Battle: The House War: Book Five

by Michelle West

  “You will not reach her now. I understand the whole of your intent—but you will not reach her.”

  “I will,” she said. “If that is the only thing that stands between this city and destruction, I will. I will pay the Oracle’s price. I will walk the long roads. I will find my kin.”

  He bowed.

  She exhaled. “Will you examine the book in my library, or are you content to leave it there?”

  He glanced at the volume that remained in Avandar’s hands. “I will examine the book, of course. It might provide a moment’s amusement.”

  * * *

  They returned to the library. To Jewel’s surprise, Angel was waiting. He seemed as surprised to see Haval and Meralonne as she was to see him. When he lifted his hands in den-sign, she shook her head; he let his hands fall to his sides.

  “What’s happened?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “I want to enter your armory. With your permission, I need to borrow a few of the weapons on the walls there.”

  “I think the one you have is significant enough,” Haval surprised her by saying.

  Angel met the erstwhile clothier’s gaze. He then turned, without comment, to Jewel.

  “Yes, of course you have it,” she said. She spoke quietly, as if there were some hope that Haval would fail to hear her. It made her feel young in all the wrong ways. “We’ve taken a book from Teller’s collection and we’re about to examine it where it won’t cause structural damage if it’s dangerous.”

  “I did not say that,” Meralonne told her.

  “Teller’s collection?”

  “That was my reaction as well.” She exhaled. “Hectore of Araven is in the West Wing at the moment; Teller is entertaining him. His servant, Andrei, is in attendance; they will remain for dinner.”

  Why are you telling me this?

  She grimaced. Early warning. Go.

  Haval waited until Angel was out of sight. “That was unwise,” he said, with the type of severe frown he reserved for her most egregious acts of self-indulgence. She did not feel this was deserved.

  “Why? I’m aware—Meralonne has made it clear—that the weapons in that room were and are significant. Unless they present a danger to their wielders, I can’t think of a person I’d rather have wield them. I can think of a few more I would arm without reservation.” She turned, then. “Torvan. Arrendas. I believe that in this space, we are not in as grave a danger as we might otherwise be. I have four Chosen, and two outside my doors; I do not require more than two. Accompany Angel, inspect the weapons on the wall. If you find weapons that suit you, take them.”

  Haval’s lips compressed. “Member APhaniel,” he said, turning to the mage, who was busy fetching his pipe from the folds of his robes. “Do you have anything of material import to add to this command?”

  “The only risk these weapons pose to their wielders is inherent in their condition.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Fools will be fools. The Captains of the Terafin Chosen are not—and have never been—fools. Optimists, perhaps, but never fools. The Terafin is correct; the weapons arrayed on the walls of that room were not crafted to be display pieces; they were meant for use.

  “They were meant for use in a time far more dangerous and far less mundane than the lives you have collectively led. The hidden ways are bleeding, at last, into the mortal lands. Weapons such as these will be useful; in my opinion, they will be necessary. And they appear to be yours to grant, Terafin. Arm your Chosen. Arm your den. Arm yourself, if you find a weapon that is willing to accept you.” He turned to the captains. “It is not simply a matter of choosing a weapon. If you are not acceptable to the weapon, it will not serve you well.

  “You will know,” he added. “And perhaps you will suffer the ignominy of finding that you are considered unworthy. It is, in my opinion, worth the risk. The weapons you carry now will be of little use against even the foes The Terafin has already encountered.

  “The weapons you might carry would be of considerable use. The decision is not entirely in your hands, but without the determination and the will to wield arms in her defense, those weapons will remain as simple, private decorations.” He had, during this speech, lined the bowl of his pipe, and with a flick of his fingers, set the dried leaves to burning; it was a slow, steady burn.

  The Captains of the Chosen did not reply. But Torvan turned to Jewel. “Will you arm all of the Chosen in this fashion?”

