Stormed Fortress

by Janny Wurts

  Even to risk guarded sleep in this place, human faculties brushed the bounds of the veil. Danger lurked for the untrained and stalked the unwary, where a strayed thought could unseal the grand portals. Lord Erlien’s chieftains gathered their people in refuge, where no mortal footstep went lightly. Not every hunter dared to stalk the game, or presumed to forage and set cookfires. Ones without subtle perception left such tasks to the gifted among them. Here, to act out of harmony with the land might carry irrevocable forfeit.

  At full moon, when the lane tides peaked, sleepers rode the driving swirl of raised flux, sunk in the meteoric splendour of dreams. Athera’s web of active consciousness beguiled them, entwined with the seasonal currents, until even waking thought sailed through the life-quickened stream, where vivid colours and sound ran outside of the familiar senses.

  The initiate mage, and those who were seer-gifted, did not rest at all, as the bore of the mysteries ran through them. Some anchored themselves in the comfort of groups. Others took solace in solitude.

  In the hours before dawn, while the moon’s silvered face laced the forest in velvet shadows, Arithon Teir’s’Ffalenn sat tucked with his back braced against a mossy boulder. His bare feet were rinsed by a streamlet, run chill since the passing of summer. The air smelled of frost, although Selkwood never saw ice and hard freeze, or the snow, soon to blanket the north. Tonight, his lyranthe was not at hand. He carried no steel, and no knife. Stripped of all things but his leathers and shirt, he held quiet, while the burning, rogue gift of his s’Ahelas heritage traced the land’s untamed concourse, listening.

  His beloved’s call touched him most easily, there, a contact dispatched from Alestron. Trained master, he curbed his distress for her danger. Right choice, founded by her conviction as healer, had sent her inside harm’s reach. Love did not confine her. Nor could Arithon’s sovereign straits argue the need that had brought her: to pursue Feithan’s headstrong, s’Valerient daughter, and circumvent a disaster.

  Wide open, beyond censure, Arithon gave his enchantress the spark of his joy, alive with the trust of his confidence. ‘Best Beloved. Elaira.’

  ‘I would have you bear witness,’ she sent in return. Beyond words, the warm invitation extended to share her immediate presence, as Jieret’s daughter was brought in for interview. He would see precisely what drove the girl’s motives; could measure what childish ideal shoved her into the ugly, cross-chop of politics. The gravity of his decision from Alland would be enabled by first-hand perception.

  Arithon closed his eyes against the seductive allure of the moonlight. Held secure by the trickling flow of the stream, and by the pines standing over him, he let go and sank into the contact. His link with Elaira drew him away, to a closed chamber, clogged with the scents of wax candles and musty travel-stained wool. He experienced the worry that freighted the air, inside the shut gates of Alestron …

  Elaira was not complaisant. Through Arithon, she discovered that state meetings in the citadel were seldom conducted in privacy. Duke Bransian was likely to post his own listeners, or lurk at a spy-hole behind the carved panelling. Yet Jeynsa was given the semblance of dignity for her encounter with Rathain’s delegation. The chamber was cleared of by-standing men-at-arms. Hurried servants removed the splashed carpet. The tall chairs with their heraldic trappings stood empty as the waiting crown spokesmen were brought a carafe of wine.

  Head clamped in pained hands, Dakar could not respond. Since Sidir stayed walled behind his compressed anger, Elaira received the servant’s request and declined the offer of drink. Unimpressed by the pretence, she stayed on the backless chair taken first, at the foot of the vacated dais. In travel-stained leathers, hardened fit by her rigorous journey from Halwythwood, she displayed an unbroken composure. Sidir stood at her back. The shadow about his gaunt face and grey eyes ran beyond the shorn loss of his clan braid. Nascent horror still marked him, the iron set of his shoulders reflecting his recent mishandling.

  Dakar slumped on a stool in wet clothing. Huddled under a blanket the serving-man tossed him, he wore his stout flesh like a wad of soaked pulp, sunk to the eyeballs in misery. His aura bled off wisps of shuddering light, sure sign to the refined perception of mage-sense that he had stressed his arcane faculties. Yet Elaira’s finesse gave the crown prince in Alland no time to plumb surface appearances. The outer door crashed back and admitted Jeynsa s’Valerient. An unlooked-for grace: Talvish served as her escort. His lithe footstep shadowed her heels, a warning to any that knew him. He bore full arms, the fist riding his sword-hilt bespeaking annoyance that he had been pulled off his watch-post.

