The Black King (Book 7)

by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

  Matt sighed. If only Coulter and Arianna were already in Jahn. Then he could go after Rugad right away instead of going through this entire farce. But he didn’t have that kind of choice. He only had two: leave or continue forward.

  He wasn’t going to leave. No matter how uncertain he was, he wouldn’t leave. But he would take precautions.

  He picked up his knapsack and opened it. The dolls were in a special sack of their own, along with the vials of blood. He wished he had the ability to create a Shadowlands like the Visionaries did, but that was not an Enchanter spell. So he pushed the sack as far into the knapsack as he could, and then, with a wave of his hand, built a small wall of cloth in front of it, a wall that looked like it was part of the sack itself.

  Still, the sack was bigger on the outside than on the inside. Anyone touching it would know. So he put a visual spell over the sack itself, so that it looked shorter than it really was.

  The dolls were safe, for the moment.

  He only wished he was, too.

  TWENTY-TWO

  THE SUMMONS startled Xihu. A Nyeian sailor had knocked on her door and called to her. When Xihu opened the door, he had told her that the visitor was from the palace, and she had felt a strange light-headedness, as if this were the confirmation of a Vision she didn’t remember.

  She had gone to see Gift first, who told her to go, and reminded her that she had promised to serve the Black Family. She hadn’t needed the reminding, but what she hadn’t said to him was that she had thought of the Black family as him, and him alone. She didn’t feel that was worth confessing to anyone.

  The sun had risen and was a small ball on the eastern horizon. It was a pale sun, giving little warmth and even less comfort. Xihu was used to the chill of Protector’s Village, a dry cold that contained the smell of the mountains and a crispness that made even the air seem sharp. Here the cold was damp. The buildings were bright and colorful—a Fey addition, Gift told her—but their structure was plain, a sign of their Islander roots.

  The marriage between Fey and Islander cultures wasn’t usually so easy. She had felt a strain ever since the ship had arrived in the harbor, a strain that wasn’t connected to the assassination attempts or Gift’s Open Vision. The strain was part of the air, part of the very land that surrounded her. It was as if she could feel a discomfort that emanated from every part of the Isle.

  The messenger had led her through a different gate than she had gone through the day before. He had taken her in a different door, and brought her to an audience room that was so large, it could have housed a dozen supplicants and another dozen guards and not seemed crowded.

  There was a throne on the dais before her, a simple sturdy throne with ornate carvings on the arms. It was nothing like the Black Throne, which was actual stone, built into the wall of the mountain. This was a simple throne for a simple ruler who had no pretensions, no thoughts of world conquest.

  The swords and spears that decorated the walls surprised her. She had heard that the Islanders were a peaceful people, even though Gift had once told her that the symbol of their religion was a small sword. She also knew that the Islanders had proven themselves strong fighters. Still, she had not expected such a warlike place.

  She walked toward the throne and stopped, looking up at the coat of arms emblazoned against the wall. Two swords crossed over a single heart. Gift had mentioned that as well, but seeing it mesmerized her. It looked like it had been created by the same person who created the Fey crest, which was a sword piercing two hearts. No wonder Gift had been startled when he had gone into the Black Throne Room.

  Two peoples with magick. Two peoples with Places of Power on their homelands. Two peoples with inverted crests. There was a message here that she felt she should understand.

  A door closed behind the dais, and then a person swept into the room. For a moment, Xihu thought she was looking at Gift’s identical twin—and then she saw the braid running down the back, the birthmark on the chin, the feminized features, and knew that she was looking at Arianna.

  Arianna wore breeches and a jerkin, and thick boots. She had muscular arms and a trim, athletic figure. Her eyes were blue like Gift’s, only unlike Gift’s they had an edge to them, a darkness that seemed to be threaded through them.

  Xihu remembered Gift’s suspicion, that Arianna had somehow been tainted by the Throne’s dark magick, and wondered at it. It certainly seemed possible. She knew that the Light had gone Seeking. She just didn’t know what it had found in Arianna—if it had found anything at all.

