"Gently, gently," said Torisen, moving the point aside. "If you ruin this coat, Burr will never forgive either of us."
"M-my lord! I beg your pardon. It's this damned storm." She started as hail struck a nearby shuttered window like a volley of flung stones. "I come from one of your border keeps. When the wind blows across the Barrier like this up there . . . well, there's no telling what might come with it."
"You don't have to tell me," said Torisen wryly. "I grew up near the Barrier myself, which is a great cure for skepticism. A pity Lord Caineron can't say the same. Is Commandant Harn in his quarters?"
"Yes, Highlord. Shall I announce you?"
"No. Let's not frighten the poor man more than necessary."
He entered and climbed the spiral stair to the first of two levels. This had originally been a watchtower, but Harn had commandeered it, apparently in another effort to separate himself from his garrison, as if prolonged contact with him might contaminate it. The furnishings were as sparse as those in Torisen's own apartments at Gothregor, but he could never have lived in such a muddle of weapons, discarded clothes, and scattered papers. There was, at least, a roaring fire and, on a table near it, an untouched meal. Torisen sat down, suddenly very hungry. He had barely eaten a mouthful in the hall below and had drunk more than he cared to on an empty stomach. He picked up a bustard wing and began to gnaw on it.
"That's my supper," growled a voice behind him.
"If you mean to eat all this," said Torisen, taking another bite, "you've got too large an appetite anyway."
"Blackie!" Harn sat down abruptly opposite him, a huge, shaggy Kendar in his late sixties, untidily dressed. "I thought you were that scamp of a guard, sneaking in again for a bite. Border brats are all alike: too independent by half."
"So you always told me. I'm glad to hear that someone can still approach you, even if you habitually bite her. Why didn't you eat with the rest of us?"
"With Caineron there? Besides," he said, looking away, "I thought you might prefer not to see me."
"What, not even to compliment you on this year's randons? Even Caineron says that they're good."
"Oh aye, they're all fine youngsters. I should be glad to have accomplished something, I suppose, and it is worthwhile work, but sometimes I can't seem to breathe here. Tentir is a world in itself . . . a small world. I feel . . . caged."
And indeed he looked it in this cluttered room, sitting hunched in his chair like something wild confined in too small a lair. Torisen regarded him with concern.
"I said I would take responsibility for what happened, and I have. The price is paid, Harn. You're free."
The Kendar shook his head like a baited bear. "Not from myself."
"Harn, it's not all that rare a problem. One out of every few hundred Kendar must have a touch of the berserker."
"They aren't high-ranking randon; and with me, it's more than a touch. You weren't there when I killed that boy. I don't even remember it myself; only with him on one side of the room and me on the other, still holding his arm. Caineron's cousin . . ."
"About seven times removed. Just be glad it wasn't that idiot son of his or we really would have been done for."
"The blood price must still have been ruinous."
"Oh, it would have been if I had paid in gold—" Torisen stopped short, silently cursing himself.
Harn looked up sharply. "In what, then?"
"Have a wing," said the Highborn, taking another one himself. "Do you realize that this bird has three?"
"In what, my lord?"
"I gave my word that the next time the Host gathered, the entire High Council would have to consent before it could march out of the Riverland."
"You what?" Harn's chair crashed over as he surged to his feet. "You young idiot!" he roared, looming ominously over Torisen.
"It was either that or order you to use the White Knife instead of forbidding it."
"By God, you should have let me kill myself! Now look at the mess we're in. You think Caineron is tamely going to let you lead out the Host?" Harn bellowed down at him. "Once you've assumed that much real power, he might as well dig a hole for his ambitions and bury them before they begin to stink! And now with the Horde on its way . . . sweet Trinity, this could be the end of us all!"
"I made my choice, and I stand by it," said Torisen quietly, looking up at him. "The Host will march, one way or another. When it does, will you come with me, as my second-in-command?"
Harn stared at him. Just then, the wind worked loose a shutter behind him. He turned mechanically and reached out for it, but then, instead of closing it, stood there blindly staring out into the storm as rain began to darken his broad shoulders.
* * *
CALDANE, LORD CAINERON, returned to his guest quarters after dinner to find Nusair there before him, drinking again. He ignored the young man as servants carefully stripped off his scarlet coat and brought him a white satin dressing gown with jeweled studs. Three full-length mirrors gave back his reflection. He regarded it with less approbation than usual, noting the thinning hair and thickset figure, which no amount of sartorial splendor could entirely disguise. It was exasperating that Torisen with his slim, unconscious elegance should look so thoroughly like one of the Highborn on an ancient death banner, especially when Caineron was trying to start a rumor that the Highlord was actually the result of some long-forgotten indiscretion between Lord Ardeth and one of his Kendar.
His eyes met Nusair's in the mirror.