  Jeynsa was herself, a bristling young wildcat who tested authority through roughshod defiance. Hauled barefoot from bed, she had dared to wear black!

  Uninvested caithdein, the brazen nerve shocked: even Dakar vented outrage. ‘You have no right!’ But his cry was snapped short by Sidir’s clamped grip on his forearm.

  The Companion knew how to handle her best; had been Feithan’s choice to check-rein her daughter’s rank insolence. ‘Who gave you the clothing?’ he said, scarcely nettled.

  For, of course, the affront would not have political backing. Dame Dawr’s seamstresses were never such fools.

  Jeynsa flushed. She marched into the breach with a rattle of steel, bearing her load of scout’s weaponry. ‘Who else here would call our crown prince to task? I refuse to condone his Grace’s desertion.’ Candle-flames whipped as she stopped to rebut Sidir’s nerveless interrogation. ‘Our clan code does not strand a loyal ally!’

  Up close, the ruse showed: her robe had been filched second hand from a heavy-set scholar. The fabric was streaked by unfinished dye. Sleeves and hem had been hacked down to size with a knife.

  ‘You’re a sight to shame your s’Valerient ancestry,’ Sidir observed in cool quiet. ‘Be glad you face us and not Asandir. Though you will, in due time. Never question the certainty. You may have been one month old at your choosing. But now, you are quite grown enough to speak your own mind and reap the sour fruit on your merits! We’re not your authorities. This is not a reprimand. Beware of your mouth, girl! Lives ride on your drama. A Sorcerer might call the account for your actions, and where can your mother appeal for relief?’

  ‘Feithan does not command me,’ Jeynsa replied. ‘You might share her bed, but don’t speak for her!’

  Only Sidir could withstand that cruel barb. No raw venom could unseat his dignity. Throughout, he stayed as sure of his own mind as ever he had been during his hard stint in Vastmark. ‘Jeynsa. Sit down. Let go of your anger.’ With the same, unimpeachable gentleness, he added, ‘If anything could have turned Jieret for home, our liege would have paid any price that was his. He’d have risked his own life before losing your father.’

  ‘We aren’t discussing my sire,’ the girl snapped. Unappeased, she accepted the chair that was offered.

  Talvish remained by the door, taut with nerves. His worried, jade eyes sought Elaira, who had not stirred. Dakar kept his own counsel, raw yet with exhaustion. Exquisitely practised at cozening whores, he had never owned this Companion’s born skill, to sort human needs and negotiate.

  ‘I will ask, as a liegeman,’ Sidir appealed. ‘Leave this place in our company, Jeynsa. Set your sovereign prince free. Duke Bransian’s people are fit to handle the fate they have flaunted before Lysaer’s war host.’

  Jeynsa lifted her chin. ‘I don’t promise false hope to the mothers I’ve seen. Or desert my Named word. I would die by the sword, in this room, before I allow you to force these folks’ deaths on my conscience.’

  ‘My weapons lie in the hands of the duke,’ Sidir declared in strait scorn. ‘Nor would your feal escort strike an under-age child in the back! You insult us, as a galling snip of a girl. The adult would step in with bare hands and disarm you. Bend you over a knee, for the strapping your bluster deserves!’

  Jeynsa pulled a riled breath. ‘Just you try –’ she began.

  Sidir overrode her. ‘Act your age! I wouldn�
��t soil my hands, or my Name! In this, I am not Feithan’s ally!’

  That icy wording slapped Jeynsa white. She was shivering, though protocol spared her: as the welcomed guest of Duke Bransian s’Brydion, nobody present could touch her. ‘I will not release Arithon,’ she announced, sounding plaintive, though her manner gave not an inch. Afraid she might be, wrung to sweating disgrace, still, no doubt assailed her fixed purpose.

  Sidir bent his head, his sudden tears masked as he ceded his lead to Elaira.

  Who still did not move: Koriani, and dangerous, her cold regard held the surgical edge of her training. At a word, she could lay open a soul to the bone or drive a wrought spell for the viscera. Had that been her way, the girl would be dead, before Talvish’s reflex could unsheathe his steel.

  ‘You will not bear the cost,’ warned Elaira, point-blank. ‘His Grace will, to the agonized depths of a spirit not made to divide you from your poisoned claim to integrity. This is no longer grief, but a back-stab done only for pain, and self-punishing, vicious contention. The exchange, if you stay, will not be one-sided. You will lose your light heart. I would suggest, Jeynsa, that if you fail to listen, you will hurt Arithon. Wound him this way, and you could destroy the last shred of your true peace of mind in this life.’