  Arianna did not sit on the throne. Instead she stepped off the dais and walked across to Xihu. Arianna extended her hand in the Nyeian fashion. Xihu stared at it a moment before taking it, knowing that it was some kind of test.

  Arianna’s hand was warm and dry. Xihu was surprised at the warmth and the fleshy feel of the fingers. She had half-expected, after the Visions and the comments she had heard, that this Arianna would be a golem.

  “Do I pass?” Her voice was throaty and filled with a dry irony.

  “I thought I was the one being tested,” Xihu said.

  Arianna smiled faintly. It was a cool, appraising smile, almost appreciative, and Xihu remembered the feeling she had had in the tower room, that Arianna seemed to play emotions for effect, not because she felt them.

  “You are,” she said. “I need a Shaman. I’m not thrilled with having one from the Eccrasian Mountains, nor am I thrilled with having one who is my brother’s choice, but here you are. I do have some issues that I wouldn’t mind discussing with a Shaman.”

  “Issues?” Xihu asked.

  “Yes.” Arianna did not elaborate. “I suppose Gift has already convinced you that I’m not the woman I once was.”

  “He says you’re different.”

  “What do you think?”

  Xihu shrugged. “I did not know you before.”

  “But you have an opinion.”

  Xihu folded her hands into her robe. “I believe that the course you have led us on during the last fifteen years is an appropriate one. I do not think that moving to Leut, as you outlined to Gift yesterday, is the appropriate path.”

  Arianna studied her for a moment. “So you would interpret any Vision to point me in a peaceful direction.”

  “I do not believe Vision can be interpreted,” Xihu said. “I believe it can be compared and perhaps the pieces will fall together.”

  Arianna’s eyes narrowed. It wasn’t quite with disapproval. It was as if her quick and agile mind were assessing all that she heard. Then she swept a hand toward the dais. “This is not a comfortable place for a real conversation. Let us go somewhere where we can both sit down.”

  Xihu followed Arianna behind the dais. Arianna took her through a small door to a room that had upholstered furniture and a fireplace with a warm fire burning in it. The room smelled of woodsmoke and seemed extremely homey, but Xihu found the entire transition disturbing. She knew that Arianna had had guards listening in the audience chamber. Now that Xihu had passed some sort of test—what kind she wasn’t sure—apparently, Arianna didn’t want them to hear anything.

  Arianna took a seat near the fire. She stretched out her legs and crossed them at the ankle. Then she pulled another chair close and bid Xihu to sit as well.

  Xihu did. The fire warmed her legs. She hadn’t realized how chilled she had become during the walk over.

  “I suppose Lyndred told you that she believes I am Blind,” Arianna said. “You probably think I need a Shaman to give me Sight.”

  Xihu froze. There would be no lying here. “Lyndred said that, yes.”

  “So you have come here as a response to my summons not because you are interested in serving me, but because you want to see if you can tell whether or not I’m Blind.”

  “I came because you said you needed a Shaman.”

  “Did you expect it to be a permanent Shaman?”

  “Is it?” Xihu asked.

  Arianna’s small smile returned. “You’
re young, but you are well trained. Is it true that you belong to that small sect of Shaman who defied Kerde?”

  Kerde was the leader of Protector’s village, and she had once been Rugad’s Shaman. There were several Shaman who did not believe Kerde’s ways. One of them had been the Shaman assigned to Rugar, the Shaman who had eventually worked with Gift’s Islander father, Nicholas.

  “You are well informed,” Xihu said, not certain if that would work to her advantage or not.

  “I try to know what I can about people.” Arianna rested her wrist on the arm of a chair. “What little I know of you suggests you might be untraditional. Are you?”

  Xihu shrugged. “I am what I am.”

  “A traditional Shamanic answer. Let me ask you questions, then.”

  Xihu nodded. She had hoped for this. It would give her insight into Arianna.

  “If you were to become my Shaman,” Arianna said, “would you tell me every Vision that you had?”

