A Tapestry of Lions

by Jennifer Roberson

  Brennan’s face grayed. “Such a simple plan, and certain to work. I was a fool. Lochiel has ways of suborning even those I most value.”

  “Not money,” Kellin said. “So he could have his wife back. Only—” He checked himself, recalling all too clearly the tiny dancing woman and Rogan’s horrible ending. “Corwyth killed him first. With sorcery. And then Urchin.” Pain formed a knot in chest and throat. “Urchin’s dead, too.”

  After a moment the Mujhar touched Kellin’s head briefly. Gently, he said, “You must tell me everything you remember about how this was done, and the Ihlini himself. Everything, Kellin, so we may prepare for another attack.”

  “Another—?” Kellin stared hard at the Mujhar, turning over the words. Realization made him breathless. “They want to catch me. Corwyth said so. He said he was taking me to Lochiel, in Valgaard.”

  Brennan’s expression was grim, but he did not avoid candor. “You are important to the Ihlini, Kellin, because of who you are, and the blood in your veins. You know about that.”

  He did. Very well. Too well; it was all anyone spoke of. “They won’t stop, then.” It seemed obvious.

  “No.”

  Kellin nodded, understanding more with each moment. “That’s why you set the dogs to guarding me.”

  “Dogs? Ah.” Brennan smiled faintly. “We dared not allow you to go anywhere alone. Not in Mujhara, not even to Clankeep.” His jaw tightened. “Do you recall how you sickened after your Naming Day feast?”

  Kellin nodded, recalling with vivid clarity how ill he had been after eating his meal. He had not wanted fish for a sixth-month, after.

  “Lochiel had no recourse to sorcery in order to harm you, not so long as you remained in Homana-Mujhar, or at Clankeep, but coin buys people. He bribed a cook to poison the meal. We were forced to take serious steps to safeguard Homana’s prince, and his freedom suffered for it.” Brennan’s words were stated with careful precision. “Rogan understood. Rogan knew why. He comprehended fully how you were to be protected.”

  That is why they were all so upset when I ran away from the fortune-teller. Guilt flickered. “It was after I heard you speaking with granddame. About how my jehan would not have me see him.” Kellin swallowed heavily. “Rogan came and said he would take me to my jehan.”

  Brennan’s expression was bleak as he exchanged a glance with Blais. “I have learned from this, too, though I believed myself wise in such matters.” He sighed heavily. “Nearly every man has his price. Most will deny it, claiming themselves incorruptible, but there is always something that will lure them into betrayal. If they disbelieve it, it is because they have not been offered that which they most desire.”

  Rogan was offered his wife. Kellin wanted to protest it. It hurt him deeply that Rogan had betrayed him, but he understood his grandfather’s words. Hadn’t he been bought by the promise of his father?

  “I would never submit to an Ihlini,” he muttered. “Never.”

  “And that is why you are here.” Brennan smiled faintly, tension easing from his features. “Tell us everything.”

  Kellin did. By the time he was done he felt tears in his eyes, and hated himself for them.

  Blais shook his head. “There is no shame in honest grief.”

  Brennan’s tone was gentle. “Rogan was everything to you for two years, and Urchin was your best friend. We think no less of you because you loved them.”

  Kellin let that go, thinking now of something else. “You said something about me. To Blais, earlier. That I offer the greatest threat to the Ihlini.” He looked first at Blais, then at the Mujhar. “What harm can I do them?”

  “You can bring down their House,” Brennan said quietly, “merely by siring a son.”

  It was incomprehensible. “Me?”

  The Mujhar laughed. “You are young yet to think of such things as sons, Kellin, but the day will come when you are a man. Lochiel knows this. With each passing year you become more dangerous.”

  “Because of my blood.” Kellin looked at the scar ringing his ankle, recalling the warm wetness running down between his toes. “That blood.”

  Brennan took Kellin’s wrist into his hand and raised it, spreading the fingers with the pressure of his thumb. “All the blood in here,” he said. “In this hand, in this arm, in this body. And the seed in your loins, provided it quickens within the body of a particular woman. Lochiel cannot risk allowing you to sire that son.”

  “The prophecy,” Kellin murmured, staring at his hand. He tried to look beneath the flesh to bone and muscle, and the blood that was so special.