"That was actually quite an acceptable meal, considering its source," he said, waving the servants out of the room. "However, it amazes me that anyone could swallow so large an insult without choking on it."
Nusair flushed. "What choice did I have? You won't sanction a duel—"
"And you, apparently, can't rid yourself of an enemy in any less public way."
"I'm not the only one," said Nusair sullenly, refilling his cup. "You haven't done so well yourself."
"My dear boy, when I eliminate a rival, I hardly need do it by dropping a building on him. Ah, what have we here?"
Small, bright eyes peered at him around the corner of the mantelpiece. He picked a crumb, which his servants had overlooked, from the sleeve of his scarlet coat and held it out on his palm.
"So far, I've merely played with this little upstart lord—and he is an upstart, you know, even if he really is a Knorth: the strength of that line was broken forever when we exiled Ganth."
The mouse timidly emerged, nose twitching. Half-tamed by some cadet, hunger made it even less cautious. It inched into Caineron's hand.
"My father was his father's dupe and paid for it with his life in the White Hills. For that, I destroyed Ganth Gray Lord. My son, my Genjar, died after Urakarn, his name fouled by Knorth lies. For that, I will destroy Ganth's son."
His fist closed. There was a shrill squeak and the muffled crunch of small bones breaking.
". . . but in my own time, dear boy, and, preferably, in a way so subtle that he won't know he's dead until decomposition begins. To break him over the Council vote is almost too easy, too . . . crude. I would prefer a more lingering end, but fate may have taken that choice out of my hands."
"Just so you get him," said Nusair vehemently.
Caineron tossed what was left of the mouse into the fireplace and turned back to his son with a bland smile.
"And you think that that will increase your worth? Dear boy, what use have you ever been to me? You haven't the courage to fight or the intelligence to intrigue. Since Donkerri's mother died bearing him, to both his discredit and yours, you can't even add to my stock of grandchildren. On the whole, the most constructive thing you could do, short of killing Torisen, would be to let him kill you. Ah, now that would be really useful."
Nusair slammed down his cup, white-faced. "A choice, is it, father? Well, then, I'd better go shove that damn coin down his throat, hadn't I?" He seized a torch and left the room, slamming the door behind him.
Caldane pick
ed up the cup and raised it in a mocking salute. "My blessings, dear boy. Either way."
* * *
THE CAINERON QUARTERS were on the third level of the old keep's south side. Nusair expected to reach Knorth's rooms within minutes. Instead, he got lost. Two-thirds drunk as he was, it took him awhile to realize this. Half the time, he scarcely seemed to be in Tentir at all. At first, he put this down to the wine, but as his anger cooled and his senses cleared to some extent, he grew uneasy.
Then the footsteps began behind him. Nusair nearly turned back in hopes of finding a guide, but the scuffling, scraping quality of the sound made him hesitate. It was as if he was being followed by someone who couldn't walk properly. He went on, more and more quickly. The footsteps followed. It seemed to his befuddled senses that sometimes they came from behind, sometimes from a hallway he had just meant to turn down, sometimes from all directions at once, but always they came closer. They were herding him, he thought, beginning to panic. He tried to think where he was, which hall would take him back to the hated but safe presence of his father. His mind wouldn't work. Here was a short corridor and, at its end, a single door. The shuffling sound filled all the empty space behind him, seemed to push him down the hall to the door. He opened it and slipped inside, closing it quietly behind him. It had no lock. Outside, the footsteps were coming closer, closer. He backed away from the door, bumping into dusty furniture, until his foot unexpectedly came down on something soft.
It moved.
Nusair went over backward with a yelp. The torch, flying out of his hand, landed still alight in the far corner. He tried to get up, but couldn't. Something gray and slimy was wrapped around his leg. Even as he started to gag, it bit him, and the world seemed to crumble. He couldn't remember where he was or why he was on the floor. The room swung dizzily around him, filled with leaping shadows.
The door slowly opened. Something white crouched on the threshold. Nusair cast wildly about for a way to make sense of this apparition and could only remember Caineron's satin dressing gown.
"Father?"
The figure shuffled forward, seeming to grow. Nusair could almost make out the rippling cloth and the familiar bland smile.
"Dear boy," it said, so nearly in Caineron's voice. "I had to follow you. I have suddenly realized how badly I have undervalued you all these years. Of all my sons, only you are fit to be my heir. I will announce it when we reach Gothregor and bind myself to it here in private, by blood rite. Dear boy, give me your knife."
It was all wrong. Nusair understood that at some deep, instinctive level, no matter what his poisoned senses told him, but he wanted desperately to believe. After a lifetime of rejection and revilement, to hear this, the ultimate acceptance . . .
"Yes," he said, breathlessly, drawing his knife and holding it out hilt first. "Oh, yes."