  “That’s not required.”

  “But would you?”

  “Would it be a condition?”

  “Yes,” Arianna said.

  “Then, if I agreed to be your Shaman, I would abide by your conditions.”

  “My conditions would be to tell me all your Visions, to follow all instruction, to analyze Visions only when told to, and to disregard most of your training from the Eccrasian Mountains. Could you do that?” Arianna’s eyes sparkled. She knew that most Shaman would not accept such conditions. Shaman liked to think of themselves as the most independent of the Fey.

  “If I agreed to be your Shaman,” Xihu said again, “I would abide by your conditions.”

  “Would you agree to be my Shaman knowing those conditions?” Arianna asked.

  Xihu studied her. Arianna was sprawled in the chair, completely at ease with herself. There was something about her expression that suggested a hardness—not an evil, exactly, nor a love of cruelty. Just a tendency to use it if it became absolutely necessary—and a suggestion, however slight, that someday it would.

  “Well?” Arianna asked.

  This time, Xihu almost smiled. So, the Black Queen of the Fey was impatient.

  “Would I be your Shaman knowing those conditions?” Xihu said. “No.”

  Arianna tilted her head back. “You disappoint me. I thought you did not follow all the Shamanic traditions.”

  “I don’t,” Xihu said. “If I did, I would be proud to serve the Black Family in any capacity.”

  “That’s not my experience with Shaman.”

  “Your father’s Shaman was not typical.”

  Something flitted through Arianna’s eyes. It seemed like surprise. What other Shaman would she be thinking of? There had been none on Blue Isle since Arianna became Black Queen.

  “Then what makes your choice?” Arianna asked.

  “I will not be the only source of Vision to a Blind leader.”

  “You believe I’m Blind?”

  “You’ve given me no cause to believe otherwise.”

  Arianna stared at her, blue eyes so pale and cold that they looked sharp. “I do not have to defend myself to a Shaman.”

  “Of course you don’t,” Xihu said. “But you asked my reasons. I’ve told you.”

  “Lyndred is a power-mad girl,” Arianna said. “She wants the Throne so she is trying to pit my brother against me, have him throw me off the Throne. And while we struggle against the Blood, she seizes power.”

  “I think that’s a likely possibility.”

  Most people would have softened when she agreed with them. Arianna did not. In fact, her gaze got even sharper.

  “But I also watched you yesterday with Gift,” Xihu said. “You treated him too harshly.”

  “Did I? He came here for the Throne.”

  “He came here for you.”

  “Perhaps he believes that. Perhaps he has you believing that. But anyone who has touched the Black Throne is in service to it.”

  “Gift rejected the Throne.”

  “Did you see it?”

  “I Saw the Seeking Light from the Throne. It was released when he let go.”

  Arianna looked away. “If I prove to you that I am not Blind, will you serve me?”

  Xihu had hoped Arianna would not ask that question. “How would you do that? Tell me your most recent Vision?”

  Arianna held out her hand. She folded it into a fist. Then she slowly unclenched it. In the center of her palm, a tiny Shadowlands rose. It was barely the size of a stone, but it was clearly a Shadowlands. Yet Arianna did not release it as most would do. She also did not make it grow.

  Xihu stared at it. She felt as if there were something wrong with it. Perhaps it was Arianna’s willingness to prove her Sight, even when she claimed she would not defend herself against the charges.

  “So,” Arianna said. “Would you be at my side, following my orders and answering my questions?”

  Something about this woman struck Xihu as unnatural. Arianna had said nothing when Xihu mentioned the Seeking Light, but logically she wouldn’t. Xihu would have been startled at a confession.

  “Why is this so difficult to answer?” Arianna asked.

  “Because,” Xihu said. “I love your brother and trust him. I do not like you.”

  Arianna closed her fist, crushing the Shadowlands. She stood rapidly and turned her back, but not before Xihu saw the complete fury on her face.

  “Liking should not enter into it,” Arianna said. “Your training said you must serve the Black Family.”

