Cast in Flame

by Michelle Sagara

  “I fail to see the problem.”

  “It just seems like—like too pretentious a name. Or something. I’d look like an idiot.”

  “That’s never stopped you before.”

  “Very funny, Teela.”

  “I note that neither of us is laughing.”

  “Severn’s grinning, does that count?”

  Teela chuckled. It was a better sound.

  “I don’t think small and squawky cares, if that helps.”

  “Not much.”

  Given Teela’s tone, Kaylin dared a question. “Are we heading toward Annarion’s previous home?”

  “The forest here is modeled on the lands that surrounded his home. I’m not entirely certain what we’ll find. But before you continue to ask questions, let me remind you that Annarion is one of Calarnenne’s brothers. It’s not impossible that we’ll find Nightshade instead.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “No?”

  “I’m almost positive Nightshade is at the center of his castle.”

  “You’re certain that this isn’t it?”

  Kaylin hesitated. “No. Not certain.”

  * * *

  The forest continued, but Teela slowed as they at last approached what looked—at a distance—to be an ancient, gigantic tree. The Barrani Hawk nodded once.

  “This is it?”

  “This is the family home as it existed in Annarion’s time.”

  “And not as it exists now.”

  Teela shook her head. She held out a staying hand, which meant she intended to take the lead and she wanted some distance to assess the danger. On the street, Kaylin would have obeyed the gesture instantly. This wasn’t the street. It was a Tower, a building made by godlike beings who didn’t really understand merely mortal architecture or the concept of fixed shapes. Her arms were glowing; she had a familiar on her shoulders who had a much better understanding of ancient, impossible buildings than any of the larger people around him—even if his communication skills were lacking. She was not going to be a liability, here.

  When Teela approached the tree, Kaylin joined her. Dark, perfect brows rose; Kaylin jabbed a finger in the direction of the small dragon. He bit it.

  “Point taken.”

  “You heard her. You can let go of my finger now.”

  He did. He unfolded and sat on her shoulder, looking curious but not especially alert. Kaylin approached the bark of what looked like tree. It wasn’t. It wasn’t stone, either. She couldn’t immediately place the material beneath the palm of her hand; it felt as smooth as sword blade, but with a little more give.

  “I don’t suppose this came with a door ward?”

  “No,” Teela said softly. “It is like—and unlike—the Hallionne. Or it was. I assume that this building is at least externally a representation of home, to Annarion. Before you ask, Annarion was chosen as one of the twelve, just as I was. He was not eldest; he was expendable. Home does not have the same meaning for the Barrani that it does for you.”

  “I had no home for years, Teela.”

  Teela snorted. “You try to make small homes wherever you go. Small, mortal homes. We don’t. We’ve learned, through bitter experience, not to trust the concept.”

  “But...does that mean you never wanted it?”

  “What? A home?”

  “In the mortal sense.” She considered this carefully and added, “Or at least in my sense.”

  “We live. We breathe. We congregate. Of course we want it. But we are not strong enough to build it and believe in it.”

  Kaylin was almost shocked; she turned to meet Teela’s gaze, but Teela was looking up at the heights of the structure.

  “Your jaw is hanging open.”

  “Doesn’t matter. Here, no insects will fly into my mouth. I’m just—I’m surprised that you used the word strong that way.”

  “Hope and belief are risks,” Teela replied. “And in the end, the Barrani are strong enough to live without them. Mortals have an adage: there’s strength in numbers. And for mortals, there is almost no strength without those numbers. They band together in their odd, tribal clusters because it’s their best chance of survival.

  “The Barrani are not mortals. We can accrue enough power that we do not rely on numbers for safety. Numbers, among my people, are often the opposite. Only when we faced Dragons or ancestors did we feel numbers were necessary. We go this way,” she added. “If there’s any accuracy at all in the depiction of this home.”

  * * *

  “If Annarion was expendable,” Kaylin asked, “why does he care about home and what happened to it?”

  “Some of us were willing sacrifices. Some were not. We were young, Kaylin. We were young, and we weren’t raised the way mortals often are. The risk was acceptable if it accrued both personal power and prestige to the line.”

  “But you didn’t—”

  “If my father had not killed my mother, I wouldn’t have cared about his choice on my behalf. I would have been disappointed. Possibly hurt—I was young, as I said. I would not have spent centuries planning his death. What he wanted from me was both power and prestige; it is what most of the Barrani want from their children. And had I not lived with my mother, I might not have cared at all. I was from an ancient lineage. My father was a Lord of the High Court. He was respected, admired—and feared. The safety of his children was all but guaranteed; no one would have dared to mark any of his children—or the children of his cousins—the way Nightshade marked you.

  “But I spent much of my early life with my mother. The West March was considered rustic—a High Halls word for weak or ineffective. What she wanted for me was not what my father wanted. Did the power that became hers through marriage appeal to her? Yes. It would have appealed to anyone with any sense. Power is safety, of a kind. But it is not particularly warm; it is not particularly giving—giving and yielding are too much the same, among my father’s kin.

