voice echoed. “Clear the way for the White Falcon.”
Laral turned in time to greet Arryk entering through the vestibule, and stooped in a bow. The king gripped him exuberantly by the arms and raised him up again. He was wearing a blood-stained apron and beaming like an orderly who’d been told the fighting was over.
“My dearest friend. Did you find them?” Such hope in Arryk’s face.
Not here, not in front of everyone, Laral wanted to say, but Arryk was not accustomed to living his life in privacy and did not understand the need for it in others. “My girls are safe. I left them in good hands. Tarsyn is with them.”
“I knew you’d like him. And Andryn?”
Hold it together, hold it—but he couldn’t. Laral’s hand flew up to cover his face.
“Goddess’ mercy,” Kelyn muttered. “Both of them?”
Andy and Jaedren both gone, so young, like falling stars.
Laral straightened himself, made every effort to stifle the outburst, but it wouldn’t be ignored any longer. He rushed out into the vestibule and double
d over, choking down sorrow that was too vast to contain. He felt Arryk’s hand on his shoulder.
Apologies, Laral tried to say, but breath wouldn’t come, and there was no room left for words.
“Rance, clear the corridor,” Arryk ordered. “Ruthan, come.”
They whisked Laral off to a dark, quiet room where he could mourn his sons in peace.
~~~~
“Lord Daryon?” asked Laniel, taken aback.
The room gradually recovered from the flood of Laral’s heartache. The commanders began to stir again. Thorn wished to convey his condolences, to Laral and Kalla both, but that would have to wait. Daryon required all his attention. The avedra’s arrival was unexpected, in the least. Startling. He carried himself with extreme dignity, yet there was something wild about his eyes, and astonishing eyes they were, a disturbing shade of yellow-green.
That he was half Elaran was plain at a glance. His skin had no pearlescent sheen, but his lean, lithe build, the musical quality of his voice, the shape of his ear, his disdain were all Elaran. Before today, Thorn had never slapped eyes on a first-generation avedra. He didn’t know whether to feel unnerved or excited—or envious. What were the extents of Daryon’s ability? Given the arrogance of his stance, he carried those abilities like trophies. He did not fear them, like a man who walks always with his sword unsheathed.
Thorn let a peephole crack open in his mind and sent out his awareness like a mouse, tiny and silent, to sniff out the man’s thoughts, but his awareness bounced back at him. The wall barricading Daryon’s mind was rock solid. Remembering the wards he had detected at Bramoran, wards swaddling the minds of the Falcon Guard, and the Black Falcon himself, Thorn had to wonder if they had let a serpent into their midst. Where did Daryon’s loyalties lie?
There was also something different, something alarming, about his azeth. It wasn’t like the lifelights of other avedrin, subtly varied though they were. The light was not a halo or a dome about him, but radiated left and right, beams of white light, golden light, silver light, rippling with each beat of his heart. Like sunlight blasting from behind a cloud. Like …
“Wings,” Thorn said.
Though he had spoken in a breath softer than a whisper, Daryon’s sour-green eyes slid his direction. “You speak as if my title offends you,” he said, addressing Laniel’s remark. “I am a lord of ruins. Guardian of the past, the present, and the future of the Elarion of the Drakhanoran.”
“There is only one who bears such a distinction,” Laniel insisted. “And the Lady has long dwelled in Avidanyth.”
Daryon almost condescended to grin. “Such ignorance. I should have expected it. Ask your Miraji friends. They have their own Lady, and she is not Aerdria of Avidanyth.” Troublesome how much he seemed to know. Like Lothiar. How much did Daryon watch from his mountaintop?
Laniel, too, was perturbed. “You knew all along that the Miraji existed?” Their emergence from the desert had been a surprise to everyone at Tírandon.
“Of course, I knew. You tell me you did not? Tsk, tsk.”
“We have been sundered since the War, yet someone like you might have united us.”
Daryon laughed. It carried a cold, unfriendly note. “Yes, of course, it’s all my fault that you Elarion didn’t care enough to learn if your cousins were annihilated. But isn’t it in bad taste to discuss this among duinóvion?” He might have stopped there, but he was not so gracious as that. “Since she passed through Tánysmar on her journey into the west, Aerdria has done nothing for us, least of all attempt to unite our scattered people. Try to tell me that she did not know that we still lived, struggling to survive among barren rock, and I’ll call you a liar.
“Long ago did we cease answering to her authority. If I bear a title, it is because the bedraggled clans of the mountains bestowed it upon me. Once the duinóvion ransacked our city, we were leaderless. No further contact with our kind. For all we knew, we were the only Elarion left.
“Once I learned otherwise, decades had passed. Duinóvion lived in our cities, and we were all of us in hiding.” A wicked grin curled his mouth. “Only one has been bold enough to step forward, to challenge these sunderings. He might lead us into a new era. Your brother, Falconeye. Lothiar, is it?”
There was an intake of breath. Then the commanders’ voices erupted with questions.
“Damn you!” Laniel bellowed. His tie to their enemy had been his secret to keep.
Kelyn shot a glance over his shoulder, meeting Thorn’s eye, making a silent demand.