  “The Firstborn reborn,” Blais said. “The bane of the Ihlini. The end of Asar-Suti.”

  Kellin looked at his grandfather. “They died because of me. Rogan. Urchin. The fortune-teller. Didn’t they?”

  Brennan closed the small hand inside his own adult one. “It is the heaviest burden a man can know. Men who are kings—and boys who are princes—carry more of them than most.”

  His chest was full of pain. “Will more die, grandsire? Just because of me?”

  Brennan did not lie. He did not look away. “Almost certainly.”

  Nine

  Kellin felt important and adult: Brennan had said he might have a small cup of honey brew, the powerful Cheysuli liquor. He knew it was his grandfather’s way of making him feel safe and loved after his encounter with tragedy, so he sipped slowly, savoring the liquor and the intent, not wanting the moment to end because he felt for the first time as if they believed him grown, or nearly so. Nearly was better than not; he grinned into the clay cup.

  The Mujhar was not present. When Brennan returned to the pavilion, he, Kellin, and Blais would depart for Homana-Mujhar, but for the moment Kellin was required to stay with his cousin. Brennan met with the clan-leader to discuss the kinds of things kings and clan-leaders discuss; Kellin had heard some of it before and found it tedious. He was much more interested in his kinsman, who was fascinating as a complex mixture of familiar and exotic.

  An Erinnish Cheysuli with Homanan in his blood, Blais did not look anything but Cheysuli, yet his accent and attitude were different. The latter was most striking to Kellin. Blais seemed less concerned with excessive personal dignity than with being content within his spirit; if that spirit were more buoyant than most, he gave it free rein regardless.

  At this moment Blais was working on a bow, replacing the worn leather handgrip with new. His head was bent over his work and a lock of thick black hair obscured part of his face. Lir-gold gleamed. Next to him sprawled sleeping Tanni, toes twitching in wolf dreams.

  “It could be you,” Kellin blurted. “Couldn’t it?”

  Blais did not look up from his handiwork. “What could, lad?”

  “You,” Kellin repeated. “The man in the prophecy. The man whose blood can do the things everyone wants it to do.”

  Now Blais raised his head. “My blood?”

  “Aye. You are Cheysuli, Erinnish, and Homanan. You are halfway there.”

  “Ah, but you are all the way there, my lad. I’ve no Solindish or Atvian blood bubbling in my veins.” Blais’ face creased in a smile. “You’ve no fear of me usurping your place.”

  “But you’re older. You are a warrior.” Kellin looked at Tanni. “You have a lir.”

  “And so will you, in but a handful of years.” Strong fingers moved skillfully as Blais rewrapped the leather.

  “But I heard you,” Kellin said quietly, grappling with new ideas. “You talked to grandsire about the a’saii.”

  The hands stilled abruptly. This time Blais’ gaze was sharp. “I said something of it, aye. You see, lad—I have more cause to concern myself with a’saii than any warrior alive.”

  “They were traitors,” Kellin declared. “Rogan told me—” He cut it off abruptly. “Grandsire said they wanted to overthrow the proper succession and replace it with another.”

  “So they did.” Blais’ tone was noncommittal. “They were Cheysuli who feared the completion of the prophecy
would end their way of life.”

  “Will it?”

  Blais shrugged. “Things will change, aye…but perhaps not so much as the a’saii fear.”

  “Do you?” Kellin needed to know. “Do you fear it, Blais?”

  An odd expression crossed Blais’ smooth, dark face. For only a moment, black brows pulled together. Then he smiled crookedly. “I fear losing what I have only just found,” he admitted evenly. “I was born here, Kellin. Keep-born, but reared in Erinn a very long way away. Customs are different in Erinn. I was a part of them, but also longed for others. My jehana taught me what she could of the language and customs of Cheysuli, but she was half Erinnish herself, and now wed to an Erinnishman. It was Keely who taught me more, who showed me what earth magic was, and what it could bring me.” His smile was warmly reminiscent. “She suggested I come here, to find out who I was.”

  Kellin was fascinated. “Did you?”

  “Oh, aye. Enough to know I belong here.” Blais grinned, caressing Tanni’s head. “I may not sound all Cheysuli, but in spirit I am.”