  “As many as I can, yes.” She hesitated. She wanted to tell him to take Arann. To take him first. But Arann was part of the Chosen; they were his captains. She had chosen him in the streets of the twenty-fifth; she trusted him as much as she trusted Torvan and Arrendas. More. But . . . they were his captains. The decision, in the end, was not one she could make without cost.

  Torvan heard what she did not say. He waited. She shook her head. “You are the Captains of my Chosen; I will trust your choice of bearers.”

  They both saluted.

  Without another word she turned to Meralonne. “My apologies. There is a table farther in upon which books of a questionable nature appear to be safe. If you feel that opening the book will harm the table, inform me.”

  “The table is of import to you?”

  “Yes. It has sentimental value, and is therefore irreplaceable. Inasmuch as simple objects are priceless, the table is priceless to me.”

  “If you speak of the table situated near the fountain, it is a flat, inanimate object made by simple carpenters.”

  “I believe it was.”

  Smoke trailed from the bowl of his pipe. He glanced at the book in Avandar’s hands, and his eyes crinkled at the corner; it was Meralonne’s version of a smile. It robbed his face of years, and the lack chilled her; on his face, it implied that the whole of a lifetime’s experience was ephemeral, transient; he might remove it the way Jewel removed dirt in a bath. In exactly the same way.

  His smile deepened as he met her gaze. “Come, come, Jewel. You stand on the precipice, now. You will see days of grandeur. You will never the see the world at the height of its youth and its beauty—but you will finally understand what true beauty is.”

  “A book made of living skin is never going to be beautiful, to me.”

  “You quibble.”

  “No, APhaniel, I don’t. I speak the truth, and nothing will ever change it. I might find beauty in things that are deadly.” Her throat grew dry. “I saw the Winter Queen. I touched her hair. I knew that could she, she would have run me down on the hidden path. She couldn’t. Not without losing her mount. If she meets me again on the hidden road, and I attempt to stand in her way, worse—far worse—than death awaits me.

  “But she was beautiful. If I close my eyes now, I can see her. She is always in my mind; she is like the dream I can’t escape by waking. And you,” she continued, her voice dropping. “I see that in you as well—but only when you fight. When you call your sword and the wind comes to take your hair and your robes shift and change and you stand like a god among men. You are beautiful.”

  He surprised her; he reached out and caught her chin in his slender fingers. “Yes,” he said, the smile somehow gentling. “You have seen her. What you see in me is only an echo, and it is yearning, Terafin. Yearning, loss, desire. But you do not conflate beauty with desire—or love. You are unusual.”

  She said, without thought, “Neither does Sigurne.”

  He withdrew his hand, and his expression lost all warmth. “Understand that I am fond of her. She was a child of the Winter in all ways. She will die; she is aged greatly. But I do not want her to pass beyond without experiencing the grandeur and the majesty of the world. She has spent so much of her life denying its existence.”

  “She will not thank you.”

  “Oh, but she will, Terafin. You admire her. You respect her. You are even wise enough, on rare occasions, to fear her. You have both dedicated your lives to protection and guardianship. But for Sigurne, the guardianship is almost at an end; as all mor
tal guardians, she has outlived her usefulness. She is not you, Terafin. She dreads the laying down of her burden, but she also welcomes it. When you have done everything in your power to delay the inevitable, when you have done more, there is no shame, no guilt, in surrender.”

  “She will never surrender.”

  “You quibble again, but I understand why, and I will allow it; where you walk, you will not have the comfort of ignorance. She will not walk your road, but she has walked dark roads before. You feel that she is like you. She is. But your first teacher was Ararath of Handernesse. Sigurne’s first teacher was not mortal. What you felt for Ararath, when you were a girl, Sigurne also felt, and it was not—it was never—safe.

  “Come,” he said again. He lowered his hand. “Take me to this object of sentiment.” Shifting position, he offered her an arm. She stared at him for a long moment before she accepted, resting her hand lightly on the crook of his elbow.