  “It’s that training you ask me to deny.” Xihu spoke as calmly as she could.

  Arianna was silent for a moment. She lowered her head as if in thought. “So I did.” She turned. “You are an amazing woman. You have proven, with a single sentence, to be the kind of Shaman I want.”

  The heat from the fire prickled against Xihu’s side. The room was almost too hot.

  “And yet,” Arianna said, “your professed love of Gift shows me that I can never trust you. How very sad.”

  She sighed and circled the chair, flouncing into it like a young man who hadn’t learned manners.

  “Since you will be going back to my brother, and since you will probably accompany him to Leut, which means we will never see each other again, would you do me one favor?”

  “How can I deny the Black Queen?” Xihu said, not answering the question. She would wait for the favor.

  “Give me a ruling.”

  “On what?”

  Arianna sat up. The image of youth was suddenly gone. In her eyes was an ancient wisdom, a cunning that startled Xihu with its ferocity. “Golems,” she said. “Golems and loose souls.”

  Xihu stiffened. “I have little practical experience with them.”

  “Most people who lived off Blue Isle have little practical experience with them. I am asking something in theory.”

  “I will tell you my understanding of the theory,” Xihu said. “I cannot guarantee that my understanding is correct.”

  “Such a proper Shamanic hedge. For one who defies tradition, you fall back on it often.”

  Xihu waited.

  Arianna sighed, as if she were disappointed that her jab had not found its mark. “Is a person, freed from his body, subject to Blood against Blood?”

  Xihu felt her palms grow damp. She didn’t want to think about the implications of that question. “What do you mean?”

  “Let me use an example,” Arianna said. “My brother Gift left part of himself in a bit of stone, a Golem.”

  “Your brother Sebastian.”

  “The Golem lived for eighteen years, and then his Link to Gift was severed, making them separate creatures. For the sake of argument, if I were to destroy the Golem and its soul, would I as Gift’s blood relative, commit Blood against Blood?”

  Xihu had to work to control her expression.

  Arianna smiled. “I’ve shocked you.”

  “it seems an odd thing to need a ruling on,” Xihu said.

  Ariann
a straightened in her chair. “A light crossed Blue Isle threaded with black. Ever since that, Sebastian has acted strange. But I think something has happened to him and I do not feel safe around him—and I was afraid for what would happen if things had gotten out of control. I could ask the question in reverse. If he manages to kill me, is that Blood against Blood?”

  Odd that she mentioned the Search Light in this context. Was it possible that the light had caused problems within a Golem? Perhaps. Had this been what turned Arianna dark and made her distrust Gift? Because his Golem had tried to harm her?

  “So,” Arianna said. “You’re going to be traditional again and not answer.”

  Xihu shook her head. “I’m considering. There is nothing in the history of the Fey that helps me here.”

  Arianna folded her hands over her stomach and leaned back. She would have seemed like someone who was in no hurry if it weren’t for the tautness of her body. There was something in the question that was extremely important to her. She tried to hide it, but Xihu could see it in her posture.

  “I have not met Gift’s golem,” Xihu said slowly. “I know that their Links are shut off, so there is no way to reach Gift through the golem. This leads me to believe that the golem is a separate entity with its own personality and thoughts. But its body is stone. It has no blood. So the question you are actually asking me is: what causes the Blood against Blood? The actual physical death of a person’s body? Or the destruction of the soul?”

  Arianna sat up, looking interested.

  “I do not know the answer to that,” Xihu said, “but I am inclined to believe that the death of the body is the important thing. Souls can be trapped in Fey lamps. They can change form and become Mysteries. There are many who believe that the Powers are ancient souls as well. I am not even sure the soul passes away. For example, if a Black family member murders you, your soul will probably live on as a Mystery. But the Blood against Blood will happen as well. That leads me to believe the body is extremely important.”

  Xihu felt a trembling inside herself. She hated this question and she was certain she was causing a problem with her honest answer. “But then there are the historical concerns.”