  “After I returned from the green, I was under a cloud of suspicion. No, not a cloud—a full-on storm. But among my kin, anyone with power is. I was considered a power simply because I had survived; I was considered a danger for the same reason. I used it, of course.” Teela shrugged, that restless “I’ve been talking about serious things for too long” shrug, and came to a stop.

  “Here.”

  * * *

  Here was, to Kaylin’s eyes, the same as any other spot on the bark of what looked like a tree. “Annarion,” Teela said quietly, as if she were speaking to the surface of the tree she faced. But when the tree failed to respond, she continued. “He was, in your parlance, very straight-laced. He believed in the base nobility of our people. He was a warrior’s son; he was not, however, a boy who believed that expressions of power were necessary to be a power. And, sadly, he all but worshipped one of his older brothers.”

  “Nightshade?”

  Teela nodded.

  “But...why?”

  And chuckled. “Calarnenne is not what he once was. Although we live forever—absent the usual, violent death that awaits many of our kind—we are not static; we seem so to you because our changes do not occur at the speed of yours. I did not revere Calarnenne; if I had not been chosen, I would have held Annarion in wary contempt; my father did.”

  “What was Nightshade like?”

  “When Annarion is less angry, you will have to ask him. Nightshade was, for a Barrani, more openly curious and far less cautious than is our wont when we are anything but children.” She reached out to touch the tree; her hand had about as much effect as Kaylin’s.

  “Is he in there?”

  Teela shook her head. “I don’t know where he is. I can’t see what he sees—and yes, kitling, I’ve been trying. Mandoran knows. I think everyone but me does. But they can’t explain it to me, eithe
r.” She hesitated and then added, “I think he is inside. I’m just not sure that we can safely or sanely be where he is now.”

  “It’s a moot point,” Kaylin replied, as she lifted both hands and ran them up and down the trunk of the nontree—or at least as far as she could reach in any direction. “If we can’t get in, our survival on the inside’s irrelevant.”

  “You’re going to be disappointed, then,” Severn told them both.

  “No, only Kaylin,” Teela replied. “I’m not bored, at the moment.”

  The side of the tree collapsed before she’d finished speaking. The tree itself didn’t seem to notice the large, gaping hole that formed on its side.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  As doors went, it was about as welcome as the ruins of a collapsed hovel. “Please tell me this is not what his home looked like when he actually lived in it.”

  Teela shook her head, although she didn’t look as surprised as Kaylin felt. “It didn’t. It may, for all I know, look like that now. I’d guess—and you know I hate guessing—that this is how Annarion feels about his home as it exists in the present time; I’m certain it doesn’t look like this in the real world.”

  “Can we get a bit of light?”

  “I have no idea what Lord Sanabalis thinks he’s doing,” Teela replied, lifting a hand.

  “Pardon?”

  “He’s teaching you rudimentary magic and you can’t create a simple light?”

  “I lit a candle,” Kaylin replied, trying—and failing—not to sound defensive. Her arms, which were still glowing faintly, began to itch. Teela was using the branch of magic with which Kaylin—or at least Kaylin’s skin—was most familiar.

  “A candle, in my opinion, is about as difficult. If he was going to torture you with the lessons you resent so much, he could have started with something that would actually be useful in investigative work.”

  “No argument, there.”

  Light grew in the palm of Teela’s hand. “A word, however, to the wise.” She frowned at her audience, and then turned to Severn. “The use of magic in buildings of dubious structural integrity and even more dubious intent isn’t always safe.”

  “You couldn’t have said that before you used magic?”

  “I could have. I can see in the dark,” she added. “You can stub your toes and curse like a Leontine, which might be just as unwelcome. Six of one, half dozen of another.”

  There were days when Kaylin vastly preferred that Teela speak in High Barrani; it didn’t have as many useful—or mocking—phrases. But Teela was right: she couldn’t see in the dark. Neither could Severn. He’d fallen silent as Teela chose to enter the forbidding, gaping hole, Kaylin almost glued to her heels. Teela kept the radius of light small; it was steadier than a torch or a candle, but its glow didn’t fade the way natural light did; it simply ended.

  If the outside of the tree felt like warm glass to the touch, the inside didn’t; it was all building, and at that, building that Kaylin wouldn’t have entered without rope, and possibly scaffolding. The floors were wood, but the planking seemed so worn she could practically see the basement beneath it. “Do we have to go down?” she asked.

  “I hope not,” Teela replied. “Understand that I was not in any way a frequent visitor. I traveled here a handful of times in the company of my father; we were treated like honored guests. No,” she added, frowning as she held up the light, “we were treated like dangerous enemies meeting under a flag of brief truce. Any happy memories I have of those visits are overlapped with Annarion. His father was cut from the same cloth as mine.”

  “Did he meet the same end?”

  A black brow rose. “You are becoming more perceptive.”

  “It’s not perception, Teela. He was a Barrani Lord.”

  “A Barrani High Lord, yes. Calarnenne was not happy when he learned of Annarion’s fate. He did not, I believe, bear the same resentment toward his father as I bore mine, but he was bitterly angry when all possibility of search—and possible rescue—was denied him.”