  * * *

  The table was as she’d last seen it. So were the chairs. The books were in an unkempt stack. Meralonne was a member of the Order of Knowledge; he reported to Sigurne. But he was not Sigurne. The volumes of questionable origin did not trouble him in the slightest.

  “Viandaran.”

  Avandar set the closed book on the table.

  “If this book is meant to have power of any significance, it can mean only one thing.”

  “And that?” Jewel asked as she withdrew her hand. The Chosen took up positions at their customary distance; Avandar, however, chose to stand closer.

  “The pages were crafted from the flesh of living beings. It is a potent way of creating a book, if one intends the book to be an object of magic in its own right. It is not the only book present in this library that was crafted in such a fashion. But those books are dormant now; they might cause mischief, but they do not have the power to be truly dangerous.”

  “You think this book is dangerous.”

  “I do.”

  “And that implies that at least one of the contributors to its many pages is somehow still alive.”

  “Yes, Terafin, it does. It cannot be Kialli flesh. In any way that matters, the Kialli chose death when they chose to follow their Lord.”

  “Demons have been used to craft weapons. Summoned demons.”

  “Yes, but weapons of that ilk are not meant for mortals. Too often, the mortals become the weapons; the demons, the wielders. None crafted in such a fashion reside within your armory.”

  “Meralonne—it can’t be the skin of mortals. Not if the book is ancient, as you say.”

  His smile was strange. “There is no immortality waiting for your kind, although men have yearned and bartered for it since the advent of mortality. But there are individuals who have been granted their heart’s desire. You know of one. It is possible, Terafin, that he was not the only one.”

  “His immortality was granted by a malevolent god.”

  “Malevolence was not required,” Meralonne replied. Avandar did not speak. “There are ways to contain the lives of mortals; there are ways to put them beyond the simple reach of time. It is not an act that could be performed by the Kialli. Nor by me or my kin. But the Winter Queen could, should she desire to do so. There are bindings that are older and deeper than the simple march of years.

  “The Winter King, Jewel, is ancient.”

  “He is no longer a man.”

  “No. But the Winter King that was at last hunted was ancient, endless; he had power and his dreams were cold and dark. There are ways. But your kind does not take well to immortality; one cannot be both mortal and immortal. The very essence of what you are denies eternity.

  “It matters little. It is possible that mortal skin was used to craft these pages.”

  “To render the book harmless, we would have to find and release those mortals.”

  “Yes. It is possible, however, that the source of these pages was never mortal, and if that is the case, Terafin, it becomes more complicated. They are bound, in part, to the physical book. It has long remained dormant—but if the book is opened, they will know.”

  “Will you know?”

  “It is possible. I was a warrior, in my youth. Games of this nature were not for one such as I. I did not deal in subterfuge; I did not require it.”

  “How much of this book requires a living donor?”

  “In this age? A page, Terafin. When the book was created, I am certain that all of the pages contained that power.”

  “Will it affect you, Meralonne?”

  “No.”

  That is his arrogance speaking, Avandar said. He cannot be certain.

  You’re not.

  No, Terafin. I am almost certain. But I would have said that Celleriant was in no danger from a tree, no matter how rooted in dream it was, or how transformed. From what you have said, he almost perished there.

  Meralonne left the book upon the table, but traced the runes across its cover.

  “What is the title of the book?” Jewel asked.

  His silver eyes widened. “Terafin, you missed your calling. You might have found a home in the Order itself with a question as irrelevant as that one.”

  Her hands found their perch on her hips again, and she forced them to slide off the fabric to rest at her sides. “If you can’t read it, just say so.”

  His platinum brows rose at the effrontery of her suggestion, but Jewel held her ground. To her great surprise, he laughed. The rich, full sound of genuine amusement filled the air as if it were sunlight on a particularly cold winter day. Much of his laughter was barbed or edged—but not this. “You underestimate yourself in all ways, Jewel. It is a failing with mortals who shoulder responsibility. They fear that they will fail; they see the things that may cause that failure. They do not see the things that will, in the end, all but guarantee success.