  “Why,” Kellin began, “do you have more cause to concern yourself with a’saii than any warrior alive?”

  Blais’ brows arched. “You’ve a good ear to recall that so perfectly.”

  Kellin shrugged, dismissing it. “The a’saii are disbanded. Grandsire said so.”

  “Formally, aye. But convictions are hard to kill. There are those who still keep themselves apart from other clans.”

  “But you stay here.”

  “Clankeep is my home. I serve the prophecy as much as any warrior. As much as you will, once you are grown.”

  Kellin nodded absently. “But why do you have cause?”

  Blais sighed, hands tightening on the bow. “Because it was my grandsire who began the a’saii, Kellin. Ceinn wanted to replace Niall’s son—your grandsire, Brennan—with his own son, Teirnan. There was justification, Ceinn claimed, because Teirnan was the son of the Mujhar’s sister.”

  “Isolde,” Kellin put in; he recalled the names from lessons.

  “Aye. Isolde. Niall’s rujholla.”

  “And Ian’s.”

  Blais grinned. “And Ian’s.”

  “But why you?”

  Blais’ grin faded. “Teirnan was my father. When I came here from Erinn, those who were a’saii thought I should be named Prince of Homana when your father renounced his title.”

  Kellin was astonished. “In my place?”

  Blais nodded.

  “In my place.” It was incomprehensible to Kellin, who could not imagine anyone else in his own place. He had been Prince of Homana all his life. “But—I was named.”

  “Aye. As the Mujhar desired.”

  Something occurred. “What about you?” Kellin asked. “Did you want the title?”

  Blais laughed aloud. “I was reared by a man who is the Lord of Erinn’s bastard brother. I spent many years at Kilore—I know enough of royalty and the responsibilities of rank to want no part of it.” He leaned forward slightly, placing the tip of his forefinger on Kellin’s brow. “You, my young lad, will be the one to hold the Lion.”

  “Oh, no,” Kellin blurted. “I have to kill it, first.”

  Blais stilled. “Kill it?”

  Kellin was matter-of-fact. “Before it kills all of us.”

  * * *

  When Kellin—with grandfather, cousin, and numerous liveried and armored guardsmen—entered the inner bailey of Homana-Mujhar, he discovered it clogged to bursting with strange horses and servants. Horse-boys ran this way and that, grasping at baggage-train horses even as they gathered in the mounts of dismounting riders; servants shouted at one another regarding the unloading; while the bailey garrison, clad in Mujharan scarlet, did its best to sort things out.

  The Mujhar himself, trapped in the center of the bailey as his horse restively rang shod hoofs off cobbles, finally ran out of patience. “By the blood of the Lion—” Brennan began, and then broke off abruptly as a tall man came out of the palace doorway to stand at the top of the steps.

  “Have I made a mess of all your Mujharish majesty?” the man called over the din. “Well, doubtless you are in dire need of humbling anyway.”

  “Hart!” Brennan cried. “By the gods—Hart!”

  Kellin watched in surprise as his grandsire hastily threw himself down from his mount and joined the throng, pushing through toward the steps. Brennan mounted them three at a time, then enfolded the other man in a huge, hard hug.

  “Su’fali,” Kellin murmured, then grinned at Blais. “Su’fali to both of us. Hart, come from Solinde!”

  “So I see.” Blais squinted over the crowd. “They are two blooms from the same bush.”

  “But Hart has blue eyes. And only one hand; an enemy had the other one cut off.” Kellin followed Brennan’s lead, climbing down with less skill than his longer-legged grandfather, and then he, too, was swallowed up by the crowd. Kellin could see nothing, neither grandfather, great-uncle, nor steps.

  He considered ducking under the bellies of all the horses, but reconsidered when he thought about the kicks he risked. Like Brennan before him, if with less success, Kellin shoved his way through the milling throng of baggage train and household attendants. Solindish, all of them; he recognized the accent.

  His path was more difficult, but at last Kellin reached the steps and climbed to the top. His grandsire and great-uncle had left off hugging, but the warm glints in their eyes—one pair blue, the other yellow—were identical.