It was taken from his grasp and his hand gripped. He braced himself for pain, but it came like a coldness against the skin—too high. Looking down, he saw not the usual palm cut but spurting blood.
"M-my wrist!" he stammered. "You've cut my wrist!"
"It doesn't hurt." The pale eyes held his own brown ones, taking away the pain. "Do you still want this honor?"
"Y-yes . . ."
The changer bent and drank greedily. Nusair felt life flowing out of his veins. It was wrong, all wrong . . .
"No!" he gasped, trying weakly to draw his hand out of the iron grip.
The changer shuddered. The very bones of his bowed shoulders shifted, and muscles crawled under the skin now glistening with sweat. Then he gave a long sigh and raised his head. Nusair found himself looking into his own face, crowned by wild, white hair, framing pale, triumphant eyes.
"Too late, fool. You have given freely, and I have taken what I need. Now I will give you what you want most: a chance to be really useful."
He shoved Nusair back on the floor and opened the young man's coat. Ignoring the feeble attempts to push him away, he carefully positioned the knife and drove it up under Nusair's ribs. When the body had stopped twitching, he stripped it and put on its clothes. In one pocket he found Torisen's coin. The changer put it in Nusair's mouth against the teeth so that its golden glint showed between the bloodless lips.
"There, little Highlord," he said with satisfaction. "Explain that. Now go down to the fire-timber hall, Beauty, and wait until I bring our real quarry to you."
He left the room with a light stride, rejoicing in the strength and suppleness of his stolen form. Behind him, firelight set shadows leaping in a mockery of life around the still, white body on the floor.
* * *
THE STORM RAGED ON. Blasts of wind and rain buffeted Tentir, shaking the windows, making fires dance and smoke in their grates. The cadets tried to sleep. Caineron paced his quarters, composing a speech for the High Council designed (oh, so gracefully) to flay the Highlord alive. Meanwhile, Torisen sat by the fire in the northeast tower, patiently waiting for Harn's answer.
Someone hammered on the door below. Harn swung away from the window, rain dripping unnoticed off the crags of his face. Hasty footsteps sounded on the stair and the guard burst into the room.
"Sir! One of the guard cadets from the main hall wants to see you."
"At this hour? Why?"
"I-I can't make that out, sir. He's nearly in shock. Please, sir . . ."
Harn brushed past her and ran down the steps with the guard and Torisen on his heels. The cadet huddled under the torch. As the commandant appeared, he raised a stricken face and held out his hands. They were covered with blood.
"D-dead," he stammered. "Dead, dead, dead . . ."
Harn shook him. The cadet stopped with a hiccup and began to cry, clinging to the big randon's arm. Harn held him for a moment, then gently pried loose his hands.
"Stay with him," he said tersely to his own guard, and set off at a run down the hall. For so large a man, he moved very quickly. Torisen barely kept up. Then they were on the stair leading down to the main hall with a clear view across it.
The other two cadet guards lay on the flagstones before the meager fire. At first glance, they seemed impossibly close to each other, as if caught in some guilty embrace that had gone much, much too far. Then Torisen saw that they had in fact been smashed together face to face so violently that their very bones interlocked. Blood formed a widening black pool on the floor. Harn knelt in it, trying to disentangle the bodies without causing more damage. He must have realized that it would do no good, but he didn't seem able to stop himself.
Torisen sensed someone behind him. He turned and found Nusair watching him from the shadows.
"We have unfinished business, Highlord."
Torisen heard voices. No alarm had yet been given, but other cadets were coming, drawn perhaps by that special sense that so often alerted them to danger. He also noted that Nusair was wearing one of the dead boy's caps pulled down over his hair. A thrill of warning went through him.
"We can't settle anything here," he said.
The other chuckled. "Now, is that discretion or fear? Follow, and prove which."
The stair leading down to the subterranean levels was behind him. He turned and descended without looking back. Torisen saw that the back of the dead cadet's cap glistened as the pavement had around the two broken bodies. He followed.
Donkerri saw them go through a thinning haze of blood-blindness. Had his father actually worked up the courage to challenge the Highlord? Sick as he still felt after his glimpse of what lay on the flagstones, he must not lose Torisen now or Grandfather would make him feel infinitely worse later. Swallowing his nausea, he rose and again followed.
* * *
MEANWHILE, Caineron had finished polishing his speech and was ready to retire when he suddenly realized that Nusair had not yet returned. How like the wretched boy to get lost and require a search party. It would serve him right to be left wandering until dawn, thought Caineron, getting into bed—but what if he had simply fallen down drunk in some corner? A fine sight t
hat would be to greet the morning's first passerby, and what great credit it would reflect on the family. No, damnit, the imbecile would have to be found. He shouted for Kindrie.
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