  Jeynsa glared, fighting tears. ‘Will the children who die care a jot for my pride?’

  ‘Arithon does!’ Elaira attacked. ‘Not even a blood-binding can halter his being! His Grace can break his pledged oath through bare will! You left that knot incomplete and unreciprocal. The option’s still open. Your crown prince may well choose the personal penalty, before being drawn to self-sacrifice.’

  ‘He will not,’ stated Jeynsa. ‘For Jieret, he won’t.’

  The truth rang incontrovertible. After all, the young upstart had taken her crown prince’s measure in Halwythwood. The gift of his presence, bestowed without strings, had exposed his core self beyond salvage. The girl knew her quarry. Birth talent had driven her insight too far and too desperately deep.

  ‘Then woe betide you, we are done.’ Dakar heaved himself upright. ‘This has all gone wrong. Far more than this citadel is going to burn, if the Master of Shadow takes up your brash challenge.’

  ‘He already has. He is here,’ Jeynsa stated, made wild by salacious relish. ‘You don’t see? Elaira has brought his Grace’s awareness. Arithon doesn’t intend to back down. Or his woman would have withdrawn from this room and abandoned my case without pleading.’

  Sidir lifted his head. Helpless, beyond weeping, his features were haggard. Beside him, Dakar recoiled in disgust from the girl’s overblown histrionics. ‘Ath’s mercy, your crown prince was made party to this?’

  When Elaira returned no word of denial, Talvish stirred fast and moved in.

  ‘I’ll take her!’ he cracked, to spare Sidir’s stunned grief. His mailed grasp caught Jeynsa’s wrist from behind, spun her headlong toward the doorway. ‘We’re off to your room! Believe this, girl. If you spurn Bransian’s guest oath and fight, I’ll break your damned neck, and crow to Dharkaron Avenger for seizing the privilege.’

  The instant the door slammed, Dakar found his wits and rousted Sidir with hard urgency, ‘Out. Let the enchantress have her time, alone. This has been a raw set-back. If Elaira’s still in rapport with your prince, they should be left in communion.’

  Sidir rallied his poise. But before he took Dakar’s advice and stepped out, he went down on his knee. His considered clasp gathered the lady’s chilled hands and lent her the solace of his warm fingers.

  ‘Mi a’daelient,’ he murmured in cadenced Paravian. Before he arose, he touched Elaira’s palms to his bent forehead in the formal salute only given to the realm’s queen …

  In the foil-and-felt tableau of moonlight and shade, Arithon held to the peace of the greenwood. The strength of his calm met the brute storm of heart-ache, and clung to grim balance, unflinching. Through the tearing interval, as Elaira wept, nothing moved through his linking presence beyond the cosseting flow of affection.

  Her sore disappointment could not be assuaged. ‘I’ve failed you,’ she sent. ‘Feithan, as well, and not least, Sidir. You know what he suffered to come here.’

  Whip scars and shackles, and the ignominy of a branding that would gall him, lifelong; Arithon was experienced enough not to bury the black rage under platitudes. Since he had no avenue to console Sidir, he tempered his touch, for Elaira. He let the held cup of her being fill all that he owned in the world.

  ‘I know Jeynsa,’ he stated aloud, that the site he had chosen to greet the full moon could transmute his burden to sorrow. ‘She is Jieret’s daughter, with her mother’s more-quiet resiliency latent. I think that her father foresaw her rebellion when he asked for my vow, by the Aiyenne. Don’t ache for the spirit that girl can’t deny. I don’t need to come north to protect her.’

  That he would leave his warded haven in Alland was never in doubt. Embraced by his care, Elaira was given the question that stabbed like cut glass.

  ‘Why should I rise to a stroke of foul play?’ Arithon grounded his naked feet into the stream bottom. While the water purled over mossy rock, and the breeze riffled the surrounding evergreens, he leaned upon calm, soothed down Elaira’s rife hurt and from somewhere bought courage to answer. ‘I will come because Jeynsa will not be left to her scars. She shall have one more chance. This much, I can grant her. To take charge and learn that pain and loss are not life. That her will is no weapon, to forge betrayed love into a shackle of tyranny.’ He added, still settled, ‘I promised Earl Jieret not to abandon her.’