Thorn heaved a sigh and shouted, “Shut up, the bloody lot of you! You’re making my head throb.” Just for effect, he made the lamps flare a little brighter; it was more difficult than he anticipated. Maybe the commanders would interpret his wince of pain as disgust. “You think I didn’t know all along who my oath-brother is related to? Kelyn knows, too. And if you have not seen Laniel’s efforts on your behalf, and the sacrifice his dranithion have made, then you are all blind, and I’ll have nothing more to do with you. Drys! Escort our … ally … to rooms of his own. The Lord Daryon will be sent for when he is wanted.”
Acid-colored eyes narrowed in Thorn’s direction. He could practically feel Daryon sifting through his thoughts, a deliberate assault. If you have come to divide our alliance, you’re off to a great start, Thorn tossed at him.
The probing stopped. Daryon lowered his chin in Kelyn’s direction, then strode from the room. The two contraptions whizzed after him. The egg-shaped sentry bumped into the wall a couple of times before it found its way into the corridor.
Thorn chuckled, pleased to have flustered the man.
~~~~
The rest of the house met Daryon at dinner. He had laid aside the stunning gold-enameled armor in favor of a threadbare gray robe.
Laral was not in attendance. His sister voiced unnecessary excuses for his absence, all the while making every effort to avoid the stranger her brother had brought into her house.
Thorn suspected that Ruthan, too, had detected something different about him.
As befitted his station, Daryon was seated at the high table. He poked at the lowland human food with a fork, inspecting the mutton as if it wriggled on his plate. That he might offend his hosts did not occur to him. If it did, he did not care. The wine, however, was to his liking. “Doreli red…” he muttered, raising his glass to the light. Then he noticed that the War Commander’s glass was empty, that he drank hot tea instead. “Strong stuff. Causes trouble, does it?”
Inwardly, Thorn swore; heat rushed into his face. How deeply, how easily, did Daryon delve into a man’s secrets? Was nothing sacrosanct? For over twenty years the War Commander had had no taste for red wine. If he had imbibed, it was with reluctance.
Kelyn handled the matter with aplomb. “No, drunkenness does. My responsibilities require sobriety.”
Thorn winced, waiting for the truth of Kelyn’s past to come spilling from Daryon’s mouth. A delectable dessert for several tables of diners.
Drys swooped in with a distraction, unintentional though it was. “What do you think of Tírandon?” he asked from the lower tables. His mouth was full of mutton, his chin shiny with grease. “Didn’t we tell you she was grand?”
Daryon’s glance swept the dining hall, wall to wall, floor to ceiling. “Tírandon is … large. And well-defended. And primitive.”
“Speaks one who lives in ruins,” Drys argued.
“There’s no hot water.” The man whined with the skill of an adolescent. “It’s been an age since I lived in a city that could channel hot water straight into my hands. Alas, some things will never be recovered.”
Kelyn chuckled. “Would that we could turn your tongue loose on the ogres. Perhaps they might flee.”
“It might be done,” Daryon said. “Every spell is made of words. But you are wise, Commander, to assume that you will never slay them all. Nor is it advisable, as much as I loathe the race. In the destruction of one race by another, both are destroyed. A great emptiness remains
. This is unbalance. In the past, balance was achieved with the naenion. In spite of them. They have been born into the world, and they will continue to dwell in it. Our task is not to gut the belly of this beast, but to sever its head. Once that task is complete, the rest will pass into dust.”
He spoke offhandedly, as if he discussed the state of the roads, but the words resonated deeply with Thorn. He didn’t entirely agree. The world had been teetering on the edge of unbalance since the first ogre walked out of the swamps. What might Daryon say of Thorn’s experiments?
From the lower tables, Etivva said, “You sound like a mystic, my lord.” Her starched linen robes rustled as she turned on the bench. The light from the chandelier gleamed atop her polished scalp.
Daryon smiled at her. The expression carried neither mockery nor arrogance. It seemed to be genuinely friendly, almost affectionate. Could he be gentle where it was due? “You’re the one to know, Etivva of the Damarri people. Perhaps it comes from my own shaddrani heritage.”
Etivva was shrewd. He had baited her, hoping to distract her with talk of his family, but she pursued the topic that mattered: “You seem to be claiming that the Mother-Father permitted this unbalance, that she permitted our enemy to raise this army against us.”
Daryon shrugged. “Of course. How can it be otherwise? The Mother-Father has some purpose which we cannot know, and may not know for generations to come. But that is the business of the Gatekeepers.”
A gasp rose from another of the tables, where Carah sat with Aisley. Daryon’s gaze pinned her, and Thorn heard the thought that passed between them: I saw you, lady. In a dream…
Carah shook her head vigorously, scrambled free of the bench, and fled the dining hall.
Daryon spread his hands in a helpless gesture. “Now what did I say?”
~~~~
That evening, Thorn bent over a siphon, carefully filling ceramic globes with the abyssal oil. Hot wax simmered in a pot over the hearth. In a crate at his feet, a couple hundred empty globes waited their turn. Full globes frosted with cold filled a second crate atop the table, crackling as they chilled. Applying the wax was the real challenge. Ceramic didn’t react well to being heated and chilled simultaneously. If one had a weakness and broke … well, Thorn just hoped the substance didn’t splash him.