  “Is that why he’s outcaste?”

  “Not directly, no. I believe it played a part in the decision.”

  “Did he kill his father?”

  “Ask him. I am certain he would tell you if you but asked.”

  “I’m not.”

  “I am willing to bet,” Teela told her. “And I think we are meant to take those stairs. They go up,” she added.

  “I’m not sure up is any safer than down at this point.” In Kaylin’s opinion, they were probably the same damned thing.

  “If you wanted safety, you should have stayed in the Palace. What were they arguing about anyway?”

  “The definition of surveillance.”

  “Ah.”

  * * *

  Stairs were a normal feature of most of the buildings Kaylin had lived in or visited. Even the Palace had them. But the Barrani Hallionne hadn’t; they’d been single story dwellings inside. The Warden’s home had had stairs, but the Warden’s home wasn’t sentient. Kaylin let Teela test the stairs because Teela carried the only source of light in what was a dilapidated hall. Its interior dimensions didn’t match its exterior—which Kaylin could still see if she turned to look back. This was more of a comfort than it should have been.

  “Can you hear him?” Teela asked, her hand on a tarnished rail which was missing parts.

  “Annarion?”

  The Barrani Hawk nodded.

  Kaylin shook her head.

  Squawk.

  “Well, I can’t. Sorry.”

  “Can Nightshade?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Ask.”

  Nightshade was amused. Kaylin, less so. Tell An’Teela that I hear what she hears. If she asks you how, tell her that I am still Lord of this Castle. I cannot believe that my brother took such a careless risk, he added. It took Kaylin a moment to understand what risk Nightshade referred to. He meant the giving of the name, of course.

  You aren’t surprised that Teela did?

  Less so. She is not young, Kaylin, and she has never been at home among our kind. Her mother was weak and dangerously sentimental; in the end, it cost her her life.

  There was a pause into which Kaylin shoved anger.

  She serves the Emperor. Were she a lesser power, that choice would have destroyed her; it has not. It has not destroyed any of the Barrani Hawks who choose to do likewise, and that is significant; they do not have the power An’Teela has. She watches them all, although they have not explicitly sworn oaths to her. Just as, he added, she watches you. No, I am not surprised at her choice. I expected better from my brother.

  Kaylin was an only child; her experience with siblings—or the expectations and effects they could have on each other—came largely through office gossip and complaint. People very seldom said warm, wonderful things about their siblings. Then again, they seldom said warm, wonderful things when they were annoyed.

  He probably expected better from you, as well.

  Nightshade didn’t answer. Teela, however, swore.

  “Nightshade can hear what you hear,” Kaylin told her. She glanced at Severn, who shook his head. “Neither Severn nor I can.”

  If you chose to do so, Kaylin, you might hear what I hear.

  The thought hadn’t occurred to her.

  No. It seldom does. You do not understand how to view people solely for the advantages they might bring you. Not even Annarion would be so squeamish; he is perfectly willing to see what any of the twelve see as it suits him.

  They can shut each other out at need.

  Can they?

  She glanced at Teela. Well, Teela can. The rest of them aren’t my problem.

  Not yet.

  Can you tell us if the ancestors are still sleeping?

/>   Nightshade fell silent. After a long pause, he said, No.

  No they aren’t, or no you can’t tell us?

  The latter. It clearly didn’t amuse him. It didn’t amuse Kaylin, either.

  Is that because Annarion is interfering with your control of the Castle?

  That, Nightshade replied, is the optimistic interpretation.

  * * *

  “Can’t you just tell him to stop speaking to the Castle?” Kaylin asked, as she hurried up the stairs, stepping exactly where Teela had stepped. The stairs didn’t creak ominously beneath her feet. The floor didn’t teeter. It still looked like it would collapse at any second.

  “I’ve tried.”

  “And he said no?”

  Teela’s brows rose. “He’s Annarion, not Terrano. He agreed.”

  Kaylin glanced pointedly at the stairs beneath their feet. “Let me guess. He doesn’t understand what you mean by speak.”

  “The Castle doesn’t understand what I mean, no.”

  Kaylin stopped walking. “If the Castle doesn’t understand, how is finding him going to be helpful?”

  Teela shrugged. “For you?”

  “For anyone.”

  “I’ll worry less.”

  “Bet?”

  Teela snorted as she reached a landing and flat floors. Like the stairs, this floor seemed to be composed of wood; unlike the stairs, the wood looked relatively new. Or at least in good repair. There were walls to either side; the walls looked less finished than the floor. The usual adornments in halls of this size failed to materialize: there were no paintings, no tapestries, no mirrors. Kaylin frowned.

  “Remember what I said about your face getting stuck that way.”

  “I remember Tain said it wouldn’t look any worse, if that helps.”

  “I suppose he had a point. Why are you frowning?”

  “The walls are made of wood.”

  Teela nodded. “And?”

  “It’s rough, or seems rough from here.” Kaylin hesitated again. “It looks like the inside of a cheap coffin.”

  “What on earth makes you choose that particular metaphor?”