  At which point, Elaira’s linked sensing could snatch the silk from the dross: see just how much of his poised equilibrium had been borrowed at need from the forest.

  Arithon changed the subject. ‘I’ve a sovereign charge to lay on Sidir, though Ath knows, he doesn’t deserve the rough burden after tonight.’

  ‘Fionn Areth?’ sent Elaira, acquiescence not fooled. At one with his thought, she knew not to ruffle the vessel that rode such stilled waters.

  Rueful equilibrium met her, gratefully warmed by her tactful understanding. ‘I gave my word, once. The grass-lander was to have an eye-witness to sort out the criminal evidence listed against me. Please ask Sidir to stand as my spokesman. Let him deliver his honest testament, even to the most damaging questions. This is no time to shelter my dignity. I want that young herdsman kept safe. Or he will be destroyed, run under by Desh-thiere’s machinations and the strife between me and my half-brother. Expose me, and Lysaer, for what we are, when the curse drives us outside all mercy.’

  ‘Burn away the false dross of idealism?’ Elaira’s wry amusement uplifted him. ‘That’s a signal task, while mewed up with s’Brydion, who live by the skin that hangs their brass bollocks, and breathe on the passion of brimstone heroics!’

  Arithon laughed. ‘They thrive in a fight. Even my brother’s mad pack of fanatics are going to be vexed by the reckoning. Your stirred nest of hornets will not crumple without sting! I am not worried, yet.’ The assessment was sincere: he owned the rogue gifts of the s’Ahelas blood-line, once crossed with the seers of s’Dieneval. Yet the shadowy offshoots of probable futures posed an abyss he was forced to skim lightly. ‘Bereaved mothers and widows won’t embellish the Alliance’s grand cause. And Duke Bransian’s wicked bent for dark strategy should secure the gates until the hour I can rejoin you.’

  ‘I’d hoped to be left to my own devices,’ Elaira said, tart. As the warmth of his smile dissolved, she thrust again, in stripped wording: ‘not least for the sake of the script that drives my Prime Matriarch’s grasping agenda.’

  ‘At her own peril!’ Arithon snapped, not offended. No brazen threat from the order could move him. ‘I’ll come in my own time,’ said the Teir’s’Ffalenn, ‘and by my own terms, which won’t be entirely for the sake of my binding oath to Earl Jieret.’

  ‘It’s Feithan’s debt on you,’ Elaira accused, also aware that her phrasing encompassed all of Sidir’s fut
ure happiness.

  ‘Some gifts of friendship cannot be earned, no matter how hard we try to live up to them.’ Recognition leaked through, of the grief lately cleansed by the cautery of remorse. ‘Rathain’s clan families have suffered too much. All I have, I would give for s’Valerient.’

  There was more – too much more, walled behind that stripped statement. Yet Elaira chose not to encroach. However the Prince of Rathain met his debts, the man who was Masterbard needed to lay his own course through the obstacles at the s’Brydion citadel. When Arithon plunged into the hotbed of jeopardy to confront Jieret’s wayward daughter, he would act by a strategy to shatter all precedents.

  ‘Beloved, don’t weep.’ The flood of aimed strength that came through in parting, this time was not taken from Selkwood. Arithon’s surety was as honed steel, forged by a conviction in the fullest command of all his protective male instincts …

  * * *

  Elaira shivered, chilled and apprehensive as the contact came to an end. Even she dared not try to fathom how Arithon might reclaim the slipped reins of his fate. Cold, though she sweated within a closed chamber inside of a threatened citadel, she dried her last tears with the back of her wrist.

  ‘Merciful grace, Jeynsa!’ she swore at due length, when composure returned and sparked anger.

  The girl was a fool – no, all the worse – a naive, callow spirit, to believe she could confound Arithon Teir’s’Ffalenn or tie up a man with initiate stature in the strings of a sworn obligation.

  While the Alliance war host surrounded the s’Brydion citadel and dug in for an entrenched siege, the full moon waned and the forest of Selkwood tossed under a whipping cold rain. The soaked canvas of the caithdein’s lodge billowed, punched by buffeting gusts, until Lord Erlien called for torches to relieve the gloom behind the laced door flap. The sumptuous, dyed carpets had been rolled aside, with a mat of pine-needles laid down to blanket the sodden ground. The scouts came in drenched to make their reports, while the fire pit fluttered and smoked, and delivered no warmth to offset their damp misery.