  “You are correct, Terafin. I did not study all of the ancient tongues, and I confess that I do not recognize this one, although I would be considered a linguistic expert in the Order itself. I will trouble you not to repeat that confession.”

  “Avandar,” she said, voice soft, “what is the title of the book?”

  Her domicis stiffened. So, too, did Meralonne.

  “The lost son of Silastrassi,” he replied.

  “It is not Old Weston.”

  “No, Terafin. It is a variant of Ancient Torra; I do not think even the Sword of Knowledge would recognize the whole of its grammatical structure; there are very, very few extant texts over which they might work, and even had they several, the written language was fractured and individual.”

  “Variant?”

  “The Cities of Man had, of course, written language, but their use of language diverged greatly upon the written page. Although the basic language spoken between the ambassadors of those city-states was one, the written language was not. A merchant tongue, as it was called, existed for commerce—and war—between the cities. But it was used only as discourse for quotidian business.

  “For any other matter in which a man of significance and power might lift quill, the syntax of the language was unique in each city. It was not completely foreign; the Tor of one city, if presented with a poem or a literary endeavor of another, would be able to parse its content.”

  “You’re saying this book was written in—or written by—men in the time of gods?”

  “Or very shortly thereafter, yes.”

  “But—would that not mean that this book was meant for mortals?”

  “Yes and no,” Meralonne cut in. “Are you mortal, Terafin?”

  She frowned. “Of course. You’ve remarked on it at least a dozen times in the past few months—let alone the decade that preceded them—and usually as an insult.”

  “Viandaran?”

  “Bind the book,” Avandar said. “Contain it. Do not open it here.” His tone of voice drew the instant attention of the Chosen who nonetheless appeared to hear and see nothing.

  Jewel, however, said, “You think this was meant for the S
en?”

  “It was meant for the Sen of a city,” Meralonne replied. “I was not certain until Viandaran spoke, but he is certain. He may even be able to tell you which one.”

  “I have not said that,” Avandar replied, in a tone so chilly it would freeze whole lakes if he dropped a word in their water. “It is possible it was written by the Sen.”

  “But why would the Sen need to create a book like this?”

  They both looked at her as if she were six years of age and had asked a question that proved she had never been educated. She was highly tired of this, but also accustomed to it; it was the danger of surrounding oneself with counselors of experience and power. “Look at this library,” she said, her hands in loose fists. “Look at the war room. Look at my forest. And then, after you have paid attention to their existence—to their creation—pretend that I asked that question a second time.”

  Meralonne lifted a brow. “I will grant you, Terafin, that it seems a strange artifact for the founder of a great city. But Sen served as a title for the women who came after. They were not all what you are; they did not all have that power. Some of the Sen were mage-born, some seer-born. In the age of man, it was rare, but not unheard of, for a woman to be both. The Sen could speak with gods with impunity. They could hear the language of the gods and retain what little sanity they possessed. They understood how to manipulate their people, and how to best use them, to defend and enlarge their domains.

  “They did not rule. But they did not serve except at their own pleasure. No Tor sought to destroy the Sen of his city, although in theory the Tors did rule. You imagine that the Sen were not human. You are wrong. They played their games of dangerous power. Sometimes it destroyed them; far more often it destroyed their enemies. Not even the Queen of the Wild Hunt chose to cross blades with the Sen Adepts except at great need.”

  She exhaled. “Why was that book given to Teller?”

  “That is what we will now ascertain.”

  Avandar reached out and placed one hand on her left shoulder.

  Meralonne gestured. A patina of orange light flared around him, overlapped in an instant by bands of green and subtle gray. After a pause, he spoke a single word, two; she heard it as language but also as thunder; the air crackled. In her gaze, his hands began to glow. The left was gloved in a golden light that superseded all others, but did not obliterate them; the right, in a black that devoured everything.