  So is everything else, except for Hart’s missing hand. Kellin looked at the leather-cuffed stump, wondering what it was like to be restricted to a single hand. And Hart had lost more than a hand; the old Cheysuli custom of kin-wrecking still held. He was, because of his maiming, no longer considered in the clans to be a warrior despite his blood and his lir, the great hawk known as Rael.

  Kellin glanced up. Spiraling in a lazy circle over the palace rooftops was the massive raptor, black edging on each feather delineating wings against the blue of the sky. I may have a hawk when I am a warrior—

  “Kellin!” Brennan’s hand closed over a shoulder. “Kellin, here is your kinsman. You have never seen him, I know, but to know who Hart is a man need only look at me.”

  “But you are different,” Kellin said after a brief inspection. “You seem older, grandsire.”

  It brought a shout of delighted laughter from Hart, who struck his twin-born rujholli a sharp blow with his only hand. “There. You see? I have said it myself—”

  “Nonsense.” Brennan arched a single brow. “You surely count more gray in your hair than I.”

  “No,” Kellin said doubtfully, which moved Hart to laughter again.

  “Well, we are very like,” the Mujhar’s twin said. “If there are differences, it is because the Lion is a far more difficult taskmaster than my own Solinde.”

  “Has Solinde thrown you out?” Kellin asked. “Is that why you have come?”

  Hart grinned. “And lose the best lord she ever had? No, I am not banished, nor am I toppled as Bellam was toppled by Carillon. The Solindish love me, now—or, if not love, they tolerate me well enough.” He tapped the cuffed stump on top of Kellin’s head. “Erinnish eyes, Kellin. Where is the Cheysuli in you?”

  “You have Homanan eyes,” Kellin retorted. “And now your hair is gray; mine is all over black.”

  “Sharp eyes, and a sharper wit,” Brennan said dryly. “The Erinnish side, I think.”

  Hart nodded, smiling, as he assessed his young kinsman. “You are small for twelve, but your growth may come late. Corin’s did.”

  “I am ten,” Kellin corrected. “Tall enough for ten; grandsire says so.”

  “Ten.” Hart shot a glance at Brennan. “I miscounted, then.”

  “Aging, are you?” Brennan’s eyes were alight. “Forgetting things already?”

  Hart demurred at once. “I merely lost track, no more. But I did think him older.”

  “Does it matter?” Brennan asked, laugh
ing. “I am hardly infirm, rujho. The Lion will yet be mine a while. Kellin should be well-grown before he inherits.”

  “I was not thinking of thrones, rujho, but of weddings.”

  “Weddings! Kellin’s? By the gods, Hart—”

  “Wait you.” Hart put up his hand to silence his brother. “Before you begin shouting at me, as you have always done—” he grinned, eyes alight, “—it is for you to say, of course. And now that I see he is so young, perhaps it is too soon.”

  “Too soon for what?” Kellin asked. “A wedding? Whose? Mine?”

  Hart laughed. “So full of questions, harani.”

  “Mine?” Kellin repeated.

  Hart sighed, scratching idly at his beardless chin. “I have a daughter—”

  Brennan interrupted in mock asperity. “You have four of them. Which one do you mean?”

  Hart’s shrug was lopsided. “Dulcie is thirteen, which is closer to Kellin than the twins. And—” He shrugged again, letting go what he had begun. “There is reason for this, rujho…we will speak of it later.”

  “Too young,” Brennan said.

  Hart’s eyes were speculative. “Too young to marry, perhaps, but not for a betrothal.”

  “This can wait,” Brennan said. “Let us be rujholli again before we must be rulers.”

  Hart sighed heavily. “That may be difficult. I have all of them with me.”

  “Who?”

  “They wanted to come,” Hart continued. “All but Blythe. She carries her first child after all this time, so we thought it best she remain behind. It will be my first grandchild, after all.”

  Diverted, Brennan stared at him. “Is she wed? When? I thought Blythe intended never to marry.”

  “She did not, after Tevis—” Hart paused to correct himself, gritting the name through his teeth. “—after Lochiel.” He forced himself to relax, blue eyes bright in remembered anger. “But she met a Solindishman of respectable family with whom she fell in love after much too long alone; she is past thirty.” Hart grinned. “And she would be quite put out if she heard me say that. But she and her lordling married eight months ago, and now there will